 |
|
|
|
2019
10 January |
Capital structure myth debunked
A ‘tight capital structure’ may be a red flag
warning of danger rather than the frequently touted
investment attribute advertised as a reason to buy. |
| |
18 January |
Analysts too
conflicted to ask tough questions
I have a test for how
to judge a sell-side analyst but there is one problem. No one meets
the standard. |
| |
24 January |
Committee
misdirecting government efforts
The Australian government
has a blueprint for lifting the country’s mining output. It’s
simple. Just find more tier-one mining properties. |
| |
31 January |
MOD shareholders
given easy choice
More industry mergers would be evidence
of dimming memories fostering repetition of past errors. |
| |
7 February |
Another Black Eye
for Blackham
Blackham Resources directors should use a
1960s Johnny Cash song for guidance when revisiting their disclosure
practices. |
| |
14 February |
Miners get a
break
Australia’s just-completed banking royal commission
showed how deeply engrained cultural practices, accepted
unquestioningly, can produce perverse and unacceptable outcomes.
Some longer-term opportunities for mining industry investors may
result. |
| |
21 February |
Look at me,
please
Gulf Manganese, Kasbah Resources, Lake Resources
and Peninsula Energy caught my eye this month as they struggled with
one of the most intractable investor relations challenges to ever
confront the sector. |
| |
28 February |
US mulls
uranium limits
Peninsula Energy chief executive Wayne
Heili is touting “the expected positive outcomes” from a US
government review of uranium imports as “an imminent share price
re-rating event” for his company. |
| |
8 March |
Court quashes coal
corruption case
The New South Wales Supreme Court has
done Australia’s mining industry a big favour in re-defining
official corruption. |
| |
14 March |
Miners face unfair
scrutiny
Australian market regulators unfairly
discriminate against miners when it comes to policing disclosure
practices. |
| |
21 March |
Stagnation
threatens without China substitute
Mining stock returns
strongly resemble those in the 1990s but without the catalyst for
something better on the horizon. |
| |
28 March |
Zinc demand stalls
Infrequent but long-lasting structural shifts in the forces
driving metal markets are often ignored in favour of more convenient
narratives promoting speedier and less sustainable changes. |
| |
4 April |
Yield curve
impacts metal prices
On every occasion in the past 60
years, an inverted yield curve has accompanied a decline in metal
prices. |
| |
11 April |
Kalium Lakes makes
quick progress
The mining industry would be a pleasantly
different place for investors if ASX-listed Kalium Lakes was
typical. |
| |
18 April |
London investors
dictate strategy
Elementos executive director Chris Dunks
recently attributed an unresponsive share price to the company not
having been out and about marketing its prospects, not to the more
obviously serious causes of its valuation malaise. |
| |
25 April |
Long risk
lists stretch credibility
Searching a prospectus for a
considered appraisal of investment risks is rarely worth the effort
as the largest risk is usually ignored. |
| |
2 May |
Gold’s
Disappointing History
Gold has turned out to be the most
disappointing mainstream investment in the past 50 years as it
continues to underperform the targets of its promoters. |
|
9 May |
India's
golden future
Policy success in India offers the next
best hope for another sustained lift in gold prices. |
| |
16 May |
Exaggerated
gold demand claims
Behind an eye-catching headline
trumpeting 7% growth in gold demand over the past year is a
confusing statistical picture offering little guidance about market
conditions for the precious metal. |
| |
23 May |
Copper
exploration values uncertain
Xanadu Mines chief executive
Andrew Stewart describes a copper market peppered with unsustainable
imbalances and pricing incongruities as he grapples with ways to
extract value. |
| |
30 May |
Wanted: a new
gold funding model
ePower Metals – to be renamed Prime
Mining Corp – is ideally positioned to recast how gold miners
attract funding. |
| |
6 June |
How big
is gold demand?
I upset the World Gold Council (WGC)
recently when I accused it of exaggerating. The WGC said my analysis
contained numerous inaccuracies. What do you think? |
| |
13 June |
New
threat from mineral supply crisis
Increasingly
anticipated but unprecedented market imbalances raise the spectre of
more direct government interference in the mining industry. |
| |
20 June |
Where's
the value: focus or diversity?
‘Focus’ and
‘diversification’ are bandied around as descriptions of corporate
style so frequently they are largely bereft of any informational
value. |
| |
27 June |
Fed
threatens asset price crisis
Financial markets have
bullied the Federal Reserve into changing course, raising the
prospect of a future asset price collapse. |
| |
4 July |
Explorers face asset-price fallout
Fresh central
bank liquidity will benefit the leading miners but bleaker prospects
lie ahead for much of the sector. |
| |
11 July |
Let's
forget the gold standard
The gold standard downgrades the
importance of domestic economic outcomes, ignores distributional
equity and is about as practical as a plan to make Monday the third
day of the week. |
| |
18 July |
Markets will always outwit miners
Markets are smart,
possibly too smart for a mining community constantly driven by long
evident errors of judgement. |
| |
25 July |
Which
gold is best?
Perth Mint’s massive US$44 million, 1 tonne
gold coin perched on the forecourt of the New York Stock Exchange
(NYSE) graphically underscored how easily investors can access gold
exposure without going near a mining investment. |
| |
1 August |
Gold
miners need strategy revamp
Gold miners must cope with
the competitive threat posed by bullion investments by reinventing
how they engage with investors. |
| |
8 August |
BHP chief
told to resign
BHP group chief executive Andrew Mackenzie
should resign in shame, according to Australia’s most widely read
newspaper columnist. |
| |
15 August |
Trade dispute
may never end
The opposing positions taken on global
trade by the US and China might be a running sore for years and
possibly decades forcing corporate planners to adapt to
irreconcilable national differences. |
| |
22 August |
Miners'
luck beats analytical skill
The world’s leading miners
are backing different commodities in response to the impending
electric car revolution. Is at least one making a strategic error or
does the choice not matter? |
| |
30 August |
How likely is
$5,000 gold?
McEwen Mining chairman and prominent gold
price bull Rob McEwen has laid out five reasons why gold will hit
US$5,000 an ounce. When could it happen? |
| |
5 September |
Five reasons to back exploration stocks
The exploration
end of the mining industry is holding up better as an investment
than the leading miners amid building anxiety about the prospects
for global growth. |
| |
12 September |
China restructuring dictates iron ore outlook
A positive
outlook for iron ore prices depends on Chinese policymakers
jettisoning longer-term economic objectives in favour of shoring up
investment spend. |
| |
19 September |
Nickel
Mines gets lucky
Nickel Mines has had a double dose of
good luck as it pushes ambitiously to become the world’s largest
listed pure play nickel stock. |
| |
26 September |
Planning
for failure
Deliberate analysis, planning and focused
execution have had their day, according to the strategy think tank
within Boston Consulting Group (BCG). |
| |
3 October |
Uranium: so
bad, it's good
Aura Energy is one of the most undervalued
listed uranium mine developers amongst a bloodied but unbowed group.
|
| |
10 October |
White Rock
loses USP
White Rock Minerals is barely a shadow of what
was promised three years ago, as a unique selling proposition has
morphed into another symptom of industry malaise. |
| |
17 October |
Regulators block key project data
Vimy Resources and
Marenica Energy are examples of Australian mining juniors forced to
withhold project details because regulators believe investors are
not sufficiently intelligent to cope with the available information.
|
| |
24 October |
Feasibility study … who cares?
Feasibility studies are
not impacting the views of investors about the value of future
mining developments. |
| |
31 October |
Appealing
narratives raise investment risk
Catchy narratives,
having superseded return on capital as drivers of investment
decisions, raise the risk profile of investment markets. |
| |
7 November |
New rules
needed for project values
Cardinal Resources has provided
another glimpse into why market regulators should either ban use of
project values or force companies to follow some basic rules. |
| |
14 November |
Mining, feminism
and CSR
Anthropologist Dolly Kikon has provided an
illuminating insight into how the daily lives of people already
confronting complex political, social and economic transitions is
altered by their proximity to mining and oil and gas production. |
| |
21 November |
Zinc damp squib
persists
Superior Lake Resources director Grant Davey
showed how easily false narratives based on obsolete data can drive
investment views. |
| |
28 November |
TSX-ASX choice
becoming moot
Australia and Canada-listed miners are
searching for greener capital market pastures as disillusion about
their investment prospects grows and alternative destinations for
risk capital proliferate. |
| |
5 December |
Dual-listing gains hard to find
Dual ASX-TSX listings by
Australian miners are more likely to create two
liquidity-constrained trading pools than open new doors to capital.
|
| |
13 December |
Companies blinded
to DRC risks
What happens when some of the world’s best
geology is in one of the world’s most risky mining jurisdictions?
|
| |
19 December |
Miners need an ESG
alternative
ESG investing is a sham not because
environmental, social or governance behaviours are unimportant but
because it is a façade for yet another investment management
marketing fad. |
| |
|
|
| |
|
|