Have a great day
Indications
Nickel 3 month $7.613
Cash Last $7.552
Euro 1.16
Yen 1156.09
gold $4443.20
silver $65.78
Copper LME $6.504
Copper Comex $6.562
Cobalt $ 26.00-29.00
Zinc $ 1.805
Tin $ 24.58
Crude $ 93.00 up 2.61%
Dow Jones up .56%
FTSE 100 up .51%
Dax up .06%
Hang Seng down .39%
Nikkei down .17%
U.S. Dollar index 99.15
Quote of the Day
One man cannot hold another man down in the ditch without remaining down in the ditch with him.— Booker T. Washington
Word of the Day
Ceaseless: Unending, without pause
Trivia
What is the capital of Australia?
Answer: at bottom of page under good read.
News of Interest
Stocks staged a comeback yesterday as pressures eased from oil prices and bond yields (S&P 500 +0.5%, Dow +0.6%, Nasdaq +0.5%)
🚘 Uber to lay off 10% of staff to become “simpler and faster.” The job cuts will affect about 3,300 people, as the company looks to get rid of layers of management and put cash toward beating its robotaxi and delivery competitors. The company said it will reduce the number of two-person or smaller departments by half and slash the number of managers by 20%. CEO Dara Khosrowshahi said the changes would “generate savings that we intend to reinvest in growth, innovation, and the capabilities that will matter most over the coming years.” It’s also targeting WFH: Uber said only 1% of staff will be allowed to work remotely.
🛢️ Chevron to invest $7 billion to more than double its oil production in Venezuela. After the US government announced a major deal for Venezuelan oil, now it’s the private sector’s turn. Chevron, the only major US oil company that currently has a presence in Venezuela, plans to spend the money over the next five years through its joint partnerships to boost its crude production there. The investment is the first large commitment from an American oil company since the US arrested Venezuela’s then-President Nicolás Maduro in January and President Trump vowed to revive the country’s troubled oil industry.
Nickel & Related Metal News
El Niño May Force Major Drop in Indonesian Nickel ProductionIndonesia Morowali Industrial Park, the country's largest nickel complex, may have to cut output by 30% to 40% if new water sources are not found, with an El Niño driven drought curbing supply to its smelters, head of media relations Dedy Kurniawan said. The energy ministry is monitoring power supply to smelter areas, with director general of mineral and coal Tri Winarno noting that reduced rainfall lands hardest on facilities running off hydroelectric generation. In the Luwu region of South Sulawesi, a ferronickel plant has already cut load and placed about 570 workers on standby as river flows and hydropower output fell.
| OUR TAKEJakarta already cut the 2026 ore quota to 260 to 270 million tonnes from the 320 million produced last year, taking RKEF utilisation to 76% from 84%, and the INSG has the market at a 32,000 tonne deficit on that basis. A 30% to 40% cut at Morowali would sit on top of a tightening Jakarta designed, with the difference that this one cannot be dialled back by policy. SMM reports the IMIP water shortage is so far constraining carbon steel rather than the nickel lines, so the figure is a conditional worst case, and El Niño is forecast to peak this month. |
There's No Shortage of Copper, It's Just in the Wrong PlaceReuters senior metals columnist Andy Home told the Northern Miner podcast that the available copper is sitting in the wrong places, with China buying on the London Metal Exchange and drawing LME stocks down as a once-global market splits along regional lines. He raised the prospect of separate pricing dynamics across the LME, Shanghai Futures Exchange and Chicago Mercantile Exchange, describing a new age of arbitrage in which regional differences replace freely moving supply. On rebuilding Western capacity, Home said the supply chain was collectively outsourced and remains nowhere near independent of China, and that a new US smelter would draw as much power as a city the size of Boston.
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Good Read
Answer to today's trivia question: Camberra