you aim shareholders will love this!!

From www.miningnews.net

Zinc hit by Katrina



Thursday, September 01, 2005
UNCERTAINTY over the state of half of the LME's global zinc inventory in the wake of Hurricane Katrina has pushed the price of the metal to a five month high.

According to Reuters, some 248,825t of zinc is held in warehouses in New Orleans, out of total global LME zinc stocks of 561,950t,

"The LME has around 24 warehouses in the New Orleans area which may be affected, and as a result we are monitoring the situation closely. Due to the communications lines being down in the New Orleans area it is unlikely that we will be able to fully evaluate the impact on LME warehouses for several days," an LME spokesman said.

An executive of Metro International Trade Services, which manages the LME's largest warehouse in New Orleans, said he had been unable to contact his people at the warehouse.

"We had a few people who actually spent the hurricane period in our biggest warehouse, which happens to be the highest point in the city. It's on the Mississippi and that's the highest point. All of our records and the metal we feel is fine, particularly in our biggest warehouse," he said.

However, he added that there were some LME warehouses located closer to where the levee broke and details were currently sketchy on the fate of those warehouses.

The city's ports have also been shutdown in the wake of the hurricane making shipments of zinc impossible at this point. Barclay's said any disruption to shipments could "have a temporary impact on zinc prices and physical spot premiums".

The zinc settlement price closed at $US1360/t overnight, up from a close of $US1349.50/t on Tuesday. Three-months zinc closed $US1369/t up $US10. In the immediate aftermath of Katrina zinc reached a five month high on Tuesday of $US1387.5/t.