Uranium supply crunch will push prices up By Dave Hannon...

Uranium supply crunch will push prices up
By Dave Hannon
Purchasing
May 30, 2007





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The CEO of the world’s largest uranium mining company says buyers can expect a uranium supply crunch in the near-term due to a lack of investment in uranium mining.

The lack of supply will push uranium prices up in the short term, but long-term prices will come back down as more supply comes online.

"In the near term we've got a little bit of a supply crunch that's going on mostly because for two decades there was almost no investment being made in exploration," Jerry Grandey, CEO of Cameco told the Reuters Global Mining and Steel Summit. "In the long term there's no question that these high prices are going to stimulate more production and as soon as there's a little bit of excess in the marketplace then I think you'll begin to see prices relax."

Grandey said while spot uranium prices were rising dramatically, the long-term price for uranium was about $85/lb, and “there doesn't seem to be much upward pressure on the long-term price, at least in the last few months.”

Other market participants, such as Neal Froneman, CEO of Toronto-based SXR Uranium say uranium prices may more than double to $250/lb next year as demand for the nuclear fuel outpaces production.

The uranium supply crunch and price increase is also pushing mining firms such as Rio Tinto Group to expand its mining efforts. In a recent presentation reported by Bloomberg, Rio Tinto Energy Group CEO Preston Chiaro said, “There remains plenty of upside to uranium fuel prices” and that Rio will benefit from higher prices when the company's long-term legacy contracts, signed with customers at lower prices, begin to expire between now and 2012.