Trading day running commentary, page-1120

Anyone notice that in their recent divestment of the Goro nickel laterite operation in New Caledonia Vale have still locked up 1/3rd of the production of mhp from the plant in an off-take with the new owners which will be sent to the Sumitomo/Vale refinery in Japan for conversion to nickel sulphate for the ev industry.

So like CTM’s agreement with them it’s unclear on the surface as to how they will be able to achieve a worthwhile margin as they are standard ‘arms length contracts’...it’s feeling that they are locking in future supply at this point for deals down the track. I’d be surprised if they weren’t currently in supply negotiations with the heavy hitters of the industry which certainly would do no harm to the Jaguar project once announced.