Interesting Ni comment.
LME nickel ended the day at $5.73/lb.
* Confusion in the press surrounds the deal announced 2 weeks ago about Norilsk Nickel's offer to purchase 20% of a South African gold field. At first, the Russian government had no comment about why they hadn't been asked to approve such a deal, now they are investigating it. Norilsk had announced that Citibank had loaned them $800 million dollars with no collateral required, and then Citibank advised they had taken a 50M/tonne nickel stockpile as collateral. This type of stockpile, unreported before now, is making nickel traders very wary about what the true level of nickel deficit is facing the world. It is believed Norilsk, usually very secretive about their nickel operation, originally denied the Citibank report, in an attempt to keep nickel prices up. As the world's largest producer, Norilsk has the most to loose by faltering nickel prices.
* Norilsk announced today it will not increase production of nickel this year. The statement is sketchy about surplus levels, which Norilsk has been known to keep, and therefore, it is unknown how this statement will affect LME prices. While most analysts still predict a production deficit in 2004, recent moves on China's part to slow their economy down has helped bring nickel pricing down from its earlier high's (although current prices are much higher than this time in 2003).
* LME nickel opened lower than its Friday close, selling at $5.85/lb.
