Diamonds & Specialty Minerals Summary for Dec. 3, 2014 2014-12-03 18:47 ET - Market Summary
by Will Purcell
Jamie Tuer's Hudson Resources Inc. (HUD), up one cent to 30 cents on 6,000 shares, is "undertaking a study to look at the economics" of producing alumina and related by-products at its White Mountain anorthosite project on the west coast of Greenland. Mr. Tuer says recent testing of its proposed method has been "very positive" and if successful, Hudson could produce a much more valuable product than mere smelter-grade alumina. (Yes, "very positive" and "successful" are two entirely different things on Howe Street.) Hudson already plans to produce feed for E-glass producers and coatings material for plastics and paints from its anorthosite. Meanwhile, Hudson's nearby Sarfartoq rare earth play is on hold, "dependent on the improvement in world market prices," which are discouragingly cyclical. (The term "cyclical" gets a lot of use on Howe Street, but only at the bottom of a cycle.) Mr. Tuer is far more bullish about the E-glass market, which he says could grow at an annual rate of up to 10 per cent "for the foreseeable future." Unfortunately, as he discovered with Sarfartoq and his Garnet Lake diamond play before that, the future is discouragingly unforeseeable.