RE:RE:Canada’s junior miners are loving the price spike You seem to feel the Financial Post was remiss in its titling (and premise) - “‘Like a car rolling down a hill’: Canada’s junior nickel miners loving a price spike - Record nickel prices could jumpstart a half-dozen mining projects in Canada
Did you read the article I referenced? You seem to be reading “spike” as “temporary spike” or aberrational rise, but that is a mistake on your part. You have read the entire article wrongly. It makes clear that the recent chaos in nickel needs to be ignored but that this temporary spike in nickel’s price has brought attention to the fact that nickel has been rising steadily for some time now - and that this steady price rise is real and substantive and that the resulting increase in positive sentiment for the metal is allowing many junior miners in Canada to gain access to the financing needed to “jumpstart” various projects.
“Prices have been climbing steadily for months, as investors bet supply for the metal, a key ingredient in batteries, would fall short of growing demand for electric vehicles.
“‘The last couple days, you almost have to set them aside,’ said Martin Turenne, chief executive of FPX Nickel Corp., which is developing a nickel project in central British Columbia. ‘It’s a very particular short squeeze that’s being just incredibly messy, but you know the nickel price will settle back down to a more normal range when these winds have passed.’
Still, Turenne said the dramatic trading day in London was only the latest sign that the nickel market is rapidly heating up as automakers look to establish battery supply chains. That adds a major source of new demand to a metal that is still primarily used to make stainless steel.
‘Two or three years ago, nickel was still a four-letter word,’ said Turenne. ‘It had a pretty grim track record and it’d been oversupplied over the past years.’”
“But in the first months of 2020, Turenne said his phone suddenly started ringing, as diversified mining companies turned bullish on nickel. Soon, automakers and battery makers were getting in touch to inquire about FPX Nickel’s project.”
But even at a price of around US$20,000 per tonne, nickel projects in British Columbia, Ontario and Quebec were having little trouble getting investors excited.
Earlier this year, Wyloo Metals Pty Ltd., a private company backed by Australian billionaire Andrew Forrest, paid $617 million for the Ring of Fire project in Ontario’s