Commodities | Sep 27 2011
By Greg Peel
It was a relatively busy week in the spot uranium market last week given industry consultant TradeTech reports eight transactions were completed totalling over a million pounds of U3O8 equivalent. It was all about speculation, however, with traders and hedge funds battling it out while utilities and producers watched on.
The spot uranium price has been quietly bouncing back from below the significant US$50/lb level in recent weeks as it recovers from the shift away from a nuclear energy focus among some developed economies. Last week began as no exception, with the spot price pushing up US50c to US$54.00/lb mid-week. However, Thursday night's action in global stock and commodity markets finally had an impact on a sport uranium market which has to date been relatively removed from panic over Europe.
One feature of Thursday night's trade was a capitulation dumping of commodity positions by commodity funds in oil, gold, base metals and softs. With speculators also dominating last week's trade in uranium, some crossover became inevitable. Hence by week's end the spot price had fallen back US$1.00, resulting in a weekly indicative price from TradeTech of US$53.00/lb, down US50c from the week before.
No doubt this week investors in uranium producers will be hoping there is some light at the end of the tunnel of European woe in the wake of last weekend's G20 meeting.
