Commodities | Jun 26 2012
By Andrew Nelson
If things weren’t travelling along slowly enough in the uranium spot market, last week saw even less activity according to market consultants TradeTech.
One couldn’t be blamed for hoping for a bit of a bounce last week after Japan officially approved the restart of not one, but two reactors to fill the gap in the country’s increasing generation shortfall. However, the announcement will take a bit of time to turn into new demand and increasingly speculative buyers seem happy to wait.
TradeTech points out the demand side is now dominated by price sensitive and discretionary buyers. With current spot supplies sufficient to meet demand and seller not willing to drop their prices to move stock, activity is slow and the gap between buyers and sellers is, if anything, increasing.
Last week saw just 300,000 pounds of U308 change hands in just two trades. Both were done at or near the prevailing spot, so there was no change to TradeTech’s weekly spot price indicator, which stayed firmly put at US$50.75/lb.
The consultant further notes there was little in the way of activity in the term markets, with no new transactions or new demand reported last week. The mid-term price stayed put at US$54.50/lb and the long term indicator was unchanged at US$61.00/lb.
There was also no activity reported in the conversion and enrichment markets, with only hints of new demand for either.
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