Recent news
Robert Friedland, executive chairperson of Ivanhoe Mines.
“You have to have the courage of your conviction, we have to be thinking of 2019 or 2022 as if it were tomorrow. It is an ugly, long-term, difficult, 19th-century business, but anyone who tells you the supercycle is over is an idiot.”
Chances of 600.000 tonne per annum coal conversion plant brighten
Confirmation that Mongolian brown coal is suited for conversion into higher value products using Coal Plus -- a proprietary coal upgrading technology -- paves the way for Jatenergy’s agreement with Monrospromugoli to go ahead, and finally to result in a 600,000-tonne conversion plant that will generate annual royalties of US$1.76 million.
Checking on how companies curb corruption
Care for it or not, any Transparency International (hereafter TI) report gets handsome media coverage in every country, even where it has no direct relevance. If a country is seen as having improved on its perceived performance recorded in the previous year’s report – as Mongolia has done in this year’s Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI) – it raises expectations of a rise in foreign investment.
Fitch revises Mongolia outlook to Negative from Stable
Fitch Ratings has revised the Outlooks on Mongolia’s Long-Term Foreign- and Local-Currency Issuer Default Ratings (IDRs) to Negative from Stable and affirmed the IDRs at ‘B+’. The Country Ceiling is affirmed at ‘B+’ and the Short-Term Foreign-Currency IDR at ‘B’. The issue ratings on Mongolia’s senior unsecured foreign- and local-currency bonds are also affirmed at ‘B+’.
TT power plant to follow global best practices
The planned thermal power plant based on Tavan Tolgoi coal is to be built with both Government and private investment. The Head of the Tavan Tolgoi Electrical Plant Proposal Department, Dr of Economics M. Enkhsaikhan, describes how things are progressing.
The over whelming burden of compensation
A prospecting company denied a mining licence under the ‘long-titled’ law is preparing to claim nearly $500 million from the State in court. It obtained the prospecting licence before the law was passed in 2009 and thereafter spent more than $10 million on the prospecting work.
Mongolia signs deal with illegal gold miners
The government has signed a deal with the country’s gold producers association, which aims to reduce illegal extraction of the metal by reducing barriers for them to become formal miners.
Taxes as important as dividend from OT
Intense discussions between the Mongolian side and Rio Tinto are on, and three separate committees with members from both sides are holding talks on how the initial investmenton OT had been spent, if the Feasibility Study needs change, and how to find finances to develop the underground mine. Meanwhile, no one is certain how long additional financing for the underground mine at Oyu Tolgoi is to remain suspended.
Shenhua to buy 1 billion tons of TT coal, build railway
Ya. Batsuuri, CEO of state-owned Erdenes Tavan Tolgoi, has said three mining companies have agreed to export 1 billion tons of coal to China’s Shenhua Group Corp. in the next 20 years. The total value of the exports at current prices would be about $50 billion
Khan Resources not alone in opting for arbitration
Toronto-based Khan Resources is gambling that an international arbitration case in Paris will allow it to regain control of a uranium project that, it claims, was illegally expropriated by the Mongolian government, leaving it with nothing but angry investors.
PM’s visit gives a big push to transit transport deals
It’s been said that with access to the ocean, Mongolia could serve the world, but without it, she will only serve her neighbours. Seaborne trade will allow Mongolia to offer her abundant natural resources in the global market and fulfil her economic potential, but for this the country needs transit transport facilities through both its neighbours. Mongolia has been holding regular strategic talks with them to reach this goal.
Wondering why companies are there
I remember how in the early days of my stay in Ulaanbaatar, interaction with local journalists would leave me both amused and bemused by their insistence on using the word Company or LLC after mentioning the name of a business firm, particularly if it was one of some size.
“We have to balance the commercial and environmental aspects of mining”
The draft State policy on the mineral sector, now before the State Great Khural, is likely to be discussed and, many hope, approved during the Fall session. Three independent working groups helped prepare the draft. One of these was led by B.Batkhuu, director of Policy Implementation Department at the Ministry of Mining. N.Aruintuya of MMJ talked to him to know more about the draft.
Erdenet Mining mulls copper cathode plant
Erdenet Mining Corp is carrying out a feasibility study for the construction of a 100.000-tpy copper smelter, according to commercial department head N. Enkhbaatar.
