With uncertainty continuing to surround the US' sanctions on Russian producers, specifically Norilsk Nornickel, Lord Copper explores the unpredictability surrounding prices and the parties involved.
The drumbeats around Nornickel are getting louder. There is a sense that the sanctions net might be starting to tighten. The Times correspondent in Norilsk has produced a few pieces of general background, in which he makes some startling discoveries, incidentally. Unexpectedly that it's really, really cold up above the Arctic Circle; mining a kilometre and a half under the frozen tundra is quite difficult; years of Soviet-era environmental practices have left the ground poisoned and the air foul; and pensions can be drawn at 45, such is the life expectancy. (Who'd have thought it?).The picture is finely balanced. Oleg Deripaska, definitely persona non grata with the Trump administration, holds a 28% stake in Nornickel...