Weekly Reports |Sep 11 2018
Solid uranium spot market volume last week saw the spot price rise to a two-year high.
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By Greg Peel
Last week saw uranium market participants attending the annual World Nuclear Association Symposium in London. Aside from the usual crowd representing producers, utilities and intermediaries, this year's symposium attracted renewed interest from investors who had otherwise been absent in recent years.
Speculation in the uranium market has now shifted from spot market activity or futures trading - a contract which has never really gained traction - to pooled speculation via investment in a listed uranium fund, which buys material directly from producers.
Much interest was generated when the Yellow Cake fund was listed on the London Stock Exchange's Alternative Investment Market in June. The AIM is arguably London's Nasdaq equivalent. That fund has since punted on the uranium price by buying sizeable quantities directly from Kazakhstan's state-owned producer, which itself is currently contemplating going public with an IPO.
Now everyone wants in on the act. Renewed interest in the market from speculators is one reason the uranium spot price has been on the move in recent months, but genuine demand from utilities and producers buying in to fulfill contracts (having suspended their own operations due to low prices) have more recently been driving forces.
Solid Volume
Typically the week of the annual symposium is one of limited activity in the uranium market given everyone's in London and not at their desk, but industry consultant TradeTech reports last week saw 2.4mlbs of U3O8 equivalent changing hands in the spot market - a significant volume in any week.
This follows a month of August which marked the highest turnover for an August since 1995.
As noted in last week's Uranium Week, producers have become increasingly more active as buyers in the spot market at the same rate they've become increasingly less active in actually producing their own uranium. Utilities are also now on the move.
TradeTech's weekly spot price indicator rose US30c to US$26.70/lb last week - a two-year high.
Red Tape
Last week also saw the highly respected Massachusetts Institute of Technology release a study which suggests unless nuclear energy is "meaningfully incorporated" into the global mix of low-carbon energy technologies, the challenge of climate change will be much more difficult and costly to solve. The report discusses recommendations for nuclear plant construction, current and future reactor technologies, business models and policies, and reactor safety regulation and licensing.