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Can Bending Spoons Help You Find Minerals?
School cutlery took a beating in the late nineteen sixties as children up and down the country tried to prove they could emulate Uri...
geoffreysambrook
Feb 1, 2017
Kings and Paupers of Scrap
“The scrap trade is an honourable profession” my old late metal friend, Reg Simmonds, would say – even as he was taking my eyes out on a...
Anthony Lipmann
Jan 25, 2017
Who'd be a Resource Economy?
Who’d choose to be a resource economy? First off, it sounds really good. The geological formation of the earth has left you a store of...
geoffreysambrook
Jan 18, 2017
The Trump Effect – and Black Swans
What’s going to affect the commodity markets in 2017? Well, the glib answer is world events and then their impact upon the supply and...
geoffreysambrook
Jan 11, 2017
2016 – 1848 Revisited?
Society in the middle part of the nineteenth century was changing rapidly. Industrialisation, with its attendant movement of population...
geoffreysambrook
Jan 4, 2017
Sunflowers and Cuspidors
When Alfred Chester Beatty opened his office and formed Selection Trust at London Wall Buildings in 1919, each director was permitted an...
Anthony Lipmann
Dec 28, 2016
What do you want for Christmas?
I’ve spent the last few weeks out of touch with the world in a yacht race. An entertaining time, and I can confirm that the Atlantic...
geoffreysambrook
Dec 20, 2016
Goodbye Baltic – Another London Exchange Goes East
‘Selling England by the Pound’ was the title of the 1973 Genesis album, two years after decimalization. Bearing in mind the sale of our...
Anthony Lipmann
Dec 14, 2016
LEADER OF THE FREE (TRADE) WORLD
Open to the World Is Britain about to become the leader of the world in free trade? Some think so, some have said so. Where does this...
Fred Piechoczek
Dec 7, 2016
Hedge Sales – Who and Why?
Does forward hedging make sense for miners? Many years ago, I wrote my MBA thesis on that subject. There’s probably still a copy of it...
geoffreysambrook
Nov 30, 2016
China Diary
Our Chinese Business Manager Perhaps it’s because of our company’s size – but, despite our good business in China, our Chinese business...
Anthony Lipmann
Nov 23, 2016
Japan Diary
A Polite Society Travelling from the land of the cold toilet seat to the land of the hot one, it is not only the toilet seats that are...
Anthony Lipmann
Nov 16, 2016
The LME Dinner 2016 – and God Bless America?
The social and commercial whirl of the LME Dinner Week is now over for another year; were there any overall themes or expectations to the...
geoffreysambrook
Nov 9, 2016
LME Dinner – the Past and Present
Keats greeted autumn with a paean to the “Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness”; the non-ferrous metal community greets it with the...
geoffreysambrook
Nov 2, 2016
Right or Wrong? Legal or Illegal?
Navinder Singh Sarao lost his attempt to resist extradition from the UK to the USA in mid-October. He was the man trading from the...
geoffreysambrook
Oct 26, 2016
Blowin' in the Wind
How do you like your politicians? Do you prefer them to treat you as an intelligent adult and put together a rational case for their...
geoffreysambrook
Oct 19, 2016
On the Debt of Nations
Where did it all start? Where does it all end? As the European economies flag, with southern Europe drowning in debt and threatening the...
Fred Piechoczek
Oct 12, 2016
Resource Nationalism – or Green Logic?
In these fevered brexit days, the subject of trade is never far from the politicians’ and commentators’ lips. Will there be a deal? Won’t...
geoffreysambrook
Oct 5, 2016
What If – Alternative Pasts and Futures
“What if…” That little phrase opens a window on an almost limitless vista of alternative universes. We can model in seconds the effects...
geoffreysambrook
Sep 28, 2016
The Euro – Life of Death
This article was written by Fred Piechoczek. History and economics are not sciences, working as both disciplines do from social and...
Fred Piechoczek
Sep 21, 2016
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