Freeport halts Grasberg mine, begins sending workers home

Shares in Freeport McMoRan Inc (NYSE:FCX), the world's largest listed copper miner, were down 1% in pre-market trading Tuesday on the company’s decision to halt operations at its Grasberg mine in Indonesia.

The firm’s local unit, which has not been able to ship copper from the mine in over a month due to a ban on concentrate exports that kicked in on January 12, also said Tuesday it has begun sending workers home, Reuters reports.

The shutdown, which effectively happened Friday, comes after PT Freeport Indonesia ran out of space to store copper that has been backing up at the site and it coincides with an ongoing strike at BHP Billiton’s Escondida copper mine in Chile, the world’s biggest.

Copper has rallied lately as a result, hitting its highest levels since May 2015 overnight, an trading at $2.76 a pound in New York Tuesday morning. The red metal has climbed about 11% so far this year, one of the best starts of the year for the commodity, which has been named by analysts as the one they expect to perform the best in 2017.

Freeport's Grasberg mining complex is responsible for more than a quarter of the Phoenix, Arizona-based company's total output. But the miner says that each month of delay in obtaining approval to export means production would be reduced by 70 million pounds of copper and 70,000 ounces of gold.

Before the current troubles, it was set contribute an even greater proportion in 2017 as copper grades improve and gold production is boosted. And, last year, the iconic mine produced more than 500,000 tonnes of copper and over 1 million ounces of gold.

The miner’s overall consolidated sales for 2017 are expected to be around 4.1 billion pounds of copper, 2.2 million ounces of gold and 92 million pounds of molybdenum, including 1.0 billion pounds of copper, 460,000 ounces of gold and 23 million pounds of molybdenum for first-quarter 2017.

More to come …

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