Tantalum price fall causing supply cutback
Australian supply giant slashes production, jobs
By Tom Stundza -- Purchasing, 12/3/2008 7:57:00 PM
Talison Minerals, the Western Australian producer of 30% of the world’s supply of tantalum, has reduced operations and slashed 200 jobs because of the global financial crisis, softening demand from end users and sales at discounted prices by miners in Central Africa with alleged poor health and safety records.
The company says its actions are driven by the recent global financial crisis, which has caused a severe downturn in worldwide demand for consumer electronics, resulting in lower demand for tantalum. Tantalum is used in such consumer electronic products as mobile phones, plasma screen televisions, digital cameras and computers.
“Customers have sufficient tantalum for the near future and have not needed to extend their current contracts,” says Talison Minerals’ CEO Peter Robinson in a statement that the Wodgina mining and smelting operations will be reduced until the “global economic situation improves and demand and prices are stronger.” Tantalite ore has been stuck in a $36-$37/lb transaction price average for months but processed tantalum prices has been falling steeply off the mid-2008 peak of $101/kilogram.
“We will keep working with the electronics industry to encourage all participants in the supply chain to purchase tantalum from responsible sources,” Robinson adds in the statement, “and to assist in establishing a system that will give consumers confidence that tantalum is being produced in compliance with internationally recognized social, legal, ethical, safety and environmental standards.”
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