Coronavirus Downturn Has Hit Commodities Hard But Uranium’s 30% Uptick Bucking Trend

Coronavirus Downturn Has Hit Commodities Hard But Uranium’s 30% Uptick Bucking Trend

I cover commodities, mostly oil & gas, often debunking risk premiums.. One commodity appears to be bucking the general market gloom - uranium.. For instance, Canada's Cameco, the world's biggest uranium miner, has shut down its mine at Rabbit Lake and suspended operations at MacArthur River.. Kazatomprom, another large global uranium miner, has cut production by 20%.. And reverting back to the near-term, even if coronavirus restrictions and production outages are fully lifted hypothetically in June in key markets, supply chain issues would mean another 4 to 8 weeks for the uranium market to return to normalcy.. Before the global financial crisis hit in 2008, it fetched around $140/lb on the back of even deeper production outages in Australia and Canada compared to what we are currently witnessing.. It then slumped to $50/lb in the wake of the collapse of Lehman Brothers, as the U.S. sub-prime loans crisis became a global credit crisis.. I am a UK-based oil & gas sector analyst and business news editor/writer with over 20 years of experience in the financial and trade press..