Stuff That Interests Me

I went to a mining conference on Monday - the Mining Journal Select London. As well as being on a panel, I wanted to catch up with the management of a couple of companies I hold shares in and get a feel for the state of the industry.Mining is cyclical. If there’s a shortage of some metal or natural resource, the price of that resource will go up. Rising prices encourage people to start looking for more said resource, investing in it and mining it. Suddenly there’s a mining boom.This eventually leads to an increased quantity of whatever the resource in question is, and the price comes back down again. The price of mining companies comes back too. Investment goes away. Suddenly we have a mining bust.In today’s fiat world of wild price swings, boom seems to turn to bust with increasing rapidity and violence. We are definitely not in the boom phase of the cycle.“Look at the room,” an investor came up to me and said after the panel I was speaking on. “It’s empty. It’s a classic bottom-of-the-market sign.”I can’t