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Gold/Mining/Energy : Mining News of Note -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: LoneClone who wrote (32195)	2/4/2009 7:21:19 PM
From: LoneClone	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 195618

Kazakhstan's miners rally in London By Steve Goldstein, MarketWatch Last update: 11:59 a.m. EST Feb. 4, 2009 marketwatch.com{B9133F48-2E72-4FE7-8AE9-FADC9F79C446}&siteid=yhoof LONDON (MarketWatch) -- The focus of London trading was Kazakhstan Wednesday, with the country's miners rallying on a devaluation of the tenge and after Eurasian Natural Resources said it doesn't have a need to further cut production. The gains for the Kazakh miners came as the country's central bank devalued the country's currency, the tenge, by 18%. The Kazakh miners have costs in tenge - notably labor -- but sell the metals they extract in dollars. Credit Suisse analysts said both firms have more than 50% of their mining costs in tenge. Liberum Capital analysts put that figure at around 45% each. Neither company was able to provide their own assessment. Eurasian Natural Resources shares (UK:ENRC: news , chart , profile ) climbed 14.4%, jockeying near the top of the FTSE 100 leaderboard, as the miner also reported production figures for the fourth quarter, with ferrochrome production down by about a third and iron ore production down over 40%. "Currently we feel comfortable with the sufficiency of the cutbacks and with our outlook, at least for the first half of 2009," CEO Johannes Sittard said. Kazakhmys shares (UK:KAZ: news , chart , profile ) also climbed, tacking on 14.9%. Kazakhmys holds a 26% stake in its one-time suitor. Meanwhile, the mining sector's heavyweight, BHP Billiton (UK:BLT: news , chart , profile ) (BHP:40.34, +1.33, +3.4%) , also reported results, with first-half net income dropping 57%. See related story. BHP shares climbed 9.4%, though they are down about 23% over the last 12 months. "BHP Billiton has announced earnings that on the face of it appear light, but after adjusting for higher than modeled currency-related tax effect, are inline with our estimates," said analysts from Merrill Lynch.