The Tape

Teck / Highland Valley Copper: Teck said on October 24 that strike action by United Steelworkers Local 7619 had begun at Highland Valley; the mine continues at reduced capacity, and the production impact depends on how long the strike lasts. The mine produced 127,100 tonnes of Copper in 2025, about 28% of Teck's 453,500 tonnes. The strike lands on an asset inside the Anglo American and Teck merger, which still awaits Chinese competition approval, so lost tonnes now also weigh on what the merged company can offer a regulator whose country's smelters buy its concentrate. The next marker is Teck's first statement of lost tonnes.

BHP / Escondida: BHP produced 400,700 tonnes of Copper in the September quarter, down 19% on a year earlier and below the 423,600-tonne Visible Alpha consensus Reuters cited, after bad weather and a fatal incident on September 23 forced temporary halts at Escondida. BHP's review puts Escondida's payable Copper in concentrate down about 30% to 197,900 tonnes while its cathode output rose 18% to 54,700 tonnes, on a planned head grade of 0.81% against 0.94%. The loss sits in feed for smelters rather than in refined metal, so it shows up first in concentrate treatment terms. Holding unchanged full-year guidance of 1.65 to 1.8 million tonnes needs 416,000 to 466,000 tonnes a quarter from here, our arithmetic; the December quarter is the test.

Etango (Bannerman / CNNC Overseas): The Etango joint venture in Namibia, 55% Bannerman and 45% CNNC Overseas, which holds 95% of the project, took a final investment decision to build the Etango-8 design at 3.5 million pounds of U3O8 a year, with about US$353M of pre-production capital, of which about US$64M is already spent, and commissioning targeted for 2028 (World Nuclear News). CNNC Overseas holds a life-of-mine entitlement to 60% of production on market-based terms (Bannerman, ASX, September 25). On October 20, Deep Yellow said equity market conditions do not support an investment decision on Tumas this quarter. The Namibian mine that reached a decision is the one with a Chinese state nuclear group's capital and offtake; the marker is who buys Bannerman's remaining 40%.

China's Copper cathode imports: China imported 254,600 tonnes of Copper cathode in September; the Democratic Republic of the Congo supplied 101,000 tonnes and Russia 53,500 tonnes, together 60.67%, while Chile supplied 17,500 tonnes, down 42.69% (SMM, citing customs data). Russian metal produced on or after April 13, 2024, which the London Metal Exchange has suspended from warranting, appears to be filling Chinese demand that Chilean cathodes used to fill. October's customs detail, due in late November, shows whether the shift holds.

Sigma Lithium: Sigma extended its US$100M senior secured loan from Synergy Capital by six months, from December 2026 to June 2027, at SOFR plus 6.95%, which it says moves 93% of its debt profile to that month, and said it produced 7,090 tonnes of concentrate between its October 5 restart and October 21, after its environmental licences were reinstated. The June 2027 maturity now depends on restart cargoes being shipped, accepted and paid within eight months.

MMG / Anglo American Brazilian Nickel: The European Commission has until November 30 to decide on MMG's purchase of Anglo American's Brazilian Nickel business (case M.11944). SMM's data show Brazil's ferronickel shipments to the European Union down about 5% in January to September, to 74,800 tonnes, with Goiás down from 48,600 to 34,100 tonnes and Pará up from 19,200 to 33,400 tonnes, while Colombia accounts for 12,700 tonnes of a 15,200-tonne drop in European supply. A remedy that names volumes for European buyers would be a Western regulator obtaining tonnes from a Chinese-owned company; November 30 is the date.

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Market Update

Executive summary (20-second highlights):

Yttrium oxide costs about 128 times more outside China than inside it. On our reading, the difference is not in the oxide. It is in who is allowed to buy it.
Outside Japan, China shipped more Yttrium oxide in the first nine months of 2026 than in the same months of 2024, before the controls. Japan got 18.1 tonnes, against 887.8 tonnes a year earlier. China is rationing the input to Japan and supplying the finished good to the United States and Europe, and this week its foreign ministry said out loud why.
On the Financial Times' account, the United States answered a shortage of an input with a restriction on a finished good. That raises China's cost. It does not move a tonne of Yttrium.
General Motors cancelled the contract a US magnet plant was built around. The US rule that bars Chinese-mined magnet material from January reaches defense deliveries, and GM was buying for electric cars.
China changed who controls four separation plants and published a clock for holding cargo at the border, in the same week and without a new export ban.
We checked almost three years of US securities filings for the word "yttrium". The companies using it are mostly the ones hoping to sell the metal. The seven engine, aerospace and chip-tool makers we tested, in the industries the shortage is said to threaten, have not written it once.