Copper mining company reports highest ever price for tonne of copper concentrate

CupruMin copper mining company of Abrud has recently sold 45,000 tonnes of copper concentrate at a tender, having been offered "the highest per tonne price ever," according to a press statement released on Thursday. 

"CupruMin was offered the best per tonne price in its history, at the recently concluded auction for one-year sale of copper concentrate. The offeror is Romanian company Ronefer," according to the company. 

Ronefer offered 1,253.89 USD/tonne of dry copper concentrate on the London Metal Exchange on October 24, according to CupruMin. 

The 45,000 tonnes should yield about 9,450 tonnes of metallic copper, which will be a record for CupruMin. For example, in October 2019, CupruMin achieved for the first time a concentrate production equivalent to 922 tonnes of metallic copper. 

The statement also shows that CupruMin got 50.8 million lei worth of investment in 2018, most of which went into quarrying equipment and machinery that increase productivity. In 2019, the investment plan focuses on refurbishing the ore processing facilities, according to a company representative. 

CupruMin Abrud is a non-ferrous mining company whose sole shareholder is the Romanian state. 

In September 2019, the company that exploits the Rosia Poieni deposit, where 60pct of Romania's copper reserves are located, announced that it was putting up for a tender about 45,000 tonnes of dry copper concentrate to be awarded according to the most economically advantageous tender, according to an announcement posted at the time on the company's website. 

CupruMin's main business is the exploitation and delivery in specific forms of copper ore resources/reserves from the Rosia Poieni quarry. The concentrate extracted by the company comes in the form of a porphyry deposit, which, besides copper, also contains other metals, including gold and silver.