New York Times reports that Goldman Sachs' efforts to hedge its bets in commodity trades, along with fixed income and currency trades, resulted in a disappointing drop in reported income in Q2. On Tuesday Goldman reported $1.05 billion in profit in the second quarter, or $1.85 share. Analysts were expecting $2.27 a share.

South African miner International Ferro Metals said output fell 17 percent in the fourth quarter due to a scheduled shutdown of a furnace. Ferrochrome production was at 42,584 tonnes for the quarter ended June 30.

Need proof that stakeholder relations can be fraught? See this recently uploaded YouTube video of Siveru Soma, an Indian MP, who was chased away and beaten up by a mob of women who were protesting a Chinese clay mining project in Visakhapatnam district.

"Soros and Moore Capital Management LLC are among hedge funds that have reduced the amount of money they’re investing in stock, bond and currency markets as they look for clarity on global events ranging from the debt crisis in Europe to China’s efforts to control inflation to the debate over the U.S. debt ceiling," reports Bloomberg.

Zinc prices gained on falling Dollar and rising EURO on the back of easing tensions of US quantitative easing. Dollar has so far lost 82 pips and is trading at 1.418 per EURO.

DAYARNE SMITH Muswellbrook Shire mayor Martin Rush has urged Anglo American to tell the community if it no longer plans to pursue the Drayton South project. The company’s Drayton mine is due to close in 2015, but the company has applied for state

Outotec has been awarded another concentrator contract with Russian Copper Co. for the Miheevsky project with throughput of 18 million tonnes of ore a year. Finnish headquartered metallurgical specialist Outotec has signed a contract with ZAO Miheevsky Image from Outotec shows Kittilä gold mine, Finland.

The price of importing South African coal has fallen to be nearly on par with Chinese domestic rates, but Chinese buyers are not biting and are asking for discounts of another $4 per tonne at least, trade sources said.

The board of Polyus Gold , Russia's biggest gold producer, approved on Tuesday its development strategy, which, once implemented, will see it become one of the world's top five gold miners in 2020.