Kazatomprom may enter spot market after Yellow Cake deal

Kazatomprom, the world’s largest uranium producer, may buy the nuclear fuel in the spot market after a London-listed investment company exercised an option to purchase the metal.

Yellow Cake Plc, which bets on uranium prices, said on Monday that it had exercised a $100 million purchase option with Kazatomprom. Yellow Cake also said it plans to make additional purchases if it sees value opportunities.

“We will evaluate our inventories and it’s possible we will buy material from market” to cover part of our deal obligations, Askar Batyrbayev, chief commercial officer at Kazatomprom, said in interview. The miner’s uranium inventory fell by 21% to 6,761 tons last year as production declined, but remained within its target range, it said on Tuesday.

The state-controlled Kazakh miner charged 10% more for its uranium last year as the coronavirus pandemic pushed up prices. Kazatomprom and Canada’s Cameco Corp. have also cut output to reducing the global glut that built up following the 2011 Fukushima disaster in Japan.

The miner doesn’t expect “excess” sales of uranium this year after the deal with Yellow Cake, Batyrbayev said.

(By Nariman Gizitdinov)