Wednesday, January 22, 2014

South Africa Gold Strike Delayed, Platinum Walkout Is On" (GLD; PPLT)

This is about as good as it gets for our little short gold/long platinum pair trade.
From Bloomberg:
South African gold producers including AngloGold Ashanti Ltd. (ANG) and Sibanye Gold Ltd. (SGL) were granted a reprieve to Jan. 30 from a strike by about 20,000 workers that had been due to start tomorrow.
Judge Hamilton Cele delayed a ruling on whether the strike by the Association of Mineworkers and Construction Union would be regarded as “protected,” in a hearing at a labor court in Johannesburg today. When South African strikes have this status, workers can down tools without being fired or disciplined.

“There’s nothing we can do, we have to respect” the court’s decision, AMCU Treasurer Jimmy Gama said in an interview at the court.

The AMCU, which represents 19 percent of the country’s gold-mining employees, had planned to strike at sites where it is the majority union including Harmony Gold Mining Co. (HAR)’s Kusasalethu, Sibanye’s Driefontein and AngloGold’s Mponeng. The union said its walkout at platinum producers including Anglo American Platinum Ltd. (AMS) tomorrow will proceed as planned....MORE 
The trade wasn't based on some psychic vision back in November as to which industry would get struck, with the resultant impact on production but rather on the shortfall of platinum vs demand compared to what should be all-time-in-the-history-of-the-world record gold production in 2014.
Whatever works though, the market pays luck as well as skill.
Via Yahoo Finance:
Chart forETFS Physical Platinum Shares (PPLT)


See also Monday's "More on South Africa's Striking Mineworkers" which links back to the original trade, if interested.