Is Uranium Down For the Count?

Resource Investor reports on the uranium sector and uranium price.

The market news is quoted as saying:

The Fukushima disaster certainly will give regulators pause (and hopefully will make them consider carefully where new plants are built and how existing plants are protected). The disaster also will slow the proliferation of nuclear energy projects in some regions. The overall effect on the uranium industry, however, is shaping up to be far smaller than some have suggested.

Not that uranium oxide (U3O8) prices haven’t been affected—they’ve fallen about 21%— from a monthly average of $65/lb on a spot basis in February (the earthquake and tsunami in Japan occurred on March 11), to an average of $51.50/lb during the week ended August 8.

In fact, far greater damage to U3O8 prices was caused by the 2008-2009 global financial crisis than by the Fukushima disaster. Prices had peaked at about $136/lb in June 2007 and then lost more than two-thirds of their value, bottoming in June 2010 at slightly below $41/lb. They had finally begun to rise again, gaining more than 50% in only eight months prior to the Fukushima disaster.

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