Gold’s value as a safe haven is all the clearer amid mounting global uncertainty about the trade war between the US and China, coupled with slowing global economic growth and worldwide recession fears. At the beginning of the second half of 2019, the price of the yellow metal surged to the highest in more than six years with prices expected to continue to escalate into 2020.
The gold rally has boosted market sentiment, lifted the share prices of gold mining companies worldwide and pushed gold miners’ margins higher, placing the industry in a reasonably healthy position.
The improved sentiment in the gold industry is also generating merger and acquisition activity.
Creamer Media’s Gold 2019 report reviews the global and South African gold markets in this context. In the latter, the focus is on supply and demand, cost pressures, as well as labour challenges, the class law suits that some of the country’s major gold miners are facing and criminal activity in the sector. It also reviews the major and smaller mining companies with operations in South Africa.
This report draws from material published over the past 12 months and is a summary of other sources of information published in Engineering News and Mining Weekly, as well as of information available in the public domain.
This report does not purport to provide an analysis of market trends.