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Tungsten's variety of uses and short supply work in favour of maintaining the metal's price point

By Leia Michele Toovey- Exclusive to Tungsten Investing News

Tungsten prices ^[2] have managed to hold steady while all the other base metals ^[3] dive. In 2004, tungsten was worth $60 per mtu, and now it oscillates around $260 per mtu. Tungsten's value is due to its exceptional properties. Tungsten has a high melting point that makes it useful for filaments in incandescent lights, a near-diamond hardness that makes it valuable for the manufacture of high-grade drill bits and saw blades, and a density higher than lead, without lead's toxicity.  With lead's toxicity causing it to fall out of favour, technological advances are leading to tungsten as a "green" replacement for lead. Some key uses- tungsten is now used in shielding blankets used every time you receive an X-ray,  it's used for amour piercing bullets, and even fisherman are using it for weights on their lines.

With tungsten's steadfast price, it is no surprise that a tungsten mining company is managing to hold its own despite the challenges the industry is facing in the current economy. North American Tungsten (TSX.V: NTC) has topped the Vancouver Sun's list of 100 fastest growing companies for the second year in a row. Led by CEO Stephen Leahy, North American Tungsten has successfully made the jump from a junior exploration company to an operating company with 223 employees, most of them at the company's mine 300 kilometers north of Watson Lake. In 2007, North American Tungsten's Cantung mine in the Northwest Territories was fully operational for the first time. Production was up 20 per cent, sales revenues increased 15 per cent, operating cash flow climbed 300 per cent and the junior mining company came close to being profitable, cutting losses to $1.2 million from $2.7 million in 2006.

Other news coming from North American Tungsten's office, after months of haggling the company has cancelled the private placement as part of a Strategic Alliance Agreement with Hunan Nonferrous Metals Corporation. The private placement entailed approximately 13.4 million units of NTC at a price of $1.45 per unit on a private placement basis.  North American Tungsten was extending every possible courtesy to Hunan; however, the company was having trouble with all the red tape in its homeland, China. The cancellation enables NTC to seek other financing options so that the company can proceed with the development of its Mactung project.

StrataGold Corporation ^[4] (TSX:SGV) is pleased to announce that a new independent National Instrument NI 43-101 Mineral Resource estimate has increased the Indicated Resource of the Mar-Tungsten Deposit by 44 per cent. The Mar-Tungsten Deposit contains 65.7 million pounds of tungsten WO3 in the Indicated category and 8.5 million pounds of tungsten WO3 in the Inferred category based on a 0.1 per cent WO3 cutoff. A primary economic assessment is currently ongoing on the property.  The Mar-Tungsten Deposit is located within StrataGold's wholly owned Dublin Gulch property, Yukon Territory, Canada.

Playfair Mining ^[5] (TSX.V:PLY) has announced encouraging results from its 2008 drilling program on the Grey River Tungsten deposit. The main objective of the drill program was to test the down dip and northern strike extensions of the #10 vein tungsten deposit. Analytical results from the drill core sample show that the #10 vein extends an estimated 250 m down dip below the previously defined deposit. The maximum concentration of WO3 found in the drill holes to date is 1.13 per cent over 2.5 m.  According to Donald Moore, Playfair's Chairman and CEO, "The 2008 drill campaign confirms the potential for additional tungsten resources below the adit and also to the north. Vein type environments are often conducive to further resource expansion through development and underground drilling. Combined with the prospect of finalizing the metallurgical test work and milling circuit design, the Grey River Deposit is another significant step closer to a production decision." 
Tungsten mining outside of China is few and far in between, and new mines are always needed to supply the western world as China is known to be stingy on exports.  That fact, coupled with steady tungsten prices means that there is a strong need for western based mines to come online.