Uranium prices are set to “explode” in two years as demand from Western utilities and China will give the heavy metal a major uplift, according to a London-listed mining executive.
Spot uranium prices, currently trading at around $18.50 a pound, could be set to almost triple in 2018, Paul Atherley, managing director of Spain-based uranium miner Berkeley Energia, told City A.M.
And he also predicted a rally for another five years, driven by major European and US utilities needing to renegotiate five-year contracts from producers. Demand from China is also escalating.
“We are about to see, in the next few years, the biggest ever deficit in the uranium market, because all the US and EU utilities will be recontracting and also competing with China’s $570bn worth of expenditure on 65 new nuclear reactors,”
Atherley said.“The general consensus is for spot uranium prices to reach $65 a pound, but generally I would expect prices to grow by at least three times their current rate.”
