By William Clowes.
Impala Platinum Holdings posted a fiscal-year loss after a slump in metal prices prompted the South African miner to write down the value of its assets.
The Johannesburg-based company known as Implats took a charge of R19.8 billion ($1.1 billion) related to impairments, mainly at its flagship Rustenburg operations in South Africa. That resulted in a loss of R17.3 billion in the 12 months through June, compared with a R4.9 billion profit the previous year, it said in a statement on Thursday.
Implats said the average price of its platinum-group metals fell by a third during the period, including a 39% drop for palladium and a 63% slump in rhodium. Those metals, along with platinum — which posted a smaller decline — are used in devices to curb emissions in gasoline and diesel vehicles.
Platinum miners in South Africa — the largest producer of the metal — are cutting jobs as they try to lower costs in response to weak prices, which the firms attribute to inventory destocking and a subdued global economy. Implats has reduced the workforce in its home country by almost 4 000 people and is accelerating the shutdown of a Canadian palladium mine.
The miner increased PGM production by 13% to 3.65 million ounces last year, but low metal prices “offset the benefit of strong operational delivery,” Implats said.
Implats and its peers are focused on finding alternative sources of consumption for PGMs, particularly in the energy transition industries, to compensate for demand that’s forecast to subside in the auto sector as electric vehicles gain market share.
The company said profit before some one-time items – known as headline earnings – fell 87% to R2.3 billion.