12,000 tonnes
That is the volume of Congolese copper Mercuria has now delivered to Project Vault, the United States' new stockpiling programme for critical minerals. The handover lands days after Washington confirmed a billion-dollar loan facility meant to help domestic manufacturers lock in metal supply outside Chinese channels. It is the first concrete tonnage figure to come out of the programme rather than policy language, and it puts a trading house with deep DRC roots on the front line of US mineral security rather than just Beijing's smelters.
461.50
Urea closed at that level per tonne on Friday, up from 452.50 a day earlier, a two percent move that breaks a run of flat prints through the week. No single cargo or tender explains the jump in the data to hand, but it is the sharpest daily swing the benchmark has posted in recent sessions, and it comes as DAP sits stalled at its last known 802.50 print with no fresh read available.
One third
The share of water the Zambezi River Authority has cut from Kariba's allocation, according to the authority's own figures cited by former energy minister Yamfwa Mukanga. He is telling Zambians to prepare for load-shedding returning in 2027, which would not be the first time hydro scarcity on the Zambezi has forced rationing onto a grid that copper and cobalt smelters in the Copperbelt depend on directly.
10
The death toll from an overnight attack attributed to the ADF on three mining sites, Makimbilio, Biasiko and Makamanda, in Mambasa territory, Ituri. Local monitors told Actualité.cd the attackers moved on toward Mangadi after the raid, and that it is the fifth such incursion into the same mining groupement since the start of the month. One of the dead was a woman whose infant was left at the scene.
Still open
- The Baltic Dry Index fell to 2,511, down 5.8% on the day and its third straight decline, after slumping through 2,545 on Thursday.
- Antofagasta says Centinela output is holding at normal levels despite no breakthrough in strike talks.
- Trafigura has named Chipo Mwanawasa as its new Executive Director for Zambia.
- COMEX copper slid 1.2% to 14,586 USD/t as inflation data and ebbing strike risk drove a third straight down day.