The Brazilian mining company, Vale SA, is predicting that cash generation from its base-metals division will roughly quadruple over the next year as new copper and nickel operations go into production.
The company’s base-metals, which is mostly nickel, division has reported earnings of $1.64 billion in 2013 before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization, also known as Ebitdam. This is a 172 percent increase from 2012.
Over the last two years Vale has reportedly spent $6.72 billion on its base-metals division and company officials have announced they are happy the company is starting to see results from this investment. Last year nickel output rose to 9.9 percent to 260,000 metric tons.
In addition, Indonesia’s government in January has banned all exports of nickel ore. Vale expects this ban to have a “significant” impact on the market since Indonesia accounts for more than 20 percent of world nickel production.