Industrial BellwetherThis quiz takes 1-10 seconds to answer. It’s 1 question.

Which industrial bellwether recently posted record second quarter profits, record sales and revenues and posted its fifth straight year of record profits?

 Boeing
 United Technologies (UTC)
 Caterpillar
 John Deere
This quiz powered by the Quiz Creator plugin for WordPress.How could a company (I can’t reveal the name now […]

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The price of oil has come down significantly over the last week or so falling from over $147/barrel to $126/barrel as of this writing. Is this the top of the chart and if it continues to fall what can we expect for metals?
Some are still predicting $250/barrel for oil next year, though others have called $50/barrel. Both seem […]

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Photo: Aluminum, titanium and platinum, in unexpected colors.
Credit: Richard Baker, University of Rochester.
In 2006, U.S. scientists announced the first step to a perfect, pitch-black Batmobile for the hero of The Dark Knight. Using lasers (or more accurately, a quick beam of light called a femtosecond laser pulse), scientists discovered a way to alter the surface properties of […]

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Good news for those on the hunt for cheap ferrochrome: Prices are steadily falling. But since this fall is due to a lack of heavy demand, the prices should increase after stainless steel mills ramp up production. For now, however, summer slowdowns have impacted prices. Also leading to these lows is “the continued collapse in sales […]

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We wrote in May on lead and last month on zinc, two metals that after years in the doldrums rose rapidly in price during 2006 to record highs in 2007, only to fall back over the last 6 months to levels not much above their historic norms. The rapid rise in price encouraged massive investment […]

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Once again rising near $1,000 an ounce — the same high prices that led some consumers to sell their gold jewelry and others to melt the kitchen sink — gold’s great heights on Tuesday were quick to fall as oil prices slowed the progress of gold and several other metals that were boosted Monday.
Gold hit that staggering […]

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Big news in US steel and mining circles yesterday. Cleveland-Cliffs, the largest North American iron ore pellet producer to the steel industry, agreed to acquire Alpha Natural Resources, with 60 coal mines, for almost $10b in a cash and stock deal according to numerous sources. The combined entity to be named Cliffs Natural Resources, expects […]

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This is a true story: I didn’t really understand what a subwoofer was until my husband informed me that he had purchased a cabinet to be placed under our new flat screen television. Since I was in charge of all “design elements” of our home remodel project, I was outraged at this purchase, especially considering […]

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Or so went JP Morgan’s statement to the US Congress in 1913. Apart from quoting that perceptive line, an article in MineWeb also covers a new report by Erste Bank of Austria that predicts the gold price will be $1200/oz by the end of the year and could exceed the inflation adjusted all time high […]

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How about a little quiz on commodities to start your Monday morning? Thanks to Rox Resources Ltd., we have pulled together a quick quiz to test your knowledge of the hottest commodities of the last 10 years (and also the hottest commodity of the last 6 months). The correct answers may surprise you.
Commodity QuizThis short […]

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