[miningmx.com] – THE minimal reaction of the platinum price to supply interruptions has analysts scratching their heads as to the quantum of inventories and whether historic estimates of supply and demand were incorrect.
In a report by Reuters, republished in BDLive, Citigroup strategist, David Wilson, said: “If you start pitching through the historic data, it begins to look like . the demand supply balances in the 2000s weren’t as tight as the data suggests.
Figures from refiner Johnson Matthey, for years considered a reference measure of supply and demand fundamentals, put the platinum market in deficit for 11 out of 14 years in the period spanning 2000 to 2013. The cumulative shortfall for the whole period was 1.525-million ounces worth about $1.94bn, Reuter said.
But analysts’ estimates of total above-ground stocks range from four million to 20 million ounces, worth anything between $5bn and $25bn, raising the question of how and when that inventory was built up, the newswire said.
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