Zinc prices may cross $3,000 per tonne mark in Aug or Sept: Arun Misra, Hindustan Zinc

economictimes.indiatimes.com:

«Government had queries on the plan regarding why do we believe that the market cap will go up and things like that. On the other side, they feel that if the timing is not right, the demerger as an effort may impact the government's effort of divestment in the OFS route,» says Arun Misra, CEO, Hindustan Zinc.

Before we dive into your numbers, I want to talk about the big moves that we are seeing in commodity prices globally, be it zinc prices which have risen in the last one month, do you believe that this is the start of a commodity up cycle or maybe just temporary euphoria?
No, we always had the news that zinc would hit $3,000 per tonne somewhere around December. So, it was expected that the growth will happen and maybe it is becoming faster than what it was predicted and I believe that it would cross that $3,000 per tonne mark somewhere around August or September. Already, it has touched 2850 and I do not see it coming back anytime soon.

Now, the board in December or last year had announced plans for demerging business into separate entities for zinc, lead, silver and recycling business, which reports suggest have been rejected by the government. So, is the demerger completely off the table?
No, the plan is not rejected by the government. Government had queries on the plan regarding why do we believe that the market cap will go up and things like that. On the other side, they feel that if the timing is not right, the demerger as an effort may impact the government's effort of divestment in the OFS route.

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