/world business
BHP Billiton on Wednesday added its voice to tentative signs of a more broad-based global recovery when the Anglo-Australian mining group reported record iron ore production in the three months ended September.
In its latest production report, the world's biggest miner said developed economies were stabilising and there had been a flow of "increasingly positive news" across most economies.
"We are starting to see some positive impact of re-stocking of pipelines, particularly in steel-making raw materials, after a period when demand essentially disappeared," BHP said. Analysts said BHP and other miners were benefiting from increased activities at steel mills in China, the US and Europe.
However, BHP cautioned that China's re-stocking of commodities was nearly complete and there was evidence of higher than normal stockpiles across the country's supply chain. "We continue to look for Chinese imports to more closely reflect real demand over the remainder of the 2009 calendar year," it said.
Iron ore production rose to a record 30.1m tonnes in the latest quarter, up 1 per cent from the 29.8m tonnes in the same period last year. BHP's production during the quarter trailed rival Rio Tinto, which last week reported a 12 per cent rise in iron ore production to 47.5m tonnes during the same three month period.
Rio also upgraded its annual iron ore production target by up to 7.5 per cent, but BHP did not provide any fresh guidance on its target for its 2009-10 financial year.
BHP said metals inventories were low in developed countries but there was still little evidence of "sustainable demand" emerging since the end of summer in the northern hemisphere.
"We continue to stress that this developed economy improvement is not without volatility and is from a very low base. We maintain our view that real demand follow-through in developed economies may not be transparent until mid-2010," it said.
BHP also reported stronger petroleum production, with output up 18 per cent to 41.2m barrels of oil equivalent compared to a year ago.
"Production hit an all time high due to the successful delivery of projects in the deepwater of Gulf of Mexico and Western Australia over the past two years," BHP said.
"Operational performance was steady and benefited from the absence of weather related interruptions. This was partly offset by natural field decline," it added.
Copper production fell 8 per cent in the quarter compared to the same period last year due to maintenance activities at Escondida in Chile and Olympic Dam in South Australia.
Gold was down 4 per cent, while lead, zinc and silver rose between 5 and 11 per cent.
BHP was hit by a mechanical failure at Olympic Dam earlier this month and said full production at the uranium and copper mine was not likely to resume until the first quarter of next year.
BHP shares fell 42 cents to A$39.49 by early afternoon in Australia.
© The Financial Times Limited 2009
| Most Viewed | Most Emailed |
From the Blogs: 
Sit tight, we're getting to the good stuff
