(Updates to afternoon)
By Lewa Pardomuan
SINGAPORE, Feb 18 (Reuters) - Platinum hit a record high
for the 13th sucessive day on Monday on lingering power supply
shortages which have disrupted mining in main producer South
Africa.
Platinum, used in jewellery and auto catalysts, has gained
more than 20 percent since late January and more than 30
percent in 2008 after South Africa, which accounts for 80
percent of global supply, was hit by power cuts that forced
mines to shut for five days last month.
Spot platinum <XPT=> hit a high of $2,087 an ounce, driven
by investor buying and purchases from auto makers, up from
$2,050/2,055 an ounce late in New York on Friday.
Palladium jumped to its highest level in more than 6 years
at $452.50 an ounce to track its sister metal platinum.
"At this moment, nobody knows the future price of platinun,
but I personally presume it will be $2,100 at the end of this
month," said Yukuji Sonoda, precious metals analyst at Daiichi
Commodities in Tokyo.
"In Japan, many automobile companies are very nervous about
future platinum prices. They will increase stocks for another
two or four months. I personally think there's a minimum
deficit of 11 tonnes (353,657 ounces)," said Sonoda, referring
to his forecast for the 2008 global supply deficit.
Mines across South Africa have been hit by a lack of power
after state utility Eskom [] asked the mining sector to
cut power use to 90 percent of normal needs to ease a
nationwide shortage caused by the failure of electricity
generation to match economic growth.
Other analysts say the global platinum deficit could widen
to 400,000 to 500,000 ounces by the end of 2008, from about
265,000 ounces in 2007. The market had a surplus of 65,000
ounces in 2006 following seven successive years of deficit.
"There is no ceiling for platinum as long as the power
problem in South Africa stays unresolved," said Shuji Sugata,
manager at Mitsubishi Corp Futures and Securities.
"In this sentiment, nobody can sell heavily or take fresh
short positions."
Japanese platinum futures were also at record highs. The
most active December contract <0#JPL:> on the Tokyo Commodity
Exchange rallied by the daily 240 yen limit to a record high of
6,945 yen.
Sugata said TOCOM's move to impose an extraordinary margin
on platinum futures contracts has not had any major impact.
"The current uptrend in platinum has not been led by TOCOM.
Also considering open interest in platinum is not big, there is
no big impact after more margins," he said.
TOCOM imposed an additional margin of 60,000 yen per
contract to all new positions built for platinum futures
contract from Monday on top of the initial margins in an effort
to cool down the market
Palladium <XPD=> hit a bid high of $452.50 an ounce, up
from $444/449 an ounce.
Gold <XAU=> rose to $904.60/905.40 an ounce from
$903.00/903.80 an ounce late in New York. Silver <XAG=> edged
down to $17.08/17.13 an ounce from $17.11/17.16 in New York.
COMEX's April gold futures <GCJ8> added $1.6 an ounce to
$907.8 an ounce.
Precious metals prices at 0413 GMT
Metal Last Change Pct chg YTD pct chg
Turnover
Spot Gold 904.80 2.60 +0.29 8.66
Spot Silver 17.08 0.02 +0.12 15.64
Spot Platinum 2085.00 25.00 +1.21 37.17
Spot Palladium 452.50 8.50 +1.91 22.96
TOCOM Gold 3160.00 -23.00 -0.72 3.27
24138
TOCOM Platinum 6945.00 240.00 +3.58 30.08
24676
TOCOM Silver 597.90 -6.70 -1.11 10.52
576
TOCOM Palladium 1609.00 55.00 +3.54 19.10
6626
Euro/Dollar 1.4681
Dollar/Yen 107.80
TOCOM prices in yen per gram, except TOCOM silver which is
priced in yen per 10 grams. Spot prices in $ per ounce.
(Additional reporting by Chikafumi Hodo in Tokyo; Editing by
Ben Tan)
