Queensland coal miner Macarthur Coal has warned that further heavy rain in March means it is likely to keep a force majeure in place until the end of this month.
The company told an investment conference yesterday that the heavy rain had increased its costs.
While production was subject to further disruptions due to wet weather, Macarthur kept its full-year sales target of 4.1 to 4.3 million tonnes.
"Cost management will continue to be a focus, however FOB costs will increase above targeted levels due to the reduction in production levels associated with the wet weather," it said in presentation slides released to the ASX.
Macarthur said it still should be able to achieve a sales target of around 5 million tonnes for its Coppabella and Moorvale joint venture for fiscal 2012, but at a higher cost than first thought, again due to the weather.
The company said the impact of Japan’s earthquake and tsunami disaster had been minimal to date and the company had also seen record price settlements for PCI coal at $US275 a tonne.
The shares fell 39c, or 3.2% to $11.85 yesterday.
Meanwhile mineral sands miner Iluka Resources says sales jumped 51% in the March quarter, as prices for its products surged on demand from emerging markets.
Revenues climbed to $226.3 million in the quarter, compared with $149.4 million a year earlier.
But the company’s shares fell 31c or 2.2% to $13.79 on the ASX yesterday.
Iluka said its weighted average price for zircon during the first quarter came to a little above $US1300 a tonne, an increase of more than 20% over the previous quarter, while it expects to achieve a further 20% price increase in the second quarter.
"Australian zircon and rutile production volumes in the March quarter met or exceeded internal expectations, associated with favourable assemblages and above budget mineral separation plant recoveries and throughputs at Jacinth-Ambrosia and Murray Basin operations," Iluka said in the March quarter quarterly report released yesterday.
For titanium, it said first-quarter pricing increases were in line with the 30-40% price increase already predicted for the first half of the year.
Production of zircon in the three months to the end of March totalled 135,500 tonnes, up, 9.7% on the same quarter in 2010.
Iluka said it expected to produce 500,000 tonnes over the course of the full year.
Production of the titanium ores rutile and synthetic rutile totalled 63,000 tonnes and 78,500 tonnes respectively, drops of 1.3% and 10% respectively.
Production guidance for the full-year was 250,000 tonnes of rutile and 220,000 tonnes of synthetic rutile.
Fortescue Metals Group said yesterday that it shipped 11.5% less iron ore in the March quarter compared with a year earlier, as heavy rain hit operations.
"Heavy rain across the Pilbara has impacted Fortescue’s operations with a 15 per cent reduction in shipping volumes to 8.4 million tonnes (mt) and a C1 cost of US$45/t," the company said.
That compared to 9.45 million tonnes in the corresponding period a year earlier.
"The realised average selling price over the period was US$162/t CFR (dry tonne) representing an eight per cent increase on the previous period."
The company also forecast, in its quarterly production report out yesterday that it would ship about 12 million tonnes of iron ore in the June quarter as production would be boosted by the completion of the Christmas Creek processing facility.
The shares fell 25c to $6.54, or 3.7%.
