Iron-Ore Miners Strive to Avoid Past Mistakes as Prices

Iron-ore’s record prices are encouraging a wave of investment in mining ventures, with companies hoping to avoid a repeat of the previous boom a decade ago that ended in multiple pit closures and abandoned developments.

Chinese companies are pushing to build one of the world’s biggest mines in West Africa, while a clutch of smaller companies are developing new mines in Australia or reopening mothballed pits idled years ago when prices were low. Many are betting that demand for iron ore, used to make steel, will remain buoyant as governments world-wide inject billions of dollars into their economies.
The benchmark iron-ore price rose to a record $233.10 a metric ton this month, according to data from S&P Global Platts, as China’s steel industry cranked up output. The rally mirrors gains in prices of commodities, including copper and crude oil, which are also in demand as the global economic recovery from the Covid-19 pandemic gathers pace.

New iron-ore entrants see an opportunity to thrive because the industry’s biggest producers are behaving differently than a decade ago.

People tend to think of “529” education-savings plans as a nifty way to save and invest tax-free for college or schooling costs, and they are.  But accountants, estate lawyers, and financial planners say they also are flexible estate-planning tools that can have utility beyond education spending and cost almost nothing to set up.

They could become even more valuable as the White House is likely to seek higher taxes to fund expanded government programs. During his campaign, President Biden proposed chopping the estate tax exclusion from its current level of $11.7 million per person. If the exemption is lowered to $5 million or even $3.5 million, as some in Congress want and Biden has suggested, millions of American families suddenly could be looking for ways to reduce their estates.
TOTTENHAM, Australia — The stench hits you first, pungent, musty and rotting. Then you hear them: a sound like ocean waves, or pouring rain hitting concrete. And the occasional squeak.

The horror lurking in the darkness is a throng of thousands of mice swarming above, around and inside a storage bunker of wheat at the Fragar family’s farm seven hours west of Sydney, Australia. After a long and painful drought, the mice are ravaging the family’s first good harvest in years and endangering the next one, putting their business on the brink of ruin.

Their farm is just one of thousands along the country’s eastern grain belt that are contending with what local residents call the worst mouse plague in living memory, with far-reaching consequences both in the fields and in rural communities.
Commencement speeches can bleed together. Adversity: overcome. Mountains: climbed. Friendships: lifelong.

But this year, as esteemed speakers across the country noted, graduation really is a victory.

“Surviving means that you have come through the catastrophe but you’re still relatively intact,” the basketball legend Kareem Abdul-Jabbar told graduates at Washington University in St. Louis. “Thriving is about learning and growing as a result of the event. That’s what graduations are all about.”
Utah Jazz coach Quin Snyder publicly apologized to Memphis Grizzlies guard Ja Morant and his family on Friday, calling for a lifetime ban for the three fans who directed vulgar, racist language at Morant’s family during Game 2 in Salt Lake City.

The Jazz banned the three fans indefinitely after the incident, but Snyder said he believes the punishment needs to be taken a step further.

“First, I’d like to apologize to Ja and his family,” Snyder said after Friday’s practice. “No one should have to be subjected to the kind of behavior that they were the other night. It’s deplorable. And the people that made those comments should be banned for life. I’m sorry for [his family] to have to endure that and as I said it’s deplorable and concerning and should not be tolerated.”

A severed head found in a plastic bag along a stretch of highway in Louisiana in 2018 was identified this week as that of a 58-year-old Texas woman missing for more than three years, according to reports. 

Sally Ann Hines, 58, was last seen Dec. 14, 2017, in her hometown of San Antonio, the San Antonio Express-News reported. 

Investigators distributed a composite sketch of Hines’ face in 2018 after sending her head to the Louisiana State University’s Faces laboratory for analysis. Her head was found by a sheriff’s team picking up litter in the marshland. 

She was identified through dental records following a tip from a local woman who had noticed similarities in the composite image and Hines’ missing person flyer. 
LOS ANGELES — Albert Pujols lingered near the batter’s box after connecting. Many LA players jumped the dugout rail. And lots of fans at Dodger Stadium raised their arms, all ready to celebrate.

Mike Tauchman had other ideas.

Tauchman remarkably reached over the left-field wall to rob Pujols of a walk-off home run in the bottom of the ninth inning, and San Francisco broke through in the 10th to beat the Los Angeles Dodgers in an 8-5 thriller Friday night.

Dodgers pinch-hitter Austin Barnes provided a jolt when he hit a three-run homer with two outs in the ninth to make it 5-all. Pujols was up next and the recently signed slugger launched a long, high drive.

“I mean just off the bat I thought obviously he hit it well,” Tauchman said.