The closure of the Indonesian Stock Exchange since Wednesday has not affected the production and investment plans of the company’s leading tin producer PT Timah. Abrun Abubakar, corporate secretary at state-owned Timah, the world’s second largest tin produce, told Metal Bulletin on Thursday that there was no immediate impact on the company’s operations. "But the urgency to complete projects that are still in the early stage of exploration is greater now, so that we can exploit the benefits sooner" he said.
Trading on the Jakarta exchange has remained suspended for the rest of the week. At the time of the suspension of the market Timah shares had dropped to 1,140 rupiah (US 12 cents) per share. Timah and other state-controlled companies have been urged by the Indonesian government to institute share buy-back programmes and to support the rupiah by converting US dollar cash reserves into the local currency.
Earlier this week Timah reported positive results from its exploration programme, adding 9,177 tonnes to its reserves as a result of new drilling carried out from January to September. The average grade of the new reserves was 252 g/m3. The company’s proven and probable reserves at the start of this year were 357,600 tonnes of contained tin.
