Ural Mining Beats Norilsk to Russian Nickel Asset, RIA Reports

Ural Mining & Metallurgical Co., Russia’s largest copper producer, won rights to the Elanskoye nickel deposit in the Voronezh region, beating a bid by OAO GMK Norilsk Nickel, RIA Novosti reported.

Norilsk withdrew its bid for a second Voronezh deposit at Elkinskoye following the decision, the company said today in an e-mailed statement. Ural Mining declined to comment immediately. A call to the offices of Voronezhnedra, which held the tender for the deposits, went unanswered outside of normal hours.

The deposits in Russia’s last large untapped mining province contain as much as 448,000 million metric tons of nickel resources and 60,000 tons of copper.

Norilsk, Russia’s largest mining company, said on Feb. 27 it may bid for the deposits and invest as much as 50 billion rubles ($1.6 billion) in their development.

To contact the reporters on this story: Yuliya Fedorinova in Moscow at yfedorinova@bloomberg.net; Ilya Khrennikov in Moscow at ikhrennikov@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: John Viljoen at jviljoen@bloomberg.net