London/Johannesburg — It’s more than a decade since miners and traders have met at London’s annual Platinum Week with prices as low as they are right now. Soft prices, currency moves that have boosted mining costs, and an uncertain demand outlook are weighing on the producers who’ll gather for cocktails under the medieval stone arches of the City of London’s Guildhall next week. "It’s an incredibly tough market out there and likely to be tough for the rest of the year — and maybe next," Anglo American Platinum CEO Chris Griffith said in an interview. "Market sentiment is negative towards platinum at present and that begins to feed on itself irrespective of the long-term fundamentals of supply and demand." The commodity, mainly used to cut pollution from diesel cars, is down more than 20% from its highs of nine months ago to about $925 an ounce. Prices are even lower than during 2016’s event, when the industry was already heaving from a 10% slump from a year earlier. Griffith is stil...
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