Author: Paul Ploumis30 Apr 2014 Last updated at 03:06:19 GMT

MOSCOW (Scrap Monster): The concerns that Nickel Supplies would be disrupted by sanctions against Russia over the Ukraine Crisis were overstated, said Vladimir Potanin, the billionaire who runs Russia’s OAO GMK Norilsk Nickel.

Nickel supplies have increased 31 percent this year after the ban on Indonesian exports of unprocessed ore. Potanin said that the medium-term outlook was for stable prices because Indonesia would start its own processed production of nickel within the next two years. This compensate for the shortfall of nickel supplies. According to him, Indonesia seems as the key nickel driver and the rest of factors had only minor effects.

Before the US charged sanctions on 7 Russian officials and 17 companies, Nickel attained the highest price level in almost fifteen months in London last day. Norilsk Billionaire said that Norilsk would continue to sign up long term nickel supply contracts with the European customers and also to maintain good customer relationship with US. The mining company has no issue in financial arrangements and agreed to $750 million of loans from an international lenders’ group this month, he added.

Potanin said that the Company also planned to increase the shipments to China, a serious driver of the world’s economy and this had nothing to do with the crisis in Ukraine. The company decided to ship 100,000 metric tons of nickel to China this year which was about 70,000 metric tons last year. This would be the maximum level for them at which their sales would be balanced between all places.