Mining PRs and the Ottotrans™, Part 36

Today's attempt to decipher mining-news-release-English into something that sentient beings have a chance of understanding comes from the IR department of Paladin Energy Ltd (PDN.ax) (PDN.to):

This is what they wrote:

PERTH, WESTERN AUSTRALIA--(Marketwire - March 16, 2011) - Paladin Energy Ltd. (TSX:PDN - News; ASX:PDN - News; "Paladin" or the "Company") expresses its deepest condolences to the people of Japan following the tragic events of Friday 11 March 2011. "We are very saddened by the catastrophic events and extreme loss of life following the dual natural disasters of an earthquake and tsunami", stated John Borshoff, Managing Director/CEO of Paladin. "We are encouraged that Fukushima plant managers are making public safety their highest priority and although the situation remains of grave concern it seems to be progressing slowly towards stabilisation of the damaged reactors".

Paladin has had numerous queries regarding its business with Japan and the impact of recent events. While the Company endeavours to work with all participants in the nuclear sector and is developing a regional diversified sales portfolio, it does not currently have a commercial relationship with Japanese utilities. Paladin has a strong balance sheet with US$251.8M in cash as of 31 December 2010; is on track to produce 6Mlb to 6.3Mlb U3O8 in FY 2011; and commissioning of Langer Heinrich Mine Stage 3 expansion to 5.2Mlb U3O8 will occur in April giving the Company an installed capacity to provide 8.5Mlb U3O8 pa.

Paladin continues to believe that the medium and long-term outlook for nuclear power remains positive and that recent events could further exacerbate the supply situation, ironically putting Paladin in an even better position with respect to global demand. There are more than 440 nuclear reactors operating safely around the world and growth of the fleet is assured with the 62 reactors currently under construction, with further expansion forecast from the emerging nuclear economies.

Paladin will hold a conference call regarding the Japanese nuclear situation on Thursday 17 March details below (continues here)

And this is what it means:

We're fucked.

UPDATE: Two images to share. First this one, the intraday chart of PDN.to so far:

Then this one (Mex guise by reader request):

Thorium and soda served, the end

Fronteer (FRG) lets uranium people worry about uranium

In December 2008, Fronteer (FRG) bought the 58% of shares in Aurora Energy that it didn't already own for $110m worth of its shares. The deal put a value of around $190m on Aurora and also came with the $86m in cash held by Aurora that was folded into the FRG books....so wrap that one with a neat bow and say FRG paid $104m for the Aurora assets.

Today, FRG has disposed of those assets. Paladin Energy (PDN.to) has agreed to pay $260m in stock for the Aurora assets. At first pass it looks like a decent win-win situation, where FRG gets to unload (and capitalize) on a decent asset that wasn't part of its core plan moving forward (it wants to be a gold miner.....lord knows why?) and Paladin gets to do what it's good at with a very good looking uranium asset (that's still under moratorium). And for the last two years, FRG has basically done zipsquat with Aurora thanks to that moratorium.

A final thought: Maybe FRG is now more attractive to majors as a purer gold play. Maybe today's move will start M&A rumours....maybe maybe maybe.....