Fergs Finds

This is a short weekly email that covers a few things I’ve found interesting during the week.

Article(s)

AUSMASA: Skills Shortages in Mining

I guess it should come as no surprise that the chart of Australian mining graduates looks similar to the chart patterns of many of the commodities I follow, in its bombed-out, crawling along the bottom of the chart.

It’s not just Australia either:

• The United States has lost nearly half its mining engineering enrollment — from 1,561 students in 2015 to approximately 600 by 2022. Twelve mining engineering programs have closed since 1985, reducing the total from 25 to 14. The remaining schools collectively graduate fewer than 200 mining engineers annually, whereas an estimated 400+ are needed.

• The United Kingdom represents the most extreme case. The Royal School of Mines at Imperial College abandoned mining as a standalone discipline. Camborne School of Mines, the last UK institution offering undergraduate mining engineering, paused new intakes in 2020 after its final cohort dwindled to just 4 students. Of the 1,250 mining engineers on the UK Engineering Council register, 80% are over 50 and 40% are at least 60. The UK currently has no traditional full-time undergraduate mining engineering program. (I stand corrected thanks Josh as the the course has now been re-opened to new graduates!)

Podcast/Video

Jeffrey Gundlach: Our Next Turning Point

I particularly enjoyed this section from the 38-minute mark on, where he dug into “Volatility laundering”. DoubleLine recently put out this piece on it.

Quote

This ties to Gundlach’s observation that there has been a lot of “marking to myth”.

“Larry, beware of the three L’s and the three M’s.”​

“Liquor, ladies, and leverage.” (the three L’s)​

“Mark to market, mark to model, and mark to myth.” (the three M’s)​

-Lawrence McDonald describing a conversation he had with Charlie Munger.

Tweet/Notes

Marine Traffic: Strait of Hormuz Ship Tracking Map

Yes, a few ships are slipping through with their transponders off, but consider the prior average was roughly 138 vessels per day, of which ~60% were tankers.

Unless vessels start moving, tacos are off the menu.

Charts

Following the earlier article on mining skills shortages, one has to wonder whether mining automation will be the way to overcome the skills shortage.

A little case study I’m monitoring is Fortescue’s full embrace of cheap Chinese loans and mining equipment vs BHP’s ongoing disputes with China (China widens BHP iron ore restrictions as talks drag).

China will dominate the global automation/robotics market, having perfected it in its domestic market (before considering critical mineral access).

Something I’m Pondering

I’m pondering new ways to use AI to improve my research/investment process.

They say the first casualty of the war is the truth, so I’ve been playing around with ways to get a well-rounded picture.

Take the example below, using Claude Opus 4.6 with extended + research mode.

A hack I use constantly is the following when first looking at a company. It’s amazing what it throws out and quite often leads you to a competitor who is better positioned. A good exercise is to run your current portfolio positions through this and see how confident you are being on the other side of the risks it identifies.

Hope you are all having a great week!

Cheers,

Ferg

P.S. I wrote this piece to outline a few of the rules I stick to religiously to protect myself from a dose of FOMO…