Norilsk Nickel revealed on Friday (30th October) that its platinum and palladium production both increased on a year on-year basis during the third quarter of 2009.

Platinum output was 173,000 oz, compared to 157,000 oz for the equivalent period 12 months earlier, while production of palladium rose from 686,000 oz to 704,000 oz.

The company saw platinum production decline from 495,000 oz to 488,000 oz in the first nine months of the year, with palladium output down from 2.124 million ounces to 2.059 million ounces.

However, the world's largest nickel and palladium producer also confirmed that it has upped its full-year output targets for both metals from estimates made earlier this year.

It now expects palladium production to be 2.850 million ounces (up from 2.685-2.71 million ounces), while palladium output is predicted to be 668,000 oz, rather than 615,000-640,000 oz.

The quarterly results also revealed that nickel output fell from 75,067 tonnes to 66,703 tonnes, while copper production slumped from 108,593 tonnes to 101,608 tonnes.

Norilsk indicated last December that it would produce less volume of metal in 2009 as a result of the economic downturn and trimmed a number of output forecasts in May.

Sources:

MMC NORILSK NICKEL ANNOUNCES PRELIMINARY CONSOLIDATED PRODUCTION RESULTS FOR 3rd QUARTER AND 9 MONTHS 2009 (30/10/09)

UPDATE 1-Norilsk cuts '09 nickel output forecast, ups palladium (30/10/09)

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