The Bre-X Gold Scandal, History and Resources

The Bre-X Gold Scandal, History and Resources Start with the biggest deposit of gold ever reported, in the headwaters of the Busang River in the steaming jungle of Borneo. The Canadian company Bre-X Minerals Ltd. didnt know about that when it bought rights to the site in 1993. But after Bre-X hired a high-living geologist to map the ore body, the deposit, along with the fever dreams that accompany gold, grew to monster size- by March 1997 that geologist was talking about a 200-million-ounce resource. You do the math at, say US$500 per ounce in mid-1990s dollars. Bre-X prepared for big times ahead by building a gold-plated website, where you could generate your own Bre-X stock chart to follow its meteoric rise. It also had a chart showing the equally meteoric rise of the estimated gold resource: together, those two pages could infect anyone with gold fever. The Sharks Arrive Bigger mineral companies took notice. Some made takeover offers. So did the Indonesian government, in the person of president Suharto and his powerful family. Bre-X owned more of this lode than seemed prudent for such a small, inexperienced foreign firm. Suharto suggested that Bre-X share its fortunate surplus with the people of Indonesia and with Barrick, a firm tied to Suhartos ambitious daughter Siti Rukmana. (Barricks advisors, among them George H. W. Bush and ex-prime minister of Canada Brian Mulroney, also favored this scheme.) Bre-X responded by enlisting Suhartos son Sigit Hardjojudanto on its side. An impasse loomed. To end the contretemps, family friend Mohamad Bob Hasan stepped in to offer all sides a deal. The American firm Freeport-McMoRan Copper Gold, led by another old Suharto friend, would run the mine and Indonesian interests would share the wealth. Bre-X would keep 45 percent of the ownership and Hasan for his pains would accept a share possibly worth a billion or so. Asked what he was paying for this stake, Hasan said, There is no payment, no nothing. It is a very clean deal. Trouble Arises The deal was announced on 17 February 1997. Freeport went to Borneo to start its own due-diligence drilling. Suharto was ready to sign a contract after this step, locking in Bre-Xs land rights for 30 years and starting the flood of gold. But just four weeks later, Bre-Xs geologist at Busang, Michael de Guzman, exited his helicopter that was 250 meters in the air at the time- an evident suicide. On March 26 Freeport reported that its due-diligence cores, drilled only a meter and a half from Bre-Xs, showed insignificant amounts of gold. The next day Bre-X stock lost almost all of its value. Freeport brought more rock samples to its American headquarters under armed guard. Bre-X commissioned a review of Freeports drilling; the review recommended more drilling. Another review focusing on the chemical assays caused Bre-X to clam up completely on 1 April, and Suhartos signature was postponed. Bre-X, in a novel strategy for the time, blamed the Web. CEO David Walsh told a fawning Calgary Herald reporter that the meltdown began when scurrilous local rumors in Indonesia were picked up by one of the ghostwriters on the Internet on the chat page or whatever. Further reviews took the rest of April. Meanwhile, disquieting details began to arise. Industry journalists soon found evidence that the Busang ore samples had been salted with gold dust. Salting of the Earth On Friday 11 April, Northern Miner magazine put a news flash on its site laying out three lines of evidence that Bre-X had been duped. First, contrary to company statements, the Busang core samples had been prepared for assay in the jungle, not in the testing lab. A videotape made by a visitor to the field site showed the humble machines common in assay labs- hammer mills, crushers, and sample splitters. Well-labeled sample bags clearly had finely crushed ore in them. Security was lax enough that samples could easily have been spiked with gold.Second, the local inhabitants had begun panning for gold in the Busang River, but in two years they never found any. Yet Bre-X claimed that gold was visible, a sign of unusually rich ore. And de Guzmans technical report, confusingly, called the gold submicroscopic, which is typical of hard-rock gold ore.Third, the assayer that tested the samples said the gold was predominantly in visible-sized grains. Also, the grains showed signs consistent with being typical river-panned gold dust, such as rounded outlines and rims depleted in silver. The assayer dodged the 64-billion-dollar question, saying that there were indeed ways for hard-rock gold grains to acquire rounded edges- but that argument was a fig leaf. The Curtain Falls Meanwhile, a storm of securities lawsuits arose around Bre-X, which vigorously protested that this was just an unfortunate series of misunderstandings. But it was too late. The collapse of Bre-X cast a cloud over the gold mining industry that lasted into the next century. David Walsh decamped to the Bahamas, where he died of an aneurysm in 1998. Bre-Xs chief geologist, John Felderhof, eventually went on trial in Canada but was acquitted of securities fraud in July 2007. Apparently in selling part of his stock holdings for $84 million in the months before the scandal hit he had not been criminal, just too stupid to catch the fraud. And I have been told that Michael de Guzman has been seen in Canada, years after the scandal. The explanation would be that, as was rumored at the time, an anonymous corpse was thrown from the helicopter. You could say the very jungle had been salted as well as the ore bags.

Globalization, Unemployment, and Recession Links

Globalization, Unemployment, and Recession Links A reader recently sent me this e-mail: It seems to me that we are now engaged in an economy that may look different from any we have experienced. The Globalization of the economy has created huge firm closures in America expecially in manufacturing and forced lower wages on those employed by this sector. Typically and historically manufacturing jobs have created higher wages in this country but now we see all the rules are changing. Do you believe globalization will bring new trends to the relationship between rececession/depression and firm closures? I believe it already has begun. - Before we begin, Id like to thank the e-mailer for her very thoughtful question! I dont think globalization will change the relationship between recessions and firm closures, since the relationship between the two was fairly weak to begin with. In Are recessions good for the economy? we saw that: We do not see great differences in firm closures between periods of high growth and periods of low growth. While 1995 was the beginning of a period of exceptional growth, almost 500,000 firms closed shop. The year 2001 saw almost no growth in the economy, but we only had 14% more business closures than in 1995 and fewer businesses filed for bankruptcy in 2001 than 1995. Competition between firms in periods of growth: During a period of high economic growth, some firms still perform better than others. Those high performing ones can often squeeze weaker performing ones out of the marketplace, causing firm closures. Structural changes: High economic growth is often caused by technological improvements. More powerful and useful computers can drive economic growth, but they also spell disaster for companies that manufacture or sell typewriters. Would 0% Unemployment Be a Good Thing? Cyclical Unemployment is defined as occuring when the unemployment rate moves in the opposite direction as the GDP growth rate. So when GDP growth is small (or negative) unemployment is high. When the economy goes into recession and workers are laid off, we have cyclical unemployment. Frictional Unemployment: The Economics Glossary defines frictional unemployment as unemployment that comes from people moving between jobs, careers, and locations. If a person quits his job as an economics researcher to try and find a job in the music industry, we would consider this to be frictional unemployment. Structural Unemployment: The glossary defines structural unemployment as unemployment that comes from there being an absence of demand for the workers that are available. Structural unemployment is often due to technological change. If the introduction of DVD players cause the sales of VCRs to plummet, many of the people who manufacture VCRs will suddenly be out of work. Thats my take on the question - Id love to hear yours! You can contact me by using the feedback form.

Discuss some of the effects of mass transit and tourism on perceptions Essay

Discuss some of the effects of mass transit and tourism on perceptions of time, space and place in the late 20th century - Essay Example Mass tourism depended upon easier and faster modes of travel as well as the emerging concept of ‘leisure’ time, the creation of disposable income through the urban factories and the media possibilities of advertising and widespread distribution of literature. During the Victorian era, a period filled with the concept of colonization, society was encountering many new cultures and ways of life as a result of increasingly available forms of reliable transportation. Rather than appreciating them for what they offered – differing perspectives, alternate means of solving common societal issues or a way of life that eliminated some of the more common social ills experienced in the newly industrialized societies – colonizing nations sought to overcome these ‘others’ and force them into a worldview in keeping with their own. When this wasn’t possible, as in dealing with faraway nations in the Orient, inventions were made of the bits and pieces of information that came back that defined entire sections of the world according to what was imagined about them rather than on true accounts of them. In doing so, comparisons were made between the ‘other’ and the self, meaning the dominant culture of the col onizing nation which is, in this case, predominantly England, that placed the self at an aggrandized level and the ‘other’ at a level quite inferior. In other words, in encountering the ‘other’, the colonizing nation reacted in a way that demonized them, reduced them to second-class humans and thereby contained them within a less-threatening context while boosting the self to new levels of superiority. It is perhaps most educative to look first to the work of philosopher Edward Said for an explanation of the ‘other’ as he places it within the context of Orientalism, a term he used to define the way in which the English-speaking world sought to contain images of

Reflection paper Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words - 12

Reflection paper - Essay Example The first week as an LPN was a little hazy having missed some of the induction programs due to some unavoidable engagements. However, on the reporting day I met the friendly and professional staff who took me to the units. The environment was challenging dealing with the middle-aged, the elderly and the dementia patients. A typical day while in shift, I was attending to an elderly man who had diabetes. We were just two nurses on the night shift. As I went round monitoring the patients and collecting data on the patients’ conditions, I noticed that a number of patients needed great attention but the elderly man was in a severe state. I became terrified and confused wondering where to start. I attended to the diabetic man and arrested the condition and decided to attend to the other patients. I didn’t even think of asking for help to save time but decided to try my best. Some of the patients could look at me with pleading eyes. I remember one patient who said that she had lost hope and felt neglected when she saw me pass her and attend to someone else. However, she admitted that I was not assuming her but had to attend to a serious case. Some of the patients also were not co-operating, and some could keep quiet completely when I question them so as to understand their health progress. Among the tasks, I was entitled to include personal hygiene duties such as brushing the teeth of the residents, bathing them, changing clothes, combing hair and shaving them. Toiletry duties such as assisting those who needed help going to the bathroom, changing bedpans and emptying catheters. In addition, I could do the monitoring of the respiration, blood pressure, temperature, oxygen levels and heart rates of the patients. Also inserting catheters, treating bedsores, giving injections, administering injections and changing bandages and developing care plans for the

Reactions to Oppression in Jamaica and South Africa :: Jamaica Oppressed Culture Religion Essays

Reactions to Oppression in Jamaica and South Africa "Bob Marley said How long shall they kill our prophets While we stand aside and look Little did he know that eventually The enemy will stand aside and look While we slash and kill our own brothers Knowing that already they are the victims of the situation" Lucky Dube, Victims Lucky Dube is a reggae artist from South Africa singing in a fight against oppression in his country. Like Jamaica, South Africa has been oppressed since the days of the European colonizers. The only difference is some Africans lost their land and others were stolen from their land. In this paper, the reactions of Africans (Jamaicans included) to oppression will be surveyed through politics, religion, and music. This will be done through a comparison of these ideas between South Africa and Jamaica. Both these countries have been subjected to nearly 400 years of oppression of Europeans over Africans. The oppression of the indigenous people of South Africa began with the colonization by the Dutch through the Dutch East India Company. The cape of South Africa proved to be a perfect resting spot for ships on their course from Holland or India. (Lapping, p. 1-2) Conflict was inevitable and finally after 7 years of settlement the indigenous Khoikhoi attacked the colony. The Khoikhioi could not match the firearms of the Dutch. (Lapping, p. 3) Van Riebeek, who proceeded over the colony had now gained superiority over the indigenous people, imported slaves, and settled the freeburghers. The freeburghers were settled on large farms, which required strong laborers. This is where the slaves came in handy since the colony did not like the Khoikhoi labor. As the freeburghers and the slaves married, a population called the Cape coloreds arose. No more Dutch were sent since this was to be a refreshing post. In 1688, after an outbreak of religious persecution in France, some two hundred French H ugeuenots arrived. (Lapping, p. 3-5) As the colony grew, the farmers (Boers) began to move forward inland. The conflicts between them and the indigenous people increased. By 1702, fights began breaking out with another indigenous culture, the Xhosa. The white mans claim to the land, ‘We were here first.’ This is however not true because the Portuguese had traded with the Xhosa before the Dutch arrived. These were not the only inhabitants of the interior, there were as the Sotho, which are now present day Botswanans and the Zulu.

Outline and evaluate the learning theory of attachment Essay

The learning theory of attachment focuses of two concepts; operant and classical conditioning. Classical conditioning as an explanation for attachment describes the baby receiving food (and unconditioned stimulus) and producing an unconditioned response (happiness) and the mother feeding the baby will be the neutral stimulus. The baby will then experience the mother giving them food (and therefore happiness) a number of times and then learn to associate the mother (now a conditioned stimulus) with the feeling of happiness (a conditioned response) and thus an attachment will form. Operant conditioning describes attachment as a reinforced response. When a baby gets food it’s discomfort will become happiness and the baby will associate this feeling with food and therefore food will become the primary reinforcer. The person feeding the baby will also be associated with the happiness and therefore become the secondary reinforcer and an attachment will form. (evaluate) Even though the learning theory of attachment provides an adequate explanation of attachment it is flawed. Research evidence, such as that of Harlow’s monkey study, opposes the idea of learning theory as an explanation of attachment. Harlow’s monkey study involved giving a baby monkey the choice of either food or comfort (food was portrayed by a wire ‘monkey’ with a feeding bottle attached to it and comfort was portrayed by a wire ‘monkey’ covered in cloth). According to the learning theory of attachment the monkey should have spent most of his time on the food ‘monkey, however the opposite was true – the monkey spent the majority of his time on the comfort ‘monkey’. This decreases the validity of the learning theory of attachment as an explanation for attachment because the findings of Harlow’s monkey study opposed what it suggested. However, the monkey study was conducted on monkeys and it could be argued that this is not an accurate representation of human attachment. Humans are a lot more complex than animals and so therefore research on animals to study behaviour cannot be applied to human behaviour. Outline and evaluate the learning theory of attachment (12 marks) A GRADE (outline)

Oedipus Rex - 1350 Words

Greek Tragedy The Greek drama Oedipus Rex is clearly a tragedy. It definitely meets the five main criteria for a tragedy: a tragic hero of noble birth, a tragic flaw, a fall from grace, a moment of remorse, and catharsis. Interestingly, even though Oedipus the King came before Poetics, Sophocles’ play illustrates Aristotle’s rules for classical drama. Oedipus the King particularly displays a tragic emotion, a tragic character, and a tragic fall. Aristotle also writes that such a drama ought to have a change accompanied by a reversal, or by recognition, or by both. Aristotle also points out terms such as catharsis, which can be said that is the purification of one’s soul. He argues in his Poetics that catharsis is achieved through†¦show more content†¦The play offers a perfect illustration of the nature of the hamartia as â€Å"mistake† or error rather than flaw. Oedipus directly causes his own downfall not because he is evil, or proud, or weak, but simply becau se he does not know who he is. Chorus The Chorus attempts to position itself in the audience’s mind as the population of Thebes, and functions largely as petitioners, relatively indecisive to the plot. The play moves on, though, and by the middle third, the Chorus begins to act as a moderator, providing a sober perspective on the heated arguments that rage throughout, attempting to infuse the arguing parties with the spirit of reconciliation, or at least keep the tempers from taking control of the characters’ actions. As the end approaches, the Chorus does indeed render judgment upon Oedipus, condemning him, in the eyes of the audience and himself as the cause of the plague of Thebes. In the beginning, they have found themselves threatened by the plague that has descended on Thebes, and so open the play by petitioning for help. By the middle third, the Chorus plays a small role as mediator. It is when these truths begin to conflict, though, in the second third of the tale, which the Chorus first begins to fully blossom into what it was intended, as a third, unbiased perspective toShow MoreRelatedOedipus Rex900 Words   |  4 PagesThe philosopher Aristotle wrote his work Poetics as a deconstruction of aesthetics approximately 50 years after the death of Sophocles, the author of Oedipus Rex. Aristotle was a great admirer of the works of Sophocles and is said to have considered Oedipus Rex to be the perfect tragedy and the basis for his thoughts in Poetics. He defines tragedy as, â€Å"an imitation of an action that is serious, complete, and of a certain magnitude; in language embellished with each kind of artistic ornament, theRead MoreThe Tragedy Of Oedipus Oed ipus Rex 928 Words   |  4 Pagesbetween Oedipus’ irrevocable circumstances as well as his flawed character that makes Sophocles’ â€Å"Oedipus Rex† a quintessential example of Greek drama. His circumstances, which are set by the Gods, are profound and beyond anyone’s control; either he must be killed or there will be great consequences. His parent’s rejection of the oracle set by the gods, the degrees of separation from his origin, and his flawed sense of pride is the complexity of the plot as well as what makes Oedipus the complexRead Moreoedipus rex2234 Words   |  9 Pages In Sophocles’ play, Oedipus Rex, there are many themes that are woven through the life of King Oedipus, and revealed through the key points of the plot. One of the most important themes is the inevitability of ones’ fate. Although fate is considered the usual genre of the Greeks in playwriting there, are specifics that Oedipus conducts unusual to our own way of thinking of a king during the Ancient Greek times. For example: Oedipus’s ignorance of believing what is said from his wife, IocasteRead MoreOedipus Rex2527 Words   |  11 PagesEssay on Oedipus Rex 4-3-97 In Sophocles Oedipus Rex, the theme of irony plays an important part through the play. What Oedipus does, what he says, and even who he is can sometimes be ironic. This irony can help us to see the character of Oedipus as truly a blind man, or a wholly public man. A great irony is found in Oedipuss decree condemning the murderer. Oedipus says, To avenge the city and the citys god, / And not as though it were for some distant friend, / But for my own sake, to beRead MoreOedipus Rex By Oedipus The King1206 Words   |  5 PagesOedipus’ evolution throughout the Theban plays is one with fascinating twists and turns. Oedipus’ characterisation evolves and changes as he experiences the fall from being the great ruler of Thebes into a blind beggar who is tortured by what he did. As the stories progress, so does their protagonist to the point where the Oedipus of the second play is a completely different man. In Oedipus Rex, the main character is portrayed as a strong and clever yet arrogant king whose ignorance leads him toRead MoreThe Characterization Of Oedipus Oedipus Rex 1303 Words   |  6 PagesIn Sophocles tragic play, Oedipus Rex, there is often feedback when discussing the characterization of Oedipus. Key issues in this pla y are pointed towards in realm of a tragedy, because Oedipus suffers a few character flaws such as anger, pride and arrogance. Within those flaws, he fails to reflect upon his actions; causing blindness and later, result his honor to be under minded and seen at the forefront of Thebes. What makes this play more on the fringe than other tragic plays are Oedipus’sRead MoreThe Consequences Of Oedipus Rex808 Words   |  4 Pageslittle shrapnel of life that he can. Oedipus from Socrates’ great work Oedipus Rex knows this kind of feeling far too well, having the city of Thebes in which citizens worship him as king have their be under some sort of curse of unknown origin. The curse, sadly, had its origin in Oedipus himself and the parents which abandoned him, causing a string of events which include father murder, incest, self-doubt, suspicion, and a plethora of other events which sends Oedipus’ mind farther and farther down intoRead MoreReview Of Oedipus Rex 1342 Words   |  6 PagesJake Gilman Modern Mythology Period 8 Fusaro Oedipus Rex Reading Questions What appears to be the function of the Chorus? - The chorus in Greek tragedies has a similar function to the narrator in various books and plays. It is an outside source that describes the actions of the characters, as well as their thoughts or feelings. Just like a narrator, the chorus can be used to foreshadow an upcoming event and provide more detail than what is said on stage. However, theRead MoreOedipus The King, Or Oedipus Rex1249 Words   |  5 Pagesmost famous probably being Sophocles’ Oedipus the King, or Oedipus Rex. For a play to be considered a tragedy, it must have a tragic hero. According to Aristotle’s definition of a tragic hero, they must be a decent moral person, of high social standing who eventually meets with a tragic downfall, of their own doing, suffering more than deserved, and realizing their error too late. In the play Oedipus the King, Oedipus is the epitome of a tragic hero. Oedipus Rex was generally a â€Å"good† person; he wasRead MoreOedipus Rex Translations1020 Words   |  5 Pagesversions of Oedipus Rex, the first version translated by Fitts and Fitzgerald, and the second translated by Luci Berowitz and Theodore Brunner, the emotional appeal is quite different due to the different diction of each of the translation versions. The different diction in the two versions seems to give Oedipus two different characters. The diction that the four authors use in their translations of Oedipus Rex is very effective in conveying different emotional feelings about Oedipus and his thoughts