October 15 (SeeNews) - The Bulgarian unit of Europe's biggest copper producer, Aurubis, and China Minmetals, China's largest metals trader, on Thursday signed a copper deal worth some $800 million (536 million euro), the government in Sofia said.
The deal was signed within the framework of a Bulgarian-Chinese business forum that opened in Sofia on Thursday, the Bulgarian government said in a statement.
"The agreement is about delivery of copper cathodes by Aurubis Bulgaria to China for the next six years. Volumes can vary between zero and the maximum of 24,000 tonnes per year," Michaela Hessling, Aurubis head of group communications, told SeeNews over the phone.
"The value [of the deal] depends on the copper price and the volumes," Hessling said.
The agreed 24,000 tonnes per year are equal to two percent of Aurubis Group overall cathodes production, Hessling said.
Aurubis Bulgaria, which has a copper smelter in Pirdop, 80 kilometres north of the capital Sofia, produced 264,895 tonnes of anodes and 126,853 tonnes of cathodes in 2008, compared to 229,000 tonnes of anodes and 70,000 tonnes of cathodes in the previous year. Last year, Aurubis Bulgaria opened an 82 million euro refinery with an annual capacity of 180,000 tonnes of cathodes which is running at full capacity.
Aurubis (www.aurubis.com), which emerged after Germany’s Norddeutsche Affinerie took over Belgian copper group Cumerio last year, has about 4,800 employees at a total of 12 production sites in Germany, Belgium, Bulgaria, Italy, Switzerland, Britain and Slovakia. It produces some one million tonnes of copper cathodes and more than 1.2 million tonnes of copper products a year.
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