Gold ended 2025 at record levels after setting 53 all‑time price highs through the year, signalling sustained investor demand amid persistent inflation and geopolitical risk. Analysts cited strong central bank buying, robust over-the-counter trading in London and COMEX futures positioning as key drivers, with spot prices repeatedly breaking through previous resistance bands. For miners, the extended bull run is supporting higher cut-off grades, accelerated feasibility work on marginal orebodies, and renewed financing appetite for greenfield gold projects.

Merger talks between Rio Tinto and Glencore are reported to be closer than ever, with both majors exploring potential corporate combinations that would create one of the world’s largest diversified miners across iron ore, copper, aluminium, coal and trading. Any deal would integrate Rio’s Pilbara iron ore system and Oyu Tolgoi copper operation with Glencore’s global copper, zinc and coal portfolio and its dominant commodity marketing arm. For engineers and contractors, a combined group could rationalise capital spend, consolidate project pipelines and reshape procurement and offtake terms across multiple regions.

Timken solid-block housed units, promoted in Australia by Motion, target crushers, conveyors and vibrating screens operating in high-shock, high-contamination mining environments where conventional split housings and standard deep-groove bearings often fail prematurely. The factory-assembled units combine a one-piece cast steel housing with triple-lip or labyrinth seals and full-contact bearing inserts, designed to tolerate heavy misalignment, shaft deflection and poor lubrication conditions typical of hard-rock and bulk-handling plants. For maintenance teams, the drop-in design and sealed-for-life options aim to cut unplanned downtime and reduce the frequency of relubrication in remote sites.