With the bulk-shipping business in the doldrums, the profitable nickel trade is a siren call for ship owners and charterers.
Total world demand for europium (used in cathode ray tubes), for example, is just 250 tons, while the ferro-vanadium market is estimated to be around 65,000 tons a year, a fraction of the 1.2 million tons of nickel traded annually and infinitesimal alongside the billion-ton-a-year iron ore market.
The London Metal Exchange's three-month nickel contract traded around $9,575 a metric ton today, up 70percentt since early January 2002 and 33percentt so far this year.
Nickel recently traded at a 15-year high, while copper surged by almost 40percentt last year, rising above $1 a pound in December for the first time since the fall of 1997.
But Mr. Nagel and professional day traders like him, whose number has been depleted by the collapse of the bull market, prey on the wild swings, trying to capture a dime here or a nickel there on trades of 100 shares to several hundred thousand shares.
Some stocks will begin trading in nickel increments, though many could be trading in penny increments by the end of the year.
Cuba traded sugar, nickel, and citrus for Soviet oil, wheat, chemicals, and machinery.
Mensink said in a statement that Queensland Nickel's decision to continue trading through administration had saved about 2,100 other jobs in Townsville supported by its operations.
Shanghai Futures Exchange zinc and nickel prices rose in early trading on Wednesday, tracking gains in London and on hopes countries would bring in new measures to soothe uncertainty after the referendum.
However, in Birmingham there were already Dutch silver 18th century coins forged in nickel around 1833 (meant for trading in Malaya).
