It’s the usual stellar line-up of names. No Robert Friedland this year, but aside from that all the usual suspects are set to take to the podium at some stage or another during next week’s Mines & Money conference in London.
Top billing on the conference website goes to Ross Beaty, the legendary chairman of Pan American Silver (TSE:PAA) which he’s built into one of the largest silver producers of the world.
Not every punter will agree that he deserves to go ahead of Rick Rule, the chairman of Sprott, arguably one of the most influential investment houses in Canada, or Mark Bristow, the man who’s consistently steered Randgold Resources through the good times and the bad, maintaining its position in the FTSE100 in spite of everything the gold price can throw at him.
Then there’s Evy Hambro, whose star isn’t perhaps shining as brightly as it once was at Black Rock, and Frank Holmes, the chief executive of US Global Investors.
These are stellar names in the world of mining finance, and what they have to say about the state of the market and the outlook for 2016 will be of real interest.
But how much business is actually likely to get done in the meeting rooms around the Islington Business Design Centre and the wider network of pubs beyond?
That is an open question that no one really seems to know the answer to at this stage.
For one thing, there remains the uncertainty about the US Federal Reserve’s stance on interest rates, and the affect that is likely to have on global commodities prices.
But there’s more to it than that.
In the mining industry, at least at the smaller end of the sector an air of uncertainty now pervades.
There’s a general feeling that if good times aren’t exactly round the corner, market conditions are unlikely to get much worse than they are now.
Apart from anything else, you don’t need a complicated analytical model to know at current commodity price levels less material is likely to be produced and that that in turn will lead, eventually, to constraints on the supply side.
But as to demand, that is the great unknown.
Current demand from China is still huge compared to what it was ten years ago, even if it is weakening off now.
The majors – BHP Billiton (LON:BLT), Rio (LON:RIO), Anglo (LON:AAL) and Vale (NYSE:VALE) - are pumping out increased volumes of iron ore in response, and seem unconcerned that the price is dropping.
The squeeze on margins will be made up by the increased volumes, so the thinking goes. Indeed, as Henry Ford would have said, that way of thinking is key making a business really big.
Where that leaves smaller companies though remains to be seen. The gold price is under pressure. Bulks have dropped through the floor. And the base metals are now hitting multi-year lows too.
All of which has been in the air for some time now, and comes as no surprise to anyone.
What to do about it is another matter.
The Canadians’ tried and tested response is to hunker down and put juniors into a semi-dormant state – running them on “fumes”, as the saying goes.
The Australians meanwhile, are making hay with a weaker Australian dollar, and are increasingly returning to their home market.
And the international juniors being run out of London are returning once more to the old tried and tested model of supporting larger aspirations with small-scale production.
So what does this all mean for Mines & Money?
It means that whatever long-term plans the likes of Evy Hambro, Rick Rule and Frank Holmes outline, there will be very little appetite for pure-play exploration, and not much indeed either for early stage development.
What’s more, there are plenty of companies around with projects at a relatively advanced stage – viz. Condor Gold (LON:CNR) and Amara (LON:AMA) – who are also struggling to raise interest.
It’s not that the quality of what these and others like them offer is in doubt. It’s simply that the market’s not buying at the moment.
Hot money has flowed elsewhere and it will be a while yet before it comes back.
Mining company directors know this, and they are now well and truly over the shock that followed the end of the boom in 2011, when the gold price turned.
But as to whether that means there’s any real appetite for deals, even with assets now on the block at knock-down prices, remains to be seen.