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RUSTENBURG, South Africa (Reuters) ? South African riot police fired tear gas, rubber bullets and water cannon on Thursday at hundreds of striking miners who went on the rampage at Impala Platinum’s Rustenburg plant, the world’s single biggest platinum mine.

At least 50 officers, backed by armored vehicles and two helicopters, moved into a shanty town near the mine after the miners torched homes in a dramatic escalation of a month-long strike that has hit the company and global platinum prices.

Police said one man had been killed overnight after a mob stripped him naked and beat him during a demonstration outside the plant, which accounts for as much as 15 percent of world platinum output.

Up to 5,000 miners blocked the road leading to the plant, which lies 120 km (80 miles) northwest of Johannesburg, and hurled stones at police, provincial police spokeswoman Adele Myburg said.

“This morning they regrouped, started intimidating people who wanted to go to the mine. There were people assaulted, vehicles were stoned,” she said, adding that one female police officer had been injured by flying stones.

“The road was barricaded, vehicles travelling on that road were stoned, private vehicles as well as heavy-armed policed vehicles.”

She said that police had made eight arrests, but the situation was still “very tense and hostile.”

Production at Rustenburg, which accounts for 60 percent of Implat’s output, came to a halt a month ago after the company sacked 17,000 employees following a January 12 wildcat strike over bonuses.

Since then, the price of platinum, a key ingredient in catalytic converters in cars, has climbed 7 percent, in part because of fears about supply disruptions. South Africa is home to 80 percent of global platinum reserves.

60,000 OZ LOST

At a results conference in Johannesburg on Thursday, Implats bosses said the firm had lost 1.2 billion rand ($155 million) in revenue and warned that total output and earnings for the remainder for the financial year would also take a hit.

Chief Executive David Brown told reporters the company had re-hired 6,000 of the dismissed workers but added that he had no idea when work at the mine would resume. The 35-day strike is costing the company an average of 3,000 ounces a day.

“If workers don’t come back to work, we’ll have to hire new people. It’ll take two to four weeks to get back to operational normality,” Brown said.

Putting up with lengthy and often costly strikes is familiar terrain for investors in South Africa, home to some of the world’s deepest and most dangerous mines.

Miners are increasingly looking for better pay in return for the hazardous jobs and the government is pushing for an industry-wide improvement in safety.

“The government is quite correctly very concerned around safety issues and until those issues get fixed it is going to cost these guys a lot of money,” said Nic Norman-Smith, a portfolio manager at Lentus Asset Management in Johannesburg.

Shares of Implats tumbled 3.1 percent to 159.69 rand, the worst performers in Johannesburg’s benchmark Top-40.

Implats said it had lost an additional 33,000 ounces in the final four months of 2011 from government-ordered safety stops. Some industry executives have criticized the safety push as too restrictive. ($1 = 7.7336 South African rand)

(Additional reporting by Agnieszka Flak and Sherilee Laxmidas; Writing by Ed Cropley; Editing by Rosalind Russell)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/world/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20120216/wl_nm/us_implats

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) ? Producer prices outside food and energy recorded their largest increase in six months in January, but are unlikely to ignite inflation pressures given the slack in the labor market.

The Labor Department said on Thursday its seasonally adjusted core producer price index rose 0.4 percent last month, the largest gain since July, after increasing 0.3 percent in December.

Economists polled by Reuters had expected core PPI to rise only 0.2 percent. In the 12 months to January, core producer prices rose 3.0 after increasing 2.7 percent in December.

But overall prices received by farms, factories and refineries edged up 0.1 percent after dipping 0.1 percent in December.

The rise, which was smaller economists’ expectations for a 0.4 percent gain, reflected declines in food and energy prices.

In the 12 months to January, producer prices increased 4.1 percent, moderating from 4.8 percent December. That was the smallest increase in a year.

The Federal Reserve last month viewed inflation as largely contained and said it expected to hold interest rates near zero at least through late 2014.

But a surprisingly strong run of economic data – from job growth to manufacturing – is raising questions about whether the U.S. central bank can hold off on tightening monetary policy that long.

Wholesale prices outside of food and energy were pushed up by a drugs costs, which accounted for about 40 percent of the increase. Higher prices for light motor trucks and household appliances also contributed.

Passenger car prices fell 0.8 percent after rising 0.5 percent in December.

(Reporting by Lucia Mutikani; Editing by Neil Stempleman)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/business/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20120216/bs_nm/us_usa_economy_prices

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) ? Few U.S. companies plan to step up hiring in the next six months although they do expect the economy to be a bit stronger this year, according to a poll released on Monday.

The National Association for Business Economics’ industry survey found that two-thirds of respondents expected no change in employment at their companies over the first half of the year. That was the highest share in recent quarters.

Although the U.S. jobless rate fell to a near three-year low of 8.5 percent in December, fewer businesses said they would hire more workers, compared with the previous industry poll.

The survey, which was conducted between December 15 2011, and January 5 2012, found that 65 percent of respondents expect gross domestic product growth to exceed 2 percent between the fourth quarter of last year and the last quarter of 2012.

That was higher than the 1.6 percent growth rate economists polled by Reuters found.

About two-thirds of the companies surveyed said the European debt crisis would have little impact on their sales over the first half the year, while 27 percent of respondents said they expected to see a decline in sales of 10 percent or less.

(Reporting By Rachelle Younglai; Editing by Jan Paschal)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/economy/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20120123/ts_nm/us_usa_economy_poll

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