Oct. 26--MINING NEWS PUTS RIPPLE IN STILLWATER: A story last week on TheMoscowTimes.com that Norilsk Nickel, the giant Russian mining company, is willing to sell its majority stake in Montana's Stillwater Mining Co. has spawned lots of interest and speculation.

While initially commenting on the news by saying they hadn't been contacted directly by Norilsk, Stillwater Mining officials are now saying no comment.

So the next questions are: What will happen to these mines along the Stillwater and East Boulder rivers and their 1,656 employees?

Answers will be dictated by corporate and world events. And there is no disputing this is one wild story.

Since Norilsk Nickel bought controlling interest in Stillwater Mining in 2003, the Russian mining giant has been making some interesting headlines:

--Aug. 6, 2008: "Russian tycoons agree on sale of Arctic mining stake." In what would be one of Russia's biggest mining deals this year, Norilsk owner Mikhail Prokhorov announced he would sell nearly 17 percent of Norilsk to his former business partner, Vladimir O. Potanin for $10 billion. That is $315 a share, or $99 more than the shares were fetching then on the stock market. (Prokhorov and Potanin owned controlling shares in Norilsk when it purchased Stillwater Mining.) Russian tycoons have been fighting recently over the ownership of the Norilsk mine and smelter that Stalin started. (The New York Times)

--April 24, 2008: Prokhorov sells 49,813,222 shares of common stock in Stillwater Mining to United Co. Rusal Limited. (U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission)

--May 24, 2007: "Norilsk raises bid for LionOre to $6.27 billion." Norilsk was bidding against Xstrata, a Swiss company, for control of LionOre Mining International of Canada. Norilsk won that battle with a final bid of $6.8 billion, according to subsequent articles in The New York Times. Now Xstrata is said to be a potential buyer of Stillwater Mining along with Impala Palladium of South Africa, according to TheMoscowTimes.com.

--Jan. 11, 2007: Prokhorov, a billionaire Russian bachelor in 2007, was arrested in the French Alps for allegedly running an international prostitution ring at the Courchevel ski resort. Prokhorov was acquitted on all charges. (International Herald Tribune) However, according to the New York Times, that ski resort incident apparently caused a split between Prokhorov and Potanin and led to an 18-month-long fight for control of Norilsk, the world's largest nickel and palladium producer.

--Dec.