Platinum group metals news on Wednesday centered on corporate housekeeping at Sibanye-Stillwater, a new mechanization order at its South African operations, and a laboratory advance in platinum-free fuel cell catalysts. Platinum held in a narrow range near $1,700/oz, consolidating after its multi-week slide from January's record high.
Top stories#
Sibanye-Stillwater's Generation Mining stake falls to 4.7%#
Generation Mining, a Canadian firm developing a copper and platinum group metals project in Ontario, completed a bought deal public offering of 312,500,000 common shares and a concurrent private placement of 62,500,000 common shares on September 21, 2026, together issuing 375,000,000 new common shares from treasury, according to a company filing reported by Sibanye-Stillwater on September 29. Sibanye-Stillwater did not take up any of the new shares. Its holding of 32,813,127 common shares stayed the same in absolute terms but its ownership percentage dropped from about 10.15% before the offering to about 4.70% afterward, triggering an early warning exit report under Canadian securities rules. Miningmx reported that the non-participation fits a pattern: Sibanye-Stillwater passed on a similar opportunity in 2021 when it chose not to exercise an option, agreed back in 2019, to take a controlling stake in the company. Generation Mining is developing the Marathon copper and palladium project in northwest Ontario. The episode signals that Sibanye-Stillwater's available growth capital remains directed toward its established South African and US PGM operations rather than early-stage North American exploration.
Epiroc secures mechanization order for Sibanye-Stillwater's Siphumelele shaft#
Epiroc said it won an order to supply underground mining equipment to Sibanye-Stillwater for the Siphumelele shaft at its Rustenburg platinum operations in South Africa. The package includes LHD 5.5 LP low-profile loaders, UV42 utility vehicles and a range of interchangeable UV42 cassettes designed for narrow-vein mining conditions, with deliveries scheduled to begin in the fourth quarter of 2026. Epiroc president and chief executive Helena Hedblom said the company was "proud to support the Siphumelele operation as it starts to use mechanised equipment." Sibanye-Stillwater's Southern Africa operations chief operating officer, Richard Cox, linked the order to the group's broader push to extend mine life and recover more value from reserves already in the ground at Siphumelele. The low-profile equipment line originates from Epiroc's 2023 acquisition of AARD Mining Equipment. Orders of this kind matter to the PGM supply outlook because mechanization is central to keeping aging Rustenburg-area shafts productive and safe as easier-to-reach ore is depleted.
Platinum-free fuel cell catalyst sets power record#
Researchers led by Hiroshi Yabu at Tohoku University's Advanced Institute for Materials Research, working with Technion's Dario Dekel and Hokkaido University, reported an iron-based, carbon-supported blue-pigment catalyst that pushed a platinum-free fuel cell to a peak power density of 902 milliwatts per square centimeter, a record for a metal-phthalocyanine cathode in this type of cell. The work, published in ACS Catalysis, targets anion-exchange membrane fuel cells, whose alkaline operating environment makes it feasible to test catalysts that skip platinum-group metals entirely. The best-performing catalyst ran for 35 hours at a constant load of 400 mA/cm², with an average voltage decay of 2.4 mV per hour, a result the researchers frame as a starting point for further optimization rather than a finished commercial catalyst. Yabu said the study shows that "careful molecular design can close the performance gap between platinum catalysts and platinum-free catalysts." This chemistry is distinct from the proton-exchange membrane systems that dominate today's hydrogen fuel cell and electrolyzer markets, but continued progress on non-PGM cathode catalysts is a long-term factor to track for platinum's automotive and hydrogen demand base.
Prices and market context#
Platinum traded in a tight band on Tuesday and Wednesday. Kitco's spot price showed platinum at $1,702.00 per troy ounce as of September 29, 2026, 8:50 p.m. ET, down $1.00 on the day. Trading Economics' tracked contract-for-difference series had platinum at 1,705.50 USD/t.oz on September 30, 2026, up 1.51% from the previous day, though down 4.94% over the past month and up 8.92% from a year earlier. Platinum's benchmark price remains well below its 2026 record: the World Platinum Investment Council reported an all-time high of $2,923/oz on 26 January 2026, while Trading Economics' separate CFD series lists a comparable all-time high of $2,923.70 reached the same month. Fortune's tracker of spot precious metals prices showed palladium at $1,220 per troy ounce as of 8:55 a.m. ET on September 30, 2026. Kitco listed rhodium unchanged at $8,400.00 per troy ounce as of September 29, 2026, 11:18 p.m. ET. For live pricing see DailyPlatinum's /price/platinum/ and /price/rhodium/ pages.
This follows a week in which TD Securities flagged a potential end to rhodium's multi-year supply squeeze and Sibanye-Stillwater confirmed a secondary listing on South Africa's A2X exchange starting October 6, both previously reported by DailyPlatinum. Background on the group's production base is available at /market/sibanye-stillwater/, and on the geology underpinning Rustenburg-area mining at /market/south-africa/. Broader PGM supply and demand context is at /market/.
What to watch#
- October 6, 2026, Sibanye-Stillwater's shares begin trading on South Africa's A2X secondary exchange.
- Fourth quarter 2026, Delivery of Epiroc's low-profile mining fleet begins at Sibanye-Stillwater's Siphumelele shaft in Rustenburg.
Sources: Miningmx (https://www.miningmx.com/top-story/67637-sibanye-stillwater-sits-out-c240m-capital-raise-on-copper-project/), Sibanye-Stillwater press release via Newswire.ca (https://www.newswire.ca/news-releases/sibanye-stillwater-announces-filing-of-early-warning-exit-report-in-respect-of-generation-mining-limited-881839308.html), Mining Technology (https://www.mining-technology.com/news/epiroc-secures-order-sibanye-stillwater/), Tohoku University (https://www.tohoku.ac.jp/en/), Kitco (http://www.kitco.com/charts/platinum, http://www.kitco.com/charts/rhodium), Trading Economics (https://tradingeconomics.com/commodity/platinum), Fortune (https://fortune.com/article/current-price-of-gold-09-30-2026).