The site saw extensive historic mining from Roman times to the mid-1940s

An ancient mine in Cornwall is estimated to be worth more than a billion dollars after it was found to contain vast amounts more critical metal than previously thought. London-listed Strategic Minerals announced on Thursday the site between Kelly Bray and Callington contained almost 50 per cent more mineral ore compared to earlier estimates.

The Redmoor tungsten-tin-copper-silver Project, which is operated by Strategic Mineral’s wholly owned subsidiary Cornwall Resources, was already seen as Europe’s highest grade, undeveloped tungsten resource. But the company told the stock market on Thursday its latest surveys had shown what it called a “transformational uplift” in the mine’s production capability – with the potential to increase mine life from 12 to 29 years.

Is is understood the mine contains 31 per cent more Tungsten trioxide, 55 per cent more tin, and 30 per cent more copper than first thought. And, for the first time, silver has also been detected at the site.

Strategic Minerals also issued an ‘Updated Economic Sensitivity Analysis’ to the market, with a base case valuation of the Redmoor project at an estimated US $1.54bn after tax.

Charles Manners, Strategic Minerals’ executive chair, said: “I cannot speak highly enough about the exemplary project design and delivery by the CRL team.

“It is hard to find any comparable project that has delivered so much, in such a short time, for the amount spent, and with such positive results. We are also deeply grateful to the many people who worked tirelessly to deliver this transformational piece of work.”

The latest report follows a decade of detailed minerals exploration activity in and around the Cornish mine, which saw extensive historic mining from Roman times to the mid-1940s.

Since 2016 Cornish Resources has undertaken wide-ranging minerals exploration activities centred around Redmoor, including a programme of borehole drilling, soil sampling, geophysics and aerial surveys.

The project has been supported by investment from the Cornwall and Isles of Scilly Good Growth Programme (which is funded by the UK Government’s UK Shared Prosperity Fund and managed locally by Cornwall Council), with the aim of helping to unlock the future of Cornwall’s critical minerals sector, both as a socio-economic driver and as a future source of critical minerals needed for modern technologies and the clean energy transition.

“The company is also enormously grateful to Cornwall Council and the Shared Prosperity Fund for their support with a grant in April 2025,” added Mr Manners. “This unlocked private sector investment and enabled the highly successful work over the last 12 months that has led to this transformational result that positions Redmoor and the UK to become a leading Western World source of tungsten.”

Mark Burnett, Strategic Minerals’ executive director, said the company would now “rapidly progress” to a prefeasibility study to test the new production scenarios and “optimise the model”.

“Redmoor is Europe’s highest grade, undeveloped, tungsten resource compared to other CRIRSCO-compliant projects, and amongst the highest grade globally,” he said. “The company is committed to advancing Redmoor at pace, with today’s results highlighting the contained metal potential of the project.”

Dennis Rowland, Cornwall Resources managing director, added: “From the outset we established clear aims to confirm previous exploration of the structure and grade of the resource and to incorporate new datasets to establish the potential presence of additional zones of mineralisation.

“We have been successful in these aims and the effects of each of these is reflecting in the robust improvements in the MRE. These results alongside the significant improvements in metallurgical recovery for tungsten, and confirmation of recoverability of silver, have directly contributed to improved project economics.”

X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter, is not experiencing a widespread outage as of Thursday, March 26, 2026, though users in some regions have reported intermittent issues with loading feeds, logging in and refreshing timelines over the past week, according to real-time monitoring sites and company statements.

Downdetector.com, a popular outage tracking service, showed relatively low levels of reported problems in the last 24 hours, with spikes limited to specific times rather than a sustained global disruption. Earlier in March, notably on March 18 and March 23, X faced brief but noticeable outages that affected thousands of users worldwide, with reports peaking at tens of thousands before service quickly recovered.

The platform, owned by Elon Musk since 2022, has faced periodic technical hiccups since its rebranding. Recent incidents have included difficulties accessing the website and mobile app, failed post loading and occasional login errors. On March 18, Downdetector recorded more than 34,500 user reports at peak, primarily involving the website and app, before service largely returned within an hour. A similar pattern occurred on March 23, with reports again dropping rapidly after a short period of disruption.

X has not issued an official statement on the latest minor reports as of Thursday afternoon. The company’s developer status page and internal communications have typically attributed past outages to routine maintenance, high traffic volumes or isolated technical glitches rather than major infrastructure failures. Musk has previously blamed some disruptions on “massive cyberattacks,” though no evidence has been publicly confirmed for the March incidents.

For users encountering problems Thursday, common fixes include refreshing the app or browser, checking internet connections, clearing cache or trying the platform via a VPN if regional restrictions or routing issues are suspected. Most reports appear scattered rather than concentrated in one country or device type.

X continues to serve hundreds of millions of users daily for real-time news, entertainment and public discourse. The platform has undergone significant changes since the 2022 acquisition, including adjustments to verification, content moderation policies and algorithm transparency. These shifts have sometimes coincided with periods of heightened technical scrutiny.

Analysts note that social media platforms of X’s scale inevitably experience occasional downtime. Major competitors like Meta’s Instagram and Facebook, as well as TikTok, have faced similar brief outages in recent years. X’s engineering team has focused on scaling infrastructure to handle growing traffic from live events, breaking news and viral trends.

Users frustrated by intermittent issues can monitor status via Downdetector, the official X @Support account or third-party sites like IsItDownRightNow. In regions with reported problems, switching between Wi-Fi and mobile data or updating the app to the latest version often resolves temporary glitches.

The platform’s resilience has improved in some areas thanks to investments in cloud infrastructure and redundancy, though critics argue that rapid feature rollouts and staff reductions following the acquisition have occasionally contributed to instability. Musk has emphasized a commitment to making X the “everything app,” with expansions into payments, video and long-form content that add complexity to backend systems.

For businesses and creators reliant on X for real-time engagement, brief outages can disrupt campaigns and audience interaction. Most incidents in March resolved quickly enough to limit long-term impact, but frequent disruptions can erode user confidence over time.

As of Thursday evening, the majority of users reported normal access to feeds, posting and notifications. Those still experiencing problems are encouraged to report them directly through the app or website help sections to help engineers identify any localized issues.

X remains one of the primary platforms for breaking news and public conversation, particularly during major global events. Its real-time nature makes even short outages noticeable, often sparking immediate discussion on rival platforms when access is limited.

Looking ahead, the company is expected to continue refining its infrastructure to support ambitious growth plans. Users can stay informed by following official channels and outage trackers.

While minor connectivity hiccups persist for some on March 26, X is largely operational and not considered “down” in a broad sense. The platform’s history of quick recoveries suggests any current issues will likely be short-lived.

This article was written by

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In this edition of ETMarkets Smart Talk, Sachin Bajaj, Chief Investment Officer at Axis Max Life Insurance, highlights that sectors such as healthcare, infrastructure, and financials are now trading at more reasonable valuations after the recent fall.

While near-term uncertainties linked to energy prices and global cues may keep markets on edge, Bajaj remains constructive on India’s structural growth story and advises investors to stay invested and focus on quality opportunities emerging from the correction. Edited Excerpts –

Q) March has been an absolute roller coaster for equity markets not just for India but across the globe. How are you reading into markets?
A) Markets have been very volatile due to the recent geopolitical events. The world is going through geopolitical events for past few years, but markets reacted sharply negatively when geopolitics is coupled with energy shocks.
The recent war has pushed crude higher and disrupted gas availability, which directly impacts input costs for many industries and compresses margins in the near-term.

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While this creates sharp volatility, we view it more as a short-term macro event and not a structural breakdown. India’s growth story remains intact with domestic demand, policy reforms, and domestic flows, but in the short-term markets will likely trade nervously until energy prices stabilize.
Q) IT sector seems to be the worst hit thanks to the AI commentary but with geopolitical tensions rising other sectors have also started to see some rub-off effect. Any sector(s) that are now available at attractive levels?
A) IT sector stocks corrected due to lower relative growth and AI related risks with year-to-date underperformance of 13% versus Nifty50.
However, post the recent geopolitical developments, the correction has broadened beyond IT as the spike in crude and gas supply disruptions are beginning to affect several sectors through higher input costs and margin pressure.

India, being a large oil importer, typically sees market volatility when crude moves above $80-90 per barrel. If oil prices sustain at these levels, then it will impact inflation, CAD, fiscal situation, and corporate earnings.

So far, FY26 saw single digit earnings growth and FY27 is expected to have mid to high teens growth in earnings. However, elevated commodity prices, gas shortage could impact corporate margins leading to some earnings cut for FY27 versus earlier expectations.

With the recent fall, many stocks and sectors have started to look reasonable from a valuation perspective. We see opportunities emerge in Healthcare, Pharma, select consumer discretionary, Infrastructure, Financials and select Autos.

Q) What could be the good, bad and ugly for Indian markets in the near term?
A) These scenarios depend on how this war unfolds and its impact on global crude prices, supply disruption of gas and other commodities.

A swift resolution and ceasefire would benefit our markets and economy as it would mean lower commodity prices and lesser macro-economic impact. Conversely, sustained oil prices remain above $100 per barrel and ongoing disruption in global energy supply could put pressure on corporate margins and earnings.

In case this conflict prolongs, we could see sustained outflows from FPIs, pressure on corporate earnings especially for energy intensive sectors and companies and may also impact domestic flows which could intensify market volatility.

Q) FPIs have been net sellers in 2025, and the story continues in 2026 may be for a different reason now. The story seems to be changing around the FDI route as India opens up channels for Chinese investment to land into several industries. What are your views?
A) The FPI and FDI have divergent narratives. FPIs have been net sellers in the past due to various factors – capital rotation towards AI themes, relatively higher valuation for Indian markets, earnings slowdown and most recently on account of higher oil prices and geopolitical developments.

On the FDI, we expect FDI to improve in the coming year due to strong macroeconomic fundamentals, policy reforms and strong domestic demand. The recent India-US trade deal also lifts a key overhang, boosting prospects for FDI inflows.

Q) Rupee seems to be hitting fresh lows every week – where do you see the currency headed and how will it impact Indian markets/economy?
A) As a large oil-importing country, any change in global oil prices impact the currency. The recent rupee weakness is largely on account of the current global backdrop of higher crude prices, FPI outflows and a stronger dollar.

In the near-term, INR could be volatile with weakness bias if crude remains elevated. From markets and economy perspective, a weaker rupee helps export oriented sectors such as IT, Pharma and Gems and Jewelry etc while it has negative impact for many sectors as it raises imported inflation and increases input costs for the broader economy.

Q) Will Crude @ $100/bbl and above hurt Indian markets and macros? We have been making an investment pitch to the world about our macro stability which could be challenged in the near future. What are your views?
A) Global oil prices have moved up from $65-70 per barrel range to around $ 100 per barrel. A crude above $100 per barrel is clearly a macro headwind for India given our heavy import dependence. A sharp rise in oil if sustains could impact inflation, current account deficit, and growth.

That said, India’s macroeconomic framework is now markedly stronger than during past oil shocks, with ample forex reserves (11 months of import cover), ongoing fiscal consolidation, and resilient domestic demand.

While high crude prices may spark short-term market volatility and briefly strain the macro narrative, they are unlikely to impact India’s long-term investment appeal.

Q) Your advice to investors of things which one must avoid doing in the current environment? We have already seen drop in SIP flows by over 3% on a MoM basis.
A) India’s long-term growth story remains firmly intact. Policy reforms, accelerating credit growth, government initiatives such as GST rate cuts, Income tax cuts, interest rate cuts likely to boost consumption in the coming year.

After two years of single digit growth, corporate earnings growth is set to rebound in FY27. Investors should avoid selling in fear amid short-term volatility from oil shocks and stay invested in quality assets to capture the upside over the long-term.

(Disclaimer: Recommendations, suggestions, views, and opinions given by experts are their own. These do not represent the views of the Economic Times)