Fiscal environments for finance of mining projects have always varied widely around the world. Since the post-1980 minerals boom began, there has been some tendency for fiscal regimes to converge toward a competitive mean, but significant variations still exist due to economic and ideological variations from country to country. The effects of variations in existing fiscal regimes on investment efficiency can be measured quantitatively, quite independently of the large risk factors inherent in mining investments due to technical, political, and market risks. The fiscal regimes of 66 mining countries on every continent have been examined and quantified at a level of detail consistent with the uncertainties due to inherent risks. The relevant fiscal factors (taxes, royalties, etc) were combined with real-world cost and timing indices and mine models to create relative cost and time-differential estimate for projects in each country. Financial indicators calculated on this basis on the proprietary MiningPro Matrix software show the combined effects of fiscal regimes and indigenous cost and timing factors on the return on investment. Results show that, while there are some differences between long-term, high-capital projects and short-term, low-capital projects (e.g. a large base-metals mining-smelting complex versus a smaller heap-leach gold project), the most critical factors in determining the competitiveness of a country's fiscal regime for the same deposit are: 1) free or under-subscribed carried interest by a compulsory government or local partner; 2) high royalties and minerals export taxes; 3) cost structure of operating in the country; and 4) the income-tax rate. The effect of income taxes on net profits is actually less important than the other factors in many cases.
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