Happy Thursday.
The build this week: America's next big block of copper is coming from a mine that has run since 1945. Freeport approved $4.5 billion to more than double mining at Bagdad in northwest Arizona, adding about 225 million pounds of copper a year and supporting more than 4,000 jobs during construction.
Underneath: NASA picked Astranis, Viasat and Global Enterprise Solutions to develop commercial relay services meant to replace its aging satellite network, the Pentagon offered LeoLabs a $150 million conditional loan to build more space-tracking radars, Fortis raised its five-year plan to $32.2 billion on U.S. transmission work, and Ingalls handed six structural units for its next amphibious ship to Eastern Shipbuilding in Panama City.
| S&P 500 (SPY proxy) | $766.81 | ▲ 1.65% |
| Copper Miners (COPX) | $74.56 | ▲ 3.97% |
| Freeport-McMoRan (FCX) | $62.60 | ▲ 1.34% |
| Aerospace & Defense (ITA) | $212.84 | ▼ 1.54% |
| Semiconductors (SMH) | $504.27 | ▼ 2.75% |
| Huntington Ingalls (HII) | $303.99 | ▼ 4.08% |
The Lead
The big picture: One practical way to mine more American copper is to grow a mine that already works. An expansion at an existing site, which miners call a brownfield project, starts with the ore body mapped, the site already built and running, and a trained crew on the payroll, so most of the money goes into bigger mills and the equipment that feeds them. Copper carries current through power lines, transformers, motors and data centers, and molybdenum, which often comes out of the same rock, adds strength to steel.
Driving the news: Freeport said Wednesday that its board had approved $4.5 billion to expand and modernize its Bagdad copper and molybdenum mine in northwest Arizona. The plan more than doubles the rate at which Bagdad mines and mills ore. New concentrators will add about 115,000 tons a day of processing capacity, fed by a new primary crusher and an overland conveyor, with a new water pipeline and power line to run them. When the work is done, Bagdad will produce more than 400 million pounds of copper a year, about 225 million more than today, plus more than 20 million pounds of molybdenum. That would make it the second-largest copper mine in the country, behind Freeport's own Morenci mine, also in Arizona.
Why it matters: Freeport expects the build to support more than 4,000 direct and indirect jobs in Arizona during construction, and thousands of long-term jobs after it. Bagdad's reserves are large, with 2.6 billion metric tons of ore and a reserve life of more than 80 years before counting additional resources. It also has a head start on automation: in 2025 it became the first major U.S. mine to run a fully autonomous haul truck fleet, and the expansion extends it. Freeport expects the larger scale, newer technology and molybdenum by-product credits to cut Bagdad's long-term unit cash costs by about 20%.
What's next: Freeport is already advancing engineering, procurement planning and early works. Spending ramps from about 20% of the budget in 2027 to 30% to 35% in 2028, with the rest in 2029 and 2030, over about three and a half years of construction. First production from the expansion is targeted for mid-2030, and Freeport says the project breaks even at a copper price of about $4 a pound, with molybdenum at $20 a pound.
Defense & Space
NASA awarded Astranis, Global Enterprise Solutions and Viasat contracts worth up to $1.07 billion combined to develop commercial Ka-band relay services that will replace coverage from its aging Tracking and Data Relay Satellites, with Viasat's award the largest at up to $460.9 million.
Shield AI unveiled the first full-scale prototype of its X-BAT drone fighter, built in about a year in Frisco, Texas, and now headed to Newton, Kansas, for testing.
Lockheed Martin won a $122.4 million Navy contract to support the Trident II missile fleet and develop its next shipboard navigation upgrade, with 77% of the work in Mitchel Field, New York.
Boeing received a $119.7 million Navy contract modification for nine retrofit kits that bring seven Navy and two Australian P-8A Poseidon patrol planes up to the latest configuration.
Detroit Defense won an Army contract worth up to $49.9 million to put its digital logbook and diagnostics systems on self-propelled howitzers, with the first $8.1 million in orders worked in Warren and Sterling Heights, Michigan.
Redwire won a $20 million DARPA contract to fly a scaled-down SabreSat that tests air-breathing electric propulsion in very low Earth orbit, with launch targeted for late 2027.
Aeon Industrial landed a $13.8 million Special Operations Command deal for low-rate initial production of fewer than 100 shoulder-fired Zeus missile systems over the next year.
Maritime & Shipbuilding
Eastern Shipbuilding Group was picked by HII's Ingalls Shipbuilding to build six structural units for the amphibious ship USS Philadelphia (LPD 32) in Panama City, Florida, for delivery to Pascagoula, Mississippi, in the second half of 2027.
Advanced Acoustic Concepts, a Thales U.S. company, won a $53.9 million Navy contract for at least two remote mine-hunting modules, which could grow to $196.2 million as the Navy orders more.
The Navy named Rear Adm. Jonathan Rucker to a new post overseeing all surface shipbuilding programs, putting the former Columbia-class submarine program manager in charge of holding those programs accountable for delivering ships at speed.
Master Boat Builders delivered the third of eight tugs to Maritime Partners from its yard in Coden, Alabama, where the yard's president says it now finishes a tug about every six weeks.
1000 Island Airboats won a Coast Guard contract worth up to $6.13 million to build up to 10 ice rescue boats in Marion, Wisconsin, for stations across the Great Lakes, with the first two due in December.
Semiconductors & Electronics
Entegris bought New Jersey-based Advanced Abrasives and signed a long-term partnership with Element Six to bring diamond and silicon carbide materials that pull heat out of advanced AI chip packages.
HexaTech released 100 mm aluminum nitride wafers for production from Morrisville, North Carolina, up from the 3-inch size it launched earlier this year, for high-power radio frequency and optoelectronic chips.
Manufacturing & Automation
Oceanetics will open a 15,000-square-foot plant in Pineville, West Virginia, more than doubling its workforce to 45 to make buoy systems and port security equipment for the Navy, with opening set for fall 2027.
Forgent Power Solutions will add 85 jobs at a new 90,000-square-foot corporate office in Columbus, Ohio to support its electrical equipment business for data centers and utilities.
Jobs for the Future opened applications for a $34 million Labor Department fund that pays employers up to $6,000 per new registered apprentice in semiconductor and nuclear energy work.
Energy & Materials
Fortis raised its 2027 to 2031 capital plan by $3.4 billion to $32.2 billion, mostly for ITC's long-range transmission lines across the Midwest grid, including part of a $1 billion Iowa transmission project ITC won in October.
ClearFlow Metalworks will spend $28 million on a recycled aluminum billet plant in Russellville, Kentucky that can cast about 100,000 tons a year and will employ 50 people.
Dealbook
ARRAY Technologies and Shoals agreed to combine in an all-stock merger, joining a solar tracker maker with an electrical balance-of-system supplier, with closing expected in the first quarter of 2027.
LeoLabs was offered a $150 million conditional loan commitment by the Pentagon's Office of Strategic Capital to scale production of its mobile Scout radars that track objects in orbit.
Corridian came out of stealth with a $38 million seed round led by Point72 Ventures to build large autonomous undersea vehicles that carry military cargo, with a public unveiling planned for 2027.
Aformic raised a $6.95 million seed round led by Veteran Ventures Capital to expand its autonomous mobile robots and fleet software across North America.
Bulwark Dynamics raised $6.8 million, with Japan's Onomichi Dockyard among its backers, to develop Caravel, an unmanned boat that lands cargo on beaches.
Ryder bought Efficiency Enterprises, adding six fleet maintenance locations from Florida to New York and about 50 technicians.
Back Tuesday.
