Commodity Contracts

9 Months Ended

Nov. 30, 2012

Commodity Contracts

(5) Commodity Contracts. MSC is exposed to certain risks related to ongoing business operations. We use derivative instruments with the objective of managing our financial and operational exposure arising from these risks: primarily commodity price risk. From time-to-time in the ordinary course of business, the Company enters into purchase contracts for procuring nickel carbonate, zinc shot and natural gas, which are commodities used in our manufacturing processes. MSC maintains a commodity forward purchase policy. This seeks to ensure that, at any time, the majority of the expected consumption over the next 12 months is secured under a purchase contract at a pre-determined price. When MSC enters into these contracts, it applies the Normal Purchase/Normal Sale election, which excludes the contracts from being accounted for as derivative instruments at fair value for as long as they qualify for the election.

At November 30, 2012, the Company did not have any commodity contracts that we accounted for at fair value.