The company also said it would cut its annual dividend to $0.08 per common share in 2018 from C$0.10 and temporarily reduced its workforce at the operations by about 845 workers. The operations' current workforce is 1,055.

The global uranium industry is in a six-year tailspin, dating back to the 2011 tsunami that caused Japan to shutter all of its nuclear reactors, some of which have since restarted.

"With the continued state of oversupply in the uranium market and no expectation of change on the immediate horizon, it does not make economic sense for us to continue producing at McArthur River and Key Lake," Cameco's president and chief executive, Tim Gitzel, said in a statement.

(Reporting by Karan Nagarkatti in Bengaluru; Editing by Peter Cooney)