Hi Speccy, it’s good to see you active again on this forum. Things seemed to go quiet in your absence. I’ve always admired your knowledge of AML and your quest to keep management accountable. Unfortunately, I don’t agree with your recent touting of the current CEO and company direction. I’ve provided some reasoning below and would welcome your/others comments. I would have liked to put these questions to the management team at today’s AGM but time got away on me. Very disappointing that no questions were raised as IMO these people have a lot to answer for - the online forum was an obvious tactic to keep shareholders disengaged. I intend to send these questions directly to management for response but given my previous dealings I won’t be holding my breath.Fred was brought in to ‘provide a fresh outlook on the prosed processing route’ for the PFS. They decided to spend millions on drilling bores for metallurgical test work to validate Fred’s ‘new’ flowsheet. No update was given on the success of this new flowsheet but we continued to hold our breath for the pending PFS. AML were weeks away from releasing the long-awaited PFS but shockingly decided to put it on pause at the 11th hour. Quoting the macro-economic environment. No prelim results were released from this PFS. Was the project economic? Or does the new flowsheet not add up? IMO blaming Covid, the Ukraine War or inflation are weak excuses and speaks volumes of the AML management. I would have much preferred them to be honest with shareholders, disclose all information of the PFS and outline a long-term vision for the company. As stated in the annual report the CEO had a Short-Term Incentive (STI) payment of up to 33% of base remuneration, evaluated on the delivery of the Walford Creek PFS in the 1st half of 2022 (50%), board discretion (40%) and a safety target of zero Lost Time Injuries LTIs (10%). IMO $400,000 per annum should be enough incentive to do your job. The CEO was awarded 50% of this bonus (40% board discretion and 10% zero LTIs). What criteria did the board use to evaluate this? Share price from 12c to 2.5c under the current CEOs tutelage. Failure to deliver PFS. Failure to deliver exploration goals. IMO the 33% should be deducted from base remuneration for failure to deliver. The company set out to drill 19,000m at the start of this year, despite having 7 months to complete, they only managed 68% of this with 13,000m. No regional Walford exploration was completed as promised. IMO this is a failure, not an achievement! Why were these goals not achieved? This leads me to my next point of expenditure. I have a spreadsheet that compares total expenditure vs meters drilled for many publicly listed exploration companies, all around the world. Most companies fluctuate between $200-$400 per meter. The cost per meter for AML is astronomically high, easily the most expensive junior explorer I’ve ever come across. For comparison, from 1/04/22 to 20/09/22 AML drilled 9,153m for $7,084,000 = $774/m, in 2018 from the same period they drilled 32,000m for $9,785,000 = $306/m. What’s caused this drastic change in productivity and efficiency? Investors want value for money and at the moment they aren’t getting it. If any other company experienced such increases in operating costs questions would be asked. Why isn’t anyone asking these questions of AML? Have we lost all hope or has FH pulled the wool over our eyes (I fear the great Speccy has fallen victim to this). Finally, the AEM survey. I’m no Geoscientist, but a quick 10min search on the QLD governments interactive regional maps will reveal a large outcropping area of the ‘Burangoo Sandstone’ which beautifully correlates to the increased AEM response. This is also visible in satellite imagery. Yes Fred, Sulphides are conductive but so is water. Most sandstones are highly porous and often water saturated. It wouldn’t surprise me if the overpaid management/staff have overlooked this but it’s more likely that they have conjured up this story to entice more unsuspecting punters to use their hard-earned money to part-take in the pending credit raise. If they believed it was so good, they would have drilled it in this campaign. Shareholders beware!IMO the company is controlled by the largest shareholder (the puppeteer) and management (the puppets or Muppets) are at the whim of their strings. Has anyone got an idea of what the puppeteer’s long-term strategy is? How does AML intend to repay the loan?
AML Price at posting:
3.3¢ Sentiment: Hold Disclosure: Held
(20min delay)