If I recall and understand correctly, 24 hour continuous production trials were carried out in July and we were told about it at the end of July, so our last update was a little over three weeks ago, not seven (about seven weeks ago we were told that 24 hour continuous production trials were going to be carried out in July).
Many people take too many things at face value rather than applying critical thinking and reading between the lines. We had someone here the other day saying we can be sure that the regulators were genuinely waiting for hydrowhatever data because they said so. What are they supposed to say? "We're still waiting for AGY to get into production so we can arrange our brown paper bag deal"? Obviously governments have to say something which seems innocent, they do this even when it's utterly transparently implausible. What is AGY supposed to say? "We're still negotiating the brown paper bag deal, the government wants to be sure we're going to be able to pay our bri...er...voluntary royalty before they give us the permit"??? They can't publicly say that, but it's obvious what's actually happening. Why would you believe politicians when they have throughout history been one of, possibly the least honest groups of people? Why would you think the company is going to cut their own throat by saying "Well, hey, you just have to accept that in a country well-known to have serious corruption issues we're going to have to play the game, and this is exactly what's going on..."? They obviously just can't do that.
I don't think Wikipedia is a great resource for reliable information, but for the sake of demonstrating the basic point, you might like to look at this Wikipedia page about Argentina
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corruption_in_Argentina
Or just read the first two paragraphs here:
Corruption in Argentina remains a serious problem.
Argentina has long suffered from widespread and endemic
corruption. Corruption remains a serious problem in the public and private sector even though the legal and institutional framework combating corruption is strong in Argentina.
A 1996 article in
The New York Times noted that "payoffs, kickbacks and government corruption are considered part of everyday life" in Argentina.
[1] Bribery and fraud are also found common among the private sector, and the lack of transparency in government regulations and laws has triggered an increased uncertainty among investors.
[2]
If you're interested in learning more, feel free to venture as deeply into that rabbit hole as you like, but the reality of doing business in highly corrupt countries is nothing like typical Australians imagine it to be. It pays to be realistic and not just believe the cover story being handed to you by people we absolutely know to be completely dishonest or people we know have absolutely no option of telling us the obvious reality.
We never needed the permits until our 2KTPA plant was finished, and we were never going to get the permits until the 2KTPA plant was finished (or roughly around the time it was officially at steady state). If I had this discussion with people in most parts of the world they would entirely agree with me, but Australians are very naive in this way because of the way the Australian system works. I had to pay a bribe to get the visa to come to the country I'm currently in, and if I wanted to get married or get a driver's license or even a meal as a patient in a hospital, I'd probably not succeed without a bribe in the country I'm going to next month (no, I won't name those countries here, it's not wise to rat them out publicly, I probably wouldn't be discussing Argentina in this way if it was a country I was prone to spending time in but if we're ever having a coffee together I'd be happy to have a candid conversation). Things just work differently in different parts of the world and AGY is an Australian company with an operation in Argentina so that dynamic means reporting is going to happen in the way it inevitably has to.
When I was talking about this early last year everyone said I was crazy, some even got angry. Now it's surely obvious. The hydrowhatever data is magically going to be deemed lovely right around the time we need the permit and demonstrate we're willing and able to pay the bri, er, voluntary royalty (the good news about this timing is that we'll give the market a well-timed double whammy of company-making news).
(20min delay)