Wow. I think you may be looking in the mirror here, you’re clearly far more emotional than I am. I’m not bluntly insulting anyone angrily, yet you’re doing that while accusing me of a ‘tirade’.
I really don’t think I’m being pessimistic, but after years of demonstrated lies and severely missed timelines, at some point you may decide that it’s enough to stop taking them seriously, step away, and wait for demonstration of competence and substance before coming back. As Rob said, if four months has turned into two years and they’ve been promising imminent results the whole time, and that’s not long enough for you, okay, then what is? Three years? Five? Ten? I ask you the question, not as hyperbole but as a question to be answered, what amount of time do you think would be unacceptable?
I never said getting outside help is a problem in itself, but it does demonstrate that they lied about the pilot plant. They told us the pilot plant had done its job, but if this was the case we would not be needing outside help all these years later to try to do what they told us they’d already done with the pilot plant. That being the case, sure, if you’re incapable of doing something, call in external help, that’s obviously better than sitting around getting nothing done. My largest concern there is that even after they did that there has been zero demonstrable sign of progress, and all they have to show for it is saying that they’re progressing towards having optimised the settings, which is along the same rhetoric they’ve used to dangle the carrot for so many years and I stopped trying to grab it.
Indeed, the permits are out of their control. That hasn’t stopped them giving absurd guidance about them being granted at the end of every quarter or two for multiple years. The problem is that they have clearly demonstrated they’re willing to dishonestly paint a picture of imminent results when it isn’t realistic to expect it, in this case when they don’t even have any control over it. If all along they said they are waiting for it and have no control over the timeframe and gave no expectations of when it would arrive, or said they hoped it would be soon rather than continually “targetting” imminent dates, we wouldn’t have so much reason to see they have no respect for shareholders and treat them like morons. Either way though, the permit is still not in after years and we don’t know when (or even if) it will arrive, which poses a risk to the company/shareholders.
Sticking to your convictions unconditionally is stupid when it comes to investing, or anything really. Any convictions you have should be flexible if new information comes to light or the situation evolves and you discover you are wrong or the situation is now less appealing than it was. Some people see holding a company as being akin to belonging to a football team or family which you have unconditional loyalty to, you seem to fit into that category, good luck to you if that is the case! To “follow your convictions 100%” as you put it is not actually a good thing when it comes to investing. A smart investor knows to always be willing to reevaluate a situation and decisively adjust their position as things develop and new information comes to light, not just to choose a hill and unconditionally commit to thriving or dying on that hill regardless of what happens. Every trader and investor makes mistakes, and takes risks which go bad (which doesn’t necessarily mean you made a mistake even if you lost money, to give an extremely simple example, if I could bet with even odds in a six-sided di not coming up with a one, I would gladly take that bet, and five out of six times I would win. One time out of six I would lose my money, but I wasn’t wrong about it being a good bet), to be incapable of admitting you made a mistake or adjusting your position according to how things have developed is a flaw, not a virtue and certainly not a strength.
timber: I’ve emailed them many times. Every time you email them, as with contacting any company, they’ll give you a glowing account of how wonderful things are and how optimistic you should be. If I was to email Jerko today and read you what he said I’m sure you’d say “See? It’s brilliant! What are you worried about?” but, consider this: if I read my old emails from Jerko from years ago to you, or anything more than a few short months ago, you’d absolutely cringe. Do you think things have suddenly changed such that the current emails will be more reliable than all emails delivered previously? At what point did AGY suddenly change? Did you write down the date?
The bottom line is that at some point you have to recognise a track record of failure and stop taking them seriously until they actually deliver some results.
Oh, and there was mention of our Salta neighbours spending huge money trying to achieve what we are trying to achieve. If we already actually had demonstrated success I’d say that’s great. Considering we haven’t actually achieved it yet, this only serves to show how difficult it is - we have so far failed to make it work. The 2,000TPA plant was supposed to be commissioned in four months, it was supposed to have been in normal operation for over 18 months at this stage. It should have produced about 3,000 tonnes of product by now, but they’re boasting about having produced a whopping total or 67 tonnes to date. Why should I be inspired by our neighbours also struggling?
AGY Price at posting:
18.0¢ Sentiment: None Disclosure: Held
