Ann: Company Update - Record Coburn Production, page-4

"The record May 2024 HMC production level of 16,267 dry tonnes is ~84% of the nominal design rate".

At the published mining rates and ore grades there is not enough HM in the ore to make 16,267 tonnes of HMC in a month. You can't feed the WCP at 60% throughput and 1% grade and make 84% of nameplate production.

"The program to date has seen the Valuable Heavy Mineral (VHM) content in the HMC increasing from circa 80%, to over 90% in late May 2024. This has been achieved through a revised Wet Concentrator Plant (“WCP”) operating strategy, with the focus on producing a high-quality HMC."

Sounds like they have just been making low grade HMC for the last few months and passing it off as "increased production". Which would explain why none of the flowery updates ever mention HMC grade or recovery and they only announce mined tonnes and ore grade in the quarterly reports because they are required to. If they are going back to making "high-quality HMC" for the MSP trial the WCP production rate will probably go back to closer to 50% of nameplate.

But didn't they already tell the ASX directly that they were making "high-quality HMC"?

From October:

RESPONSE TO ASX AWARE QUERY

"The WCP has been operating in accordance with key process design parameters in terms of mineral recoveries (ie, the recovery of heavy mineral through the spiral circuits) and heavy mineral grade (ie, the percentage of heavy minerals) contained in the final concentrate produced by the WCP. This was announced on 27 April 2023 (March Quarter Activities report) and remains correct."

Imagine having the nerve to tell the ASX directly that you are making product grade/recovery, dropping your product spec (without telling anyone) so you can tell the market your production rate has increased, then trying to sell raising your product spec as a "revised operating strategy".