Ann: Tanzanian Graphite - Investor Presentation, page-42

I agree with this statement. The other aspect is pricing. Synthetic is the incumbent and preferred input for batteries, and as demand increases the cost of synthetic will decrease (economies of scale) so there will always be a cap to natural flake prices because it competes with synthetic.

So all the rah rah rah about future demand appears to be misplaced. That's why VRC is looking at expandable and spherical, they finally worked out that the 170ktpa PFS for concentrate is unfundable.

So the real strategy is a 10-20ktpa small scale operation and we have no idea yet if that will make any money. If the modeling states OPEX was $600 per tonne producing 170ktpa then it will be much higher at 10ktpa. What margin is left? Not much if any.

Surely potential offtake partners would be better buying expandable from GPX and flake from SYR so the likelihood of Volt going into production remains very low.

And even though posters keep getting emotional about the repetitive comments on the cash issue it remains a serious and unanswered problem. My view is a convertible note will be the only option here. Not long now until the end of the quarter.