Very interesting message, and none of it is remotely accurate. I know I shouldn’t post about ASM on another companies thread, but I hope the ARU faithful grant me that liberty just this once, in light of the circumstances.
As for the shred of reality, they as I am sure you are aware, constructed a pilot plant to test this process, which was very successful, and are currently constructing a metals plant in Korea. They have had some delays due to COVID which is understandable, but said they should have this completed early next year, but should start producing on a small scale end of this year.
As for “why aren’t people rushing to ASM to sign up”. You of all people should know that potential customers are made to sign an NDA, so they can’t and wouldn’t discuss publicly who they are talking to at the moment. I seem to remember you lambasting ARU shareholders for this same reason, and here you are doing it yourself. ASM have also stated this. I have no idea if Gavin and Dave Woodall have spoken, but it is a small industry, and DW has stated publicly that the metalisation business will be looking to offer their services to other Australian companies, to help add value. Was interesting DW was in Europe scouting for a metal plant location and talking to potential customers, at the same time GL was there. May well just be coincidence, and I wouldn’t want to speculate, but this would all happen behind closed doors anyway.
They also have signed a conditional deal with this Korean consortium, for 20% of just the Dubbo project offtake (doesn’t include the metals business), for $250m USD, and have a clause stating they will only deal with eachother for the moment regarding Dubbo offtake. The Consortium have stated they will set up a magnet manufacturing business in Korea, and ASM will provide the NdFeB strip metal allow for the magnets, which they have already produced. So it’s most likely they are only speaking to the consortium at the moment, but very limited information, as obviously this is all being negotiated behind closed doors, as you should know.
I guess in theory, it might be possible for the metals business to supply NdFeB alloy to other customers using feed stock purchased from another mine, but we wouldn’t be told if this occurring just yet, and I know they will be working on the finer points of the offtake agreement, and there is a lot more water to go under the bridge. Given the circumstances they are currently in, you certainly have to be reasonable, as there is a lot going on behind the scenes we don’t know about.
As for saying the metal price would be 47% cheaper, that is absolute nonsense, they never said this. What they said is the metal process uses less energy than the existing kroll process for NdPr metal. Given the energy crises in China, and around the globe, probably not a bad thing, and also a new, green process. As for the metal price, it may well be the same as other manufacturers, but the testing of the test run of magnets showed the quality was superior to those commercially available, so has to be worth something. The fact a group in Korea is stumping up $250m mainly for the magnet metals, tells me they are far from just glossies, and more of a reality. They are in the middle of going through and finalising the agreement, so you have be reasonable, as we don’t have all the answers just yet, but this will happen in the fullness of time.
As for ASM being a farce, they have a metal plant under construction, a conditional offtake agreement they are working through for $250m, and maybe take a look at some of the people involved
Ian Gandal, cornerstone shareholder at around 25%, from the Gandal family, nett worth approx $6billion
Ian Chalmers, tremendous record from BC Iron, to starting Northern Star, and involved in discovering and bringing to production a number of different deposits in Australia. They guy is a legend in Aussie mining, period.
Nick Earner, tremendous record again in mining.
Hardly sounds like a farce to me. These are serious business people, with a track record of getting things accomplished successfully.
You do have some great knowledge in the industry Ausheads, far better than I have to be fair, but in this case you have made some very basic mistakes. I hope you aren’t getting advice from these diligent people you talked of earlier, as this is one matter they are completely wrong in.
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