I think it's absolutely a possibility, and whilst we could use the money, I think the big dollars are paid for selling proven profitable projects with a lot (decades) of upside.
Our problem is not so much a question of whether the material is in the ground, or whether the grades are good, our problem is Madagascar is an emerging market, the mining code still hasn't been approved, and there's still a fair amount of "risk" in the project given Madagascar isn't a tier 1 jurisdiction, has non-existent to poor infrastructure and the (relatively low, to be honest) investment required to get it up and running.
For me, the best path forward would be:
Phase 1 - 2024 to 2025
Get Bekisopa up and running within 2 years (finish the PFS IN 2024 and skip the DFS) for minimal money and as few shares on the register as possible (sub 200m shares would be good, 150m shares would be better).
With only about 8,000m of drilling in total (if I recall correctly), we've been able to prove up 200m tonnes of inferred resource. Estimates are as high as 1B+ tonnes, and low estimates are 500m tonnes.
If we go with 750m tonnes with a profit margin of $40/t (and it can and should be much higher), the in ground "profit" value has to be at least USD$22,500,000,000 ($22.5B) over the life of the mine - which at 10T per year would take 75 years (or $300m per year).... just for mid range resource estimates and low range numbers on iron ore price / profit margins.
Phase 2 - 2024 to infinity
Prove up Satrokala, XXmt of DSO and Christ knows how many more tonnes of regular ore. We only need to exploit the DSO in the near term due to the margins. Studies wouldn't need to start until Bekisopa DSO started to run down, so maybe 2027/28?
We'd likely have infrastructure and logistical constraints to port that would inhibit us expanding much higher that 2mtpa - which leads us to...
Phase 3 - 2025 to 2028/30
I think you're right, and I have said similar in the past that this could be a game changer... Tratramarina being pretty much on the river (I think I read somewhere that the resource may actually extend under the river) and could be fully self funded and up and running within 4 or 5 years from when we first break ground.
I'd suggest proving up the resource and selling XX% to fund the project to unlock value and allow us to figure out a higher volume and lower operating cost for transport at Bekisopa and Satrokala (slurry pipeline?) as they are the jewel in the crown.
I shared in a recent post that the road infrastructure and port costs would be negligible, and the transport operating costs would result in an increased margin of nearly $30/t.
At 500,000tpa that's an extra $15m in profit.
The low Capex car also has $21m for roads that we won't have to take dilution on.
If we can establish an efficient and low cost operation where we start to make money, pay a healthy dividend, have low shares on issue, high EPS and DPS (say a $0.30cps dividend), and over 15mt of DSO, 100mt of measured/indicated resource and another 500mt of inferred resource across Bekisopa and Satrokala, with a maiden resource at Tratramarina the share price could be up around $10 mark in 5 years.
I have no doubt Paul, Graeme and the team can pull this off, I'm sure they have better ideas and plans than me, but it's fun to speculate.
This is my speculation only, if like for people to pull it apart and share their thoughts.
Happy Easter everyone.
(20min delay)