I'm thinking a bit about how things will look after Q4 FY24...

I'm thinking a bit about how things will look after Q4 FY24 earnings.

For tin price I'm using a 4% discount to the past 20d average of $LUS / AUDUSD. For production, I'm assuming Area 5 is producing, so picked grades/volumes/costs in between Qs 2 & 3. My "Q*4" calcs are just 4* my Q4E numbers, and TTM is sum(Q1:Q3) + my Q4E. I am not making any effort to guess inventory or AR/AP changes.

I get an EV/EBITDA, usually my favourite valuation metric, of 1.2x - 1.3x. If tin is in a bull market, that is crazy cheap, despite the large Chinese presence on the register and the worries about too much cash on the BS.

You don't trust them to not blow the cash on more junior gold miners? OK, let's discount the cash by 50%; I still get EV/EBITDA of ~2.2x.

You think they're just going to light that cash on fire? OK, TTM CF/MC is 30% (CF is lumpy, so Q*4 is not the best metric).

Hard to argue this isn't cheap beyond any reasonable doubt. The discount, I believe, is mostly due to concerns about capital return. When and how are we ever going to get paid? Even if the co communicated plans for cash, I think that would help. If they say we're sitting on the cash until we need it for Ringrose/Rentails, that may not be what we want to hear, but at least we'd know it's not earmarked for hookers and blow (or empire building).

I think we should all contact MLX and advocate for a restart of the buyback. They have so much cash, they can easily afford a modest BB and still have plenty left over from CF.

I know nothing, so be nice, but I welcome feedback.