I'm going to do a bit of dreaming on Friday arvo.
From what A4N have communicated, we are on the cusp of some anns.
- The AI Nitrate offtake with a large Euro company will be "within the month", although they did say that mid-October, which hopefully means it could happen any day. I've been told this has been under strict NDA before and hasn't made any marketing updates. The order size is unknown, but let's hope they take a fair bit of the PPF Nitrate and are in for more with the main game.
- The LOI with the Korean chip makers could/should turn into offtake once they receive delivery of their first tonne of HPA. That's 1000tpa a year in 2026.
- Plus, there are some other 1-tonne orders to be delivered in January; in particular, the one with Saint Gobain got my attention; you would hope that some more offtake will drop when they start producing HPA in the PPF.
- And if they get the Saphhire business right, that's 3-4000tpa of HPA - and surely Ebner will be in for a few thousand tonnes also, if not more.
So, let's be reckless and presume they get some of the above and a few more large contracts in the next 6 months. They are starting to get near that 10,000 tpa mark, and it's still two and a bit years before the full plant is up and happening. And if they do get up near 10,000tpa in the first half of next year, I suspect we'll see a lot of movement around the Canada operation, and I'm guessing we may even see something announced for Europe - it would make a lot of sense.
And they've still got so much on the boil - imagine they start selling ATH to the incumbents or become a significant supplier to sorbent makers for the DLE industry - the lithium sector is only getting bigger.
I liked this latest 4C a lot and have upped my holding by 50% this week.
And as for the competition, they are so far behind - FYI is where A4N was back in 2019; despite the giant Alcoa leg up, they couldn't make it stick, and they have yet to progress materially. And the other Kaolin hopefuls are even further back. Clay failed at scale at Orbite, and my big question to them would be why, in a world that is all ESG nowadays, would a hi-tech company mindful of its footprint buy HPA from a company that needs to mine Kaolin instead of a company that uses commonly available by-products.
And thinking about miners for a second, one of the outstanding achievements of A4N was turning themselves from a mining operation into a chemicals business, with the associated in-house expertise to realise what was required and to pull it off (so far). It's a credit to Rimas and Seckhold - smart operators.
It's good to see some board changes also - Cameron was only ever a temporary appointment and was in investor relations not long ago. They will need some heavy hitters to help take A4N through the next phase.
As I said yesterday, I would not be surprised if Aus Super doesn't want in for more at some stage, they've got deep pockets. The debt side is sorted with the two gov agencies. And everyone has probably noticed the increased news flow since the rebalancing - fighting back against the short brigade? Let's hope it continues.
DYOR - Good luck all
(20min delay)