PEN (ASX) Ann: Annual Report to shareholders

Bloody good read care of Twitter.
A Source of Uranium Demand That NEVER EXISTED Before
It’s one that’s going to completely change how the uranium market works.
The prospect of unquenchable global thirst for uranium has invited speculators into the uranium market.
A handful of them are intent on taking every pound of available uranium off the market in order to force a long squeeze.
And make a huge profit in the process.
One of those speculators is Sprott, Inc.,
In July 2021, it bought a physical uranium holding company and re-branded it as “SPUT”: the Sprott Physical Uranium Trust.
SPUT immediately went on a buying spree, mopping up existing uranium inventory.
In fact, it bought more uranium than the original company had bought in 16 years… in just 4 months.
Total pounds of uranium the Sprott Uranium Trust holds to date is 61,845,847 pounds of uranium.
This single trust is buying more uranium than every nuclear reactor in the United States, combined.
But here’s the real kicker,
SPUT’s rules force it to buy uranium at spot prices every time its stock trades at a premium to net asset value (NAV).
Every time SPUT goes above NAV, the intent is that the trust buys more uranium at spot pricing.
That sucks up supply, which moves the price of uranium higher.
That brings in more investors, and SPUT buys more uranium.
But that intent changed on September 5th, 2023.
Something that has never happened, ever, in the spot uranium market has happened since September 5th, 2023.
On September 5th, 2023 Sprott Uranium Trust (SPUT) filed to raise $125 million.
SPUT is now sitting on just under USD$68 million cash...
And bought ZERO pounds of uranium since their announcement on September 5th, 2023 up until Thursday, September 21.

SPUT was only able to secure 100,000 pounds on Friday, September 22nd, and nothing since (as of this writing).
It's sitting on enough cash to purchase almost 1 million pounds.
Prior to September 5th, 2023, SPUT has purchased 2,576,857 pounds of uranium.
With $68 million in cash, SPUT has purchased only 100,000 pounds of uranium...
But the whole point of raising cash since September 5th was to buy more uranium.
The price of uranium during that time has literally moved from $61.25/lb the night before SPUT announced their funding to $72/lb as of close Thursday, Sept 28th.
The spot price of uranium has increased over 15% in less than 30 days without a single pound purchased by SPUT from the spot market.
But wait there’s more…
There is a new fund that will raise $500 million dollars.
And has already closed their first tranche of $125 million from their cornerstone investor that intends on competing with SPUT to buy uranium in the spot market.
But for utilities, it’s not necessarily the price that’s important.
It’s the mere availability of uranium, especially if companies like SPUT keep taking it off the market.
Because SPUT’s current structure does not allow these pounds to be sold. In other words, once they’re bought, they’re permanently (in theory) erased from supply.

For countries with nuclear power, that’s a massive problem.
Utilities are suddenly facing unprecedented uncertainty about future supply.
And if there’s one thing a nuclear plant operator doesn’t want to hear, it’s that there’s no uranium available.
There are no substitutes for uranium.
Every nuclear plant owner, operator, and developer in the world is beginning to realize that they need to buy uranium before there’s none to buy.
“We’re in inning two—and no more than that… and now we have a bit of a crisis setting in.” – SVP of Cameco
That transforms this from a security-of-supply issue into a major energy security issue.
The last country to try to procure uranium might get caught without their largest source of power.
So the biggest nuclear powers in the world—France, the U.S., Russia, and China—are taking ruthless steps to ensure uranium access for their nuclear fleets.
Whoever can provide that access stands to become very, very wealthy.
katusaresearch.com/uranium-royalt…