This is a summary based on my interpretation of events:The...

This is a summary based on my interpretation of events:

The cobalt price spiked in a big way about 18m ago on fears of a medium term supply shortage cliff and speculative buying of the metal by trade houses in a self perpetuating pyramid price escalation.

COB was on its way to 100% ownership as per the farm-in plan and with LG showing interest, things were going nicely. But BPL management saw an opportunity to exploit the situation by using their name on the title and delaying farm-in approvals in order to cause enough pain to be bought out of the farm-in at a premium.

But in the background the cobalt price dropped. At $40/pound, artisanal miners in the DRC made up for supply shortages and once Musk tweeted that he was trying to eliminate cobalt from his batteries (considered unlikely commercially for at least 10 years by most scientists and analysts), it precipitated the decline. Then Trump tweeted he was the "tarriff man".

So once COB finally received it's belated confirmation from BPL that it had achieved the 70% farm-in, they ended it, resulting in a 70:30 JV.
The resultant JV left BPL in a bind because they were no longer free-carry, and were liable for 30% of ongoing costs and did not have the money at hand and weren't confident (or didn't want to) raising the money.
So to get out of paying, essentially BPL claimed:
- COB is no longer manager of the JV
- the 70% farm-in was not valid

BPL didn't pay for drilling costs.

If the bills aren't paid by a JV partner, there's a specified dilution clause in the JV contact, which (after a notification letter from the manager) was applied to BPL.

So COB is claiming BPL has been diluted to 0% and BPL is disputing this and is claiming they still own 30% and aren't liable for any drilling costs until a new manager is found and the project is approached in a new direction with both parties "living within their means."

Both parties are now having the disputes resolved via an independent arbiter.
The decision is binding and final. This is good, as it means we avoid lengthy and expensive court proceedings.

The outcome of the arbitration is due shortly.

It is my observation that Joe Kaderavek is switched on and gets things done and BPL's management is, well... I won't comment.

Nobody is certain of the dispute outcome, but if it falls COB's way, it will be a huge de-risking step for third parties to be dealing with a motivated 100% owner and BPL will have trouble keeping their name on the title of a project they own none of, thus eliminating any obstruction of progress.

I am still firmly of the opinion that with a low cobalt price delaying the increased roll out of NMC 811 (and suppressing forget cobalt exploitation) and well over 1 tW (5x current levels) of lithium ion battery capacity in the works by 2025, there will be a cobalt supply crunch by 2022-23 which will necessitate ex-DRC cobalt mines to come on. COB has minimal sovereign risk, no exposure to child exploitation and has a much lower execution risk and CAPEX compared to HPAL projects. IMO, It's in the box seat and is looking very cheap with this risk-reward profile in mind.