on the criticism of the timing of this purchase of the uranium, this gives a lot of insights into the purchase and also the possible future purchase of more uranium.. for many like me, this purchase was unexpected and not ever mentioned as part of the planning to the mine, that the element of having reserves was necessary or critical. keeping this completely off any and all stated objectives for nexgen has imho caused a considerable drop in the share price. but there are many events coming up that will see this forgotten in an instant,,, the closing of the last 47 questions for the federal approval, then 90 days before a decision and then 60 days max for the approval is given. it does now look like most of the hurdles for nexgen to actually mine is literally only months away now..
Puneet Singh: Hi. Good morning. Just a couple questions on the convertible, just regarding strategy, the way the uranium price has traded, why not do this a couple of years ago? And what specifically were you seeing in the market that made you pull the trigger now?
Leigh Curyer: Yeah, look, you're quite right. We've always been confident that the price of uranium is going higher, even five years ago, and it's going to go higher, but the decision to purchase pounds of uranium now is completely in line with our stage of development. We're about to -- we are in the final stages of federal approval. We are immediately on receiving approval, start construction, and the contracting cycle for 2028 and beyond is now and so that predicated, given the fragility around current production and available supplies, like the producers have had a significant drawdown of inventory on hand over the last two years and then also the spot market is incredibly tight. And dealing with the nuclear fuel, the utilities want a surety of delivery. So us acquiring 2.7 million pounds is very significant in our contract negotiations with utility and recognizes the utilities risks around security of supply and so the timing of that is evident today, and I would say the Russian ban introduced last night has elevated that significantly into a new era that is unprecedented, frankly.
Travis McPherson: Yeah. Hey, Puneet, it's Travis here. I would also just add that, yeah, with respect to the timing like, three, four, two years ago, even we weren't at the point of these negotiations with the utilities. We're there now and to Leigh's point, the world that the utilities live in is it's 2028 tomorrow and so that's where the decision in terms of the exact timing, it's not a -- while we extremely bullish on the uranium price obviously, for all the reasons and more that Leigh has outlined in the opening remarks, it wasn't purchased on the basis that we're speculating on the uranium price. It's really tied to the development of the Arrow project as it relates to contracting, which obviously feeds into the debt financing discussions that we're having as well.
Puneet Singh: Okay, got it. And then just building on that, then if it's tied to the utilities, would we, should we expect more purchases from you guys or how should we look at that in terms of a strategy, contracts versus physical inventory?
Leigh Curyer: Yeah, look, you're not going to see us like materially fill. Obviously, the production volumes that are coming out of Arrow and those contracts that we do sign will be filled predominantly by Arrow's production, like vast, vast majority of it. This again, to Leigh's point, these 2.7 million pounds and whether it grows from here or not, to be determined, I think we're very happy with 2.7 million pounds that we got because it does just provide a bit of an insurance policy to the utilities and again, really, I think demonstrates that the understanding of the supply challenges, meaning the available insurance that exists out in the market is very limited.
Travis McPherson: And while it is very, very unique to the nuclear fuel market in respect to mining, it is a necessity of a start-up operation, but it's not unique when you would have seen other developers do a similar thing as they approach production. Boss Energy have done it, Denison have done it as well. So it's not unique in that sense and it does reflect, though, the aspect of commencing a uranium mine. It really does reflect, we are taking this project into production.
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