Ann: Rincon Lithium Project - Progress Update, page-112

It's extremely frustrating when people lump everything negative in as one in the same based on a few minor surface details.

The announcement on 02/03/2021 with the schedule for production shows that they had 12 months allowed for construction and installation of equipment, finishing in early Feb 2022 and 4-5 months allowed for comissioning, test works and ramp up. First production (assuming this should be at or close to 2000 tpa production rate because ramp up has been completed) was meant to take place somewhere around June 2022.

Construction and installation didn't even finish until the start of this year. I am a qualified builder and carpenter and trying to get anything done from mid 2020 - mid 2022 here in Australia was an absolute nightmare. Due mainly to material but also due to labour shortages, I had multiple jobs blow out by timeframes of more than 6 months on what should've been a 9-10 month build. That's in Wollongong, coastal NSW, 1 hour drive from Sydney and is one of the main reasons I am no longer doing it full time. It cost my clients and I a lot of money.

Some basic common sense says if that is happening with basic construction materials on the coast in Australia one may expect it to be amplified for much more technical equipment arriving to a salt flat in the middle of nowhere, 3.6km above sea level and 1700km (21 hour drive) from Buenos Aires.

Here in Australia it is the builder who gives the guidelines on the construction time to the client and this goes into the contract before it is signed. I don't think in Argentina the client is giving the builder the timeframes for construction.

Clearly these timeframes were ambitions and set based on pre COVID experience but with construction and installation taking an extra 12 months, which is not at all surprising from my experience over the last few years, that is where first setback really was. Nobody was complaining then because the share price and lithium were booming. Now that the share price is in decline with the rest of the sector (every single company in the world associated with the production of lithium has declined = not a company specific decline), people are out for blood with some even suggesting the company is going to fail because of a poorly designed filtering system and a declining share price.

Emotionally driven irrationality. Psychology in the stock market is fascinating to watch.