Thanks
@walshyo I'm familiar with ADB (you threw me when you wrote ASEAN instead of Asian) and with Paul's background.
But structurally, ADB operates as a commercial bank - it is not the source of "free money" per se (they do give out grants). Their "member shareholders" are governments (27) - these are the contributors of capital and are "non-borrowing" (Australia "owns" 5.8% of ADB and is 3rd largest shareholder, with unsurprisingly Japan and USA are the 2 largest shareholders each contributing 15.^%) and then there are the "borrowing members" (~68 countries from all around the ASEAN region and Asia generally) with the largest borrower being (surprise surprise) CHINA at 6.4% and Thailand at around 1.4%.
ADB's operations are extremely complicated - mostly because of the very large number of currencies they are dealing with - both in their issuance of bonds in multiple currencies (althought the US$ dominates this) and then in the loans they make (many of which are in the currency of either the borrowing sovereign country or the borrower's project). And yes ADB is fully supportive of "Climate Change" but a closer look shows a different style of eligible project (no mines as yet or even refineries ... not even a Gigafactory (yet) AFAICT ... they tend to lend for the end project - like a wind/solar/hydro power project .... where's the BESS which consumes Lithium .... so maybe in future we'll see Lithium demanding projects but not the lithium producing projects)
Anyway not to be too specific about ADB ... what I'm saying is its "easy" to talk about sources of capital but FOR SURE,
any debt obligation requires credit risk assessment (both project and company), and a rock solid equity base (and my educated guess on this is that we are looking at a project with 50% Debt and 50% Equity). We (i.e. PAM) does not have to capacity to raise the 50% equity (that simple IMO). They have the ability to concoct a JV with a partner who has the balance sheet to fund the required equity to be able to get the Debt component funded. That last reference you put up - Export Finance Australia -
There is no free money from a commercial bank .... grants come from Gov't and some them also have strings attached (for example the US DoE grants (not to be confused with the DoE AVTM Loan Program Office) that a few Australian companies have applied for and have be granted ... so PLL, SYR, NVX to name 3 ... and all 3 have a "matching" equity condition ... so if the grant is for $100M then the company has to contribute $100M and now the project has $200M in equity and then they might be able to fund a package of 60% debt (so $300M) and have a total of $500M to fund the project. Getting that $300M debt package might be "simple" - single lender or its a consortium of banks ... it always comes down to risk ... and PAM is a risky project
I mentioned Supriya in my post (the NED with experience at ADB) ... she would know EXACTLY whats needed to pass the credit risk assessment criteria for loan funding.
My issue is, PL/PAM is "long on talk" and "short on walk". I guess that would some it up.
I'm not trying to be negative here, as putting JVs and debt syndicates together is hard work. Not saying PL and even Supriya are not up to the task, its just that for IRPC (and ultimately PTT) to make this "leap of faith" they need to have the vison already or have the vision put into them (by PAM). And while we can point to all kinds of finance possibilities, it comes down to either
(a) A partner believes in PAM and takes an equity position in PAM (and the project) without complete information (say like what LG Chem has done with Green Technology Metals (GT1) paying a 43% premium to 30 day VWAP (deal done in May'23)
(b) A partner believes in the project and the work done by PAM and by extension what this project offers for downstream value add (the mine to CAM concept) and funds the downstream by purchasing a slice of asset and stumping up cash that PAM then uses to fund the mine to get it all started.
So again - "stop talking and start walking" - what is holding back IRPC (and I don't believe not having a PFS for a mine could be the issue) - do they want to be in the lithium refining business in Thailand or not.
Getting short on patience I guess.
(20min delay)