Hi Samsan the agreement irritates a lot of people but its what it is and been known about for years, its a binding agreement and unlikely to change and at the time signed ensured we aquired NAL, our MC at the time was around $25m so we couldn't bargain from position of strength but it did come with a backstop that eventually favours SYA. There is no reason for the board to address it, it's been public for years and Brett had previously stated it wouldn't change and is even less likely now as PLL's windfall has shrunk considerably. The priority with NAL was to get revenue flowing early and thats been achieved.
The 50/50 shipments came about by the plan to increase production to 226,000tpa at a lower grade, or 113,000tpa each, that gave more sales to the JV and also met obligations to PLL, however as we have discovered thats not going to happen at current production rates but our obligations of 113,000tpa to PLL will still remain.
With regards to downstream, things are the same as its always been and that is get to a DFS or TFS stage and make a decision, apparently the TFS is now in front of the JV and at some point a decision has to be made. There is no evidence PLL doesn't want to go downstream, they have signed an agreement that requires it , but plenty of evidence they would like to kick the can down the road as far as possible his shareholders would expect nothing less from him.
it's unlikely any FID will be made without finance being in place first and that has probably got harder unfortunately, such is life as a miner...
Cheers Whisky
SYA Price at posting:
8.5¢ Sentiment: Buy Disclosure: Held
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