I would suggest before having a crack you actually read reports. Piedmont did in fact outline this expenditure for Q4, so I think what you are trying to imply here is simply wrong.
From Piedmont's September Quarterly report. states it quite clearly:
I hope that clears this up for you and others.
(Sorry it looks like @cmonaussie may have beaten me to it in pointing out your error here haha, always on point! Either way, further validation that your 'assumption' appears very wide of the mark here @mondyinvest )
Also, in the same report and very relevant and worth revisiting. (Also, check out that $7.8m I've highlighted here, look familiar to today's Piedmont announcement....?):
Third Quarter 2023 And Recent Business Highlights
Piedmont Lithium
Purchased 29,011 dmt from NAL in Q3’23.
Shipped 29,011 dmt (~5.3% Li2O) in Q3’23 to two customers.
Our first shipment included a $31.6 million provisional prepayment received in Q3’23 based on indicative market pricing of $3,350/dmt at the time of contract execution. With the recent decline in lithium prices, current market pricing is now approximately $1,900/dmt. We have accrued $7.8 million associated with the final settlement, which will occur in Q1’24.
North American Lithium (Quebec, Canada)
In Q3’23, NAL produced 31,486 dmt and shipped 48,211 dmt, of which 29,011 dmt were sold to Piedmont.
In October 2023, Sayona Mining provided a forecast for the one-year period July 1, 2023 through June 30, 2024 projecting production of 140,000 to 160,000 dmt and shipments of 160,000 to 180,000 dmt.
Now remember NAL produced 31,486 tonnes and shipped 48,211t in Q3 as Piedmont state here, and as it says guidance is 160-180kt shipped from July 23 to June 24; therefore they are saying NAL will produce another approx 109-129kt and ship 132-152kt in only a 9 month period up to June 2024. My point being this is therefore a min of 47kt for the JV to sell before June 2024 outside of the Piedmont offtake if NAL were to sell them a maximum of 56,500t by end of June 2024 on top of the 56,500t covered by Dec 2023 as they've stated... and if at top of the guidance then 67,000t.
If prices do pick up, even only a little, that will start to become considerable revenue coming in for NAL, especially if they have been able to further lower production costs.
(20min delay)