new interesting article in the austrian media that anumber of permits are still missing or have not been submitted to theauthorities
.......I just wonder how BMW is to be supplied in 2years.
https://www.derstandard.de/story/3000000259456/lithium-aus-kaernten-betreiber-werben-mit-fragwuerdigen-aussagen
Koralpe
Lithium from Carinthia: Operators advertise withquestionable statements
The company writes that the mine in Carinthia is“fully approved”, which the mining authority denies.
The shares of the New York-listed parent company arein free fall. What's going on?
Jakob Pflügl Alexander Hahn
March 4, 2025, 05:00
The promises sound almost too good to be true:
The “Wolfsberg Lithium Project”, a “fully licensed”mine in Carinthia, Austria, has a “unique opportunity to become a leadingwestern lithium producer in Europe”.
On its website, the Australian company EuropeanLithium, which secured the rights to a deposit on the Koralpe in 2011, isbubbling over with superlatives.
The only thing is: apart from announcements and testdrillings, hardly anything has happened in the past 15 years.
When the Australians came to Austria in 2011, therewas talk of mining starting in 2016. In 2017, the start was postponed to 2019,later to 2020, 2022 and then to 2025.
Following an IPO in Australia and a temporary trip tothe Vienna Stock Exchange, the Australian group is also listed on the US Nasdaqstock exchange in New York
with an intermediate company, Critical MetalsCorporation. T
his company was created through a merger with aso-called shell company (Spac), into which the Carinthian lithium project wasincorporated.
Not all permits
However, Critical Metals' methods raise questions:
Does the company advertise with questionable tomisleading information on the Nasdaq website?
Several press releases state that the Wolfsbergproject is the first “fully permitted” lithium mine in Europe. However, aninquiry by the STANDARD
to the Austrian mining authority in the Ministry of Finance shows that this is not the case.
Although the Austrian subsidiary ECM Lithium AT GmbHis the “holder of the mining permit for the Andreas mine field”, severaladditional permits would be required for mining.
This concerns, for example, the approval of a profitplan and permits for the construction of mining facilities.
“There are currently no permits or approvals in thisregard, and the mining authority has not received any applications in thiscontext,”
the ministry states. There is also a possible environmental impact assessment (EIA) procedure. T
he question of whether an EIA procedure is necessaryis currently being litigated before an administrative court, but no decisionhas yet been made.
“Different in German”
Critical Metals itself emphasizes in several **promotion blocked** prospectuses that it is still in the development phase.
Why does the company nevertheless advertise a “fullyapproved” mine in its press releases to attract investor funds?
When asked, the company explains that this is“slightly different in German than in English”.
In Australian mining, “fully permitted” means “thatall licenses to operate a mining operation, in particular the mining licenses,have been obtained.
This means that all authorizations under mineral laware in place and no third party can apply for mining rights at the samelocation.”
Either way: ECM Lithium AT GmbH does not currentlyhave “all licenses to operate a mining operation”, as the Ministry of Financeunequivocally confirmed.
Elsewhere in the reply letter, the company itself also announces that it will “adjust information” should an EIA procedure become necessary.
Listed companies must adhere to strict informationrequirements in order not to mislead investors with misleading information.
The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) didnot wish to provide any information on individual companies when asked.
Problems with supervision
This would not be the first problem with a financialregulator for the operators of the mine. As the Australian parent companyEuropean Lithium Ltd.
was also listed on the Vienna Stock Exchange from October 2017, the Austrian Financial Market Authority (FMA) imposed a fine of EUR 160,000 on
the company in June 2021. For “disseminatinginformation and news that sent false and misleading signals” to the market.
The listing on the Vienna Stock Exchange wasdiscontinued shortly before this in May.
The intermediate company Critical Metals, which islisted on the Nasdaq, has recently seen a downward trend:
After peaking at USD 8.72 at the beginning ofFebruary, the share price plummeted to USD 1.91 on Friday - a drop of 78percent within a month.
It is unclear what caused the share price to plummet, as the company announced on February 11 that it had raised a capital increase of 24.5 million dollars.
The money was intended to finance the Carinthianlithium mine and a project for rare earths in Greenland.
Several documents that Critical Metals has filed withthe US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) give cause for concern.
Under the heading “Summary of Certain Risks”,
the following is stated:
“Our current liquidity resources raise substantialdoubt about our ability to continue as a going concern unless we raiseadditional capital in the near term to service our debt.”
(Jakob Pflügl, Alexander Hahn, 4.3.2025)
