Lotus is well funded until first production at Kayelekera.

On July 14th, Lotus issued a new release stating that Kayelekera is moving closer to production as the first feed enters the crushing circuit and SAG mill. More specifically, the SAG mill refurbishment has been completed, and the grinding media has been loaded, and mill start has been achieved. Hot commissioning of crushing, grinding pre-leach, and leach areas are underway as well. Elution, precipitation, drying, and packaging circuit commissioning underway as well. Uranium production will commence in 3Q 2025. Lotus remains well funded with a treasury balance of approximately A$77.3M (~US $50M).

The company presently has 3.5-3.8M lbs. currently contracted over the period 2026 - 2029. Accordingly, I believe Lotus may achieve one of the highest price realisations across the sector in Calendar Year 2026, as their entire contract book was built over the past ~1 year and is lacking in legacy lower-priced contracts.

Commenting on this corporate milestone, Lotus Managing Director Greg Bittar said, “Following the completion of extensive mill refurbishment, alignment and grinding media loading, we have restarted the Kayelekera mill. With the mill being such a critical aspect of the processing plant refurbishment, achieving its restart is a terrific milestone ahead of production at Kayelekera. Whilst in Malawi for the mill restart, we updated the Government of Malawi, including the Ministry of Mining, on restart plans and the steps towards production this quarter. We are currently feeding mineralised waste through Kayelekera’s mill as we verify its performance before transitioning to feeding in ore. With first ore through the mill, the restart of production at Kayelekera is on track for this quarter.”

Several days later, Lotus reported that Lotus (Africa) Limited, its 85%-owned subsidiary and owner of the Kayelekera Uranium Project (Project), has been notified by the Malawi Environment Protection Authority (MEPA) that following approval of the Environmental and Social Impact Assessment (ESIA) Report for the Kayelekera Uranium Mine, the ESIA Certificate is to be issued. While the shares of Lotus have been a real laggard in terms of performance, the company is on the cusp of becoming the industry’s next producer following Denison’s entrance into the producer category this month, and I believe we should expect a “re-rating” of these shares.

Lotus is well funded until first production at Kayelekera.

GLA!