So who is the senior , who is the junior? AAL stand to have 75%...

So who is the senior , who is the junior?
AAL stand to have 75% of the project, less whatever percentage is "sold" to the local government mining partner.
ORE stand to have an effective 50% interest via a 25% direct interest and a roughly 35% shareholding in AAL

And who would come in an as an offtake partner -
* TTC?
* Another car company?
And under what terms - direct project participation, or simply an offtake agreement. And how much will they bring to the table?

AAL have talked in terms of developing a bore field and piping the raw brine to ORE's plant (actually SDJ) for processing. It makes perfect sense - ORE have the process largely sorted out and the human and physical infrastructure is already in place - incremental volume brings economy of scale. But under what arrangement would this happen - sale of brine, or toll processing? And so, how will the spoils be divided?

And the processing plant is at capacity and would have to be expanded (ponds and plant).
But how much would this cost? And how would the cost be shared?
Before ORE's LiOH plans were announced, the stage 2 costs were estimated around 190m USD. Now it is 160m USD with a 30m USD LiOH plant. So safe to assume less than 200m USD all up. How much of this number for a borefield and pipeline? How much for the ponds and plant?

And then to the funding. Assume a similar package to Olaroz - 70% debt, 30% equity.
ORE to find around 50% of 30% of 200m USD (30 m USD - no problem to fund from SDJ cashflows).
AAL to find around 75% of 30% of 200m USD (45m USD would require new equity issue = how much dilution?).

But if AAL just do a borefield and ORE/SDJ do ponds/plant? Then, maybe ORE are finding 50% of 30% of 50m* USD (borefield & pipes) and 66.5% of 30% of 150m** USD (ponds & plant), and AAL are finding 75% of 30% of 50m USD for their share of borefield & pipes.
(* and ** are guesses that will suffice for this discussion).

So we really don't know enough about the shape of the deal yet to know how it will turn out for AAL. The derisking for AAL is less about the resource - no question mark in my mind - than it is about the shape of the agreements between AAL/ORE and various partners. I figure we will know this soon enough - I would surprised if we don't see a development announced before stage 2 construction is complete.

At this point I am inclined to view AAL as ORE's exploration vehicle - maybe their paths remain "independent" or maybe they will come together in the future. In the meantime,the ownership structure -
* removes question marks over cap raises for ORE (which subsequent production lifts and carbonate price movements have largely erased anyway)
* allows ORE to stay focused on development (the official line)
* allows a little independence from the existing ORE/TTC arrangements (could be useful).

At this stage, it seems to me that 161m CAD market cap allows some very good upside for AAL with a degree of risk around the shape of the deals.
Given that no dilution should be required for ORE, it seems to be all upside, but off a much larger base.