Timing is everything and VMS has missed their momemt. They...

Timing is everything and VMS has missed their momemt. They messed around building the wet screening plant for too long and missed the boat. Actually they caught the first boat and lost a lot of money due to the rapid decrease in the fe price from the time of committing to sell their fe til getting paid.

That meant no money to mine Mt Lindsay when the tin price was strong. $30m expected from the fe was no longer coming.

Fortunately, CHN was about to do wonders for VMS and repeat Gonneville at VMS' lookalke project down south. CHN has now lost close to 80% of their share price due to the huge decline in ni prices, amongst other issues.

REE was looking good but as soon as VMS goes near anything it turns downward.

Plenty of irons in the fire here, but the heat has shifted to another commodity each time.

Even now posters believe Mt Riley will fire up again with the fe price around US$140 pt.
It won't happen at this price as Mt Riley is only 57% fines, meaning there is usually a 30-40% discount applied to this grade of ore (was around 10% previously) and due to environmental concerns, the lower grade fe deposits are likely to attract even larger pricing discounts going forward and will eventually be unsaleable imo. The extra energy to first sinter the fines will deter countries from buying it when there is plenty of higher grade ore with a lower environmental footprint available. India will probably be the only market available for low grade ore as they are not yet committed to helping control climate change.

Having met AR at a conference in Fremantle a couple of years ago, I asked about the possibilty of Mt Riley starting up again and he said the fe price needed long term stability well above the price at the time, which was from memory $120 p/t. The shipping costs needed to come down and trucking costs also before they could realistically consider a restart. He explained how there was a long lag time from signing to sell the ore and getting paid, in which time the fe price could drop significantly and the company is paid at the price of fe at the time the ship sailed. Even the time to book in a suitable ship and it arriving at port takes quite a while when there is a boom.

I asked about hedging and he said it was difficult to get a satisfactory hedge on a small scale project when the fe price was volatile.

He came across as knowledgable and not at all arrogant despite what is sometimes inferred here. The stars just don't always align. Often you make your own luck but sometimes no amount of planning can beat bad luck.

Unfortunately there are hold-ups in construction of plants leading to timeline blow-outs. Even BHP, RIO and FMG found this out during their Rapid Expansion programs in the 2009-13 period. I worked on 10 fe projects in the Pilbara during this time and every one of them went over time and over budget, despite those large companies throwing every resource available to them to build the stackers, reclaimers and shiploaders as quickly as possible.

The difference is a large producing company can cover the losses whereas a small explorer trying to make the leap to becoming a producer has no leeway. Hold-ups by contractors who make promises in order to win contracts is almost the standard these days. They can blame any number of events from labour shortages to lack of materials to red or green tape.

I get frustrated at some of the gold producers I bought into that have blown out their register with ever cheaper equity raisings (RED, PNR etc). They have a product worth mining at the end of the delays and will hopefully pay me back for the trouble that sometimes felt as though they contibuted in part by over promising. I believed their timelines and rosy forecasts which were well off the mark

Unfortunately, VMS has less certainty of coming out the other side of hard times with a producing mine to pay back investors, especially the longer term holders who have stuck by them. Maybe their best bet is to try and sell the stockpiled ore for a guaranteed price even if it means only making a modest profit, then sell the project for whatever they can get, as the fe price is going to drop as forecast, despite generally holding firmer than expected for the last year. They need to monetise some of their projects and focus on only a couple closer to home imo.

I no longer hold but keep an eye on the company as I have a family member who has ridden this down from the highs of 12c about 3-4 years ago and taken part in each raising along the way. So many projects, so little progress.

Time to forget Tassie imo. Monetise them and try to advance at least one WA project where Andrew can spend time on the ground and use his geological knowledge where it is required.

Just my long winded opinion as a former holder.