royal bank of scotland initiate coverage, page-24

Chihawk - no doubt you're right on the likelihood MCP are delayed. He probably should have made some comment about the REO pricing implications for such a delay.
Unfortunately he is never going to go to print with a TP that takes this into account.
It's an unquantifiable "known unkown" (In Rumsfeld speak). So he'll wait for confirmation then push his pricing assumptions out and upgrade his Lynas valuation off the back of it like a good little analyst.

So you're right, in the real world of mining a late, under-delivering LYC and an on time MCP fully ramped up is an unlikely situation. However, mining risk analysis in institutional research works this way.