Good summary Jepren. Pretty much my take on it as well.
Some Sunday ramblings and my thoughts on things..
Talga are executing according to the timelines and plan they have announced previously and nothing has changed except increasing investment and government focus in electrification/climate change and growing demand for green battery materials. This is good for Talga.
There has been a lot of wild speculation on here about Talga ramping up quicker to meet all the customer demand but I don't see how you can be disappointed with or expect anything different to what they are currently doing. They're executing on the plan.
Having said that I do think they will ramp up to more than what is currently planned in the future, but the chicken and egg situation is real. They need to prove commercial scale before the big autos are willing to sign on. Then they will get a better idea of volumes and dollar values and can start thinking about really ramping up. Once the big auto dollars are there then this will go bananas, that's what everyone wants and money will be thrown at Talga. Just look at Northvolt. $14billion over 10 years from VW and they've had no trouble raising money.
The permits are obviously a limiting factor but I'm not too worried about them and I got the feeling MT isn't either. Yes they take time but if they get 100ktpa approved then I expect it should be easier to scale because the project has essentially been given the green light by the authorities. Having the big autos singing on will be a big factor as well. The authorities won't went to let that chance slip by.
The feedback from the SGU on the 500ktpa EIA Talga plan to submit in September was very positive as well, they just needed to clarify the water intrusion. The local and federal government seem to be waking up to that fact they need to act if they want to take advantage of this electrification revolution and make a difference on climate change.
I have no doubt the big autos will sign on when they prove commercial scale but realistically that's probably not until later next year. They wouldn't be this far down the procurement process if they weren't serious and Talga didn't have a great product. The UK government would be either. Also, where else are they going to get all this green anode? There aren't many suppliers outside China as advanced as Talga that can supply active anode material.
The trial mine to feed the EVA plant is 25ktpa = 25% of stage 1 100ktpa.
I think the EVA commercial output is what they need to get things really going and we start to realise the true value of the project. However there should be plenty to keep us busy until then and the catalysts for share price movement ...the DFS, JV Funding, UK studies, resource upgrades...and I wouldn't count any other left field announcements out either. Talga have a lot of products and irons in the fire you just never know
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