What will IGO do re the MCR takeoever bid?, page-37

IGO today announced plans for a nickel refinery plant in Kwinana with Andrew Forrest and Wyloo.

The capacity of the proposed plant has not been announced (or probably even decided) but its reasonable to assume it will be large enough for both IGO and Wyloo to process most (if not all) the nickel they plan to produce, allowing them to not renew their contracts to process nickel at BHP's Kwinana plant.

Further, the proposed plant goes one step further downstream and produces a 'precurser powder' for batteries.

Surely this is a very positive thing for both PAN and POS (particularly PAN as it is already producing) as the only two real nickel players left to be taken over.

IGO and Wyloo will be keen for more WA nickel to run through this proposed plant and will be willing to pay well to takeover both PAN and POS prior to the the new plant being up and running.

IGO wanted PAN before, surely with this new downstream capability IGO is even more excited to get its hands on Savannah.

As a side note, BHP may also need to respond by securing more nickel to run through the now excess capability in its own Kwinana Plant (although I am unsure if this plant goes any further in refining nickel than the current Savannah processing operations).