SP Angel Morning View -Today’s Market View, Monday 22nd May 2023

Precious metals tick higher despite US dollar gains

MiFID II exempt information – see disclaimer below

Andrada Mining (ATM LN) – Initial petalite concentrate production from pilot plant tests

Cora Gold (CORA LN) – 2022 Final Results

Golden Metal Resources (GMET LN) – Nevada exploration update

(Power Metal Resources (POW LN) holds 62% of Golden Metal Resources)

Hummingbird Resources (HUM LN) – Start of Hot Commissioning phase at Kouroussa

Pathfinder Minerals plc (PFP LN) – Pathfinder advised that AAG should be ready to complete and therefore pay £2m later this week

Gold – $1,982/oz – Prices steady as dollar climbs and traders eye US debt ceiling talks

• Gold prices are ticking higher having touched 6-week lows last week at $1,950/oz.
• Yields and the dollar have both rallied on hawkish Fed discussions and a repricing of rate hike expectations for June to 40% which have since eased back to 13%.
• Biden is set to meet with House Republican Speaker McCarthy today following a break down in negotiations on Friday.

Iron ore slides alongside base metals as China’s property market continues to falter

• Iron ore prices fell to $103/t overnight, down 2.7% for Dalia and down 3.4% for Singapore contracts.
• Prices had rallied 6% last week on optimism over fresh rounds of stimulus from Beijing.
• Coke, coking coal, steel rebar, stainless steel and other products all fell between 2-4% overnight.
• Copper prices fell below $8,200/t again despite inventories sliding to their lowest in four months at LME warehouses.
• However, import demand is showing signs of life for copper, with China’s yangshan premium rising to 7-week highs at $35/t, with traders suggesting this may be the result of an arbitrage opportunity as opposed to improving fundamentals.
• Additional data from China shows home prices rose slower in April having shown positive momentum earlier in the year.
• Property investments and sales slowed rapidly in April vs March, with investment down 16% yoy vs a 7.2% slide in March.
• Property sales fell 12% in April yoy vs -3.5% in March.

Zinc – CRU group predicts zinc prices could fall to US$2,000 by 2025 as a surplus builds.

Nickel – Indonesia to raise nickel output to 1.2mt in 2025 representing some 44% of global nickel supply, up from ~36% today

• Indonesia has forced nickel miners and processors to develop processing in Indonesia, with most producing NPI nickel pig iron grading 4-15% Ni.
• The NPI units are then converted into nickel matte and MHP ‘mixed hydroxide precipitate’ for nickel sulphate for lithium-ion batteries.

Economics

China bans Micron semiconductors in action against US

• China has banned Micron chips from key infrastructure projects due to network security risks.
• China claims Micron’s semiconductors failed to pass a cybersecurity review.

Inflation – wheat prices fall to a two-year low

• Wheat prices are now at their lowest level since April 2021.
• The fall in prices should help food product producers to raise margins and potentially lower prices, though we suspect higher margins are more likely
• Maize prices are still 13% higher than January2021 with wheat and rice 6% and 4% lower.
• Climate change is likely to continue to make basic food product prices more variable than seen in past decades.

South Africa – Stage 8 Load Shedding potential this winter

• Large parts of South Africa are already subject to Stage 6 load shedding with power unavailable for around half the day.
• Stage 6 means 5,000-6,000MW of power must be cut to prevent the South African national grid from collapsing with consumers cut from 16:00-05:00.
• Stage 8 Loashedding requires the cut of 7,001-8,000MW with six or more power outages and over 12 hours of power outages for most consumers.
• The Minerals Council SA reckons Stage 6 load shedding has cut some 20% of contracted supply for 10 hours from 14:00-24:00 with mining and smelters giving up some 2,000MW out of ~10,000 MW representing around 30% of Eskom supply. (Daily Maverick)
• Capital Economics reckons the ESKOM load shedding might push South Africa into a period of stagflation as Eskom load shedding worsens into the winter months.

ESKOM – Truth to Power – Andre de Ruyter, ceo ESKOM

• The former ceo fo Eskom has bravely published a book exposing the corruption endemic within Eskom, South Africa’s power utility.
• Andre de Ruyter was poisoned the day after his resignation by an unknown entity, though he survived.
• The book claims “Load-shedding was not a coincidence. Apart from poor maintenance and management, corruption and other crimes were conspiring to keep the performance of the plants in the doldrums”
• Many more, clearly articulated, events and crimes detailed in the book some of which cut to the root of the crisis and causes within South African politics.

Russia – US sanctions Polyus and Polymetal as UK bans Russian diamonds

• The Biden administration has imposed new sanctions on Russian gold producers, hitting Polyus and Polymetal.
• Polymetal’s Russian Subsidiary, JSC Polymetal, has been put on the US Specially Designated Nationals and Blocked Persons List.
• The Company states it is assessing the implications and emphasised that it is committed to sanction compliance.
• The UK will look to ban imports of Russian diamonds, and slash imports of Russian-origin copper, aluminium and nickel.

Currencies

US$1.0805/eur vs 1.0781/eur last week. Yen 137.91/$ vs 138.16/$. SAr 19.372/$ vs 19.335/$. $1.242/gbp vs $1.241/gbp. 0.663/aud vs 0.664/aud. CNY 7.025/$ vs 7.035/$.

Dollar Index 103.27 vs 103.39 last week.

Commodity News

Precious metals:

Gold US$1,982/oz vs US$1,968/oz last week

Gold ETFs 93.9moz vs US$94.0moz last week

Platinum US$1,071/oz vs US$1,065/oz last week

Palladium US$1,507/oz vs US$1,476/oz last week

Silver US$23.88/oz vs US$23.87/oz last week

Rhodium US$7,000/oz vs US$7,000/oz last week

Base metals:   

Copper US$ 8,156/t vs US$8,220/t last week

Aluminium US$ 2,263/t vs US$2,299/t last week

Nickel US$ 21,290/t vs US$21,290/t last week

Zinc US$ 2,456/t vs US$2,491/t last week

Lead US$ 2,097/t vs US$2,072/t last week

Tin US$ 25,451/t vs US$24,802/t last week

Energy:           

Oil US$75.1/bbl vs US$76.5/bbl last week

• Energy prices traded down as stalled bipartisan talks in Washington on a debt-ceiling deal continue to weigh on wider market sentiment.
• The US Baker Hughes rig count was down 11 units to 720 rigs last week (-8 y/y), with oil rigs down 11 to 575 and gas rigs unchanged at 141 units, with Texas reporting a 9-rig drop to 357 units.

Natural Gas US$2.706/mmbtu vs US$2.589/mmbtu last week

Uranium UXC US$53.40/lb vs US$53.40/lb last week

Bulk:

Iron ore 62% Fe spot (cfr Tianjin) US$107.3/t vs US$107.1/t

Chinese steel rebar 25mm US$541.4/t vs US$537.8/t

Thermal coal (1st year forward cif ARA) US$108.3/t vs US$108.3/t

Thermal coal swap Australia FOB US$164.0/t vs US$163.0/t

Coking coal swap Australia FOB US$224.0/t vs US$224.0/t

Other:  

Cobalt LME 3m US$34,930/t vs US$34,930/t

NdPr Rare Earth Oxide (China) US$66,791/t vs US$66,061/t

Lithium carbonate 99% (China) US$33,111/t vs US$31,352/t

China Spodumene Li2O 6%min CIF US$3,990/t vs US$3,990/t

Ferro-Manganese European Mn78% min US$1,315/t vs US$1,315/t

China Tungsten APT 88.5% FOB US$325/mtu vs US$325/mtu

China Graphite Flake -194 FOB US$775/t vs US$775/t

Europe Vanadium Pentoxide 98% 7.5/lb vs US$7.5/lb

Europe Ferro-Vanadium 80% 32.25/kg vs US$32.25/kg

China Ilmenite Concentrate TiO2 US$327/t vs US$328/t

Spot CO2 Emissions EUA Price US$94.0/t vs US$94.0/t

Brazil Potash CFR Granular Spot US$380.0/t vs US$380.0/t

Battery News

Gangfeng Lithium begins mass production of solid-state batteries

• Gangfeng Lithium (SHE: 002460) has announced that is has begun mass production of its first-generation solid-state battery.
• According to minutes from its May investor conference, the solid-state batteries can reach an energy density of 260Wh/kg and the production line is designed to have an annual capacity of 4GWh.
• Current mainstream lithium-ion battery cells have an energy density of just over 200Wh/kg
• The company has already announced its second-generation solid-state battery that will have an energy capacity of more than 360Wh/kg.
• Chinese automaker NIO (NYSE: NIO) is expected to make its 150kWh semi-solid-state, with 360Wh/kg energy density, available in the coming months.
• Last month, battery giant CATL (SHE: 300750) announced its new Condensed Battery technology, which claims an energy density of up to 500Wh/kg for a single cell.
• The Condensed Battery will be available for use in electric vehicles and will have mass production capability within this year according to at CATL spokesperson.

Gotion reveals LMFP battery with 1,000km range

• Several Chinese battery makers have previously announced batteries with ranges of up to 1,000 km, but all are based on nickel-cobalt-manganese (NCM) ternary materials.
• Gotion High-tech has unveiled a new battery technology, which claims to be able to achieve a range of 1,000 km even without the use of expensive ternary materials.
• The battery will use Gotion’s new L600 LMFP cells with an energy density of 240Wh/kg and will begin mass production in 2024.

Company News

Andrada Mining (ATM LN) 5.95p, Mkt cap £88m – Initial petalite concentrate production from pilot plant tests

• Andrada Mining (formerly Afritin) reports that it has produced 0.5tonnes of petalite concentrate at an average grade of 4.16% Li₂O from pilot plant work on material from its Uis mining licence in Namibia.
• The initial concentrate product was generated offsite by “Bond Equipment … a specialist in mineral processing solutions and a test work provider in South Africa” but the company confirms that “Construction of the on-site lithium bulk-sampling pilot plant is on schedule and on budget to be completed in June 2023”.
• Once it is completed, the on-site pilot plant provides 20tph of processing capacity and is expected to produce between 2,400-10,000tpa of concentrate which “could generate annual revenues of between US$5million to US$20 million at the upper levels of production assuming an average grade of 4.0% Li₂O and an average petalite price of US$2,000”.
• In the meantime, Andrada Mining says that “Offsite pilot DMS … [dense heavy medium separation] … processing at Bond is ongoing, and the Company expects to produce more than ten tonnes of concentrate from these samples”.
• Concentrate product from the testing programme “will be used to conduct test work with potential offtakers, including petalite conversion to lithium carbonate and lithium hydroxide”.
• Commenting on the test work, CEO, Anthony Viljoen, explained that the production “of our first saleable bulk lithium concentrate … moves us one step closer to full-scale lithium production”.
• The company explains that its “test work to date has focussed on the concentration of petalite due to its prevalence in the current mining area on ML134. However, spodumene beneficiation has been included in the future work programme, in response to the discovery of spodumene occurrences on ML133 and ML129”.
• The company also takes the opportunity to “confirm that the senior debt facility for USD 5,5 million (N$100 million) with the Development Bank of Namibia, as detailed in the announcement of 5 July 2022 … is now on track for contractual closure at the end of May 2023, with initial drawdown in June 2023 … [and that the US$25m funding facility with] … Orion Global Resource Fund … remains subject to the finalisation of an intercreditor agreement between Orion and the senior lenders DBN and Standard Bank”.

Conclusion: Pilot plant testing has delivered the first lithium concentrate from Uis providing material for further testing by potential off-takers.  Completion of the on-site pilot plant is expected in June providing the capacity to produce between 2,400tpa and 10,000tpa of concentrate generating revenues of up to US$20m.

Cora Gold (CORA LN) 3.7p, Mkt Cap £13.7m – 2022 Final Results

• Cora provides its final year results for 2022 and an update on its projects.
• 2022 saw Cora complete the DFS for its Sanankoro Gold project, including an updated MRE.
• This was completed via 6,992m of RC drilling and 897m of aircore drilling.
• The MRE increased 14% to 24.9mt @1.15g/t Au for 920koz. The oxide Indicate MRE increased 22% to 509koz.
• The project also holds an Exploration Target of between 26-35.2mt @ 0.58-1.21g/t Au for 490-1,370koz Au.
• The optimised DFS shows a 52% IRR over a 1.2yr payback with $72m in FCF for the first full year and $234m FCF over LOM (6.8 years) using a $1,750/oz gold price.
• The project holds an estimated AISC of $997/oz with 56koz pa planned for average production.
• The Company is looking to begin construction this year following permitting and financing.
• At the time of reporting, Cora had $461,000, but have since raised $19.8m for developing the Sanankaro project.
• As a result of prioritising focus on Sanankoro, the Cora team have terminated the Farani, Farassaba III, Siékorolé and Tékélédougou projects in the Yanfolila Project Area.
• The Team will submit the application of a Mining Permit for the Sanankoro project once the moratorium is lifted by the Mali government.

Golden Metal Resources (GMET LN) 8.17p, Mkt Cap £1.9m – Nevada exploration update

(Power Metal Resources (POW LN) 0.76p, Mkt cap £15m holds 62% of Golden Metal Resources)

• Golden Metal Resources reports the identification of two zones of copper mineralisation at its wholly-owned Garfield project area in the Walker-Lane Mineral Belt of Nevada.
• The zones, known as the ‘Power Line Zone’ and the ‘High-Grade Zone’ were recognised by geochemical soil sampling (447 samples)  and “are coincident with historical rock sampling results”.
• The Power Line Zone, which is situated in the western part of the project area, extends as a NE trending copper in soil anomaly over around 1,500m and remains open towards the SW. It “connects up the original Garfield showing with a previously isolated zone located towards the southwest, where limited historical rock sampling results returned up to 2.6% Cu and 0.536g/t Au”.
• The ‘High-Grade Zone’ is located in the SE of the project area around “1 km southeast of the Power Line Zone” and is outlined by a “circa 1.5km by 0.8km Cu-in-soil anomaly” which “remains open towards north, south and east”.
• CEO, Oliver Friesen, explained that the newly identified zones are “strongly coincident with the anomalies identified by the Hyperspectral Analysis completed previously, confirming the effectiveness of this exploration tool. We have obtained Hyperspectral Analysis results for the broader district and can now look at additional exploration targets based on the confirmation of the results outlined here”.
• We see increasing exploration interest in the Walker Lane Belt by both major mining companies and more junior companies including at Anglogold Ashanti’s 3.4moz Silicon deposit as well as Gold Resource Corporation’s 2020 acquisition of the Golden Mile project and continuing exploration by companies such as Tertiary Minerals* at its Brunton Pass project and Great Western Mining* work at the Olympic Gold Project in Mineral County.
• In addition to gold, Great Western holds a number of prospective copper prospects, including a JORC-compliant resource at its M2 Project, with opportunities for resource expansion.
• Tertiary’s Brunton Pass project is drill-ready and the company is exploring the potential for a deeper, porphyry-style copper target.

*SP Angel acts as Nomad and Broker to Tertiary Minerals

*SP Angel act as Broker to Great Western Mining, an SP Angel Analyst has visited Great Western’s Nevada claim blocks

Hummingbird Resources (HUM LN) 15.8p, Mkt Cap £95m – Start of Hot Commissioning phase at Kouroussa

• Hummingbird confirms that hot commissioning has begun at the Kouroussa Gold Mine.
• The team introduced first ore to the processing plant on the 20^th May 2023.
• The Company reports that hot commissioning was approved after phase one of testing the mechanical, electrical and overall functionality of the plant worked per design.
• The plant will operate at 1mtpa when in full production.
• First gold pour is expected this quarter. (Q2 2023)
• Management expects Kouroussa to become fully operational by the second half of 2023.

Pathfinder Minerals plc (PFP LN) £0.50p, mkt cap £3.16m – Pathfinder advised that AAG should be ready to complete and therefore pay £2m later this week

• Pathfinder has agreed a deal whereby AAG ‘Acumen Advisory Group LLC’, a litigation company, can acquire Pathfinder’s mineral sands business in Mozambique, IM Minerals Limited, so that AAG can litigate against the government of Mozambique.
• Completion of the Sale and Purchase Agreement with AAG will result in a cash payment of £2m to Pathfinder.
• AAG has secured at least US$15m to fund the claim and will used best endeavours to settle and or finalise the claim within five years.
• Pathfinder has been in dispute with General Valoso and the Mozambique government over the unauthorised transfer of mineral sands licenses out of Pathfinder’s Mozambique subsidiary in 2011.
• AAG is also committed to a contingent payment by AAG to Pathfinder of US$24m or 20% of net recoveries, whichever is greater, from any award or settlement of the Claim.
• Pathfinder placed of 100m new shares at 0.5p/s in February raising £500,000 along with 5m warrants exercisable at 0.5p/s with funds used to repay a £160,000 loan facility and associated interest.

Conclusion:  We remain hopeful that AAG will secure substantial damages against the Mozambique government which if not settled could result in the seizure of Mozambique government assets such as Air Mozambique’s two Boeing 737s, two Bombardier Dash 8 Q400s and two Embraer 190Ars. We hope the action will make the government of Mozambique more cautious over the improper transfer of mineral assets in the region.

No.1 in Copper:  “The winner of the 2020 Fastmarkets Apex contest for copper was the team at SP Angel comprising John Meyer, Sergey Raevskiy and Simon Beardsmore, with an accuracy score of 93.8%”

No1. In Gold:  “SP Angel’s trio took the top spot for the gold price prediction throughout the year, with an accuracy score of 97.59%”

The SP Angel team also ranked 1st in Palladium, 3rd in Tin and 5th in Silver in the fourth quarter of 2020

Analysts

John Meyer – [email protected] – 0203 470 0490

Simon Beardsmore – [email protected] – 0203 470 0484

Sergey Raevskiy –[email protected] – 0203 470 0474 

Sales

Richard Parlons –[email protected] – 0203 470 0472

Abigail Wayne – [email protected] – 0203 470 0534

Rob Rees – [email protected] – 0203 470 0535

Grant Barker – Grant.Barker@spangel.co.uk – 0203 470 0471

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*SP Angel are the No1 integrated nomad and broker by number of mining brokerage clients on AIM according to the AIM Advisers Ranking Guide (joint brokerships excluded)

+SP Angel employees may have previously held, or currently hold, shares in the companies mentioned in this note.

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