We would love to hear your thoughts about our site and services, please take our survey here.
London South East prides itself on its community spirit, and in order to keep the chat section problem free, we ask all members to follow these simple rules. In these rules, we refer to ourselves as "we", "us", "our". The user of the website is referred to as "you" and "your".
By posting on our share chat boards you are agreeing to the following:
The IP address of all posts is recorded to aid in enforcing these conditions. As a user you agree to any information you have entered being stored in a database. You agree that we have the right to remove, edit, move or close any topic or board at any time should we see fit. You agree that we have the right to remove any post without notice. You agree that we have the right to suspend your account without notice.
Please note some users may not behave properly and may post content that is misleading, untrue or offensive.
It is not possible for us to fully monitor all content all of the time but where we have actually received notice of any content that is potentially misleading, untrue, offensive, unlawful, infringes third party rights or is potentially in breach of these terms and conditions, then we will review such content, decide whether to remove it from this website and act accordingly.
Premium Members are members that have a premium subscription with London South East. You can subscribe here.
London South East does not endorse such members, and posts should not be construed as advice and represent the opinions of the authors, not those of London South East Ltd, or its affiliates.
Good to hear from you Southwesterner.
I'll put my reading boots on!
"These Proactive Investors pieces are all very well, but what we really need is an RNS declaring that serious fundraising is underway to develop this baby. Or that, on the back of QME's revision of the mineral assets, Parys has been sold to a bigboy mining company." - Brentharg
I mean, to be clear, this project is not and will never be attractive to a "major" mining companies, so all the talk of Rio Tinto et al, is fantastical. Possibly a small or mid-tier mining company might be interested, but only if they can produce a much more impressive Scoping Study than any thus far.
"yesterday's story was hot off the press (16 June) rather than a rehash of something from weeks ago. Yesterday's story seemed to be encouraging in the high copper content of the Inferred resource category. As far as you know, was that previously stated?" - Brentharg
The proactiveinvestors article on 16 June was exactly the same as the one on 27 March, no changes whatsoever. Not sure why they released the same article with a different date, presumably trying to drum up interest.
" And Calmtrader has pointed out that there’s 4MT more ore than reported in 2017 - a massive rise on the previous 6MT." - Brentharg
There's the exact same amount of resource as there was in 2017, just they have looked at the possibility of extracting more of it. By extracting the inferred resources (which have limited value in terms of any future project financing). And by reducing the cutoff, which will reduce the ore grade, making economic outcomes worse, unless combined with reduced operating costs.
"The involvement of QME is a great boon: they’re hard-headed do-ers who would never have signed up to doing all this costly planning at their own expense only to stuff it in a dusty filing cabinet." - Brentharg
"QME must have very deep pockets if they've been hard at work over the last twelve months or close to twelve months without financial gain" - Suzki
Dealing with these points together. Yes, it's specialised work, and QME should be able to make very accurate locally relevant cost estimates at their disposal. But, this concept that they have made a huge investment in the project by running this optimisation process is fairly nonsensical. The cost to them is mainly the time of some of their engineers to run different models. If AYM had hired consultants to do all the work, it could run into maybe hundreds of thousands, but its not a massive investment for QME.
Hoping for any outcomes from QME to be announced in the near future, and I think that by including inferred resources, frontloading the project with the richer Engine Zone ore - economic outcomes will be significantly improved. My main concern is that the $48 cutoff they are using for stope shapes is way too low, and whilst it will increase mine life, it will reduce payback, and make the project weaker in low metal prices, which were two of the biggest faults with the last Scoping Study.
" I don't foresee QME report doing anything other than reiterate what we already know with perhaps the moving of some tonnage from inffered to actual." - Suzki
They aren't and can't do that. They aren't redoing the JORC resource statement. The resources now are exactly the same as they were in 2012 when they were first released, and the same as what they were in the 2017 study. What is changing is potentially how much of those resources are included in the mine plan, and what sequence they are mined in. The only way to change the classification (inferrred -> indicated) of resources is to conduct exploration drilling.
"Some of QME's work, I believe, centres around converting Inferred resource into Indicated (that may sound like a subtle nuance but financial backing is highly dependent on that distinction - what we're sure we've got as distinct from what we may well have)." - Brentharg
Again, same point as above.
"I may still table a formal Motion at this year's AGM for the liquidation of Parys Mountain with its NAV of c$50m. A cash injection of even half that would transform the share price of this £3m company." - Brentharg
I think I've said before, a NAV or NPV, in the mining world, does not translate to any value. There are too many variables with how it is calculated, what inputs are used in the calculation, the level of certainty in the study, project financing viability and execution risks. Parys Mountain isn't worth half of the NAV, its worth what someone is prepared to pay for it, probably £10m at the absolute most in the current economic environment, and probably considerably less. Also remember the £4m of debt that AYM has will have to repaid before shareholders see any cash.
"we are going to sit here another 20 years pondering feasibility studies, pre-feasibility studies, financial studies, environmental impact studies, a few more bore holes and the odd placing...... Nothing, we have the stuff in the ground, we have the assets, the ZINC, COPPER, LEAD, SILVER and GOLD are just waiting to be dug out, its time for Bill to step up or step down." - Divermike
No one is going to put up the massive capital costs, in the order of £50 million, to build the project, without a more detailed report than a Scoping Study.
"For years Parys Mountain was considered to be a copper mine with extra zinc, and then with the surge in zinc prices, the reverse. The higher copper concentration referred to in the Indicated category, plus buoyant copper prices, make it look again like a primarily copper mine." - Brentharg
Whilst it would be nicer in terms of selling the project to the market, to have a copper deposit rather than a zinc/lead deposit, the reality is its neither, its a multi-metal VMS deposit. Even including the ENTIRE inferred resource, the value of the zinc/lead is higher than that of the copper even at current prices.
Be careful what you wish for invest72! I'm happy to make a few comments on some of the recent posts, and hopefully recalibrate the somewhat unreasonable expectations and strange ideas/misinterpretations that are forming, somewhat similar to when the Scoping Study was in the process of being released...
The process going forwards is going to be an Optimisation Study by QME (now running over 12 months late, as per normal with AYM). The study will be run from the 2012 JORC resource statement - it doesn't change the actual JORC resources in any way at Parys Mountain. However by both changing the mine development cost inputs, mining the existing resources in a different sequence, at a different cutoff grade, and also by including inferred resources, they may be able to demonstrate a better economic outcome. But there are advantages and pitfalls from all these factors. Mining deeper resources earlier may frontload the cashflow, significantly improving payback/IRR - but it will also increase the capital costs. Mining at a lower cutoff grade may increase the mineable resource, thus lengthening the life of mine, but it will also reduce the grade, reducing profit per year, reducing payback/IRR.
The single biggest factor though is including inferred resources. This will definitely improve the economic outcome of the study dramatically, but it will be viewed unfavourably by any future financiers. If the viability of the mine plan is materially dependant on the inclusion of these inferred resources, they will need converting to indicated through additional exploration drilling. That will cost serious money. But of course, if the study is very favourable, raising such money for additional drilling may be possible.
To respond to some other points....
"If not i wonder if Anglesey Plc will be formed to do the jv and Anglesey Mining will retain the other assets like Grangesberg." - Jonesy80.
I think this entire argument was a red herring, the reference to "Anglesey Plc" by McParland, was clearly just short form for Anglesey Mining Plc. Why would you set up up another public company to be the holding company for a 70/30 joint venture. And why would the joint venture company, that can't even be formed until the mine is in production, update the market on the results of the current optimisation study.
"Any ideas on what the SP would be arpund, if QME take up there percentage and go into development with Anglesey on the Parys project? My views , QME take up their percentage and develop Parys or the asset gets sold...we should find out shortly.." - Chaingnam
Any JV would follow a Prefeasibility Study, unless the terms of the original agreement are changed. QME aren't just going to "take up" their percentage and go into development immediately. How would the £30m concentrator be financed? I doubt QME have £50m sitting around in spare change, or are likely to sink their own money into mine development with the rest of the project totally uncert
for exciting announcements from the BOD, any news of our previous regulars eg Coppertop, Trev2, Dr Rocky? Or the informative Southwesterner?