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.
Forgetting rare earths on top of gold
To be honest, that one I don't care about anymore. It's been communicated several times now that the plan with the gold assets is to monetize them, and I do think it'll be possible to find a small-cap or mid-cap miner in the region that will acquire them for open-pit mining, especially if the gold M&A market that kicked off in the past year heats up. But is it possible to find a small-cap or mid-cap gold miner that pays a premium for the REE on top of the gold? I have my doubts about that, it might help in the negotiations, "Hey, you also have 40 Mt of REE at 700 ppm average overlaying the gold, which could come in handy if the REE market turns into a bull market either on green economy or China escalation dynamics", but I don't think a gold miner will pay extra for it in an M&A deal, it's at this point merely a factor to sweeten the deal for the gold assets.
Boland however, completely different scale, completely different economics (the acidity needed is much lower than for Clarke and Baggy Green REE, and ISR extraction seems likely possible), higher grades too. It did cost 6 months give or take, the shift away from the dual resource focus and the Thompson exploration target to a full focus on Boland, but as far as I'm concerned it was 100% the right decision.
Thanks again for your input SWS - very helpful. I obtained the Ph level of 4.2 for orange juice by a simple Google of 'acidity of orange juice' and the first table that appeared stated 4.2 for orange juice (and slightly higher for canned OJ).
Good luck with your holding of COBR - I can see why you are invested here.
Another co. reporting concentrations and recovery rates that are far superior to COBR's. To re-cap COBR stated they had around 241ppm NdPr - RBW are today reporting that their latest survey shows they are sitting on between 1,116ppm and 1954ppm for NdPr at Uberaba, Brazil. Their stated recovery rate is also far superior to COBR's at between 31% and 65%. Certainly some very stiff competition for COBR.
Rainbow Rare Earths is pleased to announce the results of the mineralogy and hydrometallurgical test work recently carried out on phosphogypsum material from The Mosaic Company's ("Mosaic") Uberaba site in Brazil that is the subject of a memorandum of understanding ("MOU") between Rainbow and Mosaic.
As announced on 7 September 2023, Rainbow had assayed gypsum samples from different areas of the Mosaic stack, which were sent to SGS Laboratories in Lakefield, Canada for testing. The assays found to have the highest grade were those taken from the most recently deposited phosphogypsum material, which is the by-product of ongoing phosphoric acid production by Mosaic at the Uberaba site. This material demonstrated a grade of between 4,520 to 7,912ppm total rare earth oxides ("TREO"), with neodymium and praseodymium (together "NdPr") being 24.7% of the rare earths basket. The TREO grade thus being ca. 80% higher (based on current phosphogypsum material from the phosphoric acid plant at Uberaba) and the NdPr grade being ca. 50% higher than those at Phalaborwa. The Uberaba phosphogypsum stack has similar characteristics to Phalaborwa given that both stacks are based upon a hard rock carbonatite phosphate deposit. As such, the Uberaba material is amenable to direct acid leaching, which the testwork demonstrated can recover between 31% to 65% of the TREO.
Mineralogical evaluation of the leach residue carried out at SGS Laboratories in Lakefield, Canada, has revealed that 50% to 71% of the rare earth oxides are contained in monazite.
Due to mineralogy, a complementary route is being studied via hydrometallurgical and monazite concentration test work at Mosaic's lab in Brazil that will allow for increasing overall TREO recovery.
The phosphoric acid plant at Uberaba receives its phosphate rock feed from long life phosphate mines which offers the opportunity to recover rare earths from the current arisings of phosphogypsum from the phosphoric acid plant. The stack still represents a significant rare earths resource that can be addressed at a later date should the current arisings become the focus of the initial study.
Another deposit you reference in a high-risk jurisdiction, without citing anything but grade (how expensive is extraction, how feasible is it, e.g. is it prime farmland the clays are located at if it's IAC style? How stable are these clays when operating heavy machinery on it? That's 2 concerns that are not part of ISR-mineable resource). Also you again focus on NdPr. These are completely different projects and you're comparing apples and oranges - Cobra is low-cost, high-HREO concentration, ISR mining, in a Tier 1 jurisdiction, with management and related persons holding 40% of shares outstanding and a history of very economical budgeting. Compare it to other REE explorers with these same metrics. Hint: you won't find any others (+ your posts about any other REE company with completely different metrics does seem to be agenda driven given that it makes up most of your total 18 posts on LSE)
Looks like poor Rachel has sunk her money in the wrong miner. Still time to get on board with Cobra though Rach
Hey - don't shoot the messenger, just putting it out there. DYOR of course.
RBW 50% down on it's sp high last year reacted to RachT's referenced mega RNS by surging 3% this morning. RBW already has a mcap almost 10 times of COBR without the gold and IOCG resource so go figure which of the two has the growth potential.
it's not just that all the comparisons rach brings up have 10x the market cap, it's that in the end cobra will be the superior ree deposit by far if things go right
it's not all about grade, otherwise go tell kazatomprom their uranium grades are ****e, i bet they'll be impressed and stop mining even though they are the biggest producer and with higher margin than other majors too...all due to isr.
show me 1 other resource in a tier 1 jurisdiction that allows for isr mining in ree and has scale! that still needs derisking for cobra too, but it sure looks good.
i'm more than okay if cobra evolves into the kazatomprom of ree, with modest grades, but isr and hence huge margins and easy to get all the permits in place as super low environmental impact. i'd take that. and that's the chance here. no guarantee, ofc not, but no other ree explorer so far has that same chance, no other that i've seen has conditions suitable to isr.
Trombone - not sure where you sourced your info regarding any holding I do or don't have in any company? But thanks for the tip :-)
Jollifant - not sure what the importance of todays price change is, or any short term price for that matter? The COBR sp dropped very quickly after the market had digested the news of their spectacular results - what inference can be drawn from that? Nothing.
SS - thanks again for your informative input and counter. However, Brasil is not a high risk jurisdiction - it's a Tier One mining jurisdiction and it now has several parties interested in REs. I cannot answer the other queries you pose but what caught my attention is the fact that Phalabora has enormous potential and it would seem that Uberaba has even greater potential - and is in a tier one mining jurisdiction. Like you I see the merits of both RBW and COBR (and Pensana and others) I'm not coming out on the side of one company or the other (I have a balanced view of both) and merely post the info. I've always thought that the more facts an investor has the better is their decision making.
Rach, I'd say Brazil is a jurisdiction where you don't need to be scared the resource will be nationalised, but you do have a lot of shenanigans involved with local parties, be it getting drilling equipment to the right place, be it accounting practices that aren't always super transparent, any other things going on with local counterparts and consultants, look at miners present there, like SRB, like HMI, they all had their fair shares of troubles that are unimaginable in Australia. I'm not saying Brazil miners are uninvestable, they aren't, but it isn't a jurisdiction on par with Australia, Canada and the likes
More important are the other points to me when it comes to the comparables, all of RBW's deposits, including the one from today's RNS are hard rock, not IAC, and most definitely not potential ISR-suitable IAC. So it could be that RBW is a great investment too, very possible, I think a lot of REE explorers are undervalued right now, but it isn't a comparable to Cobra, it's a different style mineralisation, with different project requirements and costs, and a different set of REOs that are the focus (one LREO and the other HREO). To me the potential of a scalable ISR-mineable REE resource with a focus on the rarest REEs (which you also seem to see, as every other REE company you bring up has NdPr and little Tb and Dy) is just a completely different animal if it evolves that way, which is potential rather than guarantee, but great signs. Good luck, I hope that you'll join the group of Cobr investors at some point, I'd argue that at 7m pounds market cap with important results on scale and ISR potential possibly dropping soon with the lab results we wait for would be a good time to do so
SS - thanks again for reply. I don't agree with your impression of Brazil - you paint it like a wild west. It is a Tier One Mining Jurisdiction and companies working successfully there include big names such as AngloAmerican, Vale, Kinross and Wheaton.
I'm also not sure that the description you apply to RBW's reserves as being of 'hard rock' is accurate. Both of RBW's reserves are phosphogypsum stacks - think more like course powder. These are formed as a by-product from the production of phosphoric acid and is actually in liquid form initially. When it is deposited in settling lakes it dries and forms the enormous stacks. It is a simple matter of re-hydrating it, both to transport it and process it - comparable in both cost and expediency to COBR's tasks.
Well, if you want to call 25th out of 62 jurisdictions "Tier 1", then yes, but that's what Brazil ranked in the most recent mining jurisdiction surveys - it definitely improved compared to years ago though, let's hope that continues and will be reflected in the equivalent end of 2023 release of the survey. (Source: https://www.fraserinstitute.org/sites/default/files/annual-survey-of-mining-companies-2022.pdf )
I never called it wild west, it's above average based on rankings, just not Tier 1 like South Australia, and that's not really my "impression", that's rankings.
Thanks for the info on RBW, but anyway, please let's stick to discussing Cobra on here mainly. The projects, jurisdictions, basket compositions, extraction techniques, as well as market caps are very different for the companies that you bring up and it's a very nice board to be on, one where news released by the company are discussed in an open way (there've been times any of the frequent posters - including me - were not cheering some choices management made; even though I now admit that they were right focusing on Boland and I was wrong when I thought they should have stuck to the Thompson exploration target), so it would be nice if the main focus can remain on the company the board is for. That's something that I find hard to understand about your posts tbh. You haven't posted on the RBW board once, you haven't posted on the PRE board once, yet you keep bringing them up here on a board that isn't about them, why is that? I'm always trying to give everyone the benefit of the doubt, but when you never discussed any Cobra news in an unbiased way and for the second time only through a "This other company with 10x the market cap of Cobra has higher NdPr grades [something that really really really isn't one of Cobra's focus points]", you do make it difficult to think that you are an angel who only wants to discuss research, rather than someone posting with a more sinister agenda in mind.
RachT is here to deramp COBR and to promote RBW where she is no doubt invested. Her view is anything but balanced, she is about as balanced as the BBC! Go look on the RBW bb and you will notice a frequent poster named ReeTech talking up RBW. Similar name and similar style of writing. Just saying.
SwS you doing a grand job but as you say in your last post let's focus on COBR and not get drawn into the machinations of someone not invested here.
PS. Obviously she will profess innocence and her next post here will be a complete denial but don't be fooled.
SS, thanks for reply. It's not me calling Brazil tier one I just googled 'what mining tier is Brazil'. You don't seem to consider news and information about strong competitors to be relevant to your investment case - I do and hence my posts. But each to their own. As I posted previously COBR came to my attention when it surged 40% on its spectacular news - from there I researched it and similar companies. Given that that was a relatively short time ago I'd like to think you and others are more knowdgable than I on the share of your primary focus (I can see that you are at least) - I probably can't add much that you don't already know, although having said that I've found plenty of info to help make my investment decisions. Oh, and I am no angel - that's for sure!
Jollifant - interesting theory you've created to fit your balanced opinion (lol) but once again erroneous I'm afraid. Keep trying, you might get something right eventually ;-)
Is that how you do research though? You google "what mining tier is Brazil", open the first link, which most likely is the same I see, by "Spark Energy Minerals", a lithium explorer only operating in Brazil, that claims that Brazil is a Tier 1 jurisdiction (of course they would, it suits their agenda)? The source I linked you to is the independent mining jurisdiction survey and well, Brazil does come in 25th out of 62, which I'd call "investable", but certainly not Tier 1.
You can't really blame others for questioning your intentions and thinking they are disingenuous, if by your own admission you never looked into REE miners much before 27th March (which is what you seem to say with "Cobra came to my attention when it surged - from there I researched it and similar companies). Because if that is true - and it might not, but from what you wrote it seems likely - what you say later in your post, that others are "more knowledgeable than you on the share" is almost certainly also true about the entire REE industry. How much do you know about the industry? How offtake agreements are worked out? How the mining processes work? What type of deposit costs how much to mine? What grades are economical for different types of deposits? What is the value upside of potential ISR mining (and consequently what's the margin upside even with lower grades, same as Kazatomprom in uranium)? What's the outlook of NdPr compared to Tb and Dy? What are the main challenges of moving from REE exploring to producing (if it's clays, how stable are they, can you even operate heavy mining machinery on it, can it be reinstated to its initial state after, otherwise how will they gain permits when lots of it is on prime farmland)? What's capex needs for the different mining techniques? How about opex? If leeching is used, how acidic a solution do you need?
I doubt you can answer many of these questions. Yet, instead of asking questions and trying to learn more, you make statements like "What the company claims is disingenuous", "[A] is much better than [B]". I wish you all the best with your investments, but with that "talking yourself into thinking you know much about REE and are able to compare the complexities of REE projects without answering the above questions that go far beyond grade" approach, the likelihood of ending up with the wrong REE investment is likely close to 90%. Anyway, good luck.
Thanks again SS - I do appreciate the individual effort you put into researching your extensive knowledge and your generosity in posting - I'm learning all the time. I can't recall every stating that my knowledge is as extensive as both you and Ben seem to think that it is - I'll freely admit that it is comparatively limited in the REE domain. However, I still maintain that claims of 'spectacular' and 'world class' are stretching the facts. You may disagree, fine. I also think the comment of
'Whilst the Brazilian ionic rare earth projects have captured market interest, our results are comparable in grade, scale and metallurgy.......' is also somewhat misleading. It may apply to hard rock sources but as I posted recently it comes no where near the grades of the Uberaba stacks and the metallurgy of Uberaba and Phalaborwa seem (in my limited knowledge) to be potentially as easy (easier?) and possibly cheaper than COBR's. Or do you disagree?
I tend to put a lot of faith in the opinion of experts, for example the US gov.t has invested $50m in RBW and has delegates visit their site in Phalaborwa, that's a big plus in my opinion. I like to view bull and bear sides of an arguement and to learn of competitors - you seemed very dismissive of both RBW and PRE. You were unaware of the potential for the Uberaba and Phalaborwa stacks as you thought that all of RBW's reserve were in hard rock. Good luck with COBR - I'm sure it will come good for you but in the interests of balance I might just continue to post regarding COBR's competitors.