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it's even got depressing in there lately and that's saying something.....

I think you’re right. Fryer is way out of his depth, and it’s not at all surprising. He’s a finance guy, he doesn’t have experience with running a mine.

Regarding other board members taking responsibility for something - that’s a good point. What are the other board members contributing ? They certainly didn’t seem able to have a grip on Fryers undisclosed selling.

The BoD got paid £500,000 in the year to June 2023. Likely even more for the year to June 2024 (not disclosed yet) as their salaries increased. This is on a company with a £3m market cap and which has never had any revenue.

You can see why they’re not in a hurry to move things along. Good salaries, seemingly little work to do, and they get to occasionally re-price and extend their warrants.

What’s another month delay ? Well, it’s another £41,666 for them……

The images around this area state they are from 2024. They certainly show the lithium pilot plant at Uis fully completed.

Yeah, I know you were joking :-) Even being as critical of him as I am, I don't think he'd do that.

I was just pointing out that the only person who doesn't really lose by things dragging on and on, is Fryer. He gets well paid, gets his travel expenses, and the size of his loans to CRTM go up by a risk-free 6% per year.

I've seen that Xinfeng have recently completed their lithium processing plant near Uis, and I've been trying to find it on Google Maps to get a look at the scale of it, but I can't find it anywhere.

From looking at the licences they hold in Namibia (243 and 7228) it looks like it should be somewhere near the C36 road that runs between the Andrada mine in Uis and the town of Omaruru. It's pretty close to our Lithium Ridge.

I was expecting it to be easy to find - the Uis mine really sticks out on the satellite images, and I thought this would be of similar size.

Does anyone on here know where it is, or is perhaps better at Googling than me ?

I'm interested for a couple of reasons. Firstly, I just want to see what the competition are doing, but secondly I came across an interesting recent interview where a Xinfeng spokesperson said - "the company will also be offering processing services to other mines in the Erongo region" and "details on the pricing and contractual arrangements are being finalised, with several long-term agreements nearing completion".

There aren't too many other lithium producing companies in the region, so I'm wondering.........

Financially, it would make no sense at all for him to disappear.

Why not just keep dragging it along, getting paid £24,000 a month, and hopefully having CRTM pay him the 1 million it "owes" him by getting some revenue in ssomehow ?

I can't see how he has anything to lose by this just dragging along the bottom.

Remember, he doesn't need the share price to rise - he's not losing anything having invested at a high price.

He just needs to extract cash out of the business in some way to get payment for the MO "buyout" from him (if not done already), and to pay off those old Baobab loans he had that he made CRTMs problem (and remember, those loans start getting repaid as soon as there's revenue coming in - so CRTM won't see all the revenue from ore sales hitting it's bottom line as part of it goes to Fryer).

I'll say right away that I have no idea what road building costs in DRC - that said, £1.6m feels like a huge amount as just based on a 90 day project it's £17,777 per day. We've never seen more than a couple of machines and a few people working - it's not like there's an army of hundreds. Wages in DRC are low, so how could you spend that ?

Also, the initial launch prospectus for CRTM said they would be spending £276,000 of the IPO proceeds on road rehabiliation (which of course was never done). I can't see how that increased to £1.6m.

The RNS for that raise said as well as the road, it would be spent on "General working capital purposes". A great phrase which can mean absolutely anything.

I recently had a series of questions answered by Andrada investor relations. Nothing earth shattering in the replies, but I'm happy that they at least took the time to respond. I think on reflection, I am now more comfortable with the current position regarding the strategic process.

Q: When you launched the Strategic Process 14 months ago, you said an offer for the company was not an option being considered. With the recent change of scope of the process, would an outright offer now be considered?

A: The approach remains the same because we believe that more value will be created for our shareholders through the development of these assets separately.

Q: Having said for 12 months that you were looking to sell the lithium output from the pilot plant, and even stated fairly recently that discussions with a ceramics off taker were progressing well - why has this strategy now changed, with you now saying you now don’t expect any sales until the completion of the pre-concentration circuit in 2025?

A: The testing campaigns are being prioritised to expedite the lithium development strategy.

Q: The market cap has halved over the past year, while tin prices have increased. What are the factors causing this?

A: The share price weakness has mirrored the lithium market weakness, and the UK equity market has also been under pressure with small cap companies more severely impacted.

Q: What is your view on why the last quarterly update, on 21st June 2024, was so damaging to the market’s valuation of Andrada?

A: Based on investor feedback, the market was mainly disappointed that the Company had not concluded the strategic process.

Q: What can investors expect to see during the remainder of 2024 regarding Brandberg West?

A: Analysis of the drill core is underway , and based on the results we will continue drilling campaigns.

Q: Regarding the tin expansion, are you confident you’ll be able to avoid the high 9.63% royalty rate to Orion if you don’t achieve the 1600tpa rate within the 15-month period from November 2023?

A: The royalty will be calculated on a sliding scale and is unlikely to be at 9.63%.

I think the combination of the strategic process approach remaining the same, the lithium pilot plant testing campaigns being prioritised over sales, the accelerated push back of the pit to get at higher grade lithium ore, and the recent corporate restructuring, all give me higher confidence that there is a very specific partner deal being worked on.

Perhaps there's a requirement to demonstrate they can consistently meet a certain specification of lithium output, or something like that, so the pilot plant is still being put to that specific purpose ?

It's good that they've woken up and responded anyway. Hopefully it'll continue and they'll engage more with private investors.

That's exactly why I got fully out again, by pure luck just before last weeks fall.

As you say, it's just too 50/50 at the moment - could be great news, could be more excuses.

It really should all be good news with the amount of work that has obviously been done on the road, but I just have a nagging feeling that something isn't going to be right with the OM Metals agreement. It was also very odd the way the road updates went from being very specific, mentioning sections and kilometres completed etc. - to then just vague pictures of sections of road without any context, so impossible to tell how close to completion it is. Also the odd picture of OM Metals taking a small bag of rocks away when they've already had 3 truckloads - just very strange.

According to the TG group, Fryer is in DRC at the moment. That in itself doesn't tell you anything really though - could be a great ribbon cutting ceremony for the road, or it could be to negotiate a new offtake agreement. I'm sure the falling copper price since the agreement was first made will have changed the economics a lot - given the transport and processing costs that have to be factored in.

More medium term, I'm really interested to see what's been done with the cash from the two recent raises - £215,000 in January and £1.6m in April. That's a lot of cash for a company with a £3.2m market cap. There's no mining happening, no drilling - just the road. So I wonder how much of that cash has gone into CRTM operations, and how much ended up being transferred to Fryer for payments due to him. Probably won't find out until the results are out in November.

@nesty - regarding your suggestion of AV holding back information for a seller to get out. Whilst it’s not impossible, I do think it unlikely in the extreme.

It’s against the listing rules to not release market sensitive information immediately. There’s never been a whiff of any shenanigans like that with ATM that I’m aware of. Also, unlike in some other AIM mining companies, AV doesn’t have complete control here. There’s an experienced board, COO, CFO, Chairman etc. and I just can’t imagine they would be involved in such a thing.

There's definitely one institution consistently selling - Canaccord Genuity.

At the end of 2022 they held 157m. In May 2023 they still held 135m. A year later they were down to 110m, and they've sold another nearly 10m over the past month and are now around 101m.

They originally bought in at 2.1p, so even now they're up 50% on that purchase. They did buy in later at higher prices as well though, so no idea what their average is, or whether different buys might be in different funds and so profit/loss might be accounted for independently rather than at an average (i.e. Fund1 might be selling out having bought at 2.1p, but Fund2 might have a higher average and still be holding).

It looks like they just decided to cut their exposure - they sold into the rise last year and through the drop as well, up to now. Very likely nothing behind it at all - just them rebalancing, or need the cash for fund redemptions, or just think their 3-4 year holding period has been long enough ? Who knows ? I'm just hoping they've either finished selling or will finish soon.

On a different point, the chart pattern from March 21st 2023 until now (16 months), looks very, very, similar to the pattern from Dec 21st 2021 to March 21st 2023 (15 months). I'm not a massive believer in charts, but the repeated pattern is striking to me. If it plays out again we might see a rise back up above 7p.

Yes, I'm being wildly optimistic, but remember it was only on March 21st last year the price was 3.6p. and within 3 months it was 8.6p.

And the first 4 months of 2022 saw the price go from 4.6p in late December 2022 to 9.7p just 4 months later.

We've seen it the past two years, so surely we're due now for the 2024 spectacular rise ;-)

Or……they were smart enough to hedge 30% of tin production at USD33,000, and have an operational lithium pilot plant that has run extensive test campaigns for potential partners, and will shortly be testing ore throughput from the higher grade ore that’s now accessible due to the accelerated pit pushback they’ve been doing.

It's a good question. What is he actually currently doing for his £24,166 per month (cash and shares) salary ?

There's not a team of people to manage, there's no mining happening, there's no complex corporate activity happening - just a picture of a shaky school roof put on X recently.

Since the placing in January and his talks with the FCA regarding his undisclosed dealings, you'd have to wonder what he has he actually been doing day to day ?

No-one can answer that question but you. If you try to imagine if you didn't know the share price, do you think the company has better or worse prospects now compared to when you bought ? That should guide your answer.

Since I bought ATM I've been up over 100%, and down nearly 30%. I don't think any of us thought we'd see these current prices - but it's clear there are one or more large sellers out there and in the absence of any significant news flow they're just chipping away at the price all the time. We don't know why they are selling - might be nothing to do with the prospects for ATM, they might just need to raise the cash.

I think ATM is currently mispriced, but of course I might be wrong in that. This isn't a company on the brink of collapse, or with terrible news being announced. It's valued at £51m and last month had £12m cash in the bank. I think with the expected newsflow it'll see a significant re-rate, but it might take 9-12 months for that to happen. Tin expansion will happen. Lithium will come on stream. The strategic process has to deliver something positive, and soon, surely. The financials of ATM will be transformed over the coming 12 months, barring any major crash in the tin price.

I listened to an interview with Rick Rule recently, and he said he'd been back and analysed every 10-bagger that he'd had in the resources sector over 45 years of investing. His average holding time was 5 years, and on nearly every one of them, he was down 50% at one time, even having thought he'd chosen good entry points.

Obviously I'm not forecasting ATM will be a 10-bagger from here, although that's possible. If it is, I'll buy you all a t-shirt with "Let me make you an eye-watering offer" printed on it..........

My outlook for ATM isn’t at all bleak, I think 9 months from here it’ll look very different, and I’d be snapping up everything I could get at these prices if I wasn’t already very overweight with ATM.

My frustration at the moment comes from them crashing the sentiment towards the stock themselves - through poor communication, unclear updates, and what seems to be mismanagement of the strategic process.

I do think it’ll come right. I think it has a great future. For a long time my view has been that they are operationally great, but strategically and communications wise, they need to improve.

I’m fully out again, for another small profit, having bought in again on the dip earlier in the month.

Something just doesn’t feel right. I might be totally wrong, but I’d rather trust myself than Fryer.

I’m expecting some sort of issue with the ore sales now. Might be trucks, might be OM Metals, might be “receiving a better offer” - I don’t know, but my gut tells me to expect something so I’d rather watch from the sidelines.

Regarding Director Salaries. It’ll be AGM time soon.

I was planning to vote against the Directors Renumeration Policy as a protest vote due to their terrible communications and the way they ignore contacts from private investors. They don’t seem to listen to anything, so perhaps they’ll notice that. I don’t want to vote against that might affect the running of the company, but I don’t put director salaries into that bracket.

If you think AV is overpaid, then vote against the Renumeration Policy.

12.8% of shares were voted against it last year. If that increases then they might take notice.

I'd agree, it wasn't great. Replay is available for anyone that missed it - https://www.amvestcapital.com/replays

Short highlights - tin expansion on track, last components of ore sorter due on site in next few weeks. Tantalum offtakes going well after some initial ramp up issues. More drilling due in Brandberg West, hoping to confirm the resource there in not too distant future. On strategic process he said something like - "it's like getting married and we're getting the pre-nup right". Again, hopes to update in not too distant future.

Lowlights - AV seemed tired and if I wasn't already invested I don't think that presentation had enough enthusiasm to convince me to, so I don't think it'll be attracting large numbers of US investors. Interviewer wasn't great - he didn't really seem to care what answers he got. It was cut short by 20 mins, without answering all the questions that had been submitted. No comment on the market cap of Andrada halving over the past year.

If there's a chance to ask questions on the webinar later I have a number lined up . I'm not naive enough to expect them to be fully answered, but I want to ask them anyway.

I'm happy to add some others if anyone here isn't able to attend but wants a question asked.

(1) Regarding the tin expansion, are you confident you’ll be able to avoid the high 9.63% royalty rate to Orion if you don’t achieve the 1600tpa rate within the 15 month period from November 2023 ?

(2) When you launched the Strategic Process 14 months ago, you said an offer for the company was not an option being considered. With the recent change of scope of the process, would an outright offer now be considered ?

(3) Having said for 12 months that you were looking to sell the lithium output from the pilot plant, and even stated fairly recently that discussions with a ceramics off taker were progressing well - why has this strategy now changed, with you now saying you now don’t expect any sales until the completion of the pre-concentration circuit in 2025 ?

(4) The market cap has halved over the past year, while tin prices have increased. What are the factors causing this ?

(5) What is your view on why the last quarterly update, on 21st June 2024, was so damaging to the markets valuation of Andrada ?

(6) What can investors expect to see during the remainder of 2024 regarding Brandberg West ?

Https://x.com/andrada_mining/status/1813588343156011315?s=46