Roundtable Discussion; The Future of Mineral Sands. Watch the video here.
I know some of their funds come from non-voting memberships. Maybe those include financial statements? I'm more interested in how much comes from corporate donors.
"Clutching at straws" means your baseless accusation (after the last one doubting I am a real person) that I have a PR background. I'm not the one trying to find clients for my day job, by waving a flag to the media.
Now if we only knew where ShareSoc gets its funds.
@ Matthew125 Well, if you can't answer my question about nonprofit and private fundraising transparency, you might as well filter me. You seem like an uninformed person for my purposes.
@ trikidiki3 It’s a day to be spent with family. Something many of the malcontents here might be lacking, as an explanation of their behaviour.
@ thefrogster So the membership is only 500, in the Sonora Mining Angry Losers League? Seldom does so much recruiting result in so few followers.
@ skysthelimit “You do seem to have some hate for the idea that a group of shareholders are trying to get some value. Why is that?”
A month ago Dee was accusing me of working for BCN’s PR agency. Now he has backed off, as much of an apology as I can expect, and just suggests I apply for a job there.
His work is supported by ShareSoc, so its endorsement of his personal insults has aroused my curiosity. I really am interested in how much transparency exists for nonprofits around the world. How does anyone know that corporate money does not determine the direction they take their campaigns? The transparency seems to equal the level provided to royal wills.
@ Dee12345 “You had all of yesterday to come up with your rebuttal.”
Since you live in a very narrow world, I understand your ignorance of yesterday being a national holiday. We have a saying here, though, about people who "shoot from the hip." You took less than an hour to evade my questions.
Suppose I want to start a nonprofit called Bad Investment Grievances. If I do it here in the States, I have to publish my annual financial statement for public inspection, much like publicly-traded corporations must account for income and expenses. If I do it in the UK, which will give tax benefits to my donors, is there any requirement that I show where the money is spent? (In the US, it's all available online.) If someone wonders how much I am paying myself to publicize my thoughts, is it any of their business? What if I collect money and tell people it's being used for mailing a letter to other shareholders in some enterprise with dubious expectations and Asiatic alliances -- should I keep receipts? Will I have to show them to anyone?
@ MikeBWell "As far as I know, they are not for people making false accusations about other posters."
Try saying something negative about Bacanora or Ganfeng over on the BCN board. I am regularly accused by the adolescent organizers over there of being on those companies' payroll, even though I often remind them of why they are investments best avoided.
When this offer was first announced six months ago, someone posted here that he had “a friend in the City” who predicted it would take until December for the deal to go through. I’m not sure that anticipated a Ganfeng change in strategy from scheme of arrangement to contractual offer, but it turned out to be correct. Does anyone recall who posted that comment, or will anyone take credit for making it?
Meanwhile, for those following the advantage to Ganfeng of delay, here is some exchange-rate history:
Yuan to GBP, May 19: 9.11697
Yuan to GBP, November 19: 8.59524
Decrease in Ganfeng offer, in yuan: 5.7%
Only an insecure man would try to substitute net worth for wisdom. I know someone whose portfolio was once worth 4x the value of his home, because of inherited wealth, but has now lost half of it because of investment in depreciating assets like 50k cars and KDNC. My vehicle is more than 10 years old and now worth less than 10k, but goes just as fast as yours and carries as many passengers. Admittedly, it doesn’t dazzle the people I am not interested in impressing.
@Observer842 Yes, Ganfeng is using solar energy for some of its power needs in Argentina. That may be why they want 500 hectares in Sonora, where KDNC holds a 30% interest. Solar collectors would have to be paid on delivery; there would not be 20-year amortization as offered with a gas pipeline. BCN doesn’t have funds for that, which may be one reason they decided now would be a good time to sell.
@ jam2morrow The original plan was to use gypsum exclusively, without sulfuric acid. Testing found this was not the optimal method, and also cost more. So H2SO4 was added to the mix. Gypsum also contains sulfur (CaS04), so that is the source of some of the sulfate by-products.
At Tonopah, it seems that LIACF has found that roasting with gypsum and other sulfates produces better results than sulfuric acid with less heat. But what are the relative costs for each process, and will a premium be paid for lithium not baked in a fueled kiln?
@ MikeBWell If that comment about not posting links each time is directed at me, here is the 2018 Bacanora technical report I have quoted on this thread:
https://www.bacanoralithium.com/pdfs/Bacanora-FS-Technical-Report-25-01-2018.pdf
@ jam2morrow If you look at Page 202 of the same document, you will see the operating costs include $3,210,000 a year for sulfuric acid during Stage 1, and $4,420,000 annually if it were to reach the production level of Stage 2. But of course, it would be difficult to get past Stage 1 without adequate water supply or electricity, neither of which are available at the moment.
The revenue projections include profits from a side hustle of selling potassium sulfate, a popular fertilizer. Difficult to produce a sulfate without sulfuric acid, would you not admit? You will find references to Glauber’s salt, throughout the process flow charts. That’s the common term for sodium sulfate. The sulfate comes from .... well, you know.
As for water, here is what was reported:
“A Radial Collector Well (RCW) system of three (3) wells are located 7 km north of the plant site, will pump raw water to the raw water tank in the process plant. The raw water is then distributed throughout the process plant and to the mining and administration departments. The RCW is located in an alluvial corridor associated with Rio Bacadehuachi. The RCW system can provide the water requirements for Stage 1 of the project for normal conditions. The uncertainty remains in surface flows through the dry season and sustained droughts to meet any increase in demands for the project.”
But the bigger BCN fantasy is that there will be enough fossil fuel to operate the mining and processing. The scheme is to run a natural-gas pipeline 150 miles (!) from the US border. The gas will be used for roasting the clay to 900 degrees C, and to produce electricity for all other operations. They found a supplier of the natural gas (which has increased in price by about 60% since the estimates were made) that will pay for the pipeline and recover the cost by charging more for the CNG (at the time, estimated at $8,820,000 annually for Stage 1, and twice that for Stage 2).
Back in the 19th Century, the U.S. built its western railroads with imported Chinese labor. Maybe Ganfeng can speed up the construction of this pipeline, with new immigration to Mexico. Forced Uigur labor, perhaps. Will the steel for the pipe come from Brazil?
@ Legalease "200,000 jobs. Probably a typo…"
Not sure what you're looking at but a local story from earlier this year mentioned 1,200 jobs for Bacadehuachi -- in Spanish, 1,200 is "mil doscientos," 200,000 is "doscientos mil." Translation glitch?
I’m just going by their 2018 flow chart. They changed their mind?
17.5.1 Reagents
Reagents used in the process have been described above and include the following:
Sulfuric acid is received by bulk road tanker. It is stored in the Sulfuric Acid Storage Tank and is distributed around the plant via a ring main.
https://www.bacanoralithium.com/pdfs/Bacanora-FS-Technical-Report-25-01-2018.pdf
If they pay more than the offer on open market, don't they have to pay the difference to those who accepted the offer?
So LAC went to Ganfeng and said, "See if you can turn this stuff into lithium, using the sulphuric acid process that has been around at least since the 1980s." Ganfeng already had a lab set up for that in China, probably similar to the one they set up for Bacanora in Hermosillo. The engineers say it can be scaled to an industrial level, assuming you have lots of sulphur and water available. They might be right; it's one of the three processes being considered farther south, in Tonopah, and so far yielding results slightly better than hydrochloric acid. There's lots of water in China, and a sufficient supply in Hermosillo since Ford drilled its own wells. In the Sonora desert, good luck.
@Matthew125 "I also can't see any reason why Ganfeng couldn't continue to buy on the open market"
Assuming the problem is the lack of Mexican approval, Mexico also requires approval once a company's ownership reaches 35%.
What are the chances that Ganfeng slipped the Mexicans some pesos to delay their decision, since they don't need to close the deal until they are prepared to start operations?
There’s an interesting interview with a director of the company planning to build the first lithium battery plant in Argentina. There are fewer consumers in Argentina (population 45 million) than Mexico (129 million), but a lot more lithium. The interview makes the obvious point: The value chain is lost when Argentina sends unrefined lithium to China and then buys it back in the form of batteries.
If this comes up in Spanish, use Google Translate:
https://www.elagrario.com/actualidad-news-el-pais-tendra-su-primera-planta-de-baterias-de-litio-65119.html
That may be why AMLO is proposing to amend the Constitution. He needs 2/3 of both legislative chambers, and a majority of the state legislatures. By limiting the revocation of permits to enterprises that have not started work, though, he may just be planning to argue the meaning of "retroactive" in the Mexican courts. Even if he loses, it could take years -- and then Plan B would be to amend
Even a blind squirrel finds a nut occasionally.
From an article last week in Investors Daily:
“BRKB stock [Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway] has now gained over 22% so far in 2021, which lags the S&P 500's return of around 25%.”
From a January 8, 2021 CNBC article:
“In 2020, Berkshire Hathaway shares were up, but not by much (2%), against an S&P 500 that gained over 18%, with dividends reinvested, according to S&P Global. Taken together, the two-year stretch of 2019 and 2020 marked one of the biggest gaps between Berkshire and the broader U.S. stock market in recent history, with Buffett trailing the index return by a combined 37%.”
Buffett’s time (at age 91) has come and gone. Lately he’s been in the news because of his partner Charlie Munger’s efforts (at age 97) as an amateur architect to force windowless student housing on a California university.
So if RyanAir can delist in London, why can't BCN delist also and choose to be traded only in Hong Kong, or Shanghai -- or maybe Mexico City? That would at least lose many of the pesky British investors. It's not like they haven't moved from one country's exchange to another, once already.