Gordon Stein, CFO of CleanTech Lithium, explains why CTL acquired the 23 Laguna Verde licenses. Watch the video here.
Certainly getting the Zanaga mine itself functional may be a better investment. But getting its ouputs somewhere useful has long been considered an extremely complex operation - that's why nobody has tackled it. And I don't think it's something that will happen in isolation - with one company fixing it. It will take a lot of organisational pressure and Government support to crack this nut, I suspect.
I'm a stick. Very gradually the pieces are falling into place for this opportunity. It's still a tough slog, but in the next 3yrs I think it might roll.
Why 3? Somewhat arbitrary really but my feeling is that this opportunity requires additional development in the region before it makes sense. Given recent movements, i suspect 3yrs is a realistic time-frame for that.
Perhaps I'm mistaken but I don't believe anyone said there would be an update mid-april. I thought they said they'd be completing the costing mid-april. That's only part of the journey to an update of any kind in my view - it will require development work before anything is released. That is of course assuming there is anything to be released. Do shareholders need to be informed about the results of a costing? I'm not clear on that.
Evidently though, a costing will help potential buyers decide whether this project makes sense. On that basis, I presume this is entering the end game stage. Warning - end games take time! And that is assuming you find anyone willing to make a bid and the parties decide to play ball. It might be that the project is kept rolling for a few more years until more organic or native infrastructure is developed.
My feeling would be that this will either come to some sort of a conclusion this year - I'd be amazed if it was before Q4 personally. Or, it will be in the next 10yrs, assuming the business can be kept aflot that long!
I'm fairly sure there will be no news of any note tomorrow. Certainly, I won't be expecting any.
I don't see this as can kicking personally. There's just a process afoot. ZIOC is doing some costing work right now. The results of that will help it with the ambition of progressing this project through some kind of sale/ investment/ whatever.
Once the costing is done we'll get a sniff of the basics. I imagine that will take 6wks minimum. Once that's done a story will be built around the costings and it will be taken to market to see if anyone wants to invest/ buy/ laugh them out of the room. I presume it will NOT be the latter. But I also presume that is not something that will create any news for us before Q4 - get it into market June, tout it around, gather initial feedback, due dilligence, offers etc.
I'm only guessing, but that seems like a sensible process to me.