Roundtable Discussion; The Future of Mineral Sands. Watch the video here.
I agree with most of what Takayama says, except for one thing - BEM has only ever been an exploration company, it’s never been a mine operator. Recruiting Ulla to deal with environmental permitting doesn’t turn it into a miner. The company has barely a dozen employees. I don’t criticise Kurt for an awful lot in the lead up to the concession grant, my issue is his attempt to turn BEM into something it’s not and doesn’t have the expertise or resources to do. There should have been negotiations going on ahead of the concession grant to offload Kallak to a proper mining company, even LKAB, the moment the grant came through. That’s what exploration companies do.
Eric (et al) - my SIPP broker is Stocktrade (aka SIPPtrade) and they are even more useless than ii. Absolutely nothing on their website about Primary Bid and they’ve just completely ignore the email I sent them last weekend querying it. Luckily I’m fairly ambivalent about buying more shares now that KB has decided the company is a miner not an exploration company but that’s a different story.
I do wonder how much using Primary Bid will have cost BEM in terms of take up in the UK as a result of pension providers being unhelpful such that account holders haven’t been able to add to their pension portfolio.
I guess we have to wait for the full prospectus to get full information of what rights existing shareholders will have, but we’re told purchasing (for new holders or for everyone) will be through PrimaryBid. Their website says this about ISAs and SIPPS.
“Can I use my ISA or SIPP?
Yes, but only if you apply for shares through your broker. Unfortunately, due to HMRC rules, if you apply for shares through our mobile application, you will not be able to receive your shares in your ISA or SIPP account.
If your broker is already working with PrimaryBid, you can apply for shares directly through your broker. Ask your broker to transfer your shares into your ISA or SIPP account. Please contact your broker for more details.
If your broker doesn’t work with us yet, ask them to join PrimaryBid!”
Well, he said he’d try harder. 3x RNS in 3 days. Runway looks like about 18mo at current burn rate (which would inevitably increase if we’re really going to try to build a mine). Fund raise pretty imminent I’d expect. Maybe the plan is to finish the scoping, pump the SP a bit and go for it in Jan/Feb. Thoughts?
My biggest concern is that Kurt seems to want to turn BEM into a production mining company with a high degree of vertical integration between exploration and extracted product, whether that be iron ore, graphite or gold/silver etc. that’s not what mining exploration companies do. They find valuable reserves and generate a bidding war amongst well capitalised miners so that the discovered resource can be sold off at the best price at the optimum moment. I never invested in BEM with the expectation of a long term dividend stream from mining and selling iron ore etc. my hope was that the negotiations to sell the Kallak deposit was going on in the background for completion on grant to the exploitation licence to the highest bidder. Then let a multinational with deep pockets negotiate the environmental permit process, spend years building the mine and decades recovering the purchase cost. A company of less than a dozen people with hardly any money and lacking the Skillset and credibility to build a mine is never going to convince investors. Kallak is worth a fortune, BEM should accept it’ll never get more than a good finders fee and start working to that plan. It would still be a 10 bagger (on the peak price back in early 2022) and could move on to repeat the trick on any new mineral deposits it finds; in Finland for sure, maybe also in Kosovo - though today’s RNS lacked confidence and conviction.
….which obviously my ownership of BEM shares says I am…. The interesting aspects of the loan are it’s short term and its convertibility. Assay results from Kosovo this month, further exploration in Finland thrown into the mix as teasers alongside the “main focus is on Jokkmokk” statement. Suggests confidence on KB’s part, especially the part about a mine in production by 2026. SP in Sweden up a bit on low ish volumes in response. I get the feeling that there will be some positive news coming out of Kosovo and Finland to start upwards momentum in the next 2 or 3 months and over the autumn plus something more substantial on Jokkmokk for Christmas - Yo Ho Ho