Member Info for Manlord

not exactly what you want to see prior to an asx launch.

the concern for me isn’t that mining becomes overnight, it’s what this signals for general risk capital.

the jnr mining sector (and others) attracts a lot of investment because the upside can justify the risk, early backers of empire know what i mean by that but if govt reduce that reward, some capital naturally moves elsewhere.

the majors will be fine but small and mid cap explorers and developers will suffer.

if investors see less after tax upside, capital will surely become more selective, raises get harder, dilution increases, and timelines stretch - all worst case scenario it has to be said.

for us, it is a bit more complex because pitfield continues to de-risk in the next 12 months through all areas we are waiting on, then we would move out of the pure speculative range and become far more resilient and less effected but until that happens, a weaker risk appetite across the market would not help sentiment or funding conditions.

maybe our timing will help?

https://www.han****prospecting.com.au/mining-billionaire-gina-rinehart-lashes-labors-ill-thought-out-capital-gains-tax-ramifications/

ml

Question asked on Telegram about expected news flow.

As I see it we have multiple overlapping workstreams rather than single items with individual dependencies that have to follow a straight line of updates.

Good news is we should have the remaining assay results, Thomas has been partially communicated already but particularly around Cosgrove, near term I’d say, likely by month end or early June IMO.

I’ve been talking to one or two people here and we were discussing whether if the ASX will come before or after the MRE upgrade? I don’t know but my initial thoughts are I’d like it after we list, so as to get investors excited and then boom, MRE upgrade comes out and we start building momentum from there. I’d imagine Cannacord would like their clients to have the opportunity to see early returns also rather than buy in after an expected move north by that news, but I really don’t know what will happen.

Updated MRE in July, incorporating Thomas and Cosgrove data, likely shortly after final assay results.

Mine planning and target definition, already underway now, with SB effectively saying in the last Sydney Resources interview that they now have a clear line of sight on likely initial mining areas.

SB said they’ll then be onto selecting the most commercially viable ore from the targeted high grade zone for continuous piloting, likely immediately following the latest assay analysis.

My guess is continuous piloting after that (SB said Q3 didn’t he?) but again it’s all fluid and potentially subject to change (optimisation as SB says) as I’m sure the team (NM) will want all the technical inputs to align before going all in. The flowsheet is almost certainly being continuously optimised in the background so I’m not expecting a single “finished” version just yet. The lab test work has proven the chemistry, the pilot work will refine the recoveries, reagent use and product quality, and during the continuous piloting the process will get stress tested left, right and centre. What we start with and what we finish with are likely to be different iterations of a flowsheet.

Product qualification and end user testing, likely to begin during and after continuous piloting as we build sufficient amounts of high grade material so Q3 / Q4?

Then economic studies / development planning, building off the updated MRE and pilot outputs, likely late H2 but will be ongoing from MRE onwards.

Again this is just what I have roughly in my mind with slight deviations and “bolt from the blue” news possible too, but the key point is that the expected sequencing can and will likely evolve all along the way to ensure nothing is left to chance, as opposed to the expected lead times being considered as drifting or delayed.

Then of course we have Mr.Mir’s gossip and hearsay from experts in the field! 🙄

ML

Https://theoregongroup.com/investment-insights/empire-metals-pitfield-titanium-project-global-scale-high-purity-and-strategic-potential/

Posted by Empire on LinkedIn earlier today.

A lot of PR from what I can see recently. I wonder why?

ML

Hi Munchkins,

On point 3, without harbouring my previously communicated views, I had hoped that Eclipse would generate at least £2.5m based on a number of factors such as;

Gold increase since our purchase

Costs accrued to date for holding the project

Shares issued in lieu of 3rd party work

Which I totalled IIRC, as close to £4m but as it’s been discussed and utterly pointless to reflect on it again, the positives are that it’s gone and we can solely focus on Pitfield.

If that continues to progress, the Eclipse sale price will be completely irrelevant in time.

Cash in the bank subject to final sale closure so we should now have £15m+ in the company coffers.

ML

Highlights

· Definitive Sale Agreement executed for the disposal of Empire's 75% interest in the Eclipse ML.

· Total consideration for Empire's 75% interest payable is A$750,000, including a A$50,000 non-refundable deposit already received and A$700,000 payable in cash on completion.

· The Eclipse ML sale is consistent with Empire's strategy to divest non-core assets and focus capital and management resources on advancing the Pitfield Titanium Project, in Western Australia.

 

Shaun Bunn, Managing Director, said: "We are pleased to confirm execution of the definitive sale and purchase agreement for Empire's 75% interest in the Eclipse Mining Lease. The transaction allows the Company to direct capital and management focus to advancing the Pitfield Titanium Project, one of the largest titanium discoveries globally. Completion of the sale is expected in the near term, subject to satisfaction of the remaining conditions."

 

Background

As announced on 30 December 2025, Empire's wholly-owned Australian subsidiary entered into a conditional sale agreement for its 75% interest in mining lease M27/153 (Eclipse ML), held in joint venture with the holder of the remaining 25% interest. The agreement included a three-month exclusivity and due diligence period, which was extended by one month on 31 March 2026 to enable the purchaser to complete its analysis of assay results from a 10-hole, 514-metre RC drilling programme carried out at the Project during the due diligence period.

 

Sale Terms

Key terms of the Sale Agreement include:

· the sale relates to Empire's 75% interest in mining lease M27/153 (Eclipse ML);

· total consideration for Empire's 75% interest payable is A$750,000, including a A$50,000 non-refundable deposit already received and A$700,000 payable in cash on completion;

· completion is subject to satisfaction of customary conditions precedent including Ministerial approval;

· the Sale Agreement contains representations, warranties and indemnities customary for a transaction of this nature.

 

Next Steps

The parties will now work towards satisfaction of the conditions precedent under the Sale Agreement, with completion expected to follow shortly thereafter. A further announcement will be made on completion of the transaction.

Empire continues to review options for other non-core assets, consistent with its strategy to accelerate development activities at the Pitfield Project.

 

All 🦆’s lining up nicely now 📈

For those interested, this was the anonymous Telegram poll following the £8m funding at 30p.

Question:

Empire Metals £8M placing at 30p, your honest view?

104 total votes.

Results:

35% (37 votes)

Positive overall, funding was sensible and discount acceptable in current market conditions.

29% (30 votes)

Need more context, too early to judge without seeing exactly how the capital is deployed.

14% (15 votes)

Reassured by II participation, the people who came into the raise matter just as much as the funding price.

11% (11 votes)

Excellent move, accelerates Pitfield development and long-term value creation.

10% (10 votes)

Necessary, but frustrating, the raise made sense, but the discount was too heavy.

1% (1 vote)

Preferred a different route, JV, offtake, strategic partner, or smaller/staged funding.

0%

Negative, unnecessarily dilutive and poor outcome for existing shareholders.

If you combine the clearly supportive categories (Excellent, Positive, Reassured by II participation), that is 60% broadly supportive of the raise.

Add in the 29% who simply want more clarity before forming a final view, and suddenly 89% are either supportive or at least not prepared to call it a mistake.

Only 10% felt the raise was the right move but priced too aggressively, and effectively nobody believed this was outright destructive to shareholder value.

On the surface of it, it appears a fairly balanced and telling result. The data here suggests most shareholders accepted the strategic rationale, particularly once the institutional names became clearer, and from today’s latest TR1 update.

If the funding accelerates continuous piloting, product validation, MRE expansion/upgrades, ASX execution and strategic engagement, then I think we can view it in a positive manner. Let’s see how this progresses.

ML

Just quickly read up on Ms.Barnes and AAF and for me ultimately it’s positive to see another meaningful institutional name increasing their holding via today’s TR1.

This aligns with what SB has been signalling for some time around broadening the II base and naturally reducing reliance on retail participation. That is exactly what we want to see as we move from development into production phase.

Apollo Asia Fund (AAF) don’t appear to be your typical fast-money in and out business. CB from what I can see and others have outlined has decades of Asian investment experience, and AAF’s approach historically looks to have been centred around intrinsic value, patient capital, fundamental analysis and LT business quality rather than speculative punts on hit & hope drill programmes.

Typically funds like hers don’t take decent positions unless they have looked at Pitfield through a much more scrutinised viewpoint such as our scale, strategic relevance, jurisdiction, processing progress, downstream optionality, and presumably they feel there is strong possibility that Pitfield can become something far more significant in time. It must be good news.

Also worth noting we have attended the last two TZMI conferences in Kuala Lumpur, highly relevant global titanium industry events where producers, processors, technical specialists, end users and II’s all gather to see the latest and greatest in the ti02 market.

So seeing Asian based II names appearing on the share register sort of matches with what our marketing team have been trying to build. I personally think the international awareness of Empire has building in the last 12 months with OTC, Canada, Japan conferences and other European locations such as Switzerland have all been visited by BoD members. It has taken time but it looks like we are no longer just telling the Pitfield story to UK/IRL retail message boards which is a very very very good thing!

Our story is now directly in front of the entire global titanium ecosystem from brokers, investors, suppliers and end users. Having sticky II’s with a long term view is a big positive for the pathway of Pitfield.

Now add in the ASX and it could be the start of something quite special.

DYOR

ML

So make of that what you will. At the very least, the concerns have been raised directly and are clearly known to the company. Their position is that there is nothing abnormal to be concerned about beyond normal market dynamics.

Finally, and most importantly, it is clear from the communication that we are both fully aligned on the significance of the ASX listing and that’s why Empire mgt have prioritised it.

The clear strategic objective, as I understand it, is to broaden and strengthen the II shareholder base, moving the register towards a more natural mining focused investor audience, whilst also benefiting from a market that offers greater visibility and transparency around trading activity and market movements generally.

IMHO, this is a very important point. If part of the frustration here is retail led volatility, fragmented trading behaviour, or poor price discovery, then SB & Co. are certainly not blind to that. Quite the opposite, they appear to have already identified that potential dynamic and are actively positioning the company towards what they believe will be a more appropriate LT shareholder structure.

Whether that fully resolves every little trading frustration I and others have remains to be seen, but strategically, the direction of travel makes complete sense to me and Empire mgt look like they know what they’re doing.

Now you know I like an analogy so 3 yrs ago, we were effectively playing div 1 football, a small-cap explorer with an interesting story but nowhere near being on the wider mining market’s radar.

Over the last 18-24 months, we have earned back to back promotions to the Premier League, the market has started to recognise the scale of what is being built, the company has matured significantly, credibility has grown, and institutional awareness has clearly increased.

Now, in my view, within the next couple of months, we are effectively looking to secure our Champions League place through the ASX and this is where a lot of the heavyweight mining investors play. It brings a far bigger pool of mining specific capital, stronger II participation, greater market transparency, and what should ultimately be far better price discovery for Empire.

And who knows, if Pitfield continues to deliver as many of us believe it can over the next 2-4 years, perhaps winning the Champions League in this analogy is the point where Empire stops being viewed as an emerging story and becomes a genuine major in the making.

DYOR

ML

Good morning all,

For transparency, given the amount of discussion here, Telegram & ADVFN around recent trading patterns, I reached out to SB following the latest Ignite/Sydney presentations and interviews.

Firstly, my contact was simply to congratulate the team on the recent media engagement, as I thought both the conference presentation and interview content at both the conferences were professional and encouraging from a EEE shareholder perspective.

Alongside that, I raised the concerns many of us have discussed around recent trading behaviour, including the persistent & repetitive block sales, the apparent inability for momentum to properly build despite strong operational progress, and the question of whether there was any indication of coordinated external activity, or other abnormal influences on the stock.

Without sharing private correspondence verbatim, I think it is fair to share the overall view of the response. SB explained that the company receives a full monthly share register analysis covering changes in holdings, movements in positions and broader register activity. Based on his analysis, the company’s clear view is that there is nothing to suggest coordinated external influence or manipulation of the share price, and that what we are seeing appears far more consistent with normal retail led trading behaviour and natural market churn than some organised effort operating in the background. The micro-sales are understood to be algorithmic trades, more a nuisance than anything to worry about.

Separately, and maybe this matters more to some than others, but I was pleased, albeit not surprised, to receive a direct and timely response, with senior management on Cc with the correspondence . To me, that suggests the topic wasn’t brushed aside with a “we have noted your concerns and will look into it” reply and rather a detailed analysis and reply.

For those who do not know, I have invested in AIM and smaller cap companies for the best part of 14yrs and have probably been involved, in one form or another, with 30–40 companies over that period. One thing I have always done is communicate directly with mgt where appropriate. Not to become a nuisance, not to create headaches, but because it is my hard-earned money at work, and I personally believe constructive engagement and proper due diligence is simply common sense where significant sums of money are involved. Others may take a different approach, and that is absolutely fine.

For what it is worth, purely from my own experience, SB is one of the most straightforward, transparent and credible leaders I have dealt with in that time. Things can and do go wrong in this game but based on behaviour, communication, consistency and delivery to date, my own view is that he has conducted himself in a very professional manner again was keen to point out that shareholder feedback is key and always important to receive.

CTD…..

I’ll try this another way

hxxps://t[dot]me/empiremetals/32062

ML

*************empiremetals/32062

poll on the £8m raise. it’s hard to cover every possible view on the funding but hopefully your personal view is somewhat covered.

so far, sentiment is clearly more positive than negative, with circa 60% fairly supportive of the raise, 28% wanting more clarity, and virtually nobody viewing it as an outright poor or unnecessarily dilutive move.

it’s anonymous and all vote options are shuffled for every person to avoid any suggestive answers. i’ll publish final results on monday evening.

p.s. guys, a general observation.

this board has worked hard over the last 2 years through some genuinely toxic periods, and ultimately lse admin dealt with that sad individual accordingly.

everyone is entitled to their opinion, bullish or bearish, that is what a market is, but there is a clear difference between debate and disruption.

i have certain posters filtered, only know they are active because others keep referencing or replying to them. the simple reality is that repeatedly engaging with obvious antagonists only clogs the board, derails proper discussion, and makes the thread far less usable for the 99% of genuine investors here.

we have even seen people say they arrived to research the company, took one look at the chaos, and left without digging any further. that helps nobody invested here.

so a genuine ask, if someone is clearly here only to provoke, why give them the oxygen they crave? filter, ignore, move on. if they are offered analysis, that differs from the majority view, then of course the filter button shouldn’t need to be used and that constructive, but everyone can decide that for themselves.

i know those replying are not doing so with bad intentions, and yes i’ve been guilty of this also, and i’ve apologised for that behaviour as i got dragged down to that level, but the outcome is often more disruption from the responses than from the original post itself.

we’re all adults. best thing we can do is starve the noise and keep the board readable and focused on the company, with positive, neutral or negative commentary, but respectful commentary that can be debated between all members.

ml

Very frustrating tbh.

Almost 50 trades for 3pm today with totals of pennies and less than a tenner.

Trades figure is irrelevant these days as half of them are worthless.

I’ve heard of orders being filled in multiple tranches, it’s happened to me almost every time but the endless 35, 35, 35, 35, 35 is ridiculous.

There should be absolutely no reason for so many of those 35 trades. Yes if a full order was being closed off and one single 35 shares were needed to fill your 10,000 share volume but this is just plain BS at this stage. As I’ve said, never have I seen it behave like this until late last year.

It’s also been ages since the SP finished on a UT at the 4:30pm SP close. Always showing as above or below and has to open up blue or red to the tune of 2-3% the following morning so makes the daily % performance impossible to analyse properly.

Anyway, not a lot we can do but it is grating on me now personally.

Enjoy your weekends all.

ML

Hilarious!

I probably should have waited a few hours before posting earlier today.

That cloudy II shareholding has drifted off to the west and glorious sunshine is now present.

The RNS is exactly what I had hoped to see, just went too early on my post.

Enjoy your weekends.

ML

Hi Frank,

I think you were initially right IMO.

Asian Investment Management Services last disclosed a holding on 31 October 2025 at 7.04% (50m shares).

Oberon Investments for example had previously disclosed crossing the 3% threshold on 1 Nov 2023.

As SB has indicated that large existing “Asian based” shareholders participated in the recent raise, and those shareholders include previously disclosed holders, I would have absolutely expected to see that reflected somewhere if thresholds have been crossed or increased.

Equally, if a holder previously above a notifiable threshold had since fallen below it through dilution, would that not also normally require disclosure (Oberon were at just above 3%).

I fully appreciate corporate presentation slides on the website are only snapshots and not RNS documents, and “existing shareholders” does not necessarily mean the exact same disclosed legal entities, but from an ordinary shareholder perspective, the visibility here feels slightly cloudy IMO and could do with some clarity from THE PoV of “who are the returning II’s bankrolling Empire”.

As I disagreed with here TBow here recently, one thing he is absolutely right about is that if retail shareholders didn’t get the opportunity to buy in the funding round, it would be nice to know who has been given the opportunity twice in the last 9 months.

If no TR1’s arrive - the question then is why would these II’s have decided to use a separate ownership entity mechanism to avoid a TR1 or is there another logical reason that we’re just not aware of?

I’m not saying it’s something to be concerned about but like everything on AIM, any lack of clarity will always be considered or perceived as a potential negative rather than a positive.

Personally, I’d like to know who feels Pitfield is worth stumping up £15m for continuing development. Sadly, the buyers have no responsibility or need to publicly confirm their positions?and may have taken steps to to hide that by using a separate investment vessel to do so.

ML

“We will come back to the market with a final scoping and economic study towards the end of the year.”

That gives us a very clear development runway. Near term flowsheet, July resource upgrade, then economic work later in the year. Some will again think this is taking too long and will expect it all tomorrow, but for me and with a realistic and reasonable understanding of what’s involved with a ticking all the boxes needed to create a world class mining project, this is exactly the sort of progression I wanted to hear and see.

Game on and July previously sounded like a long time away, it’s less than 8 weeks away.

DYOR

ML

P.S. Just in case anyone is interested, if you remember the idiot from last week, “LegendHasIt”, it would appear the account was removed immediately and from what I was told, because the same IP address was identified as being the same skidmark, which would explain the speed at which the account was dealt with by LSE admin.

So once again, same behaviour, same style, same attempted con, same obsession with following people across forums, same endless nonsense. The very same individual who previously lied endlessly here in 2024, threatened posters, and tried to derail all discussion thought they could simply walk back onto this forum under a fresh name and had the stupidity to think they could fool people all over again. Those that saw the posts, figured it out straight away. Not very hard to given the human skidmark has an IQ in low double digits at best.

Most people always say be very cautious of newly created accounts arriving with 20 posts and suddenly appearing to know everything about the company, and the investors who post here regularly, and this is exactly why.

Once a liar, always a liar. Once a con, always a con. Human skidmarks leave a stain, but thankfully LSE admin have removed him.

Bang! And the dirt is gone!

Anyway, back to Empire.

“We’re going to be bringing out a very comprehensive flow sheet in the coming weeks.”

The flowsheet is one of the main topics that people have said is behind schedule and that SB needed to put meat on the bone. I disagreed with it being delayed for various reasons which have been discussed endlessly here (ADVFN).

SB did not say someday, he did not not say later, he said “in the coming weeks” and that tells us the technical work has already reached a level where mgt are ready to show the market what the monetisation route actually looks like. How’s that for a meaty bone?

“I think people are going to be really excited by the fact that we can lay out conventional process steps, you know, things that are commonly found in industry”

One of the most important comments in the whole interview for me. One of the topics that the likes of Charles Archer and similar people hugely worried about Empires success, has always been whether Pitfield required some exotic processing miracle. He and others have done their best since early 2024 to suggest we had nothing but unprocessible dirt. SB is clearly telling us that the answer is no, conventional industrial steps, familiar processes, practical pathway are all in place and will not be an issue. He told us before many times but now it’s real and backed by science and data.

“We’ll be able to show a pathway to a final product.”

This is where we move from a decent resource story to a fully commercial story. We’ve had a lot of success in the last 24 months but to move the needle north, the market appears to want to know how we can turn our ore into revenue.

SB is telling us that route is about to be laid out. It’s doesn’t get better or more exciting than that.

“These are highly sophisticated investors.”

Standard mgt wording I’m sure, but still fairly relevant. These guys were not retail investors just taking a punt with loose change a hopes. These II’s just committed £8m on top of £7m and no matter what we think of the raise price, I can assure you trying to secure £15m on AIM would not have been secured at 30p & 40p by PI’s, and if it was, 50% of it would be sold at a 10% profit and would have caused a serious drain on the SP momentum IMHO.

“We haven’t gone out with a technical flow sheet yet. We haven’t completed economic studies. But I know that these people understand now that the value proposition is there.”

Again the II’s have backed us before the full technical package, the economics,cthe scoping work have even been confirmed or communicated. That tells me anyway that they have see enough in the scale, geology and technical direction to justify committing such a large capital amount. Lots of debate on this last night on LSE but it is what it is, and the money will now hopefully get us to where we want sooner than later.

CTD….

Now to Shaun’s interview from earlier.

Some standout quotes in my opinion and they are telling as to what’s ahead.

“I think people are going to be really pleased with the outcome, because it will greatly add to our already very significant mineral resource.”

This is the standout line of the interview. “Greatly add” is not the sort of wording you use if we are talking about a modest uplift. SB clearly setting expectation that July should deliver something extremely big, on top of an already monumentally huge 2.2Bt resource.

“This is a giant mineral system, 30km long, 10km wide.”

Heard it before of course but reminding ourselves this is not us investors getting carried away with statements like this. We are not dealing with a normal run of the mill deposit, we are dealing with a district scale mineral system, and the challenge has always been defining where the pot of gold is (optimal starter pit zone), not whether there is enough scale.

“The focus around the Thomas prospect was more infill drilling to bring the resource up into a higher category.”

This is important too because we knew it’s wasn’t about adding more tonnes just for the sake of it and some did say why drill more when we have 2.2bt. A higher category resource means greater confidence, and greater confidence is exactly what feeds into the upcoming economic studies, mine planning and ultimately project credibility. The bigger, the better for the future IMO.

“The Cosgrove drilling was an expansion program.”

Thomas was about confidence levels and refining the high grade core, Cosgrove was about expansion. Put the two together and July will be doing 2 things at once, improving the confidence immensely and materially increasing scale for what could be a centuries worth of mining.

“This is now arguably our biggest risk.”

Let’s not hide away from risks as they can be avoided and surmounted IMO. Of course some will focus on the word risk, I actually see this as a positive. Why? Because if metallurgy is now the biggest risk, then SB is effectively telling us the geology, scale and resource case are already doing the heavy lifting. That is a very different conversation to early stage exploration and to me confirms the BoD have already put those topics in the “completed” folder with metallurgy being the next focal point along with product options, areas which I’m sure will be completed and achieved in due course.

CTD….

@Ageos

This is the exact reason Shaun & Arabella were not forthcoming with a direct explanation as to how our ASX listing would work.

If it was a simple “this is the mechanism” they would have said without issue, but as there are clearly 2 options and possibly a hybrid in between, I assume both with positives and negatives depending on your views, it could be considered “inside info” and hence the silence to not only me but many others I’m aware have tried to figure out how it could work.

I’ll be honest, I’m all over this listing and with what I do know, I would be happy with either AIM staying as primary listing with ASX assumed to take primary in due course (essentially a slow but steady transfer) or the primary listing going straight to the ASX.

What concerns me about this listing process, is what I don’t know! And on this topic, I’m certain that’s quite a bit so it will be interesting to get this RNS and any subsequent interviews explaining the process in detail.

Thanks for your continued input.

ML

TBow, firstly, I genuinely appreciate the time you have taken to go back and forward on this. I’m not here to block your views in anyway or suggest you are wrong, equally I do not think I am necessarily right either. We both have our views, and there is merit in debating them, that is what engaged shareholders like us should be doing.

For what it is worth, I have always believed shareholders should engage constructively when they have genuine questions or concerns. I have done that for years across multiple companies I have invested in, including directly with directors and mgt, not constantly, far from it but definitely I do when I feel something needs clarity, should be challenged, or simply to share shareholder feedback with mgt.

Some may assume I am always positive here on Empire, but if they saw some of the emails or heard some of the conversations I have sent or had over the years, including to SB and Co, and directors before them, they would probably be surprised at some of the concerns, frustrations and feedback content I have raised on the behalf of shareholders.

On this particular funding point, I think where we differ is fairly simple. Your view is that a broader offer may have been fairer and achievable without some of the downsides I have focused on. My view is that in reality, speed, certainty, execution risk, potential overhang, and possible ASX timing considerations made the chosen route entirely rational, particularly at 30p, which I still see as a strong outcome with minimal discount and dilution for what we are getting in return. Would I have liked it higher, absolutely and I think 35p could have been achieved based on rolling avg SP.

At the end of the day, most reasonable people will look at the same situation and can come to different conclusions. The one fact I think we can both agree on is that the funding is now done, and mgt now have the capital to push on significantly over the next year at the very least. Hopefully the focus now shifts back to piloting, product delivery, metallurgical progress, flowsheet optimisation and the positives that very funding amount of £8m is intended to unlock.

ATB

ML

"Although I cannot think of any I am pretty sure that raises have been done at premiums, never mind discounts, simply because they solve the problem of accumulating significant quantities of shares without moving the price.

And you are missing the fact that subscribing to a capital raise is different from buying shares in the market and merits a different price. If I subscribe to a capital raise it is likely to benefit my existing holding of those shares whereas buying in the market will have a negligible effect. It may be quite rational to be prepared to buy EEE at 28p in the market but also to be quite happy to purchase similar shares at 32p in a capital raise."

I understand the distinction you are making TBow, but that logic really only applies if the investor already has a meaningful existing holding they are protecting or strategically increasing that holding.

If we are talking about entirely new money for £8m, the rationale becomes much less compelling, because capital is capital at the end of the day. An investor choosing between buying in the market at 28p or subscribing at 32p would need a very specific reason to ignore the cheaper route, in fact I can’t think of one.

I can assure you that the ratio of premium placing to discounted ones is far from even. If it was even 5% of placings being at a premium I’d be surprised.

And that brings us full circle as the BoD clearly found investors willing to back the raise at 30p, which in itself is a very tight discount by AIM standards and arguably a positive signal rather than a negative one.

I think we obviously differ on preferred funding mechanics, but from where I sit, speed, certainty, limited overhang, and a surprisingly strong pricing outcome made the recent funding call perfectly rational IMO.

ML