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I don't remember the exact details of the latest share options granted - but I think that there were 3 tranches at different option prices with different maturity dates.
In other words, for each tranche, the directors would have the right (but not the obligation) to purchase shares at the option price, on or after the maturity date.
Clearly, if when that date arrives the share price is below the option price then they would be fools to exercise the option. On the other hand, if the share price is above the option price, they would be fools not to exercise the option!
All this is moot until the date for each tranche arrives though. Unfortunately I cannot remember the precise dates or option prices, but one was at least 18 months out I think. I will leave it for someone else to search back through the RNS's to find the details, if they want to!
I think that the world is waking up to the need for transitioning from fossil fuels (yes, including China, even if they are still building more coal fired capacity). And apparently there are even battery factories being built in countries other than the UK - who'd have thought...
(I do agree that we are historically quite poor at turning good ideas into profitable businesses - we need to get much slicker at moving from R&D into manufacturing).
https://electrek.co/2022/09/22/renewables-manufacturing-installation/
https://horizonteminerals.com/uk/en/press-releases/2022/horizonte-minerals-participates-in-exposibram-2022/
I wonder if the presentation will be uploaded once it has been delivered?
They started construction in mid-May. I agree that there is a chance of glitches along the way, but I suspect that partially explains why the shares are currently trading at a significant discount to NPV - i.e. a lot of the residual risk is already baked in to the share price.
I still believe that the price could go either way from here, as global market conditions will also have an impact, but the proven value of nickel in the ground is such that a mine will be built, assuming the world doesn't end. (If things go very badly, there is still a chance of further dilution, but there is a large contingency amount set aside already)
The options are free - they grant the "owner" the right, but not the obligation, to purchase shares at a certain price some time in the future.
In this case, the option price is significantly higher than both the current share price and the funding price (as paid by Orion and La Mancha).
The option holders will only buy the shares if the price of the shares at the point of exercise is greater than the option price.
So, Contrarian is correct - as of today, the directors have not laid out any cash. I would imagine that they hope and expect their options to be significantly in the money by the time they fall due though, so that it would be an obvious choice to buy the shares.
Each Award is exercisable in return for one ordinary share in the Company and will vest in three tranches on the 12-month, 18-month and 28-month anniversaries of the Award Date at a ratio of 25%, 25% and 50%, with exercise prices of £1.68, £1.72 and £1.76 for each one third of the Awards.
Interesting to note the vesting dates and premiums associated with the options too - they are all at least 60% higher than the current share price, so that should prove an incentive to the directors to move the price in the right direction.
(Obviously the options are zero risk to the directors - if they fail to increase the share price above the option price, they simply don't have to but them!)
From what I have seen, Simply Wall Street just create "robotic" reports purely based on key numbers. Any "analysis" they attempt to do is entirely superficial and not worth the electrons on your screen.
Very occasionally there is some useful comparative information (i.e. how is Company X doing against it's peer group in key metrics), but the writing is generally worthless
Two comments on this (and it is good to see the progress slide):
1) Whatever happened to Serra do Tapa - have the resource estimates just been folded into Araguaia?
2) Why didn't they update the share holdings - still has Teck - I would have thought that this would have been quite simple.
or better still, 2 flights - outbound and return :-)
Does seem to have been a bit dull of late. I was on holiday last week (domestic rather than international), but it doesn't seem like I missed a great deal of activity.
I have neither the ability nor the patience for trading, so I guess I'll stick for now! I will admit to a teeny tiny top up this morning just to recycle some dividends from other holdings and because I simply couldn't stand my total HZM share not to be neatly divisible by 20 :-)
Not sure that the low share number psychology is working for me - my lowest holding is for 52 shares - and that is one I am looking to actively increase.
My head seems to focus mainly around total value (i.e share price X number) - when they get below about £1000 I start to get a bit twitchy. This is possibly why I was relatively indifferent to the share consolidation, is it makes no difference to the overall value.
Neither of these applies to HZM though.
@salmonn - I think that it was the same presentation, but the online post-AGM repeat worked better for me - I had thought that I would have to ask for a summary from those who attended ,so it was good to see it for myself.
I had already submitted my AGM votes, and couldn't have got there today anyway.
Agreed - good presentation, but no new news (not that I was expecting any) We got to see a bit more of the ground-breaking day, and good reiteration of the long-term intent of La Mancha and Orion - given as protection against a low-ball takeover.
I did ask how frequently we could expect updates on construction progress, but nothing beyond "quarterly updates" was promised - although any significantly developments will presumably still get their own RNS
I must admit to being mildly perplexed by the reaction of the SP to today's news - it seemed pretty positive to me.
I am left wondering whether some with short term horizons were hoping for a buyout before construction, and so sold out because the time to value has increased beyond what they were happy with.
As for myself, here since 2017, so what's another couple of years!
I suspect that we are just at the beginning of the final upward phase of the Lassonde curve - the value will be increasingly reflected in the SP as construction progresses towards first production. Not likely to be as smooth an upward curve as you see in all of the example Lassonde curves on the internet though, and still likely to be bumps in the road along the way.
The value is there though, in terms of the value of the nickel in the ground - and it does look as through the nickel market is beginning to recover it's poise following the short squeeze at the beginning of March.
(One potential concern is that if the Ni price gets too high there will be powerful I'm encentives to seek other supplies or to reduce demand)
@TG333: That would make some sense - although I did think that RNS announcements should be made as soon as reasonably practicable once a company is aware of price sensitive information.
I am looking forward to further updates on progress - it's a shame that there isn't a live webcam on site!
Sounds like good news.
If I am being picky though, it would appear a bit late when compared to the project schedule from the recent BMO Mining. conference presentation. This implied to me that ground breaking would be at the start of Q2, and that the civils contact should be awarded about now.
(The outline project schedule is only at quarterly resolution, but some of the milestones appear at different points within their respective quarters)