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Cindercone Fastmarkets FeV graph has US prices flat for last 5 to 6 weeks. That is not a 3 month downtrend. It is … flat

Thanks Paludina. Good to see a large percentage of the output from Vametco going to the high priced US market, just as management said they were doing.

Even better that Nitrovan carries an additional price premium to FeV

Interesting numbers on global market from globenewswire.com in March.

Global Vanadium market in 2022 worth $42.5 billion. They estimate this to rise to $81.8 billion by 2030. That is very large market growth.

US vanadium market in 2022 $11.6 billion! And BMN is very wisely tapping into this large, lucrative and growing market.

The market is the next factor to consider.

The price of vanadium seems to have two characteristics that are relevant:

1. It can be very volatile and hard to predict

2. The notion of a single market doesn’t seem to work any more.

Any forward looking prediction of Vanadium prices can only be made according to known circumstances. If they change then so will outcomes.

Traditionally I believe over 90% of vanadium was consumed by the steel industry. The most recent figures I have seen suggest that is now between 80 and 85%. This reflects growth in other uses which include medical, aerospace and especially the rapidly increasing demand for vanadium electrolyte in the expanding VRFB industry. New markets may also open up. Some reports concern development of domestic vanadium batteries and even lithium vanadium hybrid batteries.

These new markets are all in modern growing industries and will create rising demand for vanadium over and above its use for reinforcing steel. Hardly a week goes by without more VRFB projects being announced. The Vametco minigrid should be an excellent demonstration of the viability of VRFBs. I expect this industry to grow exponentially as demand for battery storage increases in response to the rush towards renewables to meet climate targets, and the opportunities VRFBs provide at grid scale become more widely known and accepted by business leaders and politicians.

The problem comes in meeting this extra demand. Supply restraints are likely in my opinion to push Vanadium prices upwards over the next couple of years. No significant new supply projects are likely to come on stream in that time frame. That is why I say Bushveld has timed its upgrades perfectly to take maximum benefit from any price rises.

BMN has responded well to changing market conditions. It has redirected its attention to growing sales in the US where demand is strong and prices higher than RoW. It is also worth looking at the diversity of production at Vanchem where it’s products cover a range of markets including high value chemicals and they can alter production of individual products to respond to demand.

The most recent comment from the CEO indicated that demand remained strong for all of their products. Sales figures from Q1 support this.

Recently v prices have pulled back a little. Periodically that is to be expected. However in recent days China prices have been flat suggesting that another reversal may be on the cards and s watch out for a return to rising v prices. US prices have remained higher and less volatile. The US will need to consider its sources of vanadium. Little domestic production and China and Russia seem unlikely partners. That leaves Brazil and South Africa, with BMN owning and recently upgrading two of the four primary production plants outside China.

Just my opinion. DYOR

The Biggest positive is the operational progress made by BMN over the last two years or so.

It has been a tough period for shareholders but the company had no option but to upgrade those production facilities. That work has been successfully completed, resulting in stable production at Vametco, which exceeded its increased production target in 2022. At Vanchem the refurbishment of Kiln 3, not without teething problems and impacted by load shedding, has finally demonstrated success with high production numbers in March and the first three weeks of April.

Those numbers point to another record year of group production with costs falling as a consequence of economies of scale and the high Dollar Rand, currently well over 19.

Hopefully the next few months will see the electrolyte plant and Vametco minigrid in commission and electrolyte sales commencing.

The production side of the business looking very strong for 2023

ARCM I will happily take your insults all day if it makes you feel better.

However which specific comments that I have posted with regard to BMNs operational progress would you like to challenge?

Given the published facts via RNS and other sources the company have invested wisely over the last 2 years with production stabilised at Vametco and growing at Vanchem.

And both BELCO and minigrid soon to be in commission.

ARCM most people would see these as very positive and place BMN in a strong position to take advantage of the rapidly growing VRFB market which will increase demand for vanadium at a point time where raising supply will be difficult. Laws of supply and demand would indicate a resultant rise in V price. That is my focus and I have repeated this many times.

Do you not think the above points to a very positive 2023 / 24?

By the way I do not think of myself as an investment guru nor have I claimed that. Only those trolling me have invented that story which you repeat.

As for my investment strategy that is my business.

Well that is exactly what the troll wanted eatstocks.

Who is this Pub person that is apparently bullish about this ‘stock’? Anyone know who the troll is referring to? The troll seems to be very confused … again.

Thank you for confirming my thoughts HMHG

In fairness to the trolls there is a subtle difference between giving out share price forecasts, claiming we will all get rich quick, and recognising the excellent operational progress made by the company creating the potential for share price growth if all goes well.

Sadly I am not sure that our trolls possess enough intelligence to understand that subtle difference, as witnessed by tonight’s troll post.

I am very bullish about BMN as a company. I have made this clear over and over again that they have promised and delivered significant operational progress.

The company themselves have stated in RNS that they made significant investment to stabilise and grow production, confirming exactly what I have posted here many times.

They have delivered that promise and we are now in a period waiting for that to produce evidence of profitability. Hopefully continued growth and rising profits combined with increasing V prices will trigger a positive response by the markets.

I have put up many posts giving factual evidence to explain my support for the company. If I was wrong you can be certain the trolls would respond to my many invitations to “correct” me. Not once have they been able to do so and simply resort to questioning my credibility (as HMHG tried tonight) and resort to open insults.

Water off a ducks back to me but confirmation that I pose a significant threat to their relentless negative agenda. And I will continue to do so.

The share price is disappointing now as it was in 2016. Once the profits are visible and if we see the much predicted rise in V price following V shortage as VRFB industry grows then who knows… a repeat of 2017/18? That would be nice.

Just my opinion. DYOR

My thoughts on this from yesterday:

“According to the forecast of professional institutions, the installed capacity of vanadium batteries is expected to reach 8.6 to 12.9 GWh in 2025, requiring more than 100,000 tons of vanadium resources. The potential market demand has increased significantly, …”

That raises an interesting problem. In 2021 total global vanadium production was 119,000 mtV, up just 3,000 mtV from the previous year. Where is all this extra Vanadium going to come from?

Most of China’s output is coproduction from steel industry. Difficult to independently raise output.

Russia is blacklisted.

That more or less leaves 4 primary production plants, two of which are owned by … BUSHVELD MINERALS !! Vanchem is expected to increase production but nothing like enough to meet more than a small proportion of the increased demand. Largo apparently have forecast falling production this year (DYOR on that).

What about new plant? No doubt this will come …. over time. IF the wannabe producers can raise the HUGE Investment needed to open a new mine and/or processing plant, can get in place all permissions and planning consents (and we know how long that can take) and then the time required to build a large industrial plant and/or mine plus all infrastructure, complete commissioning and iron out problems (again we should all understand those issues!)

So the anticipated shortfall in supply vs demand looks like it will be larger than I (and I suspect many others reading this) considered likely.

I will leave it to you all to work out what the shortfall in global V supply is likely to do to Vanadium prices in 2023 to 2025 just as BMN have completed their upgrades to Vametco and Vanchem and will bring the new electrolyte plant online. Not to mention the value of their investment in Enerox.

Today’s share price is crazy low. Given what is about to happen in the VRFB and vanadium market BMN looks to have placed itself in the right place at the right time as this new green energy market explodes into life.

I will leave it to the reader to consider what this is likely to do to profits and share price over the next year or two.

Just my opinion. As always DYOR if thinking of investing in BMN.

Part 2

If someone wishes to suggest the need for a placing when it comes to why it would be necessary then that idea completely runs out of steam. There is no obvious reason why BMN would need a placing and history tells us that Fortune has kept dilution to a minimum (about 15% in the last 3 1/2 years or more. Not bad for a growth company!)

Hope that reassures anyone feeling nervous about any placing suggestions.

Just my opinion. DYOR

Part 1

I see as per almost every AIM bb some poster is trying to start yet another rumour of placing to come due to ridiculously low share price.

One can never say never to an AIM company doing a placing so I won’t. However it is possible to consider probability. To do that let’s consider why many AIM placing are undertaken:

1. Little or no revenue or profit so placing necessary to “keep the lights on”. Typically a start up or an explorer. Certainly not applicable to BMN.

2. Required for large capital investment eg expansion, refurbishment, etc

Point 2 also not relevant as BMN made the following statements:

From RNS Full Year 2022 Operational Update and 2023 Guidance

“Group capital expenditure (for 2023), primarily sustaining capital, of between ZAR153 - 161 million (circa US$9.2 - 9.7 million), with most of the cost being Rand-denominated.”

And also:

“… the capital expenditure budget for 2023 is primarily related to sustaining capital….”

And also:

“Looking ahead, the strategic focus of the Group is on building a sustainable, cash-generative, low-cost production and processing platform to support the needs of the steel, chemical and energy sectors. A continued focus on operating and cost efficiencies will be largely driven by the further growth in throughput as the Company targets a sustainable production run rate of 5,000 to 5,400 mtV over the near-term, as well as continued focus on efficiencies and cost saving initiatives.”

Sustaining capital costs will be easily met from revenue.

Some may then think what about the expansion plans to grow from 5000 mtV pa to 8000 mtV pa? That is why placing is coming.

Well actually no. Here is what the company intend to do about this:

From 22 June 2022 RNS Vametco and Vanchem Study:

“Optimal (4) staged expansion plan (based on highest to lowest IRR and NPV):”

And also:

“The option to implement the expansion in stages substantially reduces Bushveld's upfront capital requirements and allows incremental production to be attained from each stage in order to generate additional cash flows, which can be leveraged for the next stage.”

Expansion to be completed one stage at a time generating cash for next stage.

And also:

“Thus, whilst our commitment to growth remains, we have the liberty to pursue the new growth plans only once we have achieved our production performance targets on delivering sustainable cash generating production at the production rate of 5,000 - 5,400 mtVp.a. and improved our balance sheet capacity to invest in such when funding has been secured.”

So whilst BMN have aspirational plans to expand production to 8000 mtV pa that will only be done when affordable and in four separate stages.

From published numbers it is likely that BMN have been profitable in Q1 and possibly into Q2 so cash situation should be much improved.

On BMN website the ARC report recently raised their NAV forecast to 14p at Dollar Rand of 17 (already MUCH higher) and V price at $40 kgV.

With higher Dollar Rand and V price the forecast gets significantly increased.

Am I the only one that has noticed that trolls deride analyst reports for being paid for by the company and not worth anything … until suddenly one fits their agenda of course!

I assume our latest one (and an insult to West Ham) is kicking off like a child with a new toy that he doesn’t quite understand but it’s all shinny and new so must be good!

Sammy you have been missed. Don’t be a stranger.

Great post by the way

“… demand was strong for all of their products …”

Agreed HarChris.

Remember BMN comment that demand was strong for of their products? That looks to be particularly true in their largest and highest priced market … the US

Now 19.89.

Costs being reduced daily. (Revenue in US$ and costs mostly in Rand eg wages.)

ARC forecast NAV of 14p at Dollar Rand of 17. That is looking very conservative right now.