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Forget the 'deal' for a moment, which some believe - or are hoping - will be a pivotal moment for the company, and think about the sheer organic growth opportunity for Andrada to transform from a junior miner into something a lot bit bigger.

Andrada say "An exploration drilling programme is currently underway with the aim of expanding the tin resource over the fourteen additional, historically mined pegmatites that occur within a 5 km radius of the current processing plant. The Company has set a mineral resource target of 200 Mt to be delineated within the next 5 years. The existing mine, together with its substantial mineral resource potential, allows the Company to consider economies of scale."

In today's RNS they said "60% year-on-year ("YoY") increase in ore processed to 915,599 tonnes". Even at that 60% increased rate of mining the above statement implies a mine life of over 200 years.

Firstly, I know that some investors worry about mine life, but you certainly don't have to worry about that here.

Secondly, the company says that this "allows the Company to consider economies of scale"; maybe, for example, quadrupling the size of the mining plant, or whatever - the sky's the limit if they've got the resource and there's a demand for the metals it contains.

Thirdly, this is the world-class scale of asset that attracts the attention of major mining companies.

Fourthly, this is a fully permitted, built and operating mining operation.

The CEO also commented that "Although the higher stripping resulted in an increase in the AISC during the year, the exposure of the orebody's grade, diversity of minerals including lithium, and scale at depth according to our geological model, will start to become glaringly apparent placing the operations in a robust position to capitalise on the rebound in the commodities markets for all our products."

IMO, there are about half a dozen positives relating to the trend towards increased production and significant future profitability in today's RNS, which "will start to become glaringly apparent" - not least of which will be the reduced AISC going forward, especially as the additional minerals come onstream for little additional cost.

What I found most interesting about his discussion surrounding Douta was the extra targets they're finding.

The Douta licence area is slap-bang in the middle of a highly-prospective gold-bearing area and if 32km long. They have previously said that it's largely either unexplored or under-explored. Segun has now said that they have found and are about to drill more oxide targets in Q2, which should add to the commerciality and profitability of the resource.

I've long been of the opinion that 2 million ounces will be just the start at Douta, the additional targets simply adding extra ounces to the initial PFS over time.

After doing the hard yards last year, Thor have confirmed that they are now mining the relatively high-grade ore body, which means they'll be averaging 4+ g/t for the next few years in the open pit.

At nameplate, the mine should produce about 100,000 oz per annum, with a reduced ASIC due to the higher-grade mining.

At current gold prices they're making over $1,000 an ounce of free cash flow, equating to $100m+ free cash per year.

I have always found Segun to be straightforward, honest and very conservative, dependably delivering or over-delivering on the company's guidance, and he talks of $300m free cash over the next three years, which clearly gives Thor an awful lot of options going forward.

I wonder what they'll do in future when reporting AISCs?

At the moment, they only quote an AISC for the tin, and say that the tantalum and lithium is produced pretty much for free. When they are saying that revenues from the lithium and tantalum, even at today's prices (forecast to be much higher in a couple of years), will be about the same as the tin, surely they must start reducing the quoted AISC for the tin and pass at least some of that through to the other 'by-products'.

In the overall scheme of things this would, to a certain extent, be window-dressing, but it would highlight the benefits of the economies of scale which are resulting from a move to the polymetallic nature of the business, and the subsequent effective reduction in AISCs.

Another thing that AV alluded to in the interview, which will be why there's been so many parties interested in an offtake agreement for Andrada's lithium, is that they have a pre-built mine of some scale which is already producing lithium concentrate, albeit as a by-product at present.

For all the talk of lithium exploration and lithium mining, it takes years to get to where Andrada are today, admittedly somewhat by accident; which just goes to show, you can't beat being in the right place at the right time.

They've even got the fringe benefit of having thousands of tonnes of pre-crushed tailings with all the lithium still in it!

Andrada will be selling bulk lithium concentrate into what is forecast to be a demand-led lithium market in a couple of years time, primarily due to the fact that it's very expensive and takes so long to build large mining operations to the point of production - all of which Andrada already have.

This interview, along with today's RNS, was extremely encouraging.

AV gave an indication of the potential and scale of the business as they exploit their world-class polymetallic resource in Namibia. He used language like "absolute behemoth of a resource" and size and scale "off the charts".

Possibly from my point of view was his focus on cash generation which is expected to flow from the new circuits and tweaks to the mine's processing plant, and stating that the operational growth should be self-financing going forward,

He said the Lithium (both Petalite and Spodumene) was expected to transform Andrada from a junior/small-cap into a mid-tier mining company.

They've obviously spent a few years building the mine at Uis based on the tin potential. The tantalum and lithium are essentially in the price for free, being extracted and sold from the existing ore body using the same processing plant, albeit with a few extra bits added to it.

Take the Tantalum for example. It was stated that 90% of the revenue from the tantalum sales went straight to the bottom line as it was simply being extracted from the existing crushed ore using magnetic separators. At $200k a ton that's $180k profit and with 85 tons per annum is a profit of around $15m pa just for the tantalum alone.

There was an interesting reference to the 'EU-Namibia round table', which might indicate that our preferred strategic partner might be EU-based, rather than Chinese.

(p.s. Interesting 250k trade at 5.10 reported after the bell.)

Thor has virtually no net debt and what little they have is due to be paid done in the coming quarter.

After that, Thor will be generating vast amounts of cash to use in whatever way it sees fit; some $100m of net cash at the current gold price, possibly more. In fact it was, proportionately, forecast to be the most cash accretive gold miner in a table of 13 global peer gold miners produced by Canaccord at the end of January, spinning off more cash than its market cap each year.

They are a 100,000 ounce producer with a relatively low ASIC (~$1,100), which could even be lower than guidance due to reaching higher grade ore recently.

Thor will be able to fund its various projects in Nigeria, Senegal and perhaps Burkina Faso, with little or no dilution to shareholders, of which Segun and his family are major ones.

As for mine life, they are uncovering new deposits around Segilola, have a number of high-grade targets below the open pit area, none of which are in the current reserves or resources estimates and all of which are still open at depth below the currently drilled depth. I fully expect Segilola mine life to be significantly extended shortly.

As for Douta, it is extremely prospective over the entire 32km corridor, about half of which is effectively unexplored. It is surrounded by other multi-million ounce discoveries/mines and I fully expect the sum total of Thor's resources there to be measured in the same category. IMO, 2 million ounces will be just for starters.

If you like Lithium, which some on here don't, Thor has found some of the highest grades out there, hence very profitable to mine relative to their global peers, in due course. Lithium demand is forecast to way outstrip supply over the coming decade, which if true will significantly increase Lithium prices.

All of this is available today for much less than nothing!

As for Nigeria specifically, rather than Africa generally, it's a great place to be a miner - just read The Mining Act of Nigeria - and it has first mover advantage in a big and largely underexplored country with vast mineral resources.

Also, Thor is a very respected company to work for with a happy and loyal workforce, having just won the Mining Indaba 2024 Responsible Resourcing Award for Labour award.

Almost irrespective of ones views on EBITDA, the point I was making about Thor being extremely cheap still holds true.

Debt is currently pretty minimal, and will be fully repaid/non-existent this year, consequently Interest will be minimal also.

Segun has also stated that capex will be next to nothing over the next year or so, during which time Thor will be generating very significant amounts of cash to fund Douta PFS and Lithium exploration, either/both of which could add a lot more tangible value to the company.

In summary, the past 12 months has positioned Thor for an extremely strong "next eight quarters", during which time I suspect Thor as a company will possibly transform into something much greater; all that cash will be put to good use and start to reward shareholders, including Segun and his family.

Thor's EV/EBITDA is currently about 1, possibly less, for the current year.

Add to that the fact that Thor is pretty much debt free now, makes this a fantastic investment opportunity IMO.

There are also a couple of very exciting prospects in development, which Segun has stated are to be internally funded by the company, and which would make Thor a multi-jurisdiction and multi-asset company.

Also, Segun and his family have a lot of skin in the game here, which is always good to see, especially with recent share purchases above the current share price indicating confidence going forward.

It's difficult to know exactly because we don't know all the operating costs, but I would imagine that once they're up and running it will be a fairly profitable, cash generative sideline.

I looked into one of the main operating costs of quicklime production in Zambia, which is the 20KWh of electricity required per tonne to produce it.

Zambia has about the cheapest electricity tariffs in the world, for both personal and business customers, at about 4.4c per KWh for businesses, so the energy cost is less than $1 per tonne.

Quicklime itself, when I last looked, sells for $80-$100 per tonne. Like most commodities prices fluctuate somewhat, but I expect the Zambian market for quicklime to be fairly robust and transport costs (paid for by the buyers) will be relatively low making it attractive to local buyers, ie Zambian copper miners/producers primarily.

Interesting development indeed!

Firering are intending to acquire around a 28% interest in a near-term cashflow producing asset which Glencore has spent in excess of $100m developing, right up to the point of commissioning, for about $5m. So, that's about $28m of Glencore's expenditure bought for $5m, and the good bit is that Firering didn't need to work for and wait x number of years for it to get to the production stage.

I also note that the limestone is of exceptionally high grade at 95+% calcium carbonate, which means less waste and cheaper to convert to quicklime.

By my rough calculation the resource is equivalent to a mine life of around 175 years, using a conversion factor of 1.8 tonnes of limestone to 1 tonne quicklime and producing 600 tonnes quicklime per day. (Please feel free to correct me if I've got this wrong.)

Atlantic are piggy in the middle here: Firstly, Atlantic need Piedmont, but if it turns out to be too much hassle (or simply not possible) Piedmont don't need Atlantic; they already have other offtake agreements and are arranging more. Secondly, Atlantic need Ghana to grant them the ML, but Ghana seem to be far less needy.

If either of those is not resolved satisfactorily, Atlantic are in trouble.

I'm not saying they won't be, but there's definitely a case of double-jeopardy here, IMO.

IMO, Ghana have made themselves far less investable overnight, not only for lithium but for all of their arbitrary list of 'green' minerals.

Yes, they hold ALL the cards as far as Atlantic are concerned, but not for future prospective miners looking at Ghana, or companies that are more diversified geographically or eg gold-focussed.

The markets don't like uncertainty or distrust, both of which Ghana have just served up 'in spades'.

Unfortunately, there's not much positive for Atlantic, Piedmont, Neil and Amanda to say right now as they're all massively entrenched pawns in Ghana's game of brinkmanship; Stuart Crow probably had a lucky escape.

What worries me is where does this somewhat inflexible mining policy, ie the 'triple no' soundbite, leave the Piedmont arrangement, whom Atlantic are relying on to fund them.

Further to my previous post, regarding the potential extent of the Atex/Alliance pegmatites...

At the end of a Firering webinar presentation, just after the acquisition of their controlling stake in Alliance Minerals, there was a Q&A session where someone asked:

Q. Can you highlight the importance of the acquisition of Alliance Minerals in the overall growth strategy and development of the business?

A. Yuval Cohen, Firering’s CEO, said something like: Alliance is a highly-prospective area adjoining Atex. There are pegmatites ‘lying around’ on both sides of the concession and we have identified the continuation of the [Atex] pegmatites into the Alliance area. The combination of the Atex and Alliance areas creates a 500 sq km concession with fertile pegmatites for both lithium and coltan.

So, Firering already appear to know from pegmatites scattered around on the surface (and possibly sampled and tested as part of their due diligence) that the larger Alliance area to the south-west has similar characteristics to Atex which adjoins it. Alliance is of course on trend with the north-east to south-west orientation of the Atex pegmatite zones already mapped, which leads me to believe that the combined extent of the pegmatite field could be absolutely massive. (It's already very extensive based on what we already know from surveys/mapping and RNSs released by the company.)

The lithium in soil assays revealed in the 30th May and 22nd June RNSs were, IMO, truly spectacular.

Australian lithium companies would be wetting themselves with excitement over these lithium in soil readings. One Australian miner recently stated: “A +60ppm lithium anomaly in shallow soil samples is highly significant. Several exploration companies have adopted this mark as a significant soil anomaly threshold based on Kidman Resources Ltd’s large and high-grade Earl Grey lithium deposit that was defined by a discrete +60ppm lithium soil anomaly.”

To put Firering’s lithium in soil assays into some sort of context, they haven’t even bothered to report any readings that low; a reading had to exceed 85 just to be registered at the lowest end of the scale on their heat-map (Figure 1 in the 22nd June RNS).

Here are a few fairly typical results extracts quoted by other miners reporting lithium exploration results: “Nimy Resources: High-grade lithium anomalies: high of 108ppm mean of 72ppm, accompanying rubidium [a pathfinder element] high of 112ppm mean of 75ppm”, “Enterprise Metals: High-grade lithium soils: Multiple major elevated Lithium soil anomalies, +60ppm Li. Lithium anomalies cover significant scale, with 0.5-1km elevated Li at most anomalies. Peak assay of 117ppm Li with multiple samples exceeding 100ppm Li”, “Balkan Mining: The results have defined two northwest-southwest striking trends coincident with high-grade outcropping spodumene-bearing pegmatites. Soil sampling assay results including up to 110.5 ppm Li”.

By comparison, Firering reported lithium soil anomalies of up to 4,499ppm and rubidium up to 2,700ppm, indicating the presence of high-quality, highly-fractionated pegmatites.

The other impressive thing is the sheer scale of the apparent mineralisation. To my mind the lithium heat-map in the 30th May RNS appears to show a pretty continuously mineralised strike from north-north-east to south-south-west of about 12km, and which is typically kilometres wide – and that’s just the area that’s been mapped; does it continue even further at either end, who knows?

IMO, Atex is looking every bit a world-class lithium and coltan resource, as hinted-at by previous drill results - and then there’s the larger, as yet unexplored, Alliance prospect to the south.

The last two RNSs were very positive imo, but passed by with little or no comment.

I'll perhaps give my thoughts on what I think the significance of them is when I get some time.

Today's RNS highlighted the discovery of a number of additional pegmatite zones resulting from the Phase II soil sampling analysis across the Atex licence, with more results still to come.

The lithography mapping contained within the RNS report seems to indicate additional pegmatite mineralisation in various zones/directions around the previously known ones, especially interesting are the results in the direction of the boundary with the adjoining Alliance area, which looks like it continues SSW into that area.

This is interesting because Firering have the option to increase their interest in the Alliance licence to 80%, in additional to their current Atex licence area, extending the project's licence area to some 500km2.

What with the existing excellent drill results around Spodumene Hill previously reported plus further drill targets it's looking like they're sitting on a whole lot of lithium, not to mention the coltan (tantalum and niobium), relative to their lowly £6m market cap.

The investment opportunity afforded by Firering's current valuation and market cap remind me of when I bought ASOS shares for just 8p, at a time when it was clear (to me, anyway) that they had reached critical mass and profitability, because some fund manager (Schroders I think) was selling down millions of shares at that level. Shortly afterwards they set off on their stratospheric journey to £40+!

I believe a similar massive rerating could occur here with Firering's shares, based on reading between the lines of what the company has already announced, and what they've said (and how they've said it) in presentations, videos, etc.

They recently announced that they had increased their stake in the Atex project/licence to 90%, stating that the decision was 'an easy one'. They also currently hold a 51% controlling stake in the adjacent Alliance licence area, with the option to increase their stake in that licence to 80%. They already know, due to their 'due diligence', that the Atex project's lithium resource extends SSW-ward into the Alliance licence area. (The combined Atex/Alliance licence area extends to some 500km2, which is 'highly prospective' for both lithium and tantalum/coltan.)

What's not to like!?

Not many people have even noticed or heard of Firering yet, but I believe that will change in the not too distant future. When that happens you won't be able to buy the shares at today's prices. All IMO, of course.

Another interesting aspect of the Ricca investment in Firering is that they have agreed to invest an additional $2m, taking the total to $20.6m, if Atex's lithium resource ends up exceeding 20Mt; that's the sort of magnitude they're looking for with their investment.

If anything remotely like that turns out to be the case, Firering's shareholders will be massively rewarded from these levels.