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Pdub - one minute you say time to move on, the next you reopen the discussion! Anyway....

- The Orion deal was signed on 30th Sept 2020 so COVID was well known about at the time.

- the falling V price is irrelevant to a discussion about missed production targets

- the Suez shipping issue had no bearing on missed production targets, nor did the war in Ukraine

- the bad weather in SA mostly affected shipping (i.e. sales) not production. The impact on production was limited in time and effect.

- I mentioned load shedding in my follow up post and didn't ignore it. It clearly got worse over time, especially last year.

My original point was that I felt that getting the production estimates wrong was a far more serious error on the part of FM and the BOD than the V price estimates as cindercone suggested. It's just my opinion, no big deal and will be long forgotten on page 25 of this board in another 24 hours.

Pdub - it was FMs job to set accurate production targets, not mine. He was CEO, he got paid the big bucks to get this stuff right and he gets criticized for getting it badly wrong. Of course my view is with hindsight because I can only see what happened. FM was the one with the info about kiln reliability, he was the one with the details about ore quality, about how much load shedding could impact if it got as bad as it did, etc.

I'm not suggesting it was an easy thing to get right and I'm sure FM and the BOD thought about the targets carefully. However this was largely under their control and they got it badly wrong and if lessons are to be learnt for the company and its investors then it needs to be said. They are much less culpable for V pricing projections because these are not in their control.

To me the bigger error in the Orion deal was not the vanadium pricing projection, rather it was the unrealistic projection of production volumes where the targets proved hopelessly optimistic. These were unquestionably FMs responsibility to get right and to make sure the Orion deal was serviceable in the worst case scenario. He knew how bad the kilns were and he failed to be realistic about the prod volumes and the time/cost required to get capacity and reliability to the required levels.

If the production had hit the projections then even at the weak V pricing levels we saw we'd have spent less capital fixing the issues and driven the C1 costs down. This would have made a huge difference to the cash flow and ability to repay Orion. And if V pricing had even been a just dollar or two better than we saw then we'd have been in very good shape if production vols were on target.

I also think the Enerox deal was a major mistake once it was clear that V production was way off the targets needed to service the Orion debt. Chucking millions of dollars at this when we hadn't got our core V production, revenue and profitability in good and reliable shape was a serious misjudgement in my view.

It doesn't need yet another discussion of this. Read back through harchris and trevorbrooking post history to see why US prices of $38 are either profitable or not.

The share price closed yesterday at 3.63p according to Google finance. This is exactly the same price as it closed on May 4 prior to the Orion RNS on May 5. Why would Orion now regard today's share price as any more of an impediment to conversion at 6p than the exact same share price on May 4?

When you look at the list of companies they cite as BMNs competitors further down the article then you know this assessment of BMN isn't worth the pixels it takes up on my screen.

Some interesting stuff posted this morning about VRFB projects and why some other battery technologies just won't cut it at the scale and pace of adoption required.

https://twitter.com/BMNperspective?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor

Thanks HC. Actually the $1/kg difference between your estimate and the company makes $4.5m difference to the top line over the course of a year so it is important to understand given the tight finances we have. However, as you suggest, it is difficult to nail some of this stuff down given we don't know exactly the geo or product splits for 2023 so your estimates are much appreciated.

One other thing.....do you have any insight as to why the trade payables are so high? They've always been high but seem to be getting higher. These are payables within 90 days and Ive always wondered who we have to pay so much to on a regular basis.

Wrong HippyDays. FM is staying on during July and is working with the new CEO. In last week's interview he was clearly enthusiastic about BMNs future and his continued involvement (probably on the energy side was my interpretation). This is a person who wants a change of role after 11 years not one who has been ejected against his will.

The company told us last week that they had received $37.99 on average for the year to date. That's the number to work from for 1h23 rather than worrying about day to day price fluctuations. It might also be worth figuring out how we end up with that number when the spot prices (especially in the US) together with our supposed Nitrovan and other product premiums suggest we ought to have been averaging more than this over the last 6 months.

CC - I think he'll spin it out as per the plan. Partly because he's a miner by trade, partly because he will want to focus on where the vast majority of his revenue, cost, and debt challenges are going to be for the next few years at least, and partly because if that's where FM and MN have interests then he can push them in that direction while he puts his stamp on the mining side.

A truce please! The first 20 posts or so on here today were good. And yes, I know who started it today. Other days it's someone else, but it's tiresome all the same.

Coffeecups,

At the moment BMN has got its fingers in too many pies and it needs to decide what sort of company it wants to be so it can focus its resources (assuming the immediate financial pressures are resolved). My preference would be as a vanadium miner/processor and ditch the other stuff, but this is me being a middle aged duffer playing armchair CEO. To this extent, I'd be more keen to explore ways of doing a JV on Mokopane (accepting that BMN would likely be the (very) junior partner) with someone with the necessary deep pockets and clout to make it happen. If the plan is to focus on V production then disposing altogether of the biggest long-term V resource would be a last resort imo. I'd strongly hope this partner was not China for geo-political reasons, but the current SA govt appears determined to cosy up to vile regimes so I don't have any faith there. Glencore would be my preference even though they are no saints either given their existing SA vanadium operations.

It will be interesting to watch as the new CEO brings his ideas to the business.

Thanks Cc. Actually I've managed to answer my own question with the following from last week's RNS.

"As disclosed in note 13, the Mokopane license held by the Group requires that mining operations commence prior to the end of January 2021. As at 31 December 2022 no mining has taken place at the site. Based on the conditions included in the mining right, the Group has the right to apply for an extension to the requirements to commence mining activities and an application has been submitted to the Department of Mineral Resources and Energy ("DMRE"), however a response has not yet been received.

Based on the mining right conditions, including that the Minister has to give written notice regarding a potential suspension or cancellation of the mining right and that the Group has the opportunity to provide reasons to the Minister on why this should not occur and the remedies put in place, the directors are confident that the extension will be forthcoming and the license therefore remains valid. Consequently, the directors have made a judgment that no impairment of the related intangible asset with a carrying amount of US$53.47 million is required."

Elsewhere in the RNS it says the reason mining didn't start was of COVID related delays including the inability to engage with the local community in the way required.

Coffeecups - you say the Mokopane mining licence will soon expire. In Jan 2020 BMN, via it's Pamish subsidiary, was granted a 30 year mining right to Mokopane. These two statements clearly don't tally, so what the bit I'm not getting here?

HC - Does your $36 breakeven figure include everything e.g. finance costs?

It would also be interesting to know whether the $37.99 actual figure to date is gross or net of commission. That alone would make a big difference when margins are tight.

Making an average of $37.99kg/V this year as per last week's RNS is what is happening.....which isn't good compared to costs. The question is how to reconcile this actual with the 2023 V price numbers we have seen quoted for the US where the largest proportion of sales go and the Nitrovan premium we are supposed to be getting.

TB - yes, but $21.5m of the all in cost was increased impairment charges. This equates to $6/kgV per sold kg in 2022. These charges occurred and there will be some impairments in 2023, but they were especially large last year and did significantly raise the all in cost for 2022 so the all in cost picture for 2023 is already likely to be a lot better on this one feature alone.

Quickest signal the new CEO can give is to buy a shed load of shares with his own money (not company awards). Can have this sorted before 9am tomorrow if he wanted to.

What is also striking about the interview is FM's ongoing support for the new CEO and Bushveld projects. Indeed, he says that he looks forward to inviting the interviewer to the switch on of the minigrid next month. He's also very positive about BEand VRFBs. These aren't the words of someone leaving BMN in the very near future or someone who has been unceremoniously ejected from his CEO role against his will. My suspicion is that he's getting a holding pattern role for a while and then going to take a senior role in BE/Mustang. His departure may be a lot more voluntary than I previously thought.

Earlier today there was unsubstantiated speculation that FM was offloading his BMN shares. In addition to the point others made that this would necessitate an RND as he's still CEO and a director, he still won't be able to immediately sell his shares once he leaves these roles as he will be in possession of way too much insider info about really short-term share price sensitive matters (2q production, Orion restructure, Mustang/BE, etc.). Some time will need to pass before he's deemed to be sufficiently distanced from these or they've become public knowledge. Also, given his enthusiasm for ongoing BMN projects and his obvious confidence in the business prospects why would he sell if he can see a share price multiples higher than today in the not too distant future?