Member Info for toneman

Plug announced their Q3 earnings and company update after hours last night. They stated that their overall 2023 results have been impacted by supply chain issues affecting North America hydrogen network - visible in California by hydrogen at fuel dispensers being $30 /kg. They also need more money to complete all their massive projects. Combined the market reacted very badly after hours dropping the stock price by 30%.

These issues are quite specific to Plug so shouldn't have a knock on effect on ITM and that seems to be generally the case with this morning's ITM price.

Maybe Plug's supply chain issues shouldn't be considered so negative as it could be argued that demand is outstripping supply, but the need for more money probably can't be anything but dilutive so it's probably fair for its stock price to be so impacted.

Thanks BESST, I thought there was supposed to be an argument for the whole life cost of VFB bringing it close to, or even on par with, the cost of implementing standard Lithium (due to anticipated double the lifetime for VFB). Was that discussed at your event, and what was the concensus around that?

I remember when ITM opened their Australian subsidiary back in 2017 it seemed like all guns blazing.

https://www.lse.co.uk/rns/ITM/new-australian-subsidiary-and-md-contract-update-cxgygd04eksll80.html

Aside from a couple of reference sales and a pilot project I can't say I remember anything coming out of it.

https://www.lse.co.uk/rns/ITM/first-sales-in-australia-tbaju85w30kyb9y.html

https://www.lse.co.uk/rns/ITM/equipment-sale-to-boc-project-in-australia-2411jf44y79qal2.html

Does anyone know if we still have an Australian subsidiary?

Latest update sounds reasonably promising. As long as the controls modification and shutdown procedure doesn't open another can of worms. Delivery in early 2024 would be a welcome relief but will still require careful monitoring to prove in-field lifetime performance and reliability. I hope it triggers a surge in orders.

A few chunky £100k buys going through around 4pm today. On top of L&G's substantial purchase two days ago suggests a few with deep pockets are thinking this is now fairly valued. With any luck we could be near the bottom of this recent nasty sell-off now. I certainly hope so, so I added a few more to my portfolio as well. Fingers crossed.

Nojhead, the 99.9% in the RNS refers to the quality of the hydrogen produced (i.e. no residual ammonia) not the efficiency. You are right that efficiencies for this sort of conversion are nowhere near 99.9% and neither will this one be.

Feels like they're going to have to announce some spectacular orders following the recent "Solar & Storage Live" trade exhibition to stand any chance of collecting on those outstanding warrants for Christmas.

Can they postpone the Warrants again or is it the case they must lapse this time?

How many investors do you think would purcahse the Warrants anyway despite them being above SP? At first glance there may seem an obvious answer - none - but isn't there is a subtle distinction between purchasing shares from the current curculation versus giving your new money directly to the company in exchange for bringing new shares into circulation thus directly helping the company's cash-flow situation? It feels like if you were a large institutionaly investor you might choose to do that.

The response from the Government in the final paragraph just about sums up UK politics....denial, spin and misdirection.

Here's the Times article for anyone stuck behind the paywall...

https://archive.ph/ipb7B

Weird isn't it. I'm sure most people are perfectly reasonable in real life, but give them a keyboard and a sense of anonymity and all hell breaks loose. It's all a bit mental really. Wish people would just chill and let comments go.

Let's hope Dennis goes on to prove Barclays wrong with their pessimistic view on "difficulty transitioning from small-scale to large-scale operations".

btw did everyone see yesterday's announcements from Plug regarding their recent 500MW and 200MW opportunities. When is ITM going to startregularly announcing that scale. Or better still, not announcing that sort of scale because it's simply commonplace.

In case of any confusion, my post was a cut and paste of Reuters note...not my own words.

** Barclays cuts Nel , ITM Power , and Mcphy Energy , citing scale-up challenges with the hydrogen market's growth expected to commence around 2030

** "We've learnt over the past 18 months the scale-up takes time, and the listed electrolyser companies are not necessarily the best exposed," says the brokerage in a note

** Barclays expects government policy to move to support the development of infrastructure, as it sees capital costs just for production equipment to amount to nearly $500 bln until 2050

** It also predicts an eight-fold growth in the hydrogen market over the next 30 years, but emphasizes electrolyser manufacturers' difficulty transitioning from small-scale to large-scale operations

** It cuts Nel to "equalweight", while giving peers British ITM Power and French Mcphy Energy an "underwight" recommendation

** However, the brokerage favors Nel on "its track record of offering technology-agnostic solutions to large-scale green hydrogen projects"

** Shares of Nel are down 3.8%, among worst performers of pan-European 600 index

Let's hope it climbs above the 50p and stays there through December so we can collect on those outstanding warrants and get some fresh cash injection into the business. If they get that and can turn a few more of those base case pipeline opportunites into confirmed sales then 2024 would be satisfied. Fingers crossed.

Visitinghost, there is one aspect that we technical people should always keep in the back of our mind. Sometimes, just sometimes, politics and economics trumps engineering facts. If a country chooses to subsidise one technology over another then that economic support can overcome, in this case, the technical inefficiencies. I'm not saying it will in this case, but just because something is a technical certainty is no guarantee of a win.

In the short term it certainly appears that hydrogen is all but out of the running in short range ground transport and home heating. But developing hydrogen in all sorts of ways is not off the radar, even politicians are still backing CCS. If in 10 years hydrogen has developed a foothold through CCS then there's no reason that the other sources of hydrogen generation don't get involved too. Technologies like PHE are more likely to generate revenues from waste disposal rather than hydrogen generation so the hydrogen becomes almost a byproduct rather than the main product.

Cards on the table though, I've still written off my investment in PHE just as I have with EQT. Both poorly run it turns out, although PHE could still just about rise from the ashes.

Some people can't resist buying 5m shares in something/anything. Doesn't mean it's going back up. Good luck to them though. I think there are better opportunities elsewhere.

I didn't miss that paragraph. It's not particularly relevant as it's limited to 12 month outlook only. It doesn't change the oulook for where they're going to get the next stage funding from to stay in business. Existing shareholders are effectively drained and will be replaced going forward.

This is the bit you should surely find a little concerning.

"The management team has prepared financial forecasts to estimate the likely cash requirements of the Company over the next twelve months from the date of announcing these unaudited interim condensed consolidated financial statements. These forecasts show that the Company will require additional external debt or equity funding going into the second half of 2024 to be able to continue as a going concern.

The directors have assessed that there is a reasonable prospect that the funding required for the Company to continue as a going concern will be secured and therefore have prepared the unaudited interim condensed consolidated financial statements on a going-concern basis. In the event that additional funding is not secured, the Company would not be a going concern and as a consequence there is a material uncertainty relating to the Company's ability to continue as a going concern."

So they're going to need a substantial investment in Q2 2024. Are they going to get that from you?

They go on to say... "In response, the Board is conducting a review of available options for required investment, with a particular focus on long-term, strategic investors of sufficient scale and resources to support the Company's growth and execution of its strategic vision. To facilitate engagement with prospective investors, the Company has, together with its advisors, including a major investment bank announced by the Company in February 2023, established a 10-year business plan built around its declared strategy."

Surely that sort of big investment to help fund a 10 year strategy would dilute existing investors more or less out of existence.

All sounds very well managed and the postential is still building. I'm happy to wait patiently for this to play out. Just added a few more into the portfolio.

I like this company. The results seem very much on track to me. We'll see if the market likes it or not. If they are taken a bit negatively by the market then it's probably because people are reminded that the technology won't be used at scale until 2025+.