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I have a good holding at JLP so it's nice to see it moving.

It honestly confuses me with Star Zinc - the extract from my question is from the Shard Capital broker report into JLP from March 4th 2019. If GLR don't supply Kabwe then it would make sense for JLP to buy out Star Zinc from GLR when Kabwe is producing good cash flows and profits i.e. 2020/2021. But it could very well be sooner than we think once the latest set of drill results enhances the resource.

Lets hope the red dot does appear soon - not only with reference to Kabwe but also Glenover - I value Glenover on it's own at about 3p per share.

Either way there can only be a couple of months of cash left in the business so either a small placing or maybe some kind of JV with JLP for Star Zinc is on the cards.

Hi Minor, it's been a long time since we last spoke about GLR and I still hold my shares so would love to see something happen with it.

One question on the Star Zinc to Kabwe that you may be able to remember and I have long since forgotten.

"Kabwe is planned to switch from a Wash Plant Tailings process to a Leach Plant Residue process circa 2022. This actually results in lower grades of Zinc - can you recall anything of how Star Zinc fits into this. Does it supply Zinc until 2022 and then not supply after 2022, or does it actually require more Zinc after 2022 to help boost the grades?"

Whether or not the switch of processes actually takes place now with JLP at the helm is not clear either. I presumed the switch was because it became easier to capture the Vanadium and Lead with the different process but I could be completely wrong on this.

A bit like a few of the other posters a little suprised that the SP has moved so quickly - but not disappointed - although it does mean my steady top-up plans are at a higher price!!

I did my finnacial forecast for JLP over the weekend (conservative as always) and it looks very positive from not only from an EPS perspective but also from a cash flow perspective - and cash flow positive means less chance of dilution.

What is most pleasing, apart from the obvious benefits of Kabwe, is the steady stream of tailings projects that should continue to arise over the years covering PGM's, Chrome and Fine Chrome. Each project in itself will not add a huge amount to the bottom line when taking into account the CapEx for but each will be a nice contributor to earnings growth as Kabwe flourishes and other projects tail off (e.g. Platchro Chrome and DCM Fine Chrome).

After many years of waiting it finally appears that JLP have arrived not just from an earnings perspective but also from a major miners boadroom perspective.

Add into this the bonus of either a Tjate outright sale or a JV and JLP is looking very good in the next 5 years.

PDub - not too long to wait I guess.

It seems that FM and his BOD are very competent so I would expect a Divident Policy directly linked to EPS and FCF. At an EPS of circa 3.6p for 2018 - please use your own figures - at "best" I can only see a 30% distribution and most likely lower (my view). That gives 1.08p per share and a return of 3.2%. All open to debate of course but certainly not a reason for me to withdraw any statements.

A very good post by BBN with some well made points. I tend to diasagree on the 2019 EBITDA but that is purely because I think that the V price will overshoot on the way down as it did on the way up. The production targets are unknown at the moment so I will take a conservative increase on last year. Hopefully BMN will suprise me.

Excellent debate guys - pretty much straight away to name calling because my opinion differs from some of yours - great approach and very mature as well.

As always with all of my shares I have a hat ready to eat and a serving of humble pie at the ready.

Enjoy your day.

Pdub, whilst not wishing to get into a futile debate and respecting your opinion - a few comments.

Withdraw an opinion - interesting. Am I to withdraw it because mine differs from yours which is equally unknown. Perhaps because none of us know the policy then none of us should comment.

Vanadium price - neither you or I know where it is going. But based upon fact it is down over 50% from its peak - that has an effect on profits for all Vanadium mines. But you could be right of course. Most experts did not see the drop in price - but it happened anyway.

I have an upper limit of 3500mtV this year which I don't see offsetting the drop in V prices - of course that is based upon a V price which no one can predict. Increased production is great and is needed but the higher the V price the better the improvement in margins exponentially.

Predicting a future price is futile but that is what you also do. Any investor must predict a future price - investing is about getting a return in the long term and you can only do that through either dividends or an SP increase. I predict it for every share I am in. Equally every share has an analyst that predicts a very nice price - if it was only as simple as to listen to them then I could save myself a whole load of research.

Not a subtle deramp at all - just my opinion as you have yours. BB's are about a balance of views.

As for the comment on the Avatar - Oh dear, nver mind.

My views are based from 25 years within the PG sector which involves batteries into the grid from my own company. I keep upto date not through headlines but by talking to industry leding CEO's and professionals. So perhaps I should leave it to the experts afterall.

Some good points raised by BBN & others. Batteries are undoubtedly here for the future, in what format, used by whom and when is up for question. Lithium certianly favours smaller installations of under 10MW and VRFB's (and other tech) favour installations over 10MW's. The question that has always surrounded batteries is a commercial one - how do you make money out of them?

It was very difficult to make money from a Li battery installation 5 years ago - it is much harder today as grid's downgrade what they see as "available capacity" from a battery. The next few years will be harder still as the Capacity Market in the UK is taken to court which brings into question its very structure. Now this may not be too relevant for countries where the sun does shine but the UK CM is viewed worldwide as a text book case.

So that brings us to the question of how do batteries make their way into the PG sector and where are the uses. Undoubtedly, grid scale batteries will become more common place which is where VRFB's come in. Grid shortages, decentralised generation and transmission issues can be solved very economically with other technologies and with the growth in engine after treatment also very environmentally friendly. Batteries are for frequency response and naturally for storing energy in times of excess - again solutions best used at a grid level. At a grid level the very high cost of a VRFB installation can be spread acrooss the cost of the user base (namely you, me and industry) - that said the electricity providers are notoriously difficult to negotiate with.

Where does that leave BMN? In my view it is well positioned to take advantage of a growing demand. A demand that will take a number of years to unfold. BMN's strategy to this is largely unknown - will they use it as a loss leader for the first few years to build a significant market share or will they price it high to get revenue in whilst the barriers are high. The point is, we really do not know and until we see a financial forecast for BE we won't. My personal view is that I cannot see a profit coming out of BE for the next 2 years at which case it is reliant upon good old fashioned mining and thus the price of our beloved Vanadium. Unless something happens sharpish to turn the price of Vanadium around and assuming a growth of upto 30% this year in output from Vametco my prediction is a lower EBITDA and EPS is 2019 than that achieved in 2018. the dividend policy really won't change much - I am suprised by the comments coming out about it's significance - from a timing perspective maybe, from a jaw dropping return perspective - not very likely.

So for me I am very optimistic long term about BMN (3-5 years) but cautious short term. I don't believe we have reached the bottom from a share price perspective and it would not suprise me to see the 20's again - it would suprise me to see over 45p hit again this year though as I don't see a catalyst to get there - unless V does a majo

A significant RNS which baiscally implies one of the most important things to PI's - no more share dilution. Positive cashflow from later this year means the company can stand on its own two feet. Run rate increasing to 24-30,000Oz per year by next year or the year after. Personally I feel that we will hit the 25,000Oz run rate early next year. And 25,000 Oz's means an Operating Profit of circa £9.5m by my calculations. That means lot's of spare cash for drilling to expand the resource and of course a good dividend.

Nice piece of information KenJ and all helps the BAG Group with questions for the cc on Monday.

I wonder if LR will now ask for investors help to raise funds - I guess time will tell.

Perhaps the BAG group could also ask - if the prospect of raising funds is limited and the local environment still makes a sale difficult but BZT are convinced of the asset - what can be done to effectively mothball the company in order to reduces expenses to the absolute minimum and make the current cash last until a more favourable environment exists. Or:

Taking into account the restrictions above are there any partners that we can work with who do not necessarily wish to purchase the company outright but would help to assist both from a cash perspective and a political influence perspective in exchange for a % of the company. The most likely would be a local Philippine company or a Chinese company (which is where most of the mined minerals from the Philippines end up).

I am sure that these are options that the Board have considered but it would be nice to get a further understanding.

Good luck to all on Monday's call.

Indeed so @onefcc - the load shedding issue could be resolved within 4-8 weeks through the installation of temp power - providing that it is a kW supply issue rather than a transmission issue. Even the latter can be significantly helped with local decentralised distribution. Aggreko specialise in this type of scenario and so do another African based company who shall remain nameless - who's owner happens to be one of the most powerful and influential people in Africa, a personal friend and has a direct contact with Cyril !. So you are correct in that the cause of the problem is Eskom and politics but the solution will be played out for political gain. Where that leaves BMN and Eskom after this I have absolutely no idea. Let's hope it leaves them in a very positive position with a clean energy long term solution.

Personally, I like VRFB's for large scale grid frequency management and Lithium for small scale local solutions rather than using them as a solution for load shedding. Generators with a battery for quick response are my preferred choice in which case you need a much smaller battery. But times are a changing and with VRFB's capable of a 4 hour supply which gives the grid time to scale up then they are certainly a good part to the solution.

SA will maybe go the way of the UK Capacity Market which talks about "stacked" income streams from multiple sources - in other words a balanced approach between generators, VRFB's, Lithium and a whole host of other technologies.

We all get negative on this one KenJ so no apology required.

The potential light at the end of the tunnel is that US investment in general has increased significantly over the last 6 months in the Philippines which is usually an indicator of how a country is viewed and copper shortages are not going away. But with cash running low and a desperately low SP any rights issue giving 12 months breathing space will result in a 40-50% dilution. The low market cap will also make negotiations on a sale at an acceptable price difficult.

That said it is only for sale a price that BZT are willing to sell at and whilst I could be critical of CBird for some of his statements about this company and others, he is probably the right man to be able to secure a sale and has sufficient skin in the game to make it happen.

So in summary, we know the asset, we know the political situation, there is not much else to come to light - it is a case of do we have faith in LR and CB to get this over the line or not. I am holding for now.

$7m was from memory of the original deal - sorry I hadn't fully read to the bottom of the RNS !

The value is irrelevant the strategic case was the point I was reffering to in order to prompt discussion about what are our views are as PI's.

When "Goldfields" say they are not interested my question is - "what will make you interested?" If discussions prove fruitless with them and they do not want a potential asset with a NPV of $1BN for a fraction of the price then either they really don't want an asset in the Philippines or the person selling it is not prepared to move sufficiently on price. That's the point I am trying to make. Meanwhile the BZT clock is seriously ticking.

@KenJ - that's kind of my point. Goldfields paid $7m in 2011 for an option agreement with a further $63m pyable on exercise of the option. In 2014 they gave a formal notification that they would not proceed but it appears that this carried on this year with the final deadline.By the end of Jan they could have agreed a funding for 50% of the company for a further $1.5-2.0m. It may very well not have sat with Goldfields strategy but everything has a price and at that price having already paid $7m surely there was a deal to be done.Admittedly not the greatest deal for PI's but maybe better than where we are at now.

The mining situation in the Philippines has improved in the last 12 months, the contraints placed were mainly for open pit sites and not underground anyway, there has been an influx of $US investment in the last 6 months and it is election year - if there was ever a good time to do a deal then now must be a resonable bet.

At the end of the day there is an asset in the ground and it appears to be a profitable one to mine. If the situation in the Philippines is improving and Copper / Gold resources are scarce then the major factor holding back a sale is the price. If it is not the price then we are sat on a worthless asset - it's one or the other for me. A very symplistic approach for the difficult sale of a mining company I know - but with cash running out, a license running out - it may be time to accept a lower valuation and walk away with something.

Begs the question that if "Gold Fields had until the end of the month to choose whether or not to buy the project, for which the price had been set at $60.5 million" and the end of the month was Feb, then at what value would they have bought it??

Either the $60.5m was just a silly number and one that Goldfields never intended to bite at or it was too expensive at which point what was the number ..... $20m ???? Bearing in mind that assets of this type sell for 1-2% of NPV. We as PI's would have taken $20m but maybe the board are being greedy and want more. It's a simple question to answer by the next fund raise - if Goldfields was the slightest bit interested it will surely take what is likely to be a 30-40% dilution and thus a large ownership in Bzt at absoultely knockdown prices. It is then both cheap and easy to raise the next batch of funding. If they do not take a a bite at a large % of the ownership at such a low price then they must think the asset is a pile of junk or it does not fit within their strategic profile - at which point why look at it in the first place.

I will over the course of the next few weeks look at the results of the study published today and interpret what the P&L would look like based upon their figures.It might give us a better appreciation for what the realistic value of the company is.

For those that subscribe to Research Tree there is a broker report from Whitman Howard that gives a traget price of 17.3p and only uses the 521,109 Oz as its resource amount. Once the additional resources talked about on the website are proven up where does that take the SP - much higher than that is the answer. Adds weight to my numbers in earlier posts.

That said I won't talk about spread again - the day after I mention the 4% spread it increases to 9% !! The joys of Aim !!

Thank you Endion - that doesn't actually mean that there is not an agreed payment in place, it just means that there is not a claim to be made outside of anything that is agreed. However, I do take your point and in the absence of any other statement 74% it is. This years P&L will tell us the full picture.

Alfa - I have not seen the structure of the deal so I do not know if the buy out was full and final or if there will be a final payment to take into account the published 2018 figures. I have structured deals much larger than the Sojitz deal that have worked both ways. As such I take a conservative approach and use the 62% in place of the 74%.

If you can be certain that there is no "final payment" structure to the deal then I stand corrected.

EBITDA of £81.7m in £'s.
NP of £55m in £'s.
BMN % I have worked out at 62% for the year so a NP of £34m.
Works out at just over 3p per share.
Current P/E is just over 11.
My calcs of course !!

And yes Loudspeaker they do like cash !! Generally in their own pockets I must admit.

I honestly do not understand why there is suprise at the recent share price drop over the past few months. BMN for sure has a very bright future but the markets do not like uncertainty and then there is the uncertainty of an AIM company which signals red flags day in day out. I will explain my take on the drop, not the daily drops but the trend:

Jan'18 BMN predicts production figures of 3,680mtV in 2018.
Aug'18 BMN revises figures lower to 2,850 to 3,000 mtV.
Q4 '18 BMN revises lower again in a range 2,600 to 2,650 mtV.
Actual figure hit was 2,560 mtV.

At some time between Jan and Aug 18 BMN realised that something was not right, it stuck with the mgt team to turn it around and they didn't manage to, so an independant study was commissioned in Oct '18. I would actually say that the Mgt team performed worse than this because they allowed an employee issue to escalate. I hope that FM has a handle on this - it looks like he may have but only time will tell.

At the same time as the above was happening the recovery rates of FeV were less than expected which increased the mining costs - Aug '18 states 240-250Kg/V.

At the same time - there is a pattern here ! - or from November onwards the price of FeV dropped significantly, still to a very good number but sigtnificantly less than it's peak.

In other words the current trading position for BMN changed and an element of doubt was placed into the markets.

If BMN can deliver what they say they can deliver then the future looks very rosy indeed, infact more than rosy - BUT the first point is to deliver and until they do there will be doubt. It's fine talking about the free cash flow delivered and the profits made but trading on a P/E of 11-12 which is where it is is at the moment is not too unrealistic taking into account the above.

That is my take on the current situation