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Funny that because you waltzed off to invest in JLP, Flybe and VAST no one in their right mind would touch with a barge pole... That worked out well for you ay? But thanks for letting us know this is on your bargepole list. It should do pretty well then!

Overall though great turnaround by HUM and much better than I was expecting.

Of most importance to me its given clear guidance and update on the remediation works near completion, government's progress on bridge construction and HUM's gold production going forward, with Jan production of 10,000 showing for now, they're on track.

FJS & CD - with most things I fall somewhere in the middle on the incentive scheme. For employees I completely agree they should be incentivised, have skin in the game and have access to a share scheme.

Mali suffered the worst rainy season in decades, some saying 50yrs (BBC news covered it in a documentary over the weekend, with Mali suffering a significant dry spell followed by uncharacteristic rains). A double whammy of impacting the pit wall (less a "defect" and more force majeure event) and the public bridge. From this RNS it is clear overall HUM have done a great job at turning it around.

However shareholders have suffered and for the HUM board, this should be reflected. I don't believe the HUM directors should be included in such an Incentive Scheme, it should be the employees only. UNLESS their Remuneration packages are commensurate with HUM's current financial position. I would therefore expect a reduction from their generous 2017 remuneration, considering they have the 1p bonus options. That is perhaps the only item I agreed with RA on. Hills is also extremely influential as a Financial Director and many investors follow FDs in share purchases, moreso than even the CEO. He needs to step up and have some skin in the game, separate to share options.

Strider - the AISC for Q4 2018 was appalling because of the pit wall issues they had. It had a huge impact on ounces produced and of course the remediation costs themselves pushed HUM's operating costs up for the quarter. Triple whammy was the public bridge was off limits with weight limits impacting heavy equipment mobilisation, so a barge was sourced.

These issues combined on a "per oz" basis pushed up AISC. Pit wall remediation looks forecast to be complete end of Jan, production is back on track and new bridge is due to be complete Q2 19. However with heavy machinery mobilised to site now, I doubt they need the barge going forward anymore. So obviously this will all reduce AISC per Oz going forward.

I was also invested in AAZ but sold out at 70p after doubling my money and then some.

AAZ now has a market cap of £100m, SHG £40m. Whilst the risk in SHG is greater, the reward/ upside too is greater I believe, particular if the VAT rebate issue is resolved.

You have to remember for AAZ in long-term the Government own 51% of "profit production" which is due to kick in in 2023, only 4yrs time. They could keep trying to delay it, but to do that means significant Capex and exploration costs and so less free cashflow than people envisage. I also don't think this will go down very well with the Government who may end up re-opening the Sharing Agreement if it's not working how it was intended.

Finally AAZ's "Gold Equivalent Ounces" is made up more and more of copper concentrate, so isn't a pure gold play. In an inflationary environment copper should do just as well as gold. However in a scenario where assets collapse in a deflationary fear environment and gold is the safe haven, gold should win out over all other investments and pure gold plays will be the place to be.

RA - are you or are you not BT? People accuse you of that because you have the exact same writing style, both solely comment on HUM and you're loose and incorrect with the "facts". It's obvious to most... You also have the same ridiculous logic. If you believe they're going sub-20p or bust, why don't you sell your shares? If you're not invested, what is your interest or reason for posting?

a) How have HUM manipulated AISC? Give 1 example where you believe they haven't reported AISC in line with the industry standard? A normal person invested in a company seeking clarification on issues like AISC calcs, Capex and the like would actually email the company (such as myself).

b) Proposed Performance Options and FD Hills lacking shares has been 2 issues I would agree with you on. The options I believe sent wrong message and acted as a significant drag on sentiment. However these are based on performance and I doubt will be "paid out" now. You're acting like they have. We won't know until perhaps this next quarterly report.

c) No one is paid £0.5m! Betts the CEO was paid $479 last year (£368k). Hills the FD £295k. Lets chalk up your numerous incorrect facts as rounding errors ay? It will of course be interesting to see what the remuneration is for 2018 and based on all the problems, most shareholders would expect it to be reduced, or the HUM board will not have learnt the lesson from the handling of the performance options.

As to the company getting back to 30p, I agree with you, but you're merely stating the bleeding obvious (meeting targets and reducing net debt)! This next quarter report will be dire as we know. The sp may indeed go down, unless there is clear update on the pit wall remediation completion and the bridge construction (the latter being outside of HUM's control).

As for your accusations of the HUM board lying, I hope you have some proof other than the drivel written in your post, or you could have a defamation case on your hands.

As we have a while to kill before SLP release their Q4 18 update on 31-Jan, thought I'd provide update on basket:

Plat: $810 (62.6% of basket)
Pall: $1,420 (24.7% of basket)
Rhod: $2,475 (12.5% of basket)
Gold: $1,290 (0.2% of basket)

BASKET: $1,170 per Oz

If we assume based on previous quarters and accounts refiner's margin/cut is circa 21-22%, the sale price to SLP is $917 per Oz. If we take the last Quarter's AISC of ZAR 7,592 and divide by current Forex of ZAR-USD 13.8, get a AISC of $550. So currently SLP's margin is $367.

Applying this margin against 80,000 Oz, margin is whopping USD 29.3m EBITDA for market cap of £57m. And when you think SLP's cash (perhaps $20m now) and trade balance (another circa $20m in their favour) is over 50% of SLP's market alone, it's crazy.

To go step further and get "free cashflow", you have to deduct Capex (circa $11m for this year) and Tax ($4m if just for estimate take June 2018 accounts). So you have free cash after everything of $14m and this during periods of high Capex, which forecast to drop to $3-4m per annum after June 2020 (barring any expansion/ growth plans).

We appear incredibly under-valued even based on existing basket price. To help realise "true" value we do need to see this updated dividend policy and/or growth strategy plan so it's clear funds aren't just left idle (even if some of it does achieve 7% in the bank!). Even this FY the dividend yield per annum should be 5%. So a final dividend for FYE June 2019 of 3% wouldn't go amiss.

Samancor are the new owners of Hernic I believe. When you state better deal, what's the current deal at Hernic? Once JLP recover their Capex, how are the earnings split?

Daisan - agreed forward sales is a bit perplexing in terms of volume as we were supposed to hedge less.

On negative side, it's hedged at only $1,230, on positive side they're hedging 45,000, which gives an indication and means they're confident with gold inventory + production guidance, of sales of 45,000+ in 1H 2019. At least I hope that's why.

It's shame they have hedged what appears to be 100%, but with $10m of debt to pay in this 1H 2019, I assume they took a decision in Q4 at some point to de-risk it. We now have the benefit of hindsight unfortunately.

Exceptional RNS. The only way you could get to 20p in very short-term is if SHG were provided the $22m VAT rebates they are owed by the government. They would then suddenly be in single digit Net Debt basis.

However excluding that, it should be able to recover to 7-8p at least relatively quickly. With guidance of 80-84K and AISC of $750-800, Net Debt down and Capex significantly reduced, 2019 is looking brighter.

True MH, good point, but SLP are nowhere near 40% Pall on a 6E basis either and neither are JLP. If we take Q3 and compare on "6E basis" (although SLP provide that for info and report on 4E. If they reported 6E they would be reporting over 100,000 Oz p.a.)

- JLP had revenue of $4.36m on 6,009 Oz or $726 per Oz (costs of $311, margin of $415)
- SLP had revenue of $15.9m on 25,723 Oz or $617 per Oz (costs of $378, margin of $239)

You can reverse engineer the difference between SLP's basket price and revenue to work out that roughly speaking, refining costs range between 21-24%. So for both JLP and SLP on a 6E reporting basis, they're nowhere near a Pall 40% content. But I would agree, on 6E basis JLP does appear to have more Pall and attract a higher rate.

SLP treat their 6Es as by-products, which why on a 4E basis the % of the 4E baskets of course goes up and sale price achieved is $829 per Oz (cash cost $508, margin of $321). This reporting method is no doubt what pushes up the remaining 4E % of plat, pall, rhod and gold.

So margin at the Hernic plant level is better at JLP currently. So will be interesting to see what is achieved at Platcro and DCM.

If you look at their revenues per quarter and divide by the ounces produced (to work out the sale price achieved by JLP), it is clearly not 40% palladium. Or else they have a terrible deal with their refiner.

They report on a 6E basis (platinum, palladium, rhodium, gold, iridium and osmium) not 4E basis (the 1st 4 stated). Based on the % make-up of PGMs usually found in SA mines, I can't possibly see how it could be 40% palladium and JLP's own figures in the quarterly RNS appear to confirm it's not, despite what may have been said during a webcast that is not subject to the usual rules a RNS is subject to.

Decent article here on Palladium & PGMs as a whole

https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2019-01-11/palladium-prices-are-bound-to-go-higher-as-plati

And a 2nd decent article on why Battery EVs are a long way off from mass adoption:

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-01-06/before-the-electric-car-takes-over-someone-needs-to-reinvent-the-battery

Unless there is an additional technological breakthrough and/or huge country-wide infrastructure projects backed by governments, adoption of EVs will be far slower than the current financial projections and media would have us believe.

So again, where does your belief come from that the exploration licenses have expired? Where does it state they expire in 2018? Has the government of Liberia issued a notice stating its expired? When it comes to many countries in Africa no entity has a firm legal hold over an asset. It can change on a whim. Look at Acacia, Centamin, DRC, Zambia. TIA

Tornadotony - agreed, which is why as unfortunate as it may be, the Dugbe Project is not viable even at $1,300 and why it's never been a factor in my decision making.

The Dugbe mine Capex ($210-280m depending on capacity) + Hydro-electric plant ($115m+) is immense. Considering HUM would use the bulk of the hydro-electric power (17.5MW+ of a total 25 or 30MW plant) and it assists with LoM Opex costs, HUM would no doubt have to fork out the majority for the hydro-electric plant. The other option is HFO generators have covered by the scoping study, but the cost over the LoM is about same as hydro-electric. However it would reduce upfront capex and based on political uncertainties, really the only option.

*cont: and can't see any expiration date anywhere

Where does this belief come from?

In what earlier RNS, Liberian Law or elsewhere are you referring to that you "believe" the 25yr MDA executed in 2015 (signed by GoL, but still to be ratified by President after his rejections on minor admin but more importantly, local content issues) automatically expires the end of 2018 if it was not ratified by the office of the president?!

I've checked the earlier RNS on the MDA and Accounts

Also news of how the government is progressing on the replacement bridge and estimated completion date, so can be business as usual and remove requirement for river barges which plugged the gap.

In the tough times, HUM didn't get much recognition for their very fast work at sourcing the barge(s) and coming up with the current work-a-round.

Edit: market cap is GBP 46m, not USD 46m

GB - if you're looking for a Platinum or "Platinum Group Metals" (PGMs) play, I can recommend Slyvania Platinum (SLP).

It produces PGMs from tailings so has low costs and is a mix of Platinum (62.6%), Palladium (24.7%), Rhodium (12.5%) and Gold (0.2%) mix. Based on this % mix and current spot prices, their basket price is $1,120 per Oz. It should be noted their PGM mix is taken to a third party refinery that takes a circa 20% cut, so sale price to SLP is more like $875 per Oz. However with an AISC of circa $525 per Oz (dependant on production and ZAR Forex) they make a very healthy $350 per Oz.

I would not touch any standard Platinum miner as platinum mines on the whole are underground, deeper and more expensive than gold mines and taking a wide average, can be anywhere in region of AISC of $1,000+.

SLP Pros
- market cap of only $46m as the extremely negative platinum sentiment has impacted all, yet SLP has $17.7m cash balance end of Q3 18 and a $20m positive trade balance in its favour (trade receivables minus payables).
- Produces circa 80,000 Oz per annum so based on $350 per Oz on current basket price, $28million "earnings" per annum.
- for FYE June 2019 and FYE 2020 Capex is circa $12m and $11m respectively, so to calc. true free cashflow you have to deduct this from $28m. But thereafter Capex drops to negligible $3-$4million range.
- Paid their 1st div in Nov 18. Dividends will ramp up after this year when main Capex is behind them.
- Circa 10yr+ life of production.

SLP Cons
- it's based in SA and power supplier Eskom with their "load shedding" can sometimes impact all miners/ producers if power is limited for certain periods.


On Plat itself, it is the superior metal for catalytic converters and whilst Plat can be used for unleaded/ gasoline converters, Pall can not be used for diesel. Of course all unleaded cc use Pall and it would take a lot of changes in manufacturing to suddenly change to Plat. However with Pall in deficit and near $500 more than Plat, I wonder if some car suppliers will look long-term and take the leap to Plat. Pall was only used because it was cheaper - at least that's my understanding. More leftfield you have fuel cells which appear to be very slowly taking off and currently use a lot of Platinum, even with the efficiencies found reducing Plat content. I believe it's 3-4x more Plat in fuel cell than a Plat CC. So long-term the runaway Pall ($1,265) and Rhodium ($2,460) and deficits in those markets should assist with a Plat recovery. However how long it could take is anyone's guess, particular with the softness in auto market. Main thing is even at these prices, SLP still makes piles of cash.