Nickel About to Get 'Shoved' Upwards by Funds

[Music] Mr Mark Selby how are we sir I am very good Mr Matthew Gordon just getting ready for the holidays here I bet you are I bet you are you have been uh you've had quite a busy year few few things uh to do yet I suspect but yes take a well earned break for sure we're going to rip through today uh because you've got a whole bunch of people chasing you on a bunch of stuff um and need to get going so um should we start we what we're going to talk about today is um some some company news the good the bad um and we're going to talk a little bit about the market in fact why don't we kick off of that what are we seeing out there with nickel price yeah so so uh you know we had the big moves that we talked about uh in our last call uh two weeks ago um we had a little popup back up over 177,000 um and and now we seem to settle in on other side of you know 16,800 a ton you know I think it'll be interesting to see you know historically back 15 20 years ago the Slowdown around Christmas time you know the the if if if the market was was was way longer way short a lot of time the commodity hedge funds would use that as an opportunity in that low liquidity low liquidity period to give the market a shove in the New Direction given where we're trading obviously that that number might be up but I think you know uh I think between now and Chinese New Year you might see some you know pretty big uh swings uh up and down uh but again you know the good thing is we're starting to see some analysts talking about the kind of restocking bump uh that we I've been talking about here for the last four or five months that might show up in 2024 so uh again you know we we'll we'll we'll see what happens uh through this last week uh when we come back in the new year I will give my forecast for for 20124 and review how I did uh in 2023 but but again I think I think 2024 is going to be surprising uh uh will surprise a lot of people again one of the big underpinnings of that you know you know despite the you know stories of of EV sales piling up uh you know inventories piling up you know Global sales up 38% uh you know year-over-year in the month and uh both in the US and globally and again there's no one who's got 40% growth in any of forecast for the next while so you know that's uh uh so don't don't use just because people have mispriced Auto models um don't read that one data point into sort of you know what's happening with the overall sector so so again we'll see we'll see pretty strong growth next year okay well let just just on before we kind of R rip into um company news the good and the bad um on on that you you talk about maybe some some Brave analysts are stepping forward and trying to maybe understand the look space a bit more than they can currently do you know historically not too ambitious and not too aggressive is the kind of that kind of bifurcation of the market in the sense of you know East versus West is that is that a narrative that is starting to be talked about uh still not as much no there's that's that's still a whole other you know sort of Gulf that's there and again I think as as we start to see you know I think in 2024 you know you will see a lot of safe Ira compliant mind sourcing deals happen you know again we saw a couple get done in the lithium space but I think you'll see as the year goes on you know um you know see in some of the other minerals that again people very clearly want access to Safe jurisdiction Ira compliant non non-foreign entity of concern material um you know that gives them uh the you know they can put their hand on their heart that they've got nice clean green nickel Cobalt graphite lithium um that they can uh put into their vehicles right okay well let's say we'll we'll have a much Fuller discussion in the new year when you make your make your forecast so far 3 and 0 in the right direction you called it so three three times in a row uh let's hope that keeps going um okay um maybe let's start off with a little bit on let's start with Canada nickel if you don't mind um you were aiming to get a strategia Again by the end of this year are you gonna sneak it in no we we basically pushed out the oret deal um by 30 days we had up to 90 days to do it um you know and as we said in the release uh you know we expect to get that done within that 30-day period we'd be crazy to extend it only that period of time if if um you know it if we didn't think that there's you know something likely to get done this time frame so doesn't happen before year end you know um you know look for it in January so those discussions are continuing to be very constructive okay I guess um yeah like you say the closer in terms of the extension period okay let's start with the good stuff first um Western Mines what yeah so this is this mulga tank project um it's a Crawford like um deposit east of caly again some pretty good Crawford like grades and the nice thing is you know getting some little high grade splashes in there so uh you know a meter at 1.8% nickel and 4.8% copper um is it was is a nice uh little bonus to have in there that's not very wide but you know again that there's there's systems going on that are increasing the mineralization there so you know again keep keep keep an eye on this one uh as as it uh as it develops forward um then the other big thing is we basically had a bunch of resources come out I guess the Aussie companies getting them out before you know their big Christmas uh Christmas uh uh Break um Life Zone uh which is the company that owns the cabanga deposit they got BHP in there um for a big payment again BP could have bought it for a ham sandwich uh three years ago but they decided to step up with a big check it's been around since the 1980s it's a beautiful deposit in a horrible location it's in Western Tanzania by the border with Rwanda uh Bundi um and the Congo um so it's always been a bit challenging uh to get going but again they're they're now basically about a million tons contained nickel 43 million tons at just over 2% with some copper and and Cobalt you know um a big chunk of that open pable so again when I say this is the best undeveloped sulfide deposit you know in terms of just the raw resource you know this is a good one you know we'll see how they will we'll see how they go they've got a poly metallic concentrate they have to deal with they're talking about using hydromat technology there so you know we'll see we'll see how that all uh comes to fruition uh the other ones back in the in the in the sort of West Australia cambala region so uh wiy nickel uh again they put out some pretty splashy intercepts um with with uh you know over the past year uh they they put out um uh a resource for their uh Armstrong deposit um which is a million tons at 1.4% again a bunch of that's open pable um and they've got Mills that they can truck the the material to uh so um you know again not massive you know we're talking about 14,000 tons contain nickel um but you know if you can just set up a a a small scale uh open pit uh mining operation and get that to a mill then you know that's not so bad uh they have pushed their scoping study into 20124 so you know we'll see how that goes uh the other smaller player left in the area uh is and metals uh so they they're on the other side of of of the lake from calda um the good thing there was they they did some metwork on one of their deposits and again they've got a whole little cluster of deposits uh south of the lake in in cambala but produces 17% congrate out of it which is which is great for that region the other one was around 13 uh and the good part is not a lot of Artic so some of these deposits in wa have arsenic issues uh with mcor you know the reason they stumbled back and and and weren't able to deliver concentrate to uh BHP um you know we set them on a spiral which ended up getting them getting taken out um but uh the arsic content of some of these deposits you know can can be an issue uh to get processed because even China won't take U concentrates that have more than half a percent arsenic um in them good thing is L medal since they went public a few years ago uh they' basically increased uh their total nickel content cross the res Reserve by more than than 2x so again nice to see some some some some new projects moving ahead as as I said you know we need all of the above and again particularly Ira compliant uh uh resources um unfortunately on the on the negative news front so uh panoramic resources you know we've talked about them a few times and talked some more about it on the last call uh they had initiated then a strategic review but uh again obviously no no one leaping up um to to to uh to to grabb this one um so they they file for bankruptcy um the Australia has some pretty aggressive Administration rules and so uh they have filed for bankruptcy key thing here and I said this on the last call you know people you know get excited and and get all hyped up about one and a half and 2% nickle well that's underground the cost of mining that is way way way way way higher right um so it's grade is just one variable um and so you know uh this was a past producing mine with a past producing Mill um and you know the deposit they've got remnants that the ex old deposit and they've got a new deposit that they were developing and and yet they hit the wall on that front um the the other gu other guys and some of the the the uh on the negative news front uh you uh L the lamancha is a private company basically uh it's obviously they've taken control of what's going on at Horizon uh they put uh one of their people in as CEO and they swapped out um a bunch of a bunch of board members there um you know the nice sign for that and healthfully uh the horizonti equity holders are able to salvage something uh they've made a great hire U with Marie Balan taking over as CEO uh she's she's an you know she's an excellent person who's got a great track record of of delivering um uh she she was a set at uh brought in uh for the Mirabella nickel project with Santa Rita which which struggled back in the in in the late team she got that operation turned around two other people had had basically completely mismanaged it um she she you know were able to get cost down production up unfortunately at that time that was when nickel prices got down to four bucks a pound and she couldn't take out cost fast enough uh to catch up with it with the nickel price but uh you know she's she's got a tremendous track record and if there's anyone out there who can can can get that Horizon Project going uh it's uh it's uh definitely Marie um and then the the other other one and again high grade you know is just a variable uh Independence group they acquired Western areas Western are has have been a standalone nickel company for 20 plus years uh they they acquired it about year and a half ago um they they uh they had an operating mine and then they had this Cosmos project which was originally owned by a company called Jubilee mines um who' successfully operated back in the early 2000s uh so basically you know they had a whole you know mechanized underground ore system rather than using Hall trucks to move the material through they've now decided to Halt that the capex for the projects gone through the roof projects way behind um and so you know they're basically saying that they're basically starting to redeploy people uh in that area even though they haven't completed the review yet but that review is going to come out when they report their end of quarter uh uh at the end uh of January and and they're flagging that they're already going to impair the asset more this is an asset that has a reserve of 10 million tons at 2% again past producing mine you know new discoveries you know you know past producing Mill and you know 2% 10 million tons at 2% doesn't work and again 10 million tons at 2% you know would be one of the one of the bigger high-grade sulfide discoveries if someone made it so grade is just a variable that's just the one thing to keep in mind you said we talk about it we talked about it for four years and that one keeps coming back grade is King there you go a perfect perfect example two two sounds insane um right well look you you've got a dash off I do appreciate you making time for us because I know you got lots of conversations going on at the moment um when you get it have a great Christmas and we'll see you in the new year okay yeah see you in the new year for sure Matt take care have a great Christmas

Channel: Crux Investor

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Keywords: mining, gold, nickel, cobalt, uranium, vanadium, lithium, precious metals, crux investor, cruxinvestor, silver, TSX, ASX, AIM, LSE, investing in uranium, investing in mining, investing in stocks, investing in stocks for beginners, investing in gold, invest in stocks, invest in stocks for beginners, invest in gold, invest in mining, analyst's notes, analysts notes, analyst notes, battery metals, electric vehicles, net zero, carbon neutral, carbon credits, nuclear, best mining stocks, TSXV

Id: Y-LZnS3dH4I

Length: 12min 28sec (748 seconds)

Published: Fri Dec 22 2023