No idea?!?!? Really?
How about the fact that phase 1 of Olaroz produced its first lithium carbonate in November 2014, with commissioning completed in February 2015 and with the explicit expectation of nampeplate production by the end of calendar 2015. A full three years later and they are still not there. Imagine if you are a banker or a customer and you find that the company you have contracted with is just not up to the job. After three years of broken promises the stream of excuses must start to wear thin.
Or how about the fact that they completed a scoping study for stage 2 in December 2016 in which they projected that the final investment decision would be by mid-2017 and that phase 2 would be begin production around about now to early 2019. Where we are now even if they make a final investment decision about phase 2 tomorrow that suggests to me that production may be at least 2 more years away, And that is assuming that they are even in the position to make a FID on this expansion project: I suspect they are struggling to get the bankers onside for the $100m loan they say they need.
Oh, and back in December 2016 the company assured the market that they expected to be able to fund the expansion through "project debt and internal project cashflows" and they stated that the company "does not anticipate the need to raise equity capital to finance either the Stage 2 expansion or lithium hydroxide plant". Turns out that they raised about $300m in equity capital and still cannot raise the project debt they expected to, and $300m of unanticipated equity later and they still cannot reach a FID.
To be blunt about the only reason Orocobre has remained a going concern has been that lithium prices have been up near US$14,000 a tonne rather than the US$6,500 a tonne they were getting back in 2015. And you wonder why Orocobre has been amongst the most heavily shorted ASX stocks in 2017 and 20118? Really?
