This has come up before; I don't think it is right I post things...

This has come up before; I don't think it is right I post things that require money ...

I don't think it is much to ask some good old fashioned DYOR !!!

I have given what I can with good intentions. I am sorry you think it is mumbo jumbo....

For ages I spoke about $1+ Veiners - I coped fair criticism for this until the market started to catch on....


SOURCE: http://www.newingonstocks.com/review-of-mrf/

In the absence of such information from MRL, a 19 page report on MRL published in November 2014 by CPS Capital (written by Peter Peterson?) is included on the company’s website and provides some guidance. A table apparently sourced from MRL contains some interesting information. For a basic small-scale operation selling 5,000t run of mine raw graphite of less than 95% purity from a number of mining operations, the assumptions included a capital cost of under US$5m, an operating cost of US$600-650/t and a product price of US$1,700-2,000/t, implying annual EBITDA of at least US$5.5m.

Not bad for a company with a market cap of under $20m.

Another scenario outlined was production of 11,000 tpa run of mine graphite, upgraded to 10,000 tpa of 99.99% purity, thence upgraded to 5,000 tpa spherical graphite on an assumed yield of 50%. Capital cost was put at US$31m, operating cost at US$1,200/t and product price at US$9,000/t, implying annual EBITDA of US$39m before royalties. The after-tax NPV was put at US$158m using a discount rate of 10%.

These scenarios have been superceded somewhat by subsequent MRL announcements on the potential to produce graphene, which is the holy grail for graphite producers because it could sell for in excess of US$50,000/t once a market is established.​

• In May MRL announced testwork results on drillcore material which demonstrated that graphene can be extracted in a readily scaleable single-step process using electrochemical exfoliation . The only other graphite company yet to have demonstrated this important advantage is Talga (TLG), using a wet physio-chemical technique on its Swedish ore.​
• On 3 August MRL announced provisional agreement to pursue graphene commercialisation outcomes with Imagine Intelligent Materials Pty Ltd of Australia. MRL said that the agreement will provide access to a network of advanced manufacturing enterprises and scientific expertise, to investigate the full spectrum of the graphene value chain.​
• Yesterday MRL announced that further preliminary testwork has suggested the yield of graphene from its graphite could approximate 50%. They went on to state that further testing could increase the yield to more than 90%.​

I had thought that because of its graphene potential Talga Resources Ltd (ticker TLG, price 35¢, mkt cap $49m) would be the  best performer of all of the ASX-listed graphite companies,  but MRL now looks far superior. Here is a quick comparison:

• In September 2014 Talga released the results of a scoping study based on an opencut mine at a 4:1 strip ratio producing 250,000 tpa ore grading some 24% total graphitic carbon (TGC). The process plant would upgrade this to 40,000 tpa of graphite concentrate grading 80-85% purity (which could be sold for $480/t) and 7,000 tpa of graphene grading 99.9% purity. However, it was thought that only a limited tonnage  of the graphene could actually be sold as graphene because of the limited market for the material at this pioneering stage of the industry, and Talga assumed, for the sake of the exercise, that 1,000 tpa would be sold as graphene with the remainder sold as high quality graphite priced at US$1,600/t. That would result in annual project revenues of some US$84m. Capital cost was put at around $30m. Operating costs were put at $84/t of feed (i.e. $21m annually) and that included processing costs.​
• MRL could achieve revenue of  US$75m from mining say 5,000 tpa (continuing with the example provided by CPS Capital) and producing 1,000 tpa graphene priced at US$55,000/t and 4,000 tpa of high quality battery grade graphite priced at US$5,000/t, at a capital cost probably well under $10m, at much lower operating costs (a cost of US$600/t for the raw graphite would amount to $3m annually, to which must be added the cost of processing) and probably earlier to boot.​

The one niggling factor in the back of my mind is that Sri Lanka is far more risky than Sweden. Although economic policies are broadly supportive of business and economic growth, as evidenced in GDP statistics of recent years, ethnic tensions remain a threat, the political system is fragmented with generally weak coalition governments, large fiscal deficits are occurring, public debt is high and corruption is endemic.

Expert Euler Hermes puts Sri Lanka on a C3 (sensitive) rating, the C being for medium term country risk on a scale from AA to D,  and the 3 (sensitive) rating being for short term risk on a scale from 1 (low) to 4 (high). For perspective, PNG and Mozambique both have the same rating as Sri Lanka, while it would come as no surprise that Australia and Sweden are both rated AA1 (low). It helps that the legal system is based on the British common law system and that English is taught and spoken as a second language.

Political risk aside, I know which share I would prefer to own. TLG looks great but MRF looks phenomenal.

I still need to do a bit more work on MRL and on graphite and graphene markets and their potential, not having had time to do so at this point. Among questions I would want answered are:

• What other operators are in Sri Lanka and what are their prospects?​
• Does MRL have the best deposits in Sri Lanka?​
• Could other producers outside of TLG and MRL produce commercial quantitites of graphene as cheaply? Perhaps they haven’t yet tried to do so?​
• How quickly can the graphene market develop and what prices are likely to be available for the products?​

So there are likely to be updates made to this review over time.

Finally, looking at the chart, it can be seen that yesterday the shares jumped from the previous close of 5.7¢ to as high as 9.1¢ before settling at 7.2¢, a rise of 1.5¢. That was in reaction to the announcement on graphene yields. The shares have now established support on the uptrend line I have drawn, while resistance is apparent in the 12-14¢ range. Dare I state that a breakout above that level would suggest a target of about $1 per share?

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Not surprising to me others are doing the maths and working through it ....

Now you are having a go because I am saying Vein Graphite/graphite is one of the top strategic resources in the world?

LOL What the ?

Google Disruptive materials or Critical Materials or Strategic Materials and Graphite is one of the top three.


Good Luck Maaze!




Kind Regards

DYOR !!!!