Who else in the world has such a suite of products like NioCorp has. This really is mind blowing to know the grouping of these critical minerals exist in one place. The lengths the NioCorp team has gone and is continuing to go to make this a mine and production facility in the heart of America. Producing AlSc master alloys that are directly going to manufactures in the form they require for making parts, is a good part of what Mark covered in his presentation. I think he did an excellent job in 20 minutes to cover the essentials of where the project stands today.
A lot of confidence and enthusiasm for the aluminum scandium alloy business.
Elk Creek Nebraska will be producing - niobium, scandium, titanium, & magnetic rare earths, all considered critical & strategic minerals by United States and ranked in criticality as number 1 for rare earths, 2 for scandium, 3 for niobium, and titanium as 24th.
FS work basically done, resource work done, drilling work done, all permits in hand, no permitting risks associated with this project at this point in time.
Off-take agreements in place for vast amounts of material, and more coming. Niobium - (ferroniobium) 50% of production for first 10 years w ThyssenKrupp which also deems NioCorp eligible for a German Loan Gurantee program worth between $150 to $200M. 25% w CMC Cometals for first 10 years. Scandium 12 tons spoken for w Traxys North for first 10 years. Rare Earths w Stellantis on term sheet and to be made a definitive agreement.
Working hard on titanium off-take agreements and hopefully have something to announce in the near future.
Off-take term sheet with Stellantis, 3rd largest OEM. They are working hard on the definitive off-take agreement which will be somewhere in the neighborhood of a 10 year agreement. Makes financing a lot easier Mark says.
Mark says, Along with the off-takes with the rare earth oxides, Stellantis will be making a simultaneous investment in the company. No amounts have been disclosed yet, but as those discussions mature, and they are maturing quite rapidly and hopefully to have something to say about that in the next 45 to 60 days.
Letter of Interest from EXIM bank, funding up to $800M in debt. Going through approval process now. Good relationship, and monthly meetings with EXIM. Very good debt terms for a project like this.
Scott Honan and his technical team have made some profound discoveries, and major advancements in terms of recoveries of minerals they are after.
Greater than 92% of recoveries of rare earth materials they want to recover, which are the magnetic rare earth oxides. They were able to increase the niobium recovery by 3 to 4%. Titanium more than double in the recovery process and titanium prices have more than doubled in the last year. Titanium will become a large source of revenue for this project.
ESG approach to business always a part of their belief system.
Mark says about the AlSc alloy business - they are vertically integrating just a little bit into this space. Production supply in the world is approx 25 tons of scandium per year. NioCorp to produce 100 tons per year.
Production platforms for auto manufacturing does not want to purchase scandium alone, they want ScAl master alloys. There are no major producers of ScAl master alloys in the world today, so NioCorp is integrating into production the master alloy they need with the help of Nanoscale, and they have achieved making the master alloy needed, and soon to produce it in ingots forms.
Mark says, Not worried about demand just need to create the mechanism to get the scandium in a useful form as a master alloy for auto manufacturers to use.
Bullish
AI
