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Leading Edge Materials to Evaluate Restart of Graphite Production at Woxna Mine due to Improved Market Conditions
Stockholm, February 11, 2022 – Leading Edge Materials Corp. (“Leading Edge Materials” or the “Company”) (TSXV: LEM) (Nasdaq First North: LEMSE) (OTCQB: LEMIF) (
About this update from Leading Edge Materials Corp.
[{"type":"text","content":" Stockholm, February 11, 2022 – Leading Edge Materials Corp. (“Leading Edge Materials” or the “Company”) (TSXV: LEM) (Nasdaq First North: LEMSE) (OTCQB: LEMIF) (FRA: 7FL) is pleased to announce it has initiated an internal review focused on the potential to restart production at the Company’s fully-owned Woxna graphite mine in Sweden (“Woxna”). Highlights: Strong market conditions with European flake graphite prices up around 40% over the last year1,2 Internal review to restart production at the Woxna graphite mine Woxna Graphite is one of the few built and permitted graphite mines in the western world Important step towards planned fully integrated production of graphite anode materials The permitted and fully-built Woxna graphite mine and processing plant was restarted by the Company in 2014 but production was halted due to adverse market conditions at the time. The site has since been kept on care and maintenance whilst the Company has focused on developing the planned downstream processes to produce an upgraded graphite anode material for the lithium-ion battery industry. Improved market conditions for traditional flake graphite products have been recognized as an additional potential opportunity with the asset offering a relatively short time to production compared with other graphite developers. The Company sees the current market conditions as an attractive opportunity to investigate this in more detail. A recent assessment by Fastmarkets1 show flake graphite prices in Europe at US$775 to US$1,395 depending on flake size, which is around 40% higher compared with the same period last year2. These price assessments also show that there is an increasing premium for flake graphite pricing in Europe compared with China. Prices have been driven by growing demand with concurrent supply disruptions and soaring shipping costs. In this context, an alternative supply from Sweden, where products could be shipped by truck to potential customers in continental Europe, could be a key competitive advantage for the Company and could offer the Company a potential opportunity for revenue generation in the near-term. Filip Kozlowski, CEO of Leading Edge Materials states “Restarting production at the Woxna graphite mine opens up a number of key opportunities for the Company. Current and expected strong fundamental market conditions not only o...