Sovereign Metals (ASX:SVM) — Investor Presentation

0:00 Good afternoon, and welcome to the SOVEREIGN Metals Limited Investor Presentation. Throughout this recorded presentation, investors will be in listen only mode. Questions are encouraged and they can be submitted at any time using the Q and A tab situated on the right hand corner of your screen. Simply type in your questions and present. Before we begin, I would like to submit the following poll. I would now like Tangier's chief commercial officer, Saipankai. Good afternoon. Good afternoon. Thanks for that, operator, and thank you everyone who's, joined the live feed. And as I say on the telly

0:32 for everyone who's, watching on catch up, thanks for your time to to to to let me take you through these these new, this new investor presentation deck, that we, SOVEREIGN METALS, have made public. Just so you're fully aware, these are the same materials that myself, as well as our CEO, chairman, etcetera, do discuss with institutional investors, with potential off takers, financiers, and indeed, most of my time nowadays is spent talking about exactly these these, materials with, the US government, and I'll get into exactly why why that is. But before I do, on the cover here, you see, quite a stunning picture of a a fighter jet. That's an f 35 fighter jet sat, in Texas, on the ground.

1:29 It is by far the most, powerful and most advanced piece of flying machinery technology ever built by humanity. It is a stalwart of the US US Air Force, and it also contains about four tons of specifically forged rolled milled titanium metal. And that titanium metal is produced with about a 100 tons of rutile, which is the titanium mineral that is sat within our deposit Kasir, which we are developing in in Malawi. In fact, Kasir is the world's largest rutile deposit, and we recently completed a DFS to show that we will be the world's largest and lowest cost producer of of that titanium mineral.

2:25 Usual disclaimers and disclosures apply alongside the forward looking statements. I'm probably not giving enough credence to the amount that we pay our, our lawyers to put these together, but please note anything that I do say, is most likely a forward looking statement, and, none of what I say is any type of advice, or how best to use your money. That is your prerogative, and you're right.

2:57 Right. So so, why did SOVEREIGN METALS about six months or so ago, decide to follow a US strategy as we call it? And and this is exactly why. There's three boxes here, three supply chains, titanium, natural graphite, heavy rare earths, and the same number in all three boxes, a 100%. That is a 100% import reliance by The US to feed titanium, graphite, and heavy rare earths into its own industrial base. On titanium or titanium sponge, particularly, which is the metal that is used for airframes, naval, and aerospace systems, for The US defense and aerospace primes.

3:44 It it... That's mainly produced in Japan. And Japan, what it needs is unencumbered feedstock to maintain its, titanium sponge supply for The US, and that's where we fit in. China, as we are very well aware and as you may have seen over the weekend, has been actively pursuing the strategy to control this supply chain. The Japanese government has just initiated a an investigation into, China, potentially dumping titanium into the Japanese, sponge industry. So, we're all, looking at that investigation with bated breath. Graphite, we've seen how China has weaponized its monopoly already.

4:30 77%, as you see on this slide, of flake graphite is produced, in China and actually a 100% of anode, which is effectively the graphite portion within a lithium ion battery, is processed in China. And then heavy rare earths. Look. Rare earths, as my, friend Robert Friedland recently said, are neither rare nor earths. But when it comes to heavy rare earths, these are extremely rare. The likes of some of the largest, rare earth producers in the, quote, unquote, Western world do not have sufficient heavy rare earths to to to to feed The US, The US machine. So what's Washington done as a response to all of this?

5:19 Price floors using taxpayers' dollars, stockpiling, putting together offtake vehicles. All the signals are there that the vulnerability is totally structural. What does this mean for for SOVEREIGN METALS? Now we, SOVEREIGN METALS, are developing Kasir, the critical minerals project in Malawi, and we intend to be the upstream solution to all three of those supply chains. On titanium, we will be, or we are the world's largest natural rutile resource. We will be the world's, largest and lowest cost producer of rutile. On graphite, our project is the world's second largest flake graphite resource. That graphite is really a byproduct, in the system. We mine, we process for titanium primarily.

6:09 That is... That that is and will be our business and our our operations. It just so happens that we have a lot of graphite, sat within our processing plants once we, process for titanium. So producing that, we can, actually produce that as a byproduct at production costs around 25% below, the Chinese average costs. That is a that is a boast that no other graphite company on the planet can make, outside of China. For both those minerals, look, they are industrial. There are a lot of titanium and graphite deposits around the world. Very few of those are actually commercially viable. So we tested the commercial viability of our titanium and graphite very early on, and we continue to actually do so with potential offtakers.

6:59 So on the titanium side, we had it validated by TOHO Titanium, a Japanese titanium metal producer. In fact, it's one of the key producers of titanium metal for The US defense, industry, and they verified that our rutile can produce a titanium metal through their process, which has been validated for all and any end uses. It's pretty well known within the titanium space that TOHO titanium has some of the most stringent requirements. And as you can imagine, being a, go to supplier for The US Defense Primes, it needs to ensure that the parameters and specifications of its products meet certain requirements and don't waiver from them at all.

7:47 So that was a massive tick in the box that we knew that our our our titanium can be used for for those purposes. On the graphite side, look, 70% of our graphite is what's known as industrial grade graphite, so that's what ends up in your refractory bricks for steelmaking, copper smelting, aluminum smelting, etcetera, and about 30% is battery grade graphite. So that's the the the graphite that ends up in your lithium ion batteries. For both those grades, we have a big tick in the box in terms of qualification. So we know that our industrial grade graphite can produce refractory bricks required for steelmaking. So as the world reindustrializes, they... We we see a quite a considerable uptick in the, the demand for that type of graphite.

8:38 On the battery grade side of our graphite product, we have tested it. We have run it through batteries, and we have confirmed that actually using our graphite meets, if not, on most parameters, surpasses the parameter, the the specifications of, China's largest anode producer, BTR, which essentially is the world's... Not not only the world's largest anode producer, but also if you have a very well known, electric car, most likely 50% of your lithium ion battery side in that car has come from BTR. And the heavy rear rest is a is a very interesting, part of the story here.

9:29 About a year ago, we upgraded our lab in Malawi. Now call it a lab. It's it's more of a factory these days. We have about a 100 Malawians working there. We we originally set it up when we were in very much the exploration and discovery phase. We were, you know, chasing grade, chasing mineralization. The the lab was able to sample drill holes on a real time basis and give us an indication of where we should and shouldn't be focusing our efforts. Over time, we've developed that lab into, as I said, more of a factory facility, which is able to produce both rutile and graphite bulk samples, which we are using for qualifying our product with off takers as we turn a lot of our nonbinding offtake agreements into binding offtake agreements.

10:21 As part of that process, we upgraded the lab with an electrostatic separator last year, and some of the, quote, unquote, boffins in the lab, were able to figure out that in that electrostatic separation module, we were able to separate out some, heavy rare earth concentrate in the form of monazite. So not only did this monazite have rare earths, but it had the heavy rare earths, dysprosium, terbium, yttrium. These are all highly valuable, highly required by the... By by by the defense and aerospace and and tech industries as I've as I've noted. And we had NDPR levels, so the light rare earth's pretty much in line with current producers as well.

11:13 We are in the progress... In the in the process of progressing test work, and that's underway with Western Refiners, and that's probably where I should should leave that without tripping over any any potential NDAs.

11:31 So on this slide, slide six, what we've done here is shown you what CASEA looks like. It's mainly scrubland, mainly used for subsistence farming. It's it's it's all very friable soft material there. It's sparsely populated, and we have drilled out 3,400,000,000 tons of a total combined resource there. Now that number pretty much means nothing to you or I without putting it into context. The context here is that after mining this ore body for twenty five years, we would have only mined around 18% of that known combined resource. So for all intents and purposes, once Kaseya is up and running as a mine, it will probably outlast everyone on this call.

12:31 This slide, derisking profile. Derisking is a a bit of a... Overused word in the in the mining industry, if at all it is a word these days. I'll tell you what derisking means for SOVEREIGN METALS and what it means for us. So in 2022, when we, realized just the size and scale of the deposit we had on our hands, the entire titanium world came crashing down on us. The fastest mover, and indeed the biggest mover of all these, all the titanium space that wanted to be involved in the project, was Rio Tinto. Made sense that the world's largest titanium deposit has the world's largest titanium dioxide producer as a, as a strategic partner within within its, within its, cap table.

13:25 So Rio Tinto, what did they bring? They bought, dollars, which is always good. They put in 40, million dollars for an initial 15% and moved to an extra 4.9% with, up to 20,000,000 extra dollars, Australian. And they provided a whole bunch of technical input, throughout the mining and processing, understanding how best to, configure these these large tier one deposits. Using those dollars, we also completed a pilot mining, program. You know, our DFS that we completed is not built on best guesses on a spreadsheet.

14:12 It's built on real world inputs. We mined about 10% of the, day one footprint of Kaseya. We understood what best fleet to use to mine it, how to rehabilitate it, how to process those materials, move those materials, what what what level in terms of the geotechnical parameters of the pit were required, and we did that with Rio Tinto's help as well as our own, owners team. We also bought in the World Bank, towards the end of last year. Now the World Bank is, moving, heaven and earth right now to to to ensure that critical mineral supply chains for the, quote, unquote, Western world, are secured.

15:03 As part of that, the IFC, which is the financing arm of the World Bank, signed a collaboration agreement with us that it would ensure our DFS and our, up... Environmental, social, and impact assessment, ESIA, were fully bankable by the World Bank. I met the requirements for them to lend into and invest into the project. For them to embed themselves into the project, we have given them, financing rights to fund the project both on the debt and equity side, and and that is a collaboration that continues today. So in April this year, we completed the DFS. That was, for all intents and purposes, signed off and agreed with Rio Tinto.

15:52 The numbers I'll go through in a bit, but the headlines were, as, as we imagined, largest and lowest cost producer of rutile and graphite for for the foreseeable future. And then when we came across the monazite earlier this year, or the rare earths, we have been working on the part of the last six months in completing a study to understand what those, you know, operational and specifically economic parameters look like in order to help us with the with the funding of the project going forwards. All in, and one of the biggest derisking profiles that we we we are working on, today is an integration into The US legislative and executive system here.

16:45 The US is very well aware of what we can bring and what we are able to provide in terms of those three supply chains I mentioned at the at the at the top of the presentation. We have already signed an MOU with Traxxas who are one of the key players within Project Vault. Project Vault is a is a US XM backed $12,000,000,000 project to shore up the defense... The US critical mineral stockpile. And Traxxas is one of the three, now maybe five, collaborators within that, within that project. Slide eight.

17:34 We've called this simple by design, and it really is simple. You know? I... I'm an accountant by background, and even I can understand what this, what what what the mining and processing of Kaseya entails. It is a large deposit. It will be a large operation, but it will be a very simple operation. We use all the misnomers of shovel and shake or, you know, a bulldozer and bath, and that's essentially what this what this project is. We'll be mining it using a dry mechanical mining. We know what the fleet will look like in terms of drag lines and, dump trucks. In fact, when we did the pilot mining, we used a lot of civil engineering fleet, which is completely viable and compatible for what we want to do.

18:25 The processing, it will be a low energy, low power consuming process, of gravity separation that will be done through spirals, where we will find a heavy minerals concentrate, that will be electrostatically and magnetically separated into into a rutile product, and the graphite will be separated into graphite concentrate. Both of those products are... Will be premium products. The rutile on average is well above the 95% titanium dioxide mark, and graphite is well above the the 90%. In fact, it's around 96 to 98%, total graphitic content, which is, which given that your final end user requires something around the 99%, we've done most of... Or at least mother nature has done most of the work in in refining those those minerals.

19:23 Logistics wise, we are very blessed to be on the Nakala logistics corridor, and I'll show you a map of that. But, essentially, we will be, able to ship out our product, all the way directly to a deepwater port. All that infrastructure is operational today, plenty of capacity for us to to get going. And then rehabilitation, this is not a twenty five year life life of mine where we leave a big hole in the ground with all the tailings sat next to that big hole in the ground for someone else to deal with. We will be progressively backfilling the pits, which means that instead of taking land for twenty five years, we will be able to give that land back anywhere between three to five years after mining it to to to previous owners.

20:17 And on the bottom there, really, you see the different the different minerals that we are very much going to be involved in, the natural rutile, the graphite, but also the the five of the seven rare earths that are subject to Chinese export controls today. We get a lot of questions about Malawi, and I've put down some details on this slide here. It is, unknown to many. To those who do know it, it's known as the warm heart of Africa. Some see it as a hurdle to come, that that we must overcome. We actually see it as a positive to be in a, Commonwealth country, a democracy, a multiparty democracy since 1994 where in... Where English common law prevails and English is the official language, so it means that we are able to get stuff done.

21:19 It's also, where The US has a large engagement. We recently had everyone from The US deputy assistant secretary of state visit our our our lab. We had the head of the Bureau of African Affairs visit our lab, and we've had many other governmental bodies out of The US US there. There are strong bilateral US relations, and I understand from state, from the state department that those, relations are, or at least The US is looking to embed those, relations in a much more formal manner. We also see the World Bank, very prevalent in in in Malawi, and just look at that the the number of of entities down there at the bottom active in Malawi, the World Bank, IFC, IMF, etcetera, etcetera.

22:16 There's a small little picture of the new US embassy. That's about 70% complete currently. That embassy... The cost of that embassy to The US taxpayer is around 400,000,000 US dollars. Now you don't spend 400,000,000 US dollars on a new embassy if you're not going to stay in that country for the foreseeable future, and and I guess I'll leave it at that until the q and a's.

22:49 I mentioned the Nicola Logistics corridor, and had we found or discovered Kaseya back in 2000, I would be here telling you we've got the world's largest rutile deposit. We just need 4 to 5 to $10,000,000,000 of infrastructure spend to get this stuff out of the ground and on a boat. Luckily for us, someone else spent that money, namely Vale, Mitsui, African Development Bank, Japanese Development Bank, and others over the course of the last fifteen years to ensure that that red rail that you see on that map is actually fully operational, and all we need is a six kilometer rail spur to connect our plant to to that rail.

23:39 We know it will cost us less than a $120 a ton for our rutile and graphite product to be on a boat at at the Nicarla Corridor, or if we wanted, we could go down south to the Beira Beira Port as well. In both instances, a $120 of logistics costs versus today's prices for rutile and graphite, which are well above a thousand thousand dollars a ton. Look. It's not a rounding error, but it's, it's it's more than, it's more than suitable for us in terms of, the economic viability of getting that product out. On the, rare earths concentrate, we've actually costed that all the way to Texas, where we intend to, supply that rare earth concentrate into The US, refinery, rare earth refineries, industry.

24:38 And at $4.04... Less than $4... Dollars a kilogram, you can understand that we will also be the lowest cost producer of of heavy rare earths concentrate on the planet too. A little bit about each of our products. So the rutile that we will be producing, It comes out the ground at 95% plus purity. It is the most preferred, feedstock for the titanium metal space. Some of it will end up in the in the welding space, and, you know, we'll probably have some end up in the pigments market.

25:23 But, I dare say most of our rutile will be used for titanium metal production. And you can see on the left hand side, on that bubble chart just the the absolute size and scale of CASEA versus any other projects out there that have, anything from half a million tons up of, of root out resource. Not only are we the largest, we we we overshadow nearly all those all those projects in a big way. On the right hand side, just to put it into end use context, in the first twenty five years, we would have mined and sold enough rutile into the titanium metal space to produce 55,000 fighter jets, specifically that f 35 that you saw on the front cover and you can see there, on the slide.

26:18 Flake graphite, it is a byproduct. What that means for us is that we will be able to produce flake graphite at 25% below what China... Even China can. China's cost of production is around $288 a ton, which is why when your... Let's call it your your worst spec graphite can be anywhere between 400 to $500 a ton. No one in the Western world, all those guys you see on the on the right hand side in in gray, or dark gray, they they won't be able to make any money. It's the reason why they need to go downstream and look at, look at other business models, because the mine itself will, or cannot be cannot be viable at today's prices.

27:13 For us, we're going to be producing graphite at an even lower cost than China. I joke that, you know, if we wanted, we could almost sell our graphite into China and and and and and almost give them a taste of their own medicine. The heavy rare earths basket, as I mentioned, we have... We... That that rare earths concentrate we will be producing will contain five of the seven export controlled rare earths. That's dysprosium, terbium, yttrium, samarium, gadolinium. Just to put that into what they are used for, so dysprosium and terbium are usually alloyed in a metal colloquially termed DYTB and is used with light rare earths to ensure that the light rare earths don't melt at high temperatures.

28:10 Itrium is used for jet engine coatings, specifically, which is that, that picture of that afterburner you see in the middle of that, the slide. Itrium is combined with, other other products to, for for radar purposes as well. Samarium is used with... Is combined with cobalt to produce samarium cobalt, and that's, that's used on the fins of Patriot missiles, Tomahawk missiles, and other, other ordinance. They, again, ensure that those... That the missiles find their way to their target essentially, but also don't melt on their way there.

28:55 And gadolinium is... It it has more medical and industrial purposes and and and uses. I mentioned the all in cost to Texas. It will... This will be a low cost delivery of a heavy rare earths basket into into The US.

29:15 Talking about the basket and what it means in in hard dollar terms, we looked at what our... What a kilogram of of our product versus that coming out of Mountain Pass, MP Materials, and coming out of Linus look like. Now MP Materials and Linus are, for for lack of a better, where the the leading rare earth producers outside of China. You can see on that chart that at a $139 a kilogram of value within our product versus 30 to 60 for the current producers, we we definitely have a a much richer basket. But what does that mean? That means that, any refiner needs less of our product to produce more of the underlying rare earth oxides.

30:10 For those who are not okay with rare earths and what rare earths have been doing over the last few years, In April 2025, China decided to put an export control or licensing around these, quote, unquote, dual use rare earths. And since then, the price of, these rare earths produced outside of China has absolutely diverged from, what you can find in China. So, for example, I'm not gonna go through each of these, these prices, but on Itrium, which, is on here, has seen a 49 x increase.

30:55 So almost 5000% increase in twelve months. As of yesterday, the Japanese government came out and had mentioned to The US, that unless China, relaxes those, those export controls, it will be facing the shortage of yttrium within months, not years. And in fact, the price of that yttrium, I have seen, western, yttrium selling at up to $4,200 a kilogram. So why did we spend all this time this year on this, this monazite study? Really, number one was the, just the geopolitical nature and the sensitivity around the rare earth concentrate and having rare earth there and and and understanding that the market there is is is fully available.

31:52 Two, it added a third leg to our to our, rutile and graphite products, but it also massively helps with what management spend most of its time thinking about these days, and that's the funding of Kaseya into into construction. We'll need something like $750,000,000 of funding. With the rare earth concentrate, we showed that for an extra $30,000,000, we would... We could add, well above $80,000,000 of of EBITDA year or profitability a year for the next twenty three years at least. So when lenders look at look at that and, you know, we're able to add binding offtake agreements across the rutile graphite and the rare earths, it counts in terms of debt sizing and and and the cost of debt to the company and ultimately to to us shareholders.

32:51 We're busy. We're busy ensuring that the rutile nonbinding MOU with Mitsui and other MOUs become binding. So we have full visibility on where the cash flows on the rutile come through on. We're busy talking to a number of, potential off takers around the the graphite, again, turning the marketing, MOU with Traxxas and Project Vault into a binding agreement as well. And on the rare earth concentrate, I think I'm... I I did I I did say that we are talking to, quote, unquote, Western refiners, US refiners about using our rare earth concentrate to fill the gaps required in their in their own refining processes to ensure that those rare earth metals are produced on US shores.

33:59 Page 16 has the economics. This is probably the the most important slide when it comes to thinking about potential value of SOVERE METLS as an investment case. The pretax numbers of 2,200,000,000, for under the DFS and an extra 722,000,000 under the, the the study even on a post tax basis, if we called it about $2,000,000,000 of value, sat there for, $750,000,000 of CapEx, is almost a three three to one return on capital. And then you you... If you just just oppose that against our current market cap of, and I think today, it's probably around $200,000,000 just given where the markets are.

34:48 US, you can see we're trading at something like a tenth of our of our underlying net present value.

35:02 The team, so a lot has been made about what we do now that Rio Tinto is no longer involved in the project, because of their own corporate decisions, because their own corporate strategy and change in strategy with a new CEO coming in. Look. We worked hand in glove with with the Rio Tinto team. In fact, some of that team now is embedded within our own our own company, specifically on the environmental and social side. But we do have an an owner's team, and we do have individuals within that team from our COO, Rob Slater, all the way down, of individuals who have built and operated, tier one deposits in Africa.

35:48 They've they've at least built and operated 10 mining projects over the last twenty years, and they are, for lack of a better phrase, chomping at the bit to get going on this one too. Otherwise, the key takeaways from this slide are that board and management still own over 10% of the company. We are still very much aligned with our shareholders in in in achieving a value, which closes that gap between what the project, is valued at and what the market perceives our value at SOVEREIGN METALS, looks like. And with that and having taken way more time than I had suspected, or expected, I'll go straight into the q and a, which is usually the, the...

36:37 These meetings. So question number one, and I'll take it all from the the top. I have been an investor since 2010. I was introduced to the company. I have held on to my position since then in the hope that the market eventually recognizes the deep value and strategic relevance that SVML currently, offers. I am now running out of patience. Thank you for your candor. What clear catalyst can I look forward to? Look. We're we're we're in this position now where we've told the world what Kaseya, is valued at. We are building the team, the correct team around it to to actually build it. We are working on turning those offtake agreements into binding offtake agreements.

37:27 We are talking to funders and have been talking to funders for the best part of the last twelve months, to be honest. But now we have the understanding of what the rare earth component looks like as well. We're we're able to have those, discussions at a much, much more advanced level. So I'm hoping that over the next twelve months, if not if not sooner, we will be in a position where we have been fully permitted. We we have binding offtake agreements in place. We have a line of sight on where at least the debt component and offtake financing components of our build will look... Will will come from. And we will be at final investment decision with with shovels in the ground building this thing, to be honest.

38:17 I hope that answers that question. Question two, 720,000,000 for the plant. Why so much? So the $720,000,000 or $727,000,000 under the DFS is the full plant mine infrastructure, everything, all all encompassing. I think the plant or the processing part of that is the biggest, portion of it. This is a very simple operation, but it's also a very large operation. In the first five years, we'll be moving 12,000,000 tons of, of dirt. And from year five onwards, we'll be moving 24,000,000 tons, and, you know, that's a that's a lot of tons and and and and and therefore require big processing plants to handle handle that capacity.

39:06 But what it does mean is that we will be the dominant player in the titanium industry, from an upstream perspective, for for the foreseeable decades and generations.

39:22 Could you share your strategy on how you're planning to finance the project? Yes. So I think the way to answer this is looking at the 750... Let's call it 750 to make the make the maths nice and simple of, of CapEx. I think, we'll probably be in a position where we could get a sixty forty split between debt and equity, and that's our kind of working assumption. Obviously, the smaller the equity piece, the better for all of us, which is why we are working very hard in understanding what the debt financing portion and the offtake financing portion of this, this project will look like.

40:10 But if you're running your own models, I would suggest looking at something like a sixty sixty forty split as a base case scenario. What what I do want to add is in terms of dilution for shareholders and, you know, worrying how does... How... If you are talking about a 40% split on $750,000,000, you're talking about $300,000,000 of of equity. How is a $200,000,000 market cap company going to fund that? I think this company will be in a very different position once it's permitted. Well, once the project is permitted, once we have full alignment and visibility on the debt, once we have the binding offtake agreements in place, once we have items, lead... Long lead items and on on on order, we will be in a very different position at that point in time than than where we are today. And and, hopefully, that is that that is seen by the market by that point in time when we do go out to ask for equity.

41:18 The US has been prioritizing critical minerals projects on home soil. Could you share your strategy on how you plan to access US and European funding?

41:29 Yes. The US has been prioritizing projects on home soil. Specifically, it's been prioritizing refinement, or, sorry, refining processing projects on home soil. It understands, and, you know, this is both on the executive and legislative, sides of of the

41:51 the floor and and the system. Everyone understands that these these rocks are found where they're found. Now, they also understand that China has had a stronghold over Africa for a long time, but there are certain and specific nations that have not lent into China or into the Belt and Road initiatives or any of that, and and and are very much, western aligned, shall we call it, have, a very long, relationship, going back, decades with the likes of US and Japan, and I'm talking about Malawi here. Malawi is exactly one of those, and and and I do think that Malawi provides a gateway for foreign direct investment to come in and to to to build that company into something. So it's something where their GDP is is much higher.

42:52 They did the the the the... And that each Malawian gets gets the benefit of The US and others coming into coming into that country and and helping fund the, the mining industry.

43:11 How much more infrastructure derisking are banks and western and in country institutions requiring for funding closure? Very little. Most of the infrastructure's there. We need to put... We need to build a power line. In fact, others want to build the power line for us, and we just pay them. So it's less about infrastructure derisking. The key risks, for, especially, development finance institutions and, ECAs or export credit agencies, it's more around environmental and social more so than infrastructure. And given that our environmental and social team is ex Rio, Tinto, ex First Quantum, you know, we have we have the a team there. And given IFC has already embedded itself in there to ensure that we are fully bankable from their standards.

44:08 If we're bankable by World Bank standards, we'll be bankable by any other any other commercial lender or otherwise.

44:17 Could you give a clear timeline on how all outstanding permits are progressing? No is the short answer, and the reason for that is simply because we are... So so so Malawi's mining industry, it's it's immature. So the mine... The the... With the help of the World Bank, funnily enough, the the Malawi Ministry of Mines is re... Reorganizing its framework. It asked stakeholders recently on its views on what that framework should look like. SOVEREIGN METALS is very much involved in that. In fact, our country manager is the head or heads up the chamber of mines in Malawi.

45:03 So we have been working hand in glove with with the Malawian government and and and the ministry ministry to understand... For them to understand what would work for the... For industry participants and for us to provide them with what would work from our side to ensure that everyone, including the host nation benefits from from from the project. We do hope that those discussions are nearing, or the the the framework, discussions are nearing the end. The deadline for any submission of of industry papers was the October 10. So, hopefully, we will we will learn what that means for for the actual framework.

45:48 Once that framework is developed, then the the the the the ministry can move on with, with with licensing, or granting mining licenses, etcetera.

46:00 What's happened to the MOUs with Chemours and Hascor? They have expired. Once we got into discussions with Mitsui and and and the titanium metal, industry, really out of there and into the US government who who who, for all intents and purposes, told us the molecules in the ground belong on US US shores. They want to wrap the American flag around the project. We have embedded ourselves into that into that supply chain as the as the upstream producer for for titanium minerals there. That's not to say that we cannot go back and look at those those MOUs with Chemours, Hascor, and others at a later date depending on how much how much production is required by the the the titanium metals industry or how much rutile is required by the titanium metals industry.

47:02 The company is currently awaiting an ESIA approval, part of the application for a mining license. What stage are we at? Look. Very simply put, I expect that assessment to be completed in in in in the coming few weeks. It will then undergo a full public disclosure, and I'm told by the guys on the ground that we expect that to happen at some point before Christmas.

47:32 The... Question 12. The heavy rare earth study will cost both money and time, and your cash looks like it runs out within twelve to eighteen months. What happens then?

47:44 We... The the study is not going to take that long. We're we're... We know where we sit with the rare earths, and remember the rutile and graphite has been done to a, definitive level already. This project is bankable on the rutile alone. The graphite is the icing on the cake, and the rare earths are the cherry on the icing. What we've done by working up the rare earths part... Portion of the project is essentially trying to lower that that that cost of capital required to build this this this project. So rather than focusing on the study over the course of the next twelve to eighteen months, we are actually focusing on understanding who are off takers for that that monocyte will be over the course of the next two to three months.

48:37 Is the company capable of running phase one at a 100% capacity drawing down power from the national grid or, alternatively, from solar sources and generators. Yes. We require 30 megawatts of power from a, a national grid that provides 560 megawatts of power, so more than capable of doing that. Phase two will require 60 megawatts of power, and that's in five years' time by which time the hydroelectric dam that the World Bank is helping finance and is being built by Total and EDF in Malawi will have doubled Malawi's Malawi's actual capacity. So, yeah, power power requirements capacity is not an issue.

49:27 What is the present political situation outlook in Malawi? Could you please update us as to any recent significant foreign investment in Malawi and greenfield mining projects? Thank you. So, look, as I said, Malawi still... At least the Malawian mining industry is still quite quite green. But having said that, there are two mines now up and running. There's the Kai Lakera uranium mine up in the North in Malawi, and another ASX company, Lindion, has has just commissioned its rare earths mine as well in in in country. So things are moving, albeit at a slower pace than what we're used to in in in in the, quote, unquote, Western world.

50:17 But but but that mining industry is now, really coming into its own, and and will do so the coming weeks and months.

50:30 What is the basic structure of collaborations, partnerships, strategic investments that SVML is currently undertaking? Are any close to finalization. Obviously, I can't, disclose any information on any of any of, that, and anything that is under either NDA or has not been taken to a a a binding term. But when you have the world's largest titanium deposit, world's second largest graphite deposit, and you have, essentially The US, government wanting to back the project. You can understand that anyone within those industries is is or has talked to us, and we are or have been in discussions with those those parties.

51:19 And I'll leave that at that for now. What is the current estimate of actual mine start? So mining itself, if all the stars aligned, we'd probably get there towards the end of twenty twenty nine, and that that that means FID in q three next year, or q two, q three next year, and then it's a twenty seven month build. Question 17, has the US government partnered with any titanium miners project since the US government's strategic push to source critical minerals from friendly nations? No. It hasn't talked to anyone else on the on the titanium side. And, look, without blowing our own trumpet, myself and our CEO, Frank Eager, we, you know, we are the knowledge base these days in in DC for the titanium industry, at least from an upstream perspective.

52:19 We sit, and we have meetings whether they're on Capitol Hill, at the Pentagon, in the White House, on these matters. We're very much at the forefront of of of those discussions. SVML appears well funded for the interim. How far ahead will SVML require significant infusion of funds prior to FID mining finance? Look. The the big... Any big equity requests I think I've talked to, they'll come towards the the the end of understanding where we are with FID, with debt funding, with the binding offtake agreements, fully permitted. We won't be asking for hundreds of millions of dollars anytime soon from from from the market.

53:10 How volatile are titanium prices? Are there any new uses for titanium or possible substitutes for existing use? Substitutes, no. Very quickly, titanium is stronger than steel and lighter than aluminum, which is why it's great as a as a f 35 airframe. The titanium prices, they do fluctuate. And up until recently, they used to follow wherever world GDP goes, but rutile, as the preferred titanium metal feedstock is slowly by bifurcating or diverging away from from that. We are well aware having spoken to Boeing, Boeing Defense Airbus, as well as, the Japanese, titanium producers that everyone is...

54:03 I wouldn't say in the doldrums, but titanium prices are are suppressed at the moment and will be for the foreseeable future up until 2029, where the likes of Boeing and Airbus have asked the titanium industry to, ramp up its production and produce more so they can play catch up on on their own their their own stockpile requirements, which is exactly why the Japanese industry, you know, the likes of Osaka Titanium or Toho Titanium, and I do urge you guys to to go and do your research on on those companies. They are building capacity to come online or extra capacity to come online at a time that suits when, SOVERE METLS will be in production too.

54:53 Next question. Given interest in minus critical minerals, why has SVML not attracted investment from institutional investors given its scale? We do have institutional investors. Most of them are under the 3% threshold, so, I can't really name them, unless they gave me gave me approval to do so. So I won't do that, But I would say about 40% of our register actually sits with institutional investors, and that is across The US, UK, and and and Australia. Could you update as to the primary energy source for Kaseya mine? Yes. We'll be... First and foremost, we'll be plugging into the grid, the national grid in Malawi.

55:42 That is a hydroelectric powered grid, not diesel or anything like that. So so that helps our our carbon footprint as well. Could you give an overview on transport costs? I think I did that. $100,117 dollars a ton for rutile and graphite to be on a ship to anywhere at the Port Of Nacala, and our rare earths concentrate less than $4 a kilogram to to Houston in Texas.

56:14 Now that Rio Tinto has passed on the operator role, do you feel the current DFS built around the large scale project has become too heavy or even counterproductive? No. We think that it is actually the right size for what the market is going to require by 2029, both in terms of rutile and graphite. We are having those discussions with our future customers. And, in both rutile and graphite, they will require, very much those volumes that we are looking to produce out of out of SOVEREIGN.

56:52 Given The US interest in rutile and reverse that will be by the company, how do you envisage any US government involvement in the company? I'm going to kind of tiptoe around that a little bit at this stage. I think what I can tell you and from all my discussions discussions and being in the room on these discussions, across the the entire critical minerals and industrial base and and and defense stockpile space is that The U... When the US government had figured out that, essentially, the West had stopped mining and China had taken the keys,

57:33 it needed to move fast, and it almost put a chip on the table on any and every, developer, explorer, any company out there that, had even the slightest, snifter of rare earths, tungsten, antimony, etcetera, etcetera. It's very much learnt from that. At least certain government entities have very much learnt from that. A lot of the programs such as grants, etcetera, have been pulled out. And what what what what the US government really wants to do is do full blown DD and back those projects that it really sees can get up and running and can provide real value and specifically real critical minerals and those molecules back to US shores one way or another.

58:35 A positive investor. Thank you. Rio position was expected. Positive still holding shares. World Bank confirmed supporting and potential direct investment by June 27. What or how many additional funding partners are required to complete the task? SV Angel indicated that rutile market is depressed due to Sierra rutile with US squeezing China supply chain. What is the timeline in play to complete funding mine build? I think I've answered most of that. Sierra rutile is an interesting, one because I think it runs out of, out of, material in about nine months. So where the market goes for its rutile from there on is is going to be quite interest... Interesting.

59:21 Obviously, there are substitutes to rutile that come in the form of synthetic rutile, which is what Rio Tinto essentially manufactures or processes out of Richards Bay in South Africa. So it'd be interesting to see what happens there. Question 29. Do you plan to apply for EU CRMA designation? Not at this point. We are very much focused on The US. It is the state department that, asked us to ensure these molecules end up on, as I said, on on US shores or in US end uses one way or another. So, that is our that is our prerogative, and that is what we were working on. May Rio step in as financier of the project after raising its stake?

1:00:13 No. So let... Let's just put some context and color around Rio Tinto. So Rio Tinto, under its last CEO, who actually loved the titanium space, For them, it was obvious that the world's largest titanium dioxide producer has a foothold, a toehold in the world's largest, rutile deposit. With the new CEO, and the focus on copper, aluminum, iron ore, and, focus on lithium, there's no room for titanium. Titanium has been put on structure... On, strategic review. In fact, Rio Tinto's recent, quarterly has said because of their change in corporate strategy, Casir is no longer considered one of their own projects. Now I don't expect and and I can very strongly suggest that Rio Tinto will not be selling its shares on market.

1:01:10 That is something that we... If if and when they decide they want to sell those shares, that is something that we will work on together. And I think I've I've alluded to in the past that usually these things these these things are works in progress that that are obviously covered by NDAs, etcetera. And I think that's it. So 32 questions. That was That's quite a few. Yes. That's great, Pan. Thank you very much for addressing those questions from investors today. But, Sapan, before I redirect investors to provide you with a feedback, which I know is particularly important to yourself and the company, could I please just ask you for a few closing comments to wrap up? Yeah. Look. So investors always ask, you know, why should I be buying stock in this company? And and the answer is kind of a short, medium, and long term. Short term, management is working on getting this thing funded, getting binding offtake agreements sorted, getting, you know, that tick in the box from from whether that be the US government or otherwise or the Japanese government, getting line of sights and derisking the entire project from that perspective for for equity holders.

1:02:24 In the medium term, you get to participate in in in the build of what will be the dominant player in both the titanium and graphite space going forward and will be a very important piece of the heavy rare earths puzzle for for The US. And, look, in the long term, this thing is a twenty five year minimum life of mine project, if not, you know, a hundred years. And and, based on the current prices of our our commodities and based on the the the costs that we can we can achieve,

1:02:58 this thing will be paying out dividends way way past, as I said, any of our lifetimes. Fantastic. Well, look, Sapan, thank you once again for updating investors today. Could I please ask investors not to close the session as you now be automatically redirected to provide your feedback, which will help the company better understand your views and expectations. On behalf of the management team, we would like to thank you for attending today's presentation, and good afternoon to you all.