Wednesday 18 February 2015

Morning Mumble: Centamin Egypt (CEY) the jinx of AIM...'ALLO 'ALLO Alecto and watch the F(ORM).

Good Morning,

Centamin Egypt (CEY) are slowly becoming the curse of junior AIM wannabe gold miners. First there was Nyota Minerals (NYO) now Alecto Minerals (ALO). One can only assume CEY disliked what they have found within the two Ethiopian licenses, or have perhaps fallen out with the management. 

Although looking back at ALO's  placing rns that was a hugely discounted (circa 40+%), "two gold projects in Ethiopia which are currently subject to a joint venture with Centamin plc." Now had there been no discussions or a potential end to the joint venture with CEY, then I do not believe the wording of "currently" would have been used. Nor in fact the discount that was applied to the placing had CEY been involved. 

Did ALO know about the termination of the JV before or during the placing? Were there discussions about the termination happening whilst the placing was occuring? Over to those holders whom care enough to support this company. Yes, potential upside but not without significant shareholder support and risks. Raising 600KGBP at a 40% discount shows the realities of the situation.

CEY can now strong arm Kefi Minerals, where rumours have been loose but circling for awhile for a take out. Kefi Minerals are "currently" refining the NYO Definitive Feasibility Study (“DFS”/ aka the shambles under NYO), CEY are well positioned to offer funding either via equity or take out in Kefi

Knowing a few in Kefi, I suspect they'd not prefer an equity raise at the current SP. With the short 2.0 on Kefi by NYO holders despondent with all things gold like, the price of Kefi has performed exactly as it should. Perhaps KEFI will be the operator of Tulu Kapi for Centamin? This nicely brings us on to...

ORM Mining (ORM) give a Barruecopardo - Financing and Operations update including a loan whilst financing discussions take place of $1.5M. They've managed to find a party to fund the entire stage 1 development of Barruecopardo Tungsten Project (The project). Step forward Oaktree Capital Management, L.P. (Oaktree), "a leading global investment manager". ORM inform their shareholders ORM would be manager of the Project, and receive an ongoing management fee for this service. Ormonde has been assisted with the arrangement of this financing package by Swedbank Norway and Davy Corporate Finance (No doubt a fee payable).

What isn't clear is whether ORM will have any equity left in the project post inking the deal with Oaktree. For shareholders it appears like a near zero cash disposal of their asset for a management fee (as yet undisclosed) and a minuscule equity holding (if any) remaining in the project. 

Due to the significance or lack of in such a deal, one hopes there will be a vote put to shareholders on any such deal. Clarification will be required on what majority holder (namely Oaktree) ends up with in equity terms and what management fee is payable ORM (including the small print). One has to wonder whether there will be anything left for shareholders. 

POG, (Petropavlovsk) notes the statement made by Sapinda Holdings and perhaps there's some jostling?

Limited time, Atb Fraser.

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