Christopher Williams

Thanks @ResourceTalks for an engaging conversation! We discuss Lithium price; supply/demand drivers, and frameworks I adopt in assessing exploration and development projects youtu.be/t6SzlArbMM0?si…

@James2464 Difficult to fault the build and operations thus far, though I’ll reserve judgement until I see the plant humming on 100% underground ores

@zempheth thoughts on Liontown?

@zempheth Yeh that’s the angle I’m coming from 😂

If only I had 1/10th the tenacity required to chase down these kind of spodumene hits $CHR wcsecure.weblink.com.au/pdf/CHR/030723…

@Spec_punter absolutely mate. there's relative value for the bottom fishers

@zempheth Just for perspective #WC8 MC is 500M & $CHR is 7M that’s all

@Spec_punter from my perspective, taking a step back, as the Li market matures, as does our understanding of what is out there, the bar is actually going higher for what a deposit needs to look like (unlike, say, copper). I'd say something like wildcat is the absolute minimum viability in oz

@zempheth You don’t think the 28M hit is any good? Seems to me it will come back good grade & the current resource is going to significantly increase from the current 8.2Mt Got to factor in current market cap etc which is only like 7M & don’t let current #Lithium cycle get you down haha

$LTH.v spodumene offtake agreement w/floor price is a doozy linkedin.com/posts/cdw4870_…

$ALB and DLE linkedin.com/posts/cdw4870_…

@Thematicafunds Not strictly true. I.e. Norah Mining (and other Nigerian outfits) working with North American offtakers announcements.asx.com.au/asxpdf/2026020…

Ghana approves its first lithium mine, which will be Africa’s only US-bound lithium project bloomberg.com/news/articles/…

@JodyDahrouge Crikey. Even Sonora made the cut on that chart

Someone hasn't heard of $QTWO .

@lithiumanalysis @AugustCohen4 Agree this was my immediate reaction when Kobold came into the picture

$AVZ @AugustCohen4🤡 Kobold is a VC-backed EXPLORATION co. that over 8yrs has raised ~$1.2B which has already been spent/committed via its Portfolio of 60 projects🌎 They DO NOT have plenty of💰& R completely ill-equipped to produce #Lithium i.e. UR WRONG again so please STOP🛑!!

@spjarry It’s really perplexing, successive administrations chasing “high-tech” domestic lithium projects we keep seeing better and better spodumene discoveries in Quebec

@zempheth He should look north in Quebec James Bay. Lots of fully permitted projects just waiting to get fully financed !

The world’s most strategic lithium deposit garnering the attention of the highest levels of government $AVZ bloomberg.com/news/articles/…

@D_Jimenez_Sch Kwinana still operating, and by all accounts, Covalent is going very well

Albemarle's 4Q25 Earnings Report: Kemerton's Train 1 LiOH Refinery on C&M: This marks the end of Albemarle´s SC refining experiment in Australia. Current economics do not support refining SC outside of China. This will only change if/when a sizeable downstream industry (Cells & CAM) is developed in the EU/US. Sales Volumes 25: Grew 14% YoY. However, expect flat sales for 2026. Market Outlook: - 2026: lithium demand to expected to grow 15% to 40% (not a small range…..) 🤔 - BESS: 2025: 640 kMT-LCE (the highest I've seen, consensus estimates are around 300) 🤯 2030 F: 1200-2000 kMT-LCE (higher than CATL's Feb 25 forecast) 🤯🤯 - Demand LCE: 2030: 2800-3600 kMT-LCE My read: Albemarle is as lost as all the rest of us when it comes to understand the BESS market 😵‍💫

$ALB places Kemerton lithium hydroxide plant in WA into care and maintenance As I understand it, Kemerton operated with a batch processing method, a design perhaps to blame for fatal inefficiencies albemarle.com/us/en/news/alb…

Stellantis follows Ford & GM on EV pivot with €22Bn asset writedown. They "overestimated" the pace of the electric transition. $STLA down 25%. reuters.com/business/autom… IMO, autos weighed too heavily on U.S. for EV growth spurred by IRA, 45X etc. U.S. 2025 YoY BEV+PHEV=<1% growth

@exencial_RP so a global recession in 2026? 🤔

UBS GLobal Lithium supply-demand model

@daando37 great post m8. met variability is a key value driver. ive heard many armchair metallurgists conclude this is a float project-maybe true, just depends on whether the ~+20% recovery pays for the +50-80% CAPEX & some. my (early) sense is qtwo could thrive just fine on 50% DMS-only

if you want to read $QTWO $QTWO.V cisco like an operator, start w/ the processing route the rock is hinting at. the sgs HLS results are a proxy for dms amenability, not a finished flowsheet. they're a useful lie 'cause they tell you something fundamental: the spodumene appears to carry enough density contrast & liberation to upgrade into a potentially market aligned concentrate spec early, based on limited composites; saleability depends on the full impurity suite & variability. if you've watched spodumene markets long enough, you learn the industry doesn't pay for Li2O alone. it pays for Li2O delivered inside a spec box. the moment your concentrate carries elevated penalties, your realized price gets shaved, your customer list shrinks & your bargaining power evaporates. this is why the early low Fe2O3 signal out of the sgs work matters more than people admit. low iron is not a brag, it's a commercial advantage. the market doesn't buy 'Li2O in the ground'. it buys a consistent concentrate that doesn't blow up someone else's converter. if cisco can repeatedly hit ~5.1-5.7% Li2O concentrate (early HLS) & keep deleterious elements inside a buyer's spec box as you move across domains, you're negotiating from strength even if you're a junior. if you can't, you're discounted, blended, or ignored; no matter how good your core photos look. now connect that to geology (operator inference). pegmatites are not uniform ore bodies. they're intrusive events w/ internal zoning, variable spodumene distribution & variable wall rock contamination depending on the mining method & the geometry of the sheets. the exploration target scale is basically signaling a bulk tonnage ambition, which usually means bulk mining decisions, more contact mixing & more fines. & that's where the 'dms only' fantasy often breaks once you scale. this is why the next metallurgical step matters more than the next assay headline: variability testing across multiple domains, not one composite. you want to see if the low Fe2O3 holds when you include different areas, different textures, different alteration states & different degrees of country rock entrainment. then you want to see what the fines curve looks like, 'cause fines recovery is where your recovery headline gets cut down. or your CAPEX gets bid up. & neither is free. one extra variability driver can translate into more buffering, more stockpiles, more blending constraints & more working capital bleed in ramp up. this is why advanced operators obsess over geometallurgical domaining early, even before a PEA. ELV(SYA)/NAL shows you what 'iron risk' usually is: not a mystery penalty, but dilution & feed variability pulling high fe wall rock into the mill, forcing heavier cleaning circuits & crushing margins. cisco's first sgs HLS work is the opposite early signal: low Fe2O3 in concentrate (~0.42-0.55%) w/ no magnetic separation, plus decent upgrade, which hints the ore may stay in the 'clean spec' lane. the re-rate trigger is whether that low iron/spec stability survives scale (more domains, more contacts, more fines & real mining dilution). if follow up variability work keeps fe low across the envelope, you remove a major discount: 'spec risk'. hard rock equities re-rate when a known discount gets removed. two buckets matter here: first, the ELV(SYA)/NAL lesson: ramp ups can torch value through feed/grade control issues, CAPEX tweaks, inventory build & working capital bleed. then re-rate hard once throughput, recovery & spec stabilize 'cause the market stops pricing 'commissioning chaos'. second, the james bay lesson: permitting can be a multi year grind, then you get a step change re-rate when key authorizations land & the risk flips from 'can you permit it' to 'can you execute it'. both are potential pickup points for re-rates: operational stabilization & permitting de-risk. the positive read is simple: early signals say cisco might be a 'standard hard rock' problem, not a weird one. standard problems have standard tools: dms to strip waste & upgrade early, flotation to treat fines & maximize recovery, then tighten the spec through magnetic/cleaner stages if impurities demand it. the negative read is also simple: if domains are inconsistent, you design the plant for the worst case. & you carry that cost forever. so the real 'technology story' at cisco is not some proprietary magic. it's whether the geology lets them stay in the boring lane: consistent concentrate, predictable recoveries, manageable penalties & operational simplicity. that's how you build a lithium mine that survives the ugly part of the cycle. you can read drill results like it's the whole business. it isn't. the whole business is whether you can make a buyer grade concentrate & convert the rock into an NI 43-101 MRE that survives tighter spacing, QA/QC & variability. that's when the story stops being a highlight reel & becomes underwriteable. now pair that w/ what they're racing toward: infill into q1 '26, hole 44 as the flagship, 457.4 m @ 1.65% Li2O anchoring the narrative. the real question is whether the domain model stays simple under tighter spacing, or whether it turns into a bunch of intervals that look great individually but don't join hands. if you're trying to read qtwo through mgmt, read it like this: in a hard rock story like cisco, the only person who can kill the downside early is the technical lead, 'cause the downside is almost always 'continuity isn't what you thought' or 'variability is bigger than your plant can tolerate'. mccallum is both qp & vp exploration, plus director. qtwo also has a vp esg w/ a community relations background & claims close relationships w/ first nations/local stakeholders. in james bay, that's not fluff, it’s schedule insurance. & yes, his corvette staking track record is real context, but the 'pattern recognition' part is still just that: context, not a guarantee. mgmt's job here is to build a bridge between technical reality & community reality. the vp exploration can deliver a model & metallurgy plan, but the community hears 'roads, camps, noise, traffic, water & jobs'. if those narratives diverge, you don't get delayed by months. you get delayed by seasons. alicia milne is a securities/legal admin specialist, not a geo. exploration companies don't die from lack of rocks, they die from bad governance, bad cash control & dumb financings. the board addition of keith phillips is a very specific signal: ex piedmont lithium ceo, plus decades in mining investment banking. that's not a 'random director'. that's 'we want credibility w/ lithium capital allocators & strategic counterparties once the MRE drops'. dyor. no financial advice.

@mondyinvest by my count, they actually produced less lithia in 2025 than 2024 despite all the upgrades and ramping up etc

New name, new management - same old deposit issues: high iron content. $ELV.AX aka $SYA.AX #lithium

@thelithiumminer Sooo what ya thinkin, Ferrari or Lambo?

Sold 50% of #gold miner exposure Giving thanks 🙏