Jubilee in smelting deal
Article Date: Feb 04 2010Mining concerns Jubilee Platinum and Sylvania Resources are to form a smelting and refining company using Jubilee’s ‘ConRoast’ technology.
Jubilee, which raised £13.25 million last year at 30p to develop the technology, will hold 70 per cent and fellow AIM counter Sylvania 30 per cent of the new company, which will process and refine tailings left over from extracting platinum group metals (PGMs), chrome and hard rock resources in south Africa’s Bushveld complex. Sylvania has agreed to make all its uncommitted PGM concentrate available to the new company.
In addition, London-headquartered Jubilee and Western Australia-based Sylvania are setting up a 50-50 company to process future platinum tailings ‘opportunities’. Jubilee boss Colin Bird proclaims the agreement ‘provides the platinum industry with a formidable total capability solution for the processing of PGM tailings and high chrome concentrates’, though some City followers had been hoping for a sale and/or licensing deal for ConRoast.
At 35.5p, up from a 12-month low of 7.13p but 18.5p off their year’s high, Jubilee’s shares value the company at £81.5 million. After fluctuating between 86.5p and 30p over the past year, Sylvania’s shares give it a market price tag of £129.4 million.
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