Liontown raises $1bn for WA mine
Lithium miner Liontown Resources has sealed a $1bn funding package for its Western Australian project only days after a deep-pocketed suitor abandoned a lucrative takeover deal.
Lithium miner Liontown Resources has sealed a $1.2bn funding package for its huge West Australian project only days after a deep-pocketed suitor abandoned a lucrative takeover deal.
Liontown has in recent days been scrambling to find funding for the Kathleen Valley project after major shareholder Gina Rinehart’s intervention dashed hopes of a $6.6bn takeover by US-based Albemarle.
Liontown announced on Thursday that it had finalised $760m in debt funding from commercial banks and government credit agencies, including Export Finance Australia. It also had raised equity of $365m in a fully underwritten institutional placement at $1.80 a share. In addition, it made a non-underwritten placement to chair Tim Goyder for 6 million shares at the same price to raise $10.8m.
In addition, Liontown’s existing eligible shareholders in Australia and New Zealand would be invited to invest a further $45m through a share purchase plan.
Liontown CEO Tony Ottaviano said the fundraising efforts were critical achievements in “de-risking” the development of the Kathleen Valley project, 680km northeast of Perth.
“These initiatives ensure we are funded to first production and beyond,” Mr Ottaviano said.
“We have assembled a syndicate of lenders that can only be described as high calibre and, following a comprehensive and independent technical review, this syndicate has committed significant funding support to completing our world class Kathleen Valley project.”
He said the significant involvement of both Export Finance Australia and the Clean Energy Finance Corporation was another big endorsement for the project and spoke to its global importance.
“The potential remains for other international export credit agencies that have expressed their joint interest to join the lending syndicate to do so in the future,” he said.
“We remain confident in our ability to execute the plan for Kathleen Valley on schedule and on budget, and as part of our financing strategy we have ensured an appropriate financial buffer is in place to allow the company to successfully weather any unforeseen issues.”
Mr Ottaviano said Ms Rinehart had been invited to invest in the share purchase plan and he expected she would want to maintain her stake in the company,
He said the company was on track to ship its first load of lithium next year with offtake agreements with Tesla, Ford and LG
The announcement ends a period of uncertainty for Liontown after global lithium giant Albemarle walked away from its takeover offer on Monday.
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