Transcription of Finance News Network interview with Lake Resources Limited (ASX:LKE) Managing Director, Steve PromnitzCarolyn Herbert: Hello, I’m Carolyn Herbert for the Finance News Network. Joining me from lithium explorer Lake Resources Limited
(ASX:LKE) is Managing Director, Steve Promnitz. Steve, welcome to FNN.
Steve Promnitz: It’s great to be here, Carolyn.
Carolyn Herbert: Can you start by giving us an introduction to Lake Resources?
Steve Promnitz: Lake Resources
(ASX:LKE) has actually been around for a number of years. In November 2016, we put a package of exciting lithium projects into the company. These are right in amongst the majors. They’ve got both scale and optionality – as well as significant opportunity for growth. The way we see it, there’s a deep unlocked value because we’ve got three lithium brine projects and one hard rock lithium pegmatite project in the lithium triangle of Argentina. In northern Argentina and Chile, this is where half the world’s lithium comes from. And our project is right next door to the majors. We’re moving towards a drill program. There’s going to be a significant amount of news flow that will unlock that value, and I think we can see significant upside for the company.
Carolyn Herbert: Steve, you’ve just come back from Argentina. Can you bring us up to date with your projects?
Steve Promnitz: We have three lithium brine projects – two in the far-north, next to Orocobre
(ASX:ORE), and one in Catamarca Province. This one called Kachi is the one we’re focusing on at the moment. We’re moving to a maiden drill program in a project that has never been drilled before. We’ve recently consolidated the title – more than 50,000 hectares on a 100% basis. Our project is nicely located in a basin next to Albemarle (NYSE:ALB), which is the biggest lithium producer in the world. As those results start to flow out through May, June and July, I think we’re going to see a significant catalyst to the share price – an uplift. At the same time, we’ll be having discussions with potential offtake partners. So there’s quite a lot happening. Argentina is really the place to be at the moment. A lot of explorers, a lot of news flow on the lithium sector.
Carolyn Herbert: What’s planned, and are you fully-funded for 2017?
Steve Promnitz: Fortunately, we did a capital raising in February and that has us funded for this year. But if we moved into a major drill program and needed to upscale, perhaps we could look at further funding. At the moment, we’re funded for everything we have planned this year and that’s drilling on the project we’re about to start – as well as one other. Furthermore, we’ve got sampling that’s underway and our lithium pegmatite project and we expect some results to be coming out of that. At the moment, we’re well-set, we’ve got a team underway, and we’re going to lock down this drilling and follow-up with some further drilling.
Carolyn Herbert: Finally Steve. What’s the priority for the next six months and for the longer term?
Steve Promnitz: Our main focus – there’s a lot of lithium players in the market and it’s difficult to differentiate yourselves. Our difference is we have a large package, probably one of the largest in Argentina, and we’re amongst the majors. Our aim is to produce results from our lithium brine projects as well as the pegmatites – sufficient so we can put together a scoping study and initial resource, and we can continue our discussions with potential offtake partners. I was recently in Asia and there’s a lot of interest in talking to juniors like ourselves and working together to develop these projects. We just need to produce enough news in the next few months and we’ll be able to move that forward. It’s going to be quite an exciting year and I think, by way of reference, there’s a company that recently listed in Toronto in February called LSC (TSXV: LSC). They listed with a market cap 10 times ours and they have a similar property holding. So I think there’s a lot of potential upside, a lot of catalysts to deliver that deep unlocked value in Lake.
Carolyn Herbert: Steve Promnitz, thanks for the update.
Steve Promnitz: Thank you, Carolyn.
Ends
