News blog

Tri-Star Resources

• BY: Andrew Hore |
• POSTED: 29/08/2014 |

Integrated antimony company Tri-Star Resources has started a joint venture which has entered into a lease for a plot that can be used for an antimony roaster with a capacity of 20,000 tonnes a year.

In April, Tri-Star entered into a joint venture with Oman Investment Fund and Castell Investments Ltd, which is called Strategic & Precious Metals Processing LLC and has been incorporated in the Sohar Free Trade Zone, which is near a port and has low energy costs. The lease on a 22 hectare plot is in the zone.

Tri-Star has open cast mine interests in Canada and Turkey, which it hopes to bring on stream by the time that the roaster is up and running. Additional exploration at Bald Hill in New Brunswick, Canada has led to the discovery of a new area of antimony. The redevelopment of an existing antimony mine in Turkey is progressing but still requires further permits.

At 0.15p a share, Tri-Star is valued at £10.4m. Non-executive director Mike Hirschfield has exercised options over 90m shares at 0.005p a share. This gives him a 1.33% stake in Tri-Star. Finance director Guy Eastaugh has been granted options over 16.67m shares exercisable at 0.19p a share. Eastaugh does not own any shares.

Tri-Star has issued £2m of secured convertible bonds to Odey European Inc. The bonds are due for repayment in 2018.A previous tranche of £4m was issued in June 2013 and these were in the balance sheet at £2.92m at the end of June 2014 and on top of that there is a £426,000 value put on the convertible element. The non-cash coupon is 15% a year and the bonds are convertible at a 10% discount to the lower of the latest share issue price prior to conversion of any fundraising completed within 10 business days of the conversion notice.

Net debt was £3.21m at the end of June 2014, including the original Odey convertibles. There was a cash outflow of £1.2m in the six months to June 2014.

Download the latest AIM Journal from http://www.hubinvest.com/AIMPDFAugust2014_59.pdf