Welcome to the annual general meeting of Ioneer Limited. My name is James Calaway, Executive Chair of the company. As we have a quorum, I will now declare the meeting opened. Today's meeting is being online via the Lumi platform. I will ask our Company Secretary, Ian Bucknell, to provide instructions on both how to ask questions and how to vote during the meeting. Ian.
Thanks, James. I'll quickly run through a number of slides explaining how you can participate in the meeting. To ask a written question, select the messaging icon, type your question in the box towards the top of the page, and press the send button. To ask your question verbally, click the request to speak button, confirm your name, and enter the topic of your question. Submit your details and select join queue to be connected. Shortly, the Chair will declare voting open on all items of business. At that time, the resolutions and voting options will appear on screen. To cast your vote, simply select one of the options. Your vote is automatically recorded. There is no need to press a submit or enter button. You can change your vote up until the time the Chair declares voting close. I'll now pass you back to the Chair, James.
Thanks, Ian. I now declare voting open on all items of business. The resolutions will soon appear online. Please submit your votes at any time. I will give you a warning before I move to close voting. The agenda for today is on the screen. We will have a number of presentations before undertaking the formal business of the meeting. Time will be provided during the meeting for questions. Before the presentation, I'd like to introduce your Board. First, of course, Bernard Rowe, our Managing Director. Our Non-Executive Directors, Alan Davies, Rose McKinney-James, Margaret Walker, and Tim Woodall. They all wave hi to you if they could. They're all glad to be here with us, and thank you, Board. Also at this meeting are Siobhan Hughes of E&Y, the Company Auditor, and our Company Secretary, Ian Bucknell. I will now provide the Chairman's address to the meeting.
It is a pleasure to address you once again and reflect upon a year of progress and strategic resilience. Despite the challenging environment confronting the global lithium sector, our company has continued to advance with purpose, conviction, and discipline. The achievement of the 2025 fiscal year has positioned Rhyolite Ridge Project on the threshold of a defining moment, the realization of a final investment decision, and the formation of a long-term strategic partnership that will unlock the project's full economic potential. Our foremost objectives remain the successful completion of the global strategic partnering process undertaken with the support of Goldman Sachs. This process seeks to secure partners with both financial strength and strategic alignment, one capable of advancing the project decisively through construction and into production. Initiated on July 3, 2024, this process is expected to conclude early next year.
Upon its completion, we will have secured not only a partner but also a foundation for enduring value creation. This is an essential step towards transforming Rhyolite Ridge into a globally significant, vertically integrated lithium-boron operation, one that helps anchor the United States' position as a large producer of both lithium chemicals suitable for direct use in battery production and boric acid, essential to national security applications. Our project uniquely produces not one but two critical minerals in the United States. Over the past year, we achieved several milestones that have fundamentally de-risked the project and enhanced its strategic appeal. In October 2024, we received a favorable record of decision, as you all know, from the Bureau of Land Management, completing the rigorous National Environmental Policy Act permitting process, NEPA. This represents the culmination of more than six years of sustained effort and collaboration across federal, state, and local levels.
It also underscores the recognition of Rhyolite Ridge as a project of national importance. It should be noted that very few U.S.-based mining projects received fully permitted status during these years. In January, Ioneer successfully secured an upgraded $986 million loan from the U.S. Department of Energy under improved terms, further strengthening the project's financial foundation and demonstrating important support by the U.S. government for our project. While Sibanye-Stillwater's decision to withdraw from the joint venture in February introduced near-term uncertainty, it ultimately affords us greater flexibility and the opportunity to pursue a broader, more strategically aligned partnership, an outcome that, in hindsight, we view as fortuitous. Operationally, our team delivered an exceptional year of disciplined execution and technical progress.
Among the key achievements were the completion of a comprehensive mine plan with supporting ore reserve and mineral resource estimates, together with Class II capital and operating cost estimates, the finalization of the SK-13 compliant technical report, continued optimization of our process design, including refinement to maximize sulfuric acid yield and lithium recovery efficiency while minimizing impurities and capital intensity. Bernard Rowe will cover that in a lot more detail. These accomplishments are the result of rigorous analysis, creative problem-solving, and the unwavering dedication of our technical and operational team, led by CEO Bernard Rowe. Their work ensures that Rhyolite Ridge remains not only technically robust but also economically compelling and environmentally responsible. Project economics and strategic positioning, the updated ore reserve estimates and project economics reaffirm Rhyolite Ridge's position as a world-class, long-life asset with exceptional cost competitiveness.
On a lithium carbonate equivalent basis, the project sits firmly within the lowest cost quartile globally, supported by the additional co-production of boric acid, a unique differentiator that enhances both economic resilience and market flexibility. The project's initial 25-year mine plan is expected to deliver strong cash flow and industry-leading returns, underpinned by sustained operations or robust environmental stewardship. These fundamentals not only validate the project's economic strength but also reinforce its strategic significance as a cornerstone of U.S. critical mineral supply. As we approach the decisive phase of securing our strategic partner and achieving FID, our priorities are clear. First, finalize the global partnering process to secure capable and committed equity partners. Advance the project to full construction readiness, ensuring all technical and all permit requirements are met, and preserve our strategic optionality, positioning Rhyolite Ridge as a globally relevant supplier of lithium boron chemicals for decades to come.
The momentum we have built in 2024 gives us confidence that the coming year will mark a transformational period, one in which the years of vision, perseverance, and disciplined execution translate into tangible long-term value. In closing, I wish to express my deep appreciation to our CEO, Bernard Rowe, and to our Board of Directors, whose insight, determination, and stewardship have guided the company through both opportunity and challenge. To our shareholders, I extend my sincere gratitude for your continued trust and support. Your confidence empowers us to pursue our mission with ambition and clarity of purpose. We stand at the threshold of a defining chapter, one that will see Rhyolite Ridge become not just a mine, but a cornerstone of Western critical chemical production through an integrated mine to final production of processed lithium and boric acid, produced at the bottom of the global cost curve.
This resource development will enhance critical material independence and play a critical, early role in the realization of the U.S.-Australian critical minerals framework. Thank you, and I will now turn over the presentation to our able CEO.
Thank you very much, James. Thank you, everyone, for joining today. I'm going to do a brief presentation. Then we'll have some time for questions a little bit later on. Please read the disclaimer before making any investment decisions. Next slide, please. This simple slide really epitomizes why Rhyolite Ridge is such a special and unique deposit. On the photo on the left is a hill where the ore outcrops at the surface and is very rich in both lithium and boron. This is a hard rock deposit that will be mined in a traditional drill and blast type of process. To the right is the end product of the processing that will be done at the site. Two products, not one, which is unusual in itself. Also, the fact that these are high-purity lithium chemicals.
As of today, there is not another hard rock mine anywhere in the world where they produce those refined high-purity chemicals at the mine site. It's the unique mineralogy, the unique geology of this deposit that allows us to do this. It's a very, very rare and special deposit. Next slide, please. Just touching on the key main points that I'm going to address in this presentation. Strong and resilient economics. We've just recently announced yet another update of our economics. I'm going to talk a bit more later on in the presentation about what we've been doing and how we've been managing to continuously be improving those economics through optimization of the processing, particularly the leaching. Currently, the NPV stands at $2.3 billion and the IRR 23.2% leveled.
The ore reserve, 265 million tons at our current mining rate of 3.4 million tons, which is an increase from where we were before. That's sufficient to mine for 77 years. Obviously, very long life and also meaning that there's plenty of potential for future expansion just based on the reserve alone. The all-in sustaining cash cost, as James mentioned, right at the bottom part of the global cost curve, certainly well in the bottom quartile at $4,628 per ton of lithium carbonate produced. A lot of that has to do with the fact that the boron generates so much revenue, and we apply that as a credit against the lithium production. Fully permitted, shovel-ready with offtakes in place and low-cost U.S. government debt means that this is without peer in the United States as a critical minerals project. Proven expansion potential, the reserve was 265.
That is included in a resource that is now totaling 549 million tons of mineral resource: measured, indicated, and inferred. This implies and demonstrates the expansion potential of this project. I'm also going to touch on the status of the partnering process. Next slide, please. The strong and resilient economics are here for you to read at your leisure. We split these into two categories or two groups: years 1- 25 and then the life of mine, the 77 years. You'll see there's a difference. The lithium production in the first 25 years is around 24,500 tons per annum of lithium carbonate equivalent. That drops down to 20,400 tons when you look at it over the life of mine. Boric acid drops even more from 135,500 down to 70,700.
The reason for that is in the latter years, we're mining the ore that's much lower in boron and a bit lower in lithium. We like to look at the 25-year period as more reflecting of what the deposit is more likely to be producing. It also coincides with the 20-year tenor on our debt. I'll leave you to read the other numbers, but I'll just point out one or two more: $790 million in our annual revenue and an annual EBITDA in the first 25 years of $563 million. Next slide, please. The ore reserves that underpin that are broken into three streams. Stream one is high in lithium and high in boron. Stream two is high in lithium and lower in boron. Stream three is high lithium, low boron, but it has clay.
You'll see that the tonnages mainly lie in stream one and stream two, so we're only mining a small amount of the material that has a higher clay content. The beauty of stream one and two is that those rocks are actually extremely low in clay. I've just circled a couple of the numbers there to help explain some of the other stuff that you're going to see. If you look at stream one, it contains 800,000 tons of lithium carbonate and 6.4 million tons of boric acid. That's a ratio of about 8: 1. Whereas if you look at stream two and stream three, that ratio is more like just above 1: 1. Stream one has 10 times the amount of boron that streams two and three do. All of these streams can be processed. They can all go through the same processing plant.
It's important for us because we actually blend this material as we're mining. Whilst it sits in separate layers, the streams, we actually mine them all at the same time because they're sitting one on top of the other. Some of it gets stockpiled. Overall, the reserve contains 2 million tons of lithium carbonate equivalent and 7.7 million tons of boric acid. You can see that on that basis, it's about 4: 1. Those ratios are important to keep in the back of your mind. Next slide, please. Operating costs, because of the boric acid contribution, whether that be the 4 tons per ton of lithium or even, as we're mining stream one, up to about 8 tons of boric acid per ton of lithium carbonate, when you apply that as a credit, it covers the majority of our costs, something of the order of 70% of our costs.
That brings our cost of lithium carbonate production down to $4,600. You can see it's right in the bottom part of that cost curve, well in the bottom quartile. The other sort of things to point out here are that roughly 50% of the world's production is on a cost basis of above $10,000 a ton. Now, whilst it's slightly dated, the dotted line from April of this year shows the spot price. That spot price has risen. It's up around between $10,000 and $11,000 now. It shows that a lot of the world's production, circa 50%, is actually at a production cost above the current spot market. That's not the case with Rhyolite Ridge. It's down in the bottom quartile.
A lot of that has got to do with the way we process the ore, the acid leaching, which is a low-cost way of doing it, and the fact that we get that major contribution from the boric acid. Next slide, please. The project has been substantially de-risked. I said earlier that it's without peer in the United States. It's fully permitted, state and federal permits. It's shovel-ready. The engineering is actually at 70%, way beyond what mining projects are typically at when they start construction. That's after an investment of approximately $200 million. There isn't another project in the United States in lithium that's as advanced in terms of an engineering and study basis and de-risking.
The offtakes are in place with Ford , EcoPro, Prime Planet , which is a joint venture between Toyota and Panasonic, and Dragonfly , one of the local Nevada-based battery manufacturers. We also have signed offtakes and sales agreements on our boron. Low-cost debt, $986 million, low interest, long tenor, 20 years, government loan. That loan was closed early this year and involved a very rigorous due diligence period. That was a process that was conducted over several years. Next slide, please. Expansion potential. I apologize. The map, hopefully, you can—it's a bit faint, but hopefully, you can see. There are two basins at Rhyolite Ridge. The south basin, which has been the focus of nearly all of our work, 98% of our work has been in the south.
There is another basin, a north basin, that's about three or four kilometers to the north or slightly northwest. Shown on this map in colors, blue, green, and a sandy color, are the resource. Blue is measured, green is indicated, and the sandy color is inferred. You can see our 546 million ton resource is actually covering only about 50%, 60% of the south basin. We have to drill the rest of that to know what's there. There's a very good chance that there'll be additional tons drilled as we explore that area, which we are now fully permitted to do with the mine plan operation that was approved last year. North basin is an area where we have drilled several holes to confirm what previous exploration from the 1980s had shown. It also has similar potential to host large tonnages of similar lithium boron mineralization.
Simply, the footprint of the basin, the size of the basin shows that it has huge tonnage potential. There are many different avenues for expansion here, both of lithium and of boron, which could simply mean a duplication of the plant that we've designed. It also could mean a dedicated lithium plant versus a lithium boron plant like we're building in phase one. There are lots of options, and there's lots of tons for future expansion. Next slide, please. The status of the partnering process. We've obviously had many questions about this in recent times as we've been talking to investors. We wanted to provide a bit of an update here. Goldman Sachs is assisting with the formal strategic partnering process. That partnering process, as James described, is instrumental to the development of the Rhyolite Ridge Project.
It's our strategy by which we fund this project and take it forward by selling down an equity stake in the project to a partner or multiple partners, as the case may be. We've had strong interest across multiple sectors. The process is still ongoing. Recently, we provided an update because we were trying to close out the process before the end of the year. We've recently announced that it's going to extend into 2026. A lot of that is to do with the current lithium sector, and the status of the sector is very volatile. The geopolitical environment, the discussions that are going on between various governments around critical minerals, also play a role. We've seen that between Australia, the U.S., and Japan in particular just very recently. That all has an impact on what we're doing, which is why we're extending that process into 2026. Next slide, please.
I'm just going to spend a few minutes, again, trying not to get into too much detail here. I do want to try and explain briefly the impact of this leach optimization because it has made a huge difference to the economics of this project, no question. This is something that our team knew about a long time ago, saw it as an opportunity. While we were permitting and doing the other things over the last couple of years, this was something that we parked and decided that we would come to it at the appropriate time. 2025 was the appropriate time. What we've done is we've looked at how long we leach for with sulfuric acid. How long is that white rock that I showed you at the beginning of the presentation? After we've crushed that, how long does it stay in contact with sulfuric acid?
The base case based on our feasibility study was for three days. What we knew was that we didn't need to leach a full three-day period, because as we went into days two and three of the leach, the recovery, the amount of additional lithium and boron that we were getting, was starting to tail off. The acid was still being consumed, and it was being consumed by other minerals in the rock, which do not contain lithium and boron. They're gang minerals. The acid was being less efficiently used in days two and three. That's why we then tackled and looked at, okay, what if we reduce it down to two days? What if we reduce it down to 1.5? We did the two-day first to make sure that we're on the right track.
With those results, we then had the support to go and look at a one-and-a-half-day leach. What difference does it make? These numbers summarize it quite nicely. You're talking about 20% more lithium produced, and a similar sort of slightly less than 20% more boric acid produced. That's a big number, 20%. How are we doing that? We're processing more. We've gone from 2.4 million tons per annum, which is about 7,200 tons a day, up to 3.4 million tons, which is about 10,500 tons a day. That's about a 40% increase. We're processing about 40% more. We're getting about 20% more lithium and boron. The reason the numbers are slightly different there, the 40% versus 20%, is because the recoveries are slightly less. We are blending some of this low boron ore in with the high boron ore to make sure we're maximizing the efficiency in the process.
By shortening the leach days, we use less acid. These extra tons that we're talking about do not require any additional acid, do not require any additional capital expenditures. This is all using the plant as it's designed. We are being more efficient in the use of the acid, shortening the leach day. With that surplus acid, we are processing more ore. You can see that makes a big difference when you look at annual EBITDA data. It's gone from $319 million up to $417 million. The revenues have gone from about $500 million up to $600 million. Not surprisingly, because you're processing the ore at a faster rate, the mine life has gone from 95 years down to 77 with approximately the same total tonnage. Importantly, the CapEx has not changed. We're using the same processing plant. We're just doing a more efficient job. Next slide, please.
Again, some nice photos here to show you all the test work that we've been doing and the type of test work that we're doing as it relates to this acid leach. We crush the rock down to about 20 mm, and we leach it in vats. These are simulations of those vats in the laboratory in Reno. You can see it's coarse material. We leach it, and it stays coarse. It's very easy to separate the liquids and the solids. That's all to do with this very unique geology and mineralogy at Rhyolite Ridge, for which there isn't another lithium deposit anywhere in the world that we know of that has these same characteristics, not one. Next slide, please. These are the vats that we're talking about. The khaki-colored circular tanks at the top of the processing plant there. There are seven of them.
Three of those vats would have been leaching, and now we're talking about one and a half of those vats at any particular time. One to two of those vats as being leaching. The others are being either loaded and unloaded or washed. We had the capacity in these seven vats to increase the tonnage. It was really just making sure that we had the additional acid. By reducing the timeframes down, as I described, we were able to do that. I won't go into the rest of the plant, but I just wanted to show the vats and how they relate and why three days has gone to one and a half. Next slide, please. Key takeaways: It's a unique deposit, extremely unique. There isn't another one that has the same mineralogy anywhere in the world.
That's why we can make these lithium chemicals and boron chemicals at the mine site and why we can do it on an extremely cost-competitive basis, both our operating costs, but also the capital costs to build this operation. Dual revenue, very, very rare in the lithium world to have dual revenue like we have at Rhyolite Ridge, where the boron is producing about 25%- 30% of the revenue, $100 million- $200 million a year. It's shovel-ready, permitted, engineered. All the agreements in place, the local communities, the tribal nations, the state, all supportive and in place, extremely robust economics, very resilient in a low lithium pricing environment. The benefit, again, of the boron. Large component of the revenue, but also a very, very stable pricing regime for boric acid and boron products. It has been that way for many, many decades.
It's a great counter to the volatility that we see in the lithium pricing. It's very expandable. It's stable, secure, long-term supply of two incredibly important products necessary for batteries, magnets, and semiconductors and other military applications. This is exactly what the U.S. government has been highlighting as the priority for them as they move forward and look for development of domestic supply chains. It's around batteries, magnets, and semiconductors as the priority. Our next steps: the equity financing, the partnering, meaning the partnering. An FID decision to follow that, a construction period of about 36 months, including six months of long lead items. Based on completion of the FID in early parts of 2026, we would be then first production at the end of 2028, early 2029. Next slide, please. That's all from me. Thank you, James. I just would like to thank James as our Chair.
Extremely supportive working alongside you. Also to the other directors, Rose, Maggie, Alan, and Tim, I also say thank you for their strong and ongoing support. My exceptional executive team made up of Ian, Matt. Ken, Chad, and Yoshio, and all the Ioneer team, an amazing team of people. I don't think there is a technical team in the lithium space anywhere in the world that compares with what we have at Ioneer. I think all of the work that you've seen demonstrates that. The fact that we got a Greenfields mining project permitted in the United States in six years is an exceptional credit to the team. The fact that we also did it without objection from the typical stakeholders that we deal with in doing these processes is also an exceptional record for the team. I thank them.
I thank you, all of our shareholders, for your ongoing support. Thank you, James. Back to you.
Thank you, Bernard, very much. I remind shareholders and proxy holders that you have the ability to ask questions via the Lumi platform. We will hold questions specific to the resolutions to the formal part of the meeting. Are there any questions on the address, the Managing Director's presentation, or more generally on the management of the company? Ian, do we have any questions?
Yes, thanks, James. There are a couple of questions here at this stage. The first was submitted by Sam Shields ahead of the meeting. He asks, "Given that the United States has numerous shovel-ready projects capable of supporting domestic self-reliance in critical minerals such as lithium, why does the U.S. government continue to prioritize overseas supply deals? In addition, boron is recognized as a vital material for national defense. Why has Ioneer remained relatively quiet in positioning itself publicly during this period of heightened strategic focus on critical minerals?"
Thank you for that question. Bernard, let me take it first. First of all, I don't want to be combative, but there really are not very many at all projects that are permitted and ready to go for production of lithium. I would take exception to the point. There are many different people that have little projects or early-stage ideas. As our work, and by the way, and Thacker Pass's work shows, these are very long, take a lot of work, a lot of resources. There aren't many of those. In fact, I don't know of any of them besides ours and Thacker Pass that are in that position. I would take some exception to the first point, but I appreciate it.
The second thing is, we are becoming more vocal about the importance of boron to our future and also to national security interests. It's really rather remarkable, as you've rightfully noted, how many applications relate to national security. The other thing is that how rare a big boron project is. It's extraordinarily rare. The only boron project in the United States is run by Rio Tinto and is in a very deep phase of being old. It's deep, and it's difficult. We all know that they're considering doing something with that asset and giving you a hint of how old it is. We really have a rare project. Let me just say, I don't want to overstate this. Bernard, you may have some comment on this, but I do believe that we're having many conversations with many different entities around the world.
The issue of boron and national security are being brought to us too because people understand how extraordinary it is that you would have a project like this that has dual production of both lithium and boron. That's rare, and that's very valuable to American national security and, quite frankly, to national security in general in the West. We may be quiet, as you would see it in the press or whatever we are, but in terms of discussions, it's quite an active conversation. Bernard, do you want to add anything to that?
Yeah, I'll just add a couple of things. Thanks, James. Yes, and I agree with exactly what James has said. I would actually explain it that it's a reflection of the fact that we are one of the very few shovel-ready, feasibility completed, fully permitted projects in the United States. There are not many. That's 100% accurate. There are not very many. It's a reflection of the very advanced stage that we are at, that we're not in a situation to speculate on the discussions that we're having. Of course, we've negotiated offtake agreements around lithium and boron, and we continue to have discussions around those. Until such time as those agreements are in place, we're not in a position to be commenting on them. I think that what you perhaps perceive as being our hesitancy or reluctance to be very open about discussing those in public is more of a reflection of the advanced nature of those discussions. I would also add that I think it's actually a reflection of the U.S.
government's recognition that it requires a joint effort amongst countries to address the reliance or the over-reliance of critical minerals, whether that be lithium and boron or rare earths or gallium and germanium and antimony and tungsten. These are all on the top of the priority list. It requires a collaborative joint effort amongst partner countries, and that includes Australia and Japan, as I alluded to before. That's what the government are recognizing, the U.S. government are recognizing by being involved in development of these assets outside of the United States. I do not think that they are ignoring the development of similar projects within the country. The reality is today, U.S. produces very little lithium, 5,000 tons, and it consumes in the hundreds of thousands of tons. It needs both domestic and overseas supply to meet the demands from secure, stable, friendly countries like Australia.
Thank you, Bernard. Ian, are there further questions?
Yes, there are further questions here. The next one is from a Mr. Jared Brooks. Is the plan to complete the 70% design once the project has achieved FID, or will Ioneer engage an EPC contractor to complete this last 30%?
Bernard, I'll let you take that one.
Yeah, and it's probably a little bit confusing because it would be extremely rare to complete all of the detailed design engineering before you commence construction. 70% is actually about the limit that you would actually go to or want to go to because some of the things that are required in that last 30%, you actually want to do while you're in construction, while you've put certain parts of the plant into place, etc.
Another way of looking at that or answering that would be typically in mining, projects are at 30% or 40% engineering complete when they start construction. We're way beyond that. Now, when are we going to do and how are we going to do that 30%? We already have an EPCM in place, and that's Fluor. Fluor and our other consultants will work on completing that engineering, but that will be done post FID decision and post commencement of construction. It won't be done before.
Thank you, Bernard. Are there further questions again?
Yes, I've got multiple questions from Ormi PTY Limited. What sort of equity deal is INR contemplating? Did Sibanye give any reasons for not proceeding? If yes, what were they? Have any equity partnering offers been received or rejected? What was offered?
Bernard, do you want to take that one?
Sure. I'll start with Sibanye because chronologically, that was the first one. Sibanye were very clear. They publicly mentioned that they did not have the capacity to fund their share of the project. In terms of on their balance sheet, they would have had to go and raise additional funding to be able to participate. There was a question around that. Ultimately, when they put out an announcement, they said that the project did not meet their investment criteria, and they exited. What's their investment criteria? They never shared that with us, so I can't comment on that. I think it's also worth pointing out that Sibanye were a circa $20 billion company when we started talking to them. I think they were about $15 billion market cap when we concluded the agreement a couple of years ago.
Early this year, when they were having to make their decision because we had our permits in place and we've updated the economics, which was the trigger for Sibanye to either participate and advance funding into the joint venture structure or walk away, the market cap of the company was around $3 billion. A lot of that related to platinum and palladium prices, which are the core of their business. I think that sort of explains why they did not proceed. The other parts of the question in terms of we've got multiple parties in the data room, we're in discussion with multiple parties. They're at different stages of discussion, some of them, as is normal. I could point back and say that Sibanye, when we ran that process, came in very late in the piece. It's not everybody at the same stage. I can't comment further on that.
We're restricted with what we can say. Obviously, as I mentioned before, given we're at such an advanced stage with this project, many of the things that we discuss must remain confidential until such time as they are concluded. Once they are concluded, of course, we'll update the market. We're not in a position to be able to provide commentary on things that are incomplete. Rest assured, as things complete, we will update the market accordingly.
I agree with you, Bernard. I'm trying to be careful here, but I think that we don't want to be in too much of a rush here. I mean, as Bernard pointed out earlier, we're in a highly dynamic situation where we're talking about sort of strategic things about the changing nature of how people are going to address, nations and militaries and other people are going to address the issues that our project address. It would be a strategic mistake for our shareholders to be too anxious here. We're working very diligently on this, but I think that we want to take a little bit more time to make sure we get as good of a result as we can for our shareholders. Look, let's not ignore the fact that we're working for the last two and a half years in a terrible environment for lithium.
I mean, very little is getting done, and the only reason we're going to get done is because of what Bernard described earlier, that it is very rare to have a great project ready to go in the United States to address some of the more strategic things that around the world governments are thinking about. That's about all I can say. It's important for you to know that we're not rushing to the first deal that's thrown over the transom. We're working to make sure we get as good a deal as possible and get it done in a timely way, of course. That's how we're approaching it. Thank you. Next question, Ian?
Yeah, just a final question here, which speaks to equity. Has Ioneer considered trying to raise the remaining $670 million of CapEx required itself?
Look, we consider everything. I mean, we look at all the different alternatives. I think that we're still, I think, firmly in the camp of believing that the lion's share of what we're looking for is going to come from financing at the project level versus internally. Of course, it's also a dynamic situation that, depending on how this all plays out, it could alter our share price to the point that it would become attractive to raise more of it, or some or all of that money. I doubt all of it, but some of that money through a capital raise. That's something that we're constantly thinking about and constantly working on. We certainly, at this point, don't have that intention. Any other questions, Ian?
No further questions, James.
If I could also, sorry, just add one thing. It's sort of a step removed from the question, but I just want to reiterate to people as we're moving through this partnering process, don't be thinking that we're just going to do another deal like we did with Sibanye, where it was one party and a 50% sell down in that case. We're thinking more broadly than that here. We've said it could be a partner or it could be partners. How we actually fund the equity that we require, I think, don't get fixated on one partner coming in like we did last time and providing the solution. We have interests from multiple parties, and it's a matter of working through those and working out how best to structure it. It's not one-size-fits-all.
Exactly. All right. Ian. Noticing that there are no further questions, I would like to now. The notice of meeting was lodged with ASX on 1 October 2025. It has been sent to all members and can be found on Ioneer's website. I will take the notice of meeting as read. All voting today will be conducted by way of a poll. As already noted, voting is open on all resolutions. For each item of business, the Company Secretary will display, one, the full resolution to be considered, and the total number of valid proxies received in respect of each resolution. In accordance with the proxy form, which forms part of the AGM pack, I intend as Chairman to vote all eligible undirected proxies in favor of resolutions 1 through 12. We will now move to the first item of business as set out on the notice of meeting. To receive and consider the consolidated financial statements for the financial year ended 30 June 2025.
The company's financial statements and reports are being taken as released to the ASX in the annual report. Ian, are there any questions or comments on the company's financial statements and reports or questions for the company's auditors?
There are no questions, James.
Thank you very much. The second resolution is to consider and, if thought fit, pass the remuneration report for the year ended 30 June 2025. The remuneration report is contained in the annual report. Note your vote of this resolution is advisory only and does not bind the directors of the company. The number of proxies received on this resolution are shown. Should 25% of the vote be cast against this resolution, this will constitute a first strike for the company for the purposes of the Corporations Act 2021. Ian, are there any questions or comments on this resolution?
There are no questions or comments, James.
Thank you very much. The next item is in resolution three, is to consider, and if thought fit, pass that Margaret Walker be re-elected as a non-executive director of the company. The number of proxies received for this resolution are on the screen. Your directors, including Maggie unanimously recommend this resolution. Ian, are there any questions or comments on this resolution?
No questions or comments.
Thank you. The next item of business is to consider, and if thought fit, pass that Timothy Woodall be elected a director of the company. The number of proxies received for this resolution are on the screen. The Directors, excluding Tim, unanimously recommend this resolution. Ian, have we received any questions or comments on this resolution?
No, James. No questions or comments.
Thank you. Given my personal interest in the next item of business, I will hand you to Bernard to chair the meeting for this resolution. Bernard?
The next item of business, resolution five, is to consider, and if thought fit, pass approval of performance rights to James Calaway in lieu of Directors' fees on the terms and conditions set out in the explanatory memorandum. The number of proxies received for this resolution are displayed on the screen. Ian, have we received any questions or comments on this resolution?
There are no questions or comments.
I'll now hand back to you, James, to resume chairing the meeting.
Thank you, Bernard. The next item of business, resolution six, is to consider, and if thought fit, pass approval of performance rights to Alan Davies in lieu of Directors' fees on the terms and conditions set out in the explanatory memorandum. The number of proxies received for this resolution are displayed on the screen. Ian, are there any questions or comments on this resolution?
There are no questions or comments.
Thank you. The next item of business, resolution seven, is to consider, and if thought fit, pass approval of performance rights to Rose McKinney-James in lieu of Directors' fees on the terms and conditions set out in the explanatory memorandum. The number of proxies received for this resolution are displayed on the screen. Ian, are there any questions or comments on this resolution?
There are no questions or comments.
Thank you. The next item of business, resolution eight, is to consider, and if thought fit, pass approval of performance rights to Margaret Walker in lieu of Directors' fees on the terms and conditions set out in the explanatory memorandum. The number of proxies received for this resolution are displayed on the screen. Ian, have we received any questions or comments on this resolution?
We have no questions or comments.
Thank you. The next item of business is to consider, and if thought fit, pass approval of performance rights to Timothy Woodall in lieu of Directors' fees on the terms and conditions set out in the explanatory memorandum. The number of proxies received for this resolution are on the screen. Ian, are there any questions or comments on this resolution?
No questions or comments.
Thank you. The next item of business, resolution 10, is to consider, and if thought fit, approve the granting of 13,877,598 performance rights to Bernard Rowe on the terms outlined in the company's 2025 annual report as set out in the explanatory memorandum. The number of proxies received for this resolution are displayed on the screen. Ian, are there any questions or comments on this resolution?
No questions or comments.
Thank you very much. Given my personal interest in the next item of business, I will again hand over to Bernard to take over the chair for this resolution. Bernard?
The next item of business, resolution 11, is to consider, and if thought fit, approve the granting of 5,940,362 performance rights to James Calaway on the terms outlined in the company's 2025 annual report and set out in the explanatory memorandum. The number of proxies received for this resolution are displayed on the screen. Ian, do we have any questions or comments on this resolution?
There are no questions or comments.
I will now hand back to you, James, to chair the balance of the meeting.
Thank you very much. The next item of business, resolution 12, is to consider, and if thought fit, approve the refresh of the company's 15% placement capacity for the issue of 252,500,000 ordinary shares under the Australia $25.3 million equity placement issued on 19 June 2025. The number of proxies received for this resolution are displayed on the screen. Are there any questions or comments on this resolution, Ian?
We have no questions or comments.
Thank you very much. That concludes our discussion of the items of business. In a couple of minutes, I will close the voting system. Please ensure that you have cast your votes on all resolutions. I now will pause to allow you time to finalize the vote. Voting is now closed. The result of these votes will be released to the ASX later today. Thank you for your attendance today. We look forward to working hard on your behalf to ensure the development of Rhyolite Ridge and the success of Ioneer Limited. Thank you very much.