Kali launch shows lithium death greatly exaggerated

It seems like it was just last year when market pundits were lamenting the dramatic fall of the global lithium price and predicting explorers would need to diversify their portfolio to survive.

With more lithium producers coming online and a host of projects making steady progress towards operation – plus a less than expected global take-up of electric vehicles – the battery metal bears were coming out of hibernation.

But wait a minute, that was last year which is (checks notes) less than a fortnight ago.

Now, helping to start 2024 on a frenzied lithium investing note, a fresh-faced newcomer has captured the attention of the market with a staggering share price leap of 256 per cent after hitting the ASX boards with a singular focus on the one resource.

Yes, that’s right folks, Kali Metals is this week’s top ASX runner after officially coming online as a lithium spin-out from Kalamazoo Resources and TSX-listed Karora Resources … and boy has it been a hit. Its shares touched as high as 89 cents on Wednesday, a remarkable jump from its initial public offering price of 25c.

The share price peaked on the day of the company’s first major announcement when it revealed impressive sample grades from its Higginsville project in the Goldfields region of Western Australia, which was previously part of Karora’s portfolio.

Assay highlights include 3.69 per cent lithium oxide and 349 parts per million tantalum from the Parker-Grubb prospect, while a sample from the Flynn-Giles deposit returned results of 1.63 per cent lithium oxide and 258ppm tantalum.

Not a bad start as far as opening announcements go.

Among the flurry of investors seeking to take a piece of the action was lithium giant Mineral Resources, which picked up close to a 10 per cent share in the fledgling explorer. This probably has nothing to do with Kali’s proximity to MinRes’ Mt Marion lithium mine, though. Or does it?

In addition to Karora’s Higginsville project, Kali also inherited Kalamazoo’s Pilbara lithium portfolio that includes the Dom’s Hill and Marble Bar projects, which are part of a joint venture (JV) with major Chilean lithium producer Sociedad Química y Minera (SQM). It also added its wholly-owned Pear Creek lithium project, in addition to the Jingellic and Tallangatta lithium projects in New South Wales.

Remarkably, none of these projects are anywhere near Canada’s now-famous James Bay region. Hopefully, regular readers of this column will appreciate that subtle in-joke.

While it is still (very) early days, the excitement around Kali is substantial and, to badly paraphrase Mark Twain, the rumours of lithium’s death appear to be greatly exaggerated.

Culpeo Minerals has started the new year in a similar fashion to the way it ended the last after recording a share price hike of more than 136 per cent to touch 13.5c from a previous close of 5.7c, which appears to be based on an announcement from last week.

Perhaps the market was still enjoying the post-Christmas and New Year celebrations and were a little late to the party, but the company recorded some impressive surface sample grades of up to 3.96 per cent copper and 2.61 grams per tonne gold from its Fortuna project in Chile. When investors finally woke up and checked the ASX on Monday, Culpeo exploded with more than 93 million shares changing hands to smash its previous record from last year of more than 52 million.

It then went into a trading halt.

A hike last year of more than 106 per cent came after recording some shallow hits of visible copper mineralisation from diamond drilling at Fortuna. However, the ASX questioned both last year’s price rise and this week’s trading volumes with both an “aware query” and an “ASX price query”.

This price rise appears to have all the hallmarks of a sleepy market responding late to good news as Fortuna is progressively looking to be an iron oxide-copper-gold (IOCG) hydrothermal system based on early interpretations from management.

Culpeo also believes the surface sampling results indicate the presence of a copper-gold porphyry system outcropping at surface, while the company has also drawn comparisons to its Lana Corina prospect that returned drill intersections of 257m at 1.1 per cent copper equivalent and 169m grading 1.21 per cent copper equivalent.

Drill results from the diamond holes sunk in December at the El Quillay prospect at Fortuna are still pending, so it will be interesting to see if the official assays match the hype.

Jupiter Energy joined this week’s list of runners with a share price jump of more than 123 per cent from a previous close of 1.8c to a peak of 3.8c after revealing a significant increase in reserves at its three oilfields in Kazakhstan.

The company recently engaged Canada-based independent sub-surface consultancy group Sproule International to assess and evaluate its proved, probable and possible reserves that have been revealed as a combined total of nearly 46.8 million barrels, including more than 14.5 million barrels in the proved category.

Management says that based on the modelling of the field development plan for the proved and probable categories of almost 36.5 million barrels in a projected 17-year life and using a discount rate of 20 per cent, the post-tax net present value (NPV) of the oilfields is calculated at about US$180 million (AU$268 million).

Jupiter is focused on developing its onshore assets in Western Kazakhstan where it holds 100 per cent of the Block 31 permit, located in the oil-rich Mangistau Basin close to the port city of Aktau.

While tempted to make a joke about the 2015 space opera Jupiter Ascending, that film was terrible and doesn’t deserve to be used as a comparison to what appears to be a significant announcement for the Kazakhstan oil explorer. Likewise, the pop duo Jupiter Rising from the mid-2000s.

Let’s just say that Jupiter appears to be doing well and oil produced from the three fields can now be sold through a variety of sales channels, including both the domestic and export oil markets.

This week’s final runner goes to medtech company Singular Health Group, which achieved a share price surge of more than 135 per cent from a previous close of 3.8c to touch as high as 9c today.

The jump coincides with the announcement that it had locked in its first enterprise order for its 3Dicom software in the US, with 5000 licenses purchased by Techworks 4 Good.

However, the big news from the latest announcement is how this deal will benefit US veterans, who will be able to upload and share medical records from their 3Dicom Patient account through online, desktop and mobile applications, greatly improving accessibility, portability and continuity of care.

US veterans transitioning from active service to civilian life face an often-challenging readjustment to their living arrangements and that can significantly impact their healthcare.

While in active service, healthcare is provided through the Military Health System (MHS) at hospitals that are either directly managed or contracted to provide healthcare services to active personnel and their immediate families. Once discharged, veterans are often unable to retrieve and subsequently share their images, except through requesting their medical records that are kept on CDs.

Singular’s device allows practitioners such as dentists, surgeons and radiologists to convert conventional two-dimensional MRI, CT and PET scans into immersive 3D images. The change provides a clearer insight into a patient’s medical problems and enables better surgical planning.

Management says the initial purchase order is for just a small proportion of the more than 36,000 veterans in Miami-Dade County, but there are an estimated 18 million veterans nationwide in the US and that provides for plenty of potential market growth if the initial deal proves successful.

It should be noted that Singular’s share price rise comes from a closing price that was registered on December 27 last year and it appears the market was once again caught napping with no movement since that date, aside from a lowly 2000-odd shares changing hands on Tuesday.

But that increased significantly yesterday when more than 2.6 million shares were bought and sold following the purchase announcement, marking the company’s greatest trading volume in well over a year.

This column has never shied away from its love of medtechs and the human stories that often come with them. And while the latest Singular deal has the potential to expand its presence in the US market and lead to even greater sales, it is also looking to improve the lives of those in vulnerable positions.

Is your ASX-listed company doing something interesting? Contact: matt.birney@businessnews.com.au