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Blue Orca is Short Piedmont Lithium Inc. (NASDAQ: PLL)

Piedmont Lithium Inc. (“Piedmont” or the “Company”) is a pre-production lithium stock promotion that boasts a $1.1 billion market capitalization on the promise that its newly announced Tennessee conversion facility will produce battery grade lithium under a sweetheart supply deal from a Ghana lithium mine.  Piedmont claims that revenues and profits will flow from Tennessee in 2025, but we believe that is a fantasy.

In 2021, Piedmont committed to invest over $100 million into a mine in Ghana through UK-listed junior mining company Atlantic Lithium (“Atlantic”) to secure spodumene offtake.  However, our investigation of source documents and Ghana corporate records indicates that Atlantic obtained key Ghana mining licenses by making secret payments and promises of payment to the immediate family of a high-level Ghana politician.  Specifically, Atlantic paid and promised tens of millions of dollars in potential royalties to a company secretly owned by the son of a leading politician known as General Mosquito, who previously served in Ghana’s Parliament as Chair of the Mines and Energy Committee.

In our opinion, evidence of Atlantic’s payments to the son of a high-level politician for mining licenses is textbook evidence of corruption.  Atlantic still needs Ghana’s Parliament to approve and ratify its mining licenses and permits in order to build the lithium mine. Based on precedents in Ghana and around Africa, including a recent decision by Ghana’s highest court, we do not believe that authorities in Ghana (including the Parliament) will ratify Atlantic’s mining licenses tainted by corruption. 
  
We are short Piedmont because without Atlantic’s Ghana supply, Piedmont and any promise of near-term revenue from its much-hyped Tennessee facility are dead on arrival.  Without Ghana, industry experts and even a former Piedmont senior executive have confirmed that Piedmont is unlikely to find a source of replacement spodumene.  Additionally, FOIA requests we obtained from the Department of Energy (“DOE”) suggest that the spodumene from Ghana was important to Piedmont’s grant proposal, meaning that the loss of the offtake agreement, and questions surrounding Piedmont’s own potential liability under the FCPA and other anti-corruption statutes, raise doubt about whether Piedmont will ultimately receive the conditional government funding. 

Ultimately, the premise of Piedmont’s valuation is the Company’s claim that it will soon leverage spodumene from Ghana to become a fully integrated lithium hydroxide producer.  We think not.
  

A copy of the report can be downloaded here.