Shareholders of Berkeley Energia have voted to approve a strategic $120million strategic investment agreement with the Sultanate of Oman’s sovereign wealth fund.
The approval has released $65million of funding which will now be used to invest a loan amount in a uranium mine in the country.
Funding now approved, Berkeley Energia will commence awarding mining and construction contracts.
The firm has also appointed Mr Deepankar Panigrahi as a Non-Executive Director effective immediately.
Managing Director, Paul Atherley, commented: “We are delighted to have now closed the Oman financing transaction, which fully de-risks the capital costs required to bring the Salamanca mine into production. We welcome the Oman fund as a strategic, long term investor and shareholder in the Company and we welcome Mr Deepankar Panigrahi to our Board.
“With the funding in place we will now award the main EPC and mining contracts and begin major earthworks in the new year, focusing first on the installation of the crushing circuit.
“Over the coming months, we expect more supply to be removed from global markets as higher cost operations are forced into closure when historical sales contracts roll off.
“The Salamanca mine, with some of the lowest operating costs globally, is being constructed at the bottom of the uranium price cycle and when production commences the market is expected to be dominated by US utilities looking to re-contract, who will at the same time be competing with Chinese and Japanese reactor demand.”
