Livent Corporation

Good afternoon and welcome to the third quarter 2022 earnings release conference call for Livent Corporation. Phone lines will be placed on listen-only mode throughout the conference. After the speaker's presentation, there will be a question and answer period. I will now turn the conference over to Mr. Daniel Rosen, Investor Relations and Strategy for Livent Corporation. Mr. Rosen, you may begin.

Thank you, Dennis. Good evening, everyone, and welcome to Livent's third quarter 2022 earnings call. Joining me today are Paul Graves, President and Chief Executive Officer, and Gilberto Antoniazzi, Chief Financial Officer. The slide presentation that accompanies our results, along with our earnings release, can be found in the investor relations section of our website. Prepared remarks from today's discussion will be made available after the call. Following our prepared remarks, Paul and Gilberto will be available to address your questions. Given the number of participants on the call today, we would request a limit of one question and one follow-up per caller. We would be happy to address any additional questions after the call. Before we begin, let me remind you that today's discussion will include forward-looking statements that are subject to various risks and uncertainties concerning specific factors, including but not limited to those factors identified in our release and in our filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Information presented represents our best judgment based on today's information. Actual results may vary based upon these risks and uncertainties. Today's discussion will include references to various non-GAAP financial metrics. Definitions of these terms, as well as a reconciliation to the most directly comparable financial measure calculated and presented in accordance with GAAP, are provided on our Investor Relations website. And with that, I'll turn the call over to Paul.

Thank you, Dan, and good evening, everyone. Liban had another very strong financial performance in the third quarter as the business continues to achieve record levels of profitability. Q3 adjusted EBITDA of $111 million compares to $15 million one year ago and to $95 million last quarter. In what remains a very strong market, Liban has continued to achieve higher realized prices while also delivering increased volumes to customers in the third quarter. As we approach year end, Liven has narrowed the ranges of its full year 2022 financial guidance while increasing projections for adjusted EBITDA at the midpoint. This is underpinned by higher realized pricing in the second half than previously expected. As we will go into in further detail, Liven continues to make considerable progress on its expansion projects and remains on track with all projected timelines and capital plans. Construction of our 5,000 metric ton lithium hydroxide expansion in Bessemer City was completed in the third quarter, and we are now in the early stages of producing and qualifying this product with customers. 2023 will be a landmark year for Liven, as we expect to fully ramp up the Bessemer City hydroxide expansion, complete two phases of lithium carbonate expansion in Argentina, totaling 20,000 metric tons in nameplate capacity, and add a new 15,000 metric ton hydroxide facility in China, all by year end. Given the time required to ramp up the new Argentina expansions, Liven expects to produce roughly 6,000 metric tons of incremental LCE volume in 2023, or roughly 25% annual increase starting in the second quarter. And we expect to further increase our production in 2024 and the years to follow. 2023 will also be a pivotal year for the Damascus project as it begins construction and critical decisions regarding project financing and commercial pathways are made and executed on. All of these capacity expansion efforts continue to progress as expected and as previously communicated. I will now turn the call over to Gilberto to discuss our third quarter performance and our updated 2022 financial guidance.

Thanks, Paul, and good evening, everyone. Turning to slide four, Livent reported third-quarter revenue of $232 million, adjusted EBITDA of $111 million, and adjusted earnings of $0.41 per diluted share. This was another record-quality financial performance for Livent as we continue to execute well operationally in a strong market environment. Versus the prior quarter, revenue was up 6%, with higher total LC volume sold complemented by slightly higher realized prices and a favorable product mix. Third quarter adjusted EBITDA was 17% higher than the prior quarter and over seven times higher than the prior year. This was due to continued strong pricing across all products and our ability to take advantage of favorable market conditions. Additionally, we saw a small improvement in sequential costs as we sold the bulk of our remaining higher-cost third-party carbonate material from inventory in the second quarter. There was also an effects benefit to adjust EBITDA as a result of the strengthening of the U.S. dollar versus some of our foreign denominated costs. From a balance sheet perspective, we finished the quarter with $212 million of cash, inclusive of the receipt of $198 million prepayment from General Motors. As a reminder, this prepayment is related to a six-year very great lithium hydroxide supply agreement beginning 2025, which was announced by Liven and GM last quarter. During Q3, Liven also announced the renewal of its revolving credit facility for five years through 2027, while upsizing it by $100 million. As a result, and due to continuing strong cash generation, Liven's now $500 million facility remained under a quarter end. As we look to the remainder of 2022, You will see that LIVEN has updated its full year guidance, as shown on slide five. We have narrowed the ranges of our guidance while increasing the midpoint of our projected results for adjusted EBITDA by 10 million. For the full year 2022, LIVEN now projects revenue to be in the range of 815 million to 845 million. and adjusted EBITDA to be in the range of $350 million to $370 million. This improvement is largely underpinned by expectations for slightly higher realized pricing. Lithium demand has been exceptionally strong throughout this year, and published lithium prices in all forms have continued to move higher, reflecting very tight market conditions. Liven has been able to take advantage of this by realizing higher prices on the subset of its volumes that are exposed to market prices. We are confident in this environment not changing for the rest of the year, and Liven will continue to take advantage of this. However, due to customer mix, we will have a larger portion of sold volumes in the fourth quarter that are contracted at previously set lower fixed price. As a reminder, we expect 2022 total volume sold on an LCE basis to be roughly flat versus 2021, as no meaningful volumes from our capacity expansions are expected to be commercially available until 2023. The revised guidance does not assume any change in total volumes compared to last guidance, although we do expect to sell slightly higher volumes sequentially in the fourth quarter. With that said, given some of the regional supply chain disruptions we continue to see affecting many industries, including our own, there is a potential for some year-end volumes to be pushed into the beginning weeks of 2023. LIVEN's significantly improved profitability and cash flow will be further enhanced by additional production volumes coming online over the next few years. This much-improved cash generation provides LIVEN with ample liquidity to continue advancing and, where possible, accelerating its expansionary investments. Additionally, we will continue to evaluate other forms of funding, such as the prepayment received from GM that provide additional flexibility and are only available to proven reliable producers such as Liven with credible expansion projects. The focus from customers on securing supply of battery grade lithium from proven producers remains as strong as ever. Liven's projection for 2022 capital spending of 300 to 340 million remains unchanged. Our pace of spending picked up in the third quarter, and this will continue in the fourth quarter as we approach commissioning of our first 10,000 metric ton phase of carbonate expansion in Argentina and reach other key milestones across our projects. I will now turn the call back to Paul.

Thank you, Gilberto. Turning now to several market observations on slide six, despite some Near-term supply chain disruptions, particularly in China, with energy curtailments and zero tolerance COVID-19 policies, lithium demand has continued to be incredibly strong. For the first nine months of 2022, China EV sales reached 4.5 million units. And based on most full-year estimates, sales in China will more than double versus 2021. EV battery sales in China show similarly impressive growth, up roughly 245% through Q3 year today versus 2021. And BEV registrations in Europe reached an all-time high in the month of September, a feat that was not expected until the typically higher year-end push in December. The lithium market has continued to be extremely tight. As evidenced by the lack of inventory building throughout the supply chain, and the continually higher bid prices set for the limited, uncommitted feedstock material that is available. We believe that Australian spodumene-based LCEs, which make up close to half of the total market, did not increase in the third quarter versus the prior quarter, while demand continued to grow. There are few credible data points to suggest this pressure will abate as we move through the remainder of this year. as we go through a period of seasonal slowdown for higher-cost Chinese brine producers, and as automakers' supply chains ramp up production to meet higher anticipated year-end demand. It's also hard to make a strong case for a meaningful shift of supply-demand balances as we look out over the foreseeable future. On the supply side, there are several expansions on new projects that are slated to bring incremental volumes to the market over the next few years, But the challenges in doing so only seem to increase. There are multiple reasons for this, ranging from permitting challenges to difficulties in procuring long lead time equipment to difficulties in finding sufficient labor. Expansion projects, and especially greenfield developments that are becoming more critical, are very complex undertakings and are time intensive by their very nature. On top of this, the cost of these projects is moving higher due to inflationary pressures backlogs at the contractors, and especially tight labor markets. And of course, pressure from local communities to participate in these projects means that a longer, more extensive engagement than many new entrants expect is typically required. The complexities of integrated lithium production are matched downstream as qualification standards for selling battery grade material are not getting easier. And even incumbent producers such as Livent require time to ramp up new production lines to meet the tightening specifications of customers. None of this is to say that there will not be some supply relief in the coming years or that there is any long-term cost curve out there to justify current market prices. But it's hard to see a probable scenario where the lithium market does not remain structurally tight to varying degrees or one where our industry returns to prior trough pricing levels On the other side, it's important to acknowledge just how resilient lithium demand has been. Despite having gone through a global pandemic where no industry, region or consumer was left unaffected, forecasted lithium demand growth has not only not slowed down, but it's exceeded just about every published forecast available. The latest cautionary flags being waved point to fears amongst commentators that high lithium prices will be demand-destructive. or to the negative impact of a potential global economic slowdown, especially on consumer demand. While we do not intend to dismiss the likelihood of either, there are still many reasons to remain bullish around lithium. With respect to lithium prices from the recent historical highs we've seen over the last few months, there's been little to no evidence of a resulting slowdown in demand. And even at these higher price levels, lithium still represents a relatively low percent of the total cost of an electric vehicle. Additionally, we're seeing many examples of record profitability from consumers of lithium, including major EV and battery producers. A broader or sustained macro weakening could ultimately have an impact on the end consumer. However, there is merit to a recent EV player's classification of the industry as being somewhat recession resilient. A critical reason for this is just how strongly The shift to electrification is supported by various regions and governments that continue to reinforce their own low-to-zero carbon commitments. Policy incentives and emissions regulations remain hugely influential, and we've seen stepped-up efforts in recent months, particularly in the U.S. As we will discuss, this is the development that we believe is hugely beneficial to Livent and one we have been preparing for. On slide 7, I'd like to provide some more Livent-specific comments. and why the company is so well positioned as we move into 2023. As we said earlier, this is a business that will continue to generate meaningfully higher cash flow. Our growth is supported by being able to sell an incremental 6,000 metric tons of internally produced LCEs in 2023, or a roughly 25% year-over-year increase. Additionally, a large portion of these incremental volumes are uncommitted today from a pricing standpoint. So if market prices remain resilient in 2023, which is in line with our and apparently most other observers' expectations, we would achieve higher average realized prices versus 2022. We're therefore confident that we will generate meaningfully higher cash flow under a wide range of scenarios. While it may be somewhat premature to speak to cost trends, it is fair to say that we are not projecting a material improvement in raw materials and other input costs in a broad-based high inflationary environment. But with that said, as an integrated producer, our exposure to third-party costs is much lower than those who have to source their lithium inputs externally. And we've shown an ability to pass through certain key cost to customers in 2022. We're projecting capital spending in 2023 to be higher than 2022. This is not a change to our previous expectations as we continue to execute on our roughly $1 billion in investment plans from 2022 through 2024, excluding Damascus. We will begin to see the initial benefits of these efforts in early 2023 when we ramp up our first 10,000 metric ton phase of carbonate expansion in Argentina. something we can do relatively quickly given the unique nature of our DLE-based processes. Given some of the recent announcements in the U.S. from the current administration, I want to spend some time on slide 8 highlighting Liven's regionalization efforts and why the company is so well positioned to take advantage of a growing government and industry focus on developing a comprehensive North American energy storage supply chain. As mentioned earlier, we completed a 5,000 metric ton battery-grade hydroxide expansion in the third quarter and have begun the process of ramping up production and qualifying with customers. We expect this ramp-up to be complete in the first quarter of 2023, aligning with the completion of our first carbonate expansion in Argentina, which will provide the feedstock for the plant. This additional capacity builds on Liven's position as the largest producer of lithium hydroxide in the U.S. and one of the few hydroxide producers outside of China today. We also want to provide an update on Namaska, as the project is now reaching the conclusion of its detailed engineering phase. Having done this work, we remain as committed as ever to helping bring Namaska into production. We continue to believe that Namaska will be critical to a future North American supply chain, and we are excited to be a part of it. As a reminder, NAMASCA is a fully integrated lithium hydroxide project located in Quebec, Canada, in which Livent is a 50% and equal partner today alongside Investment Quebec, an investment group owned by the government of Quebec. NAMASCA plans to have 34,000 metric tons of nameplate capacity of battery-grade lithium hydroxide and will have over 30 years of mine life as a very large and cost-competitive asset. It will have access to zero carbon hydroelectric power and will be strategically located close to regional shipping ports at an industrial park being developed in Beacon Corps. This is expected to become a global battery materials hub, and there have already been multiple announcements to produce cathode active materials at the site alongside Namaska, creating a model for localization that we believe is essential to the sustainable development of our industry. Total capex is currently estimated to be around $1 billion, which is consistent with the capital costs of similar integrated projects being developed globally. Mechanical completion for Namaska remains on track for the end of 2025, with the first meaningful production beginning in 2026. The team has already begun ordering important long-lead equipment that is required for construction, which we expect to begin in early 2023. With respect to financing, Namaskar is evaluating a number of attractive options. The resulting structure is likely to include a combination of third-party debt financing, including potential low-cost government funding, financing or prepayments from future customers, and some funding from the existing shareholders, that is, IQ and ourselves. We expect to have more to share and a comprehensive plan in the first half of next year. It is important to reiterate that 100% of future Namaska volumes remain uncommitted to customers today. Livent will play a major role in helping Namaska to identify an appropriate commercial strategy and to manage commercial decision-making. It should come as no surprise that Namaska is looking for us to help them in these areas, given our expertise in qualifying and selling battery-grade lithium products to leading customers globally, and especially in North America. we expect to help Namaska seek a few initial customers that will be both credible and committed to supporting a North American and especially Quebec-centered localized supply chain. Liven recently hired a new senior executive who joins us for a major EV-focused OEM and will lead our efforts in Canada as well as our expansion strategy more broadly. Regionalization of supply chains, both for security of supply and sustainability reasons, has become a growing focus for our industry. Recent actions taken by the US government, led by the Inflation Reduction Act, have provided commitments and incentives to encourage the strengthening of a domestic energy storage supply chain. Given the importance of domestically mined or processed lithium supply in these efforts, we believe Livent is extremely well positioned to take advantage of a number of additional long-term regional growth opportunities. We expect the operations in Bessemer City and at Namaska to qualify for downstream EV credits under the critical minerals requirement for the sourcing and processing of lithium. We also believe there could be cost and capital saving opportunities for Liven via the advanced manufacturing production tax credit portion of the IRA. We will continue to grow our production capabilities in North America and build on our leading domestic footprint. Both the Bessemer City and Namaska projects are designed with significant scope and space to build additional production capacity as we continue to grow alongside our customers. Additionally, Liven is advancing designs that will allow any future production lines to be much more flexible in their ability to utilize a wider variety of lithium feedstock material, including various recycling-produced lithium streams. With the passage of time, we continue to have increased confidence in the decisions we are making to invest in an Americas-based supply chain. I want to conclude with a few ESG-related updates. On the back of our annual sustainability report published in the second quarter, we have continued to make meaningful strides on a number of fronts. As one of the first lithium producers in the world to become a full member of the Initiative for Responsible Mining Assurance, we are leading by example in our industry. and helping to drive an agenda for increased transparency, stakeholder engagement, and responsible growth. At the end of November, Livent will advance to the next stage of the IRMA process by beginning a voluntary and comprehensive on-site assessment of our Phoenix operations in Argentina. During the on-site review, independent third-party auditors will evaluate our claims and seek direct feedback from various stakeholders, including members of local communities. Our participation sends a strong signal that we welcome input from our stakeholders and are committed to responsible growth and continuous improvement in all aspects of our operations. Livent's longstanding commitment to sustainability and the progress we're making across ESG is increasingly being recognized by both our customers and independent organizations that evaluate sustainability credentials. Most recently, Livent was placed in the highest tier of sustainable lithium producers in the inaugural ESG report from Benchmark Mineral Intelligence. This is another testament to Liban's leading sustainability profile and the progress we continue to make as we work to deliver on our 2030 and 2040 sustainability commitments. I will now turn the call back to Dan for questions.

Thank you, Paul. Dennis, you may now begin the Q&A session.

If you would like to ask a question at this time, please press star, the number one on your telephone keypad. Please limit yourself to one question and one follow-up. If you have additional questions, you can jump back in the queue. To withdraw your question, press the pound key.

We'll pause for just a moment to compile the Q&A roster. And your first question is from the line of Chris Katsch with Loop Capital Market.

Please go ahead.

Yeah, good afternoon. So you addressed this somewhat in your formal comments about the industry dynamics, but just obviously demand outstripping supply. In fact, one consultancy we talked to is pointing to more than, I think, 800,000 metric tons of demand this year. So obviously this is underpinning the strong pricing cycle, or maybe even paradigm is a better word. I'm just curious if this dynamic most recently is influencing the procurement strategy of any major OEs that you're engaged with, or is it giving you, um, any thoughts on, on, uh, just revamping your commercial strategy? Just your thoughts on that.

Hey Chris, you know, good question. Um, yes and no. I think, I think those of you including yourself who followed us for many years know that we've, we've always tried to be commercially focused, right? We don't think the answer in this industry is producing cellular products into the market. If you're not engaged with your customers, particularly when you're making hydroxides, you can get really blindsided by changes in battery technology or changes in who's making buying decisions in the supply chain. And so I think it's fair to say that our commercial engagement has allowed us to constantly sort of look forward and have a reasonably accurate view as to what dynamics are coming. And we've largely been kind of not surprised. I think what we're seeing today, I think the interesting dynamic that I see today, I'm not sure it's necessarily driven by the high prices, although I think it gets a bit more attention this way. I think it's the OEM realizing that they're ultimately paying for the lithium, and they're the ones that in the end are going to suffer if they don't have enough access to the lithium. And so to varying degrees, they're looking around and saying, what role do we play? It can't be zero in most cases. even people that have been 100% we will buy all the lithium are backing away from that and say that's maybe not possible anymore. And we're going to have to let other parts of the supply chain see if they can source the lithium too. I mean, ultimately, if you're a cathode producer or maybe a cell producer, it's up to you as to what grade of lithium you can use. It's up to you to develop a process if you can to make it easier to acquire different grades of lithium. I don't see a massive trend in that. In fact, My conversations with our customers is frankly advising them that they are crazy to keep tightening the specifications because they're just making it harder and harder for themselves. But I do think there's going to have to be more flexibility on the part of the OEMs. But I also think that today there's maybe three or four guys in the world that have actually engaged with actual really credible lithium supply contracts in the OEM world, and it's going to have to go broader than that. I think allowing agents or your supply chain to source everything for you it's going to be really difficult for them. Now, are they acting any differently today? No, I think it's an evolution. I think the shortness of supply rather than the prices, and maybe they see the prices as a perfect indicator of the shortness of supply, is really what's triggering their behavior, which, you know, go back and read our script from a year and a half ago. We predicted this. This was going to happen, right? There's going to be a look forward and someone's going to realize they just don't have the raw materials secured. And so I think there's a Desperation is a strong word, but certainly a lot more concern amongst the auto manufacturers today about whether they will have enough material.

I appreciate that. So my follow-up question, and I think you touched upon this. You mentioned a strategic hire, and I did pick up on this in the public domain that I believe this hire is referred to as now your chief strategy officer, this person that she was formerly – I had a battery materials procurement at, as you put it, a major EV company. And so I'm just wondering if you could just elaborate a little bit more on the rationale for the hire and what her mandate will be. Thank you.

Yes, the rationale is really, really straightforward. We obviously had a huge amount of engagement with her. She's incredibly talented. She knows the industry probably better than anybody else. And it's a great cultural fit with Liven. And She also brings some other specific skills and qualities that lend herself, for example, to operating in Quebec, which is where we have certainly tasked her with taking the lead on everything Canada-related to us. We see Canada, and particularly Quebec, as being the second hub for Lyvan after Argentina and, frankly, probably surpass Argentina with time. And there's opportunities broadly in our view across Canada that she'll take the lead on. But I think also she can help us with just a whole range of different areas of where we take the business, what we do in recycling, for example, what our strategy will be there, how large we go and how big we go in terms of product mix, carbonate versus hydroxide, even in metal space. So it really reflects the fact that Liven is growing. We can't keep... We can't keep pretending that with the company we were five years ago or even three years ago and in three or four years' time, I think we'll be unrecognizable. And to get there, we need more talent. We need people with capabilities. And we need to invest not just in assets and resources, but in the people that we have. I believe the people we have in our areas of expertise are the best in the entire industry. And that is a source of competitive advantage. And we're going to keep adding talent, particularly talent like this person, as much as we can, to be honest, Chris.

Your next question is from the line of David Deckelbaum with the Cowan & Company. Please go ahead.

Thanks for taking the time, Paul. My first question was just a follow-up on Namaska. Just wanted to understand the timing. One, I think the last update was estimated CapEx at 100% level is $1 billion. Is that still subject to final feasibility studies? And then I guess, would that CapEx begin already in the first half of 23? Would that just be early works construction before you might be announcing some sort of, you know, holistic financing plan and structure?

You know, that capital number is to what we call an FEL3 level, which is essentially we're confident of it to plus or minus 10%, which is the level we insist and so the investment in Quebec insists we get to. in order to give construction approval, you know, too many projects. You've seen numbers out there where they're FL1 or FL2 level, which is plus or minus 30%, 40%, 50%. You can't make investments. You certainly can't start ordering items and starting construction that way. So it is absolutely a definitive number as far as we will go in terms of the engineering. So it's a pretty solid number for sure. The spending has frankly already started. Remember, this is an integrated project. It's both a mine and it's the hydroxide plant. A lot of the spending of the mine actually already took place in the previous incarnation, and it's spending that doesn't have to be repeated. So at the mine level, frankly, the mine is sort of sat waiting for the chemical plant. We could certainly start. We could bring the mine up and running much more quickly, probably sometime maybe in late 23, early 24 if we really wanted to, But we're not going to sell spot concentrate. We're not going to export spot concentrate. I don't think the government of Quebec wants us to do that. We don't want to do that. So we will defer additional spending on the mine until closer to the point at which the chemical plant is built. The chemical plants take two or three years to build. People can tell you whatever they wish, but unless they've got a special magic into some of the long lead item producers, you know, the crystallizers and some of the And by the way, we compete for parts with like copper projects, for example. It's not like everything's unique to lithium. You just can't get this stuff inside two or three years. You shouldn't order this stuff until you're at the L3 level anyway. So this is just the nature of why it takes so long to build these things. Maybe somebody has a magic path in China, but in the West, that's just how long it takes. The groundbreaking to start construction of Beckham Co. will start in January, February. It's always a little more difficult in Canada because it gets so cold in winter, so we have to sort of phase when we start the construction. But the construction itself is not, frankly, the item that pushes that until 25, 26. It's these long lead items.

Fair enough. Thanks for the color, Paul. And then my second question was hoping to take a stab at the percentage of volumes on market-based pricing. Maybe if you want to stick to high level, you can walk us through the evolution of contracting, which this year I think was around 70% of your volumes were on fixed price arrangements. And that's evident in kind of the guidance that you're giving through 4Q. One, I guess, would those contracts be coming up for review in 23? And then certainly, I guess, with the expansion at Solar Ombre, I assume that the incremental volumes would be under new contracts. Maybe you can give us a a high-level sense of just that mixed shift and when that would be occurring?

It's really straightforward. I think those contracts we've sent this year roll forward into next year. Those volumes are still under a fixed price next year. The additional volumes, as and when they come on, with a few adjustments here and there, largely we're free to sell at whatever price we wish. We may do them under contract. We may just sell them, frankly, at $79.15 or whatever the latest realized price in China is. That's a decision we'll make later in the year as those products come online. But almost certainly, even if we contract them, they will be market-exposed prices. I think as you look forward a little bit further, you should assume that as we go through 24 and 25, I personally believe the day of the fixed price contract has been killed by the last 12 months. I don't think anybody's renewing a contract at fixed prices. I think cash and collars will have a bigger role to play, but there'll be a lot of flexibility and market price movements there. within caps and collars. And the reason for that is very simple. You could get away with a fixed price when the tension over that price was never too great. The market price is $3 higher or $3 lower. But when the market price is tens and tens of dollars higher, you just have too much tension around a fixed price contract. So whichever way you look at it, fixed price contracts probably are no longer going to be part of our industry, generally speaking, is my own view. And so as fixed price contracts do roll over, they're all going to roll over into some form of market-based pricing.

Your next question is from the line of Steven Richardson with Evercore ISI. Please go ahead.

Good evening. Thanks for the time. Paul, I was wondering if you could address, you know, last quarter we talked about the GM transaction and the pre-sell or however you want to categorize it. I'm wondering if you could talk a little bit about conversations with your other customers and how that may have kind of changed the tenor of conversations with other your potential customers and your existing customers, knowing that you have this longer term commitment and tie up with GM.

Yeah, it's an interesting one. I think there are, I'm going to describe this three different types of customers. There's the customer that has kind of had the market for themselves for many years, And their reaction, which I think is largely, you know, as you would expect, no surprise. I mean, the market's evolving. There's a lot more competition coming in. And when that relationship that we've had with customers goes back so far and so long, it's an honest, open conversation about where are we with each other and what does it mean and what is expected of that customer as we go forward. And what's expected of us, by the way, with that customer as they move forward. There's the customers that are contracted with us relatively early in their relationship. frankly get a little nervous that does this mean there won't be more volumes for them in the future and so there's a it helps our engagement with that customer because it forces them to come and really understand what our investment plans are where they sit in those investment plans and equally what they can do to be more prominent in our future supply chain plans which is they're all keen to do and then there's the customers that we don't supply today that have been wanting to be supplied by us and frankly i think it creates a little bit of panic and uncertainty on their part and Again, I don't want to use the word desperation because that's not actually a valid word for what is going on out there, but it's created, I think, more concern that people like Liven and I think others in the industry aren't going to have 10 major customers. I think we're going to be serving three or four, and we're going to pick the customers that fit best with us on multiple different parameters. And so there comes a bit of a dating game going on, I think, amongst the uncontracted customers as to who do they want to try and persuade to partner up with them.

That's great. Very helpful.

One thing I was wondering if you could just clarify or give us your read on is the tax credit element on critical minerals as part of the IRA, the language around U.S. sourced and FTA sourced. Could you just clarify your ability to meet that and your customer's ability to meet that requirement with material that's sourced from Argentina. Sounds like there'll be a pretty broad reading of that. It really just means not China sourced, but I was wondering if you could just... No, I don't think that's the case.

I actually think it's going to be a very narrow reading of it. If you look at the comments that... the Treasury Secretary made recently. I don't think the interpretation of the wording is going to be a broad one. I think it's going to be quite a narrow one. I think what is interesting, I think most people's reading of it, not ours, but obviously our customers read it very carefully too, which is if the final product coming in is from a country with a free trade agreement, then it's going to be eligible. Frankly, in Lithuania today, that's only one place. That's Chile. Carbonate coming from Chile. If the product is processed into a secondary product, a usable product in the U.S., that will also qualify. So lithium carbonate from Argentina into Bessemer City converted in lithium hydroxide, that lithium hydroxide is processed in the U.S., that will qualify. Spodumene concentrate coming out of Australia processed into carbonate or hydroxide in China will not qualify, even though Australia does have a free trade agreement. So it's not always as clear and as simple as you might think, right, in terms of lithium, because you think it's a benefit for Australia, but the product Australia produces can't be used in the U.S. or won't come here. The product in Argentina, made by us at least, can be processed into a usable product. And so although there's no pre-trade agreement with Argentina, that actually will be okay, provided it runs through additional value-added processing in the U.S.

That's a really helpful clarification. Thank you very much. Your next question is from the line of Christopher Parkinson with Mizuho.

Please go ahead.

Awesome. Thank you very much. Paul, could you just quickly run through just the various projects and expansions and just kind of cite where you are, where you expect to be, and just anything that could instill further confidence in getting these up and running over the next year or two? That would be very helpful. Thank you.

Sure. So first 10,000 tons in Argentina, all carbonate. It will be mechanically complete carbonate. There's four pieces to it. Three of them will be mechanically complete in the next few weeks. The last one just after the new year, which means that we can start feeding that plant and getting it up and running. It'll start producing, as we said, sometime in the second quarter. The second 10,000 ton expansion, which was sort of linked to the same infrastructure as this one, which is like so much quicker, will be mechanically complete 12 months later. So it'll go up and running again. And then we have another 20,000 ton expansion coming that will follow that. which will be mechanically complete by the end of 2024. So, you know, we've got big chunks coming on at the end of 2022, end of 2023, and end of 2024 in Argentina. We just mentioned Damascus will be done by the end of 2025 and producing in 2026. We have Bessemer City expansion is already complete, 5,000 tons that will be up and running and producing and shipping to customers sometime early next year. And then we have a 15,000-ton expansion in China for hydroxide which will be completed by the end of 2023 and also, no doubt, commercially contributing sometime early, mid-2024.

Got it. And just as a quick follow-up, I mean, you and others have been signing a plethora of strategic partnerships. I'm sure you're happy with those. But kind of now that you've had a chance to kind of take a step back and see what you've already been accomplishing, is there anything else on the horizon which the street should be considering in terms of that? Are you kind of happy with the ones you've already done over the last you know, 12 to 18 months. Any color would be helpful. Thank you. Are you talking customer commitments or supply commitments?

Look, our customer commitments and the ones we've made are nowhere near big enough to keep us happy. We just don't have any more supply to sell anymore. And so we're very happy with the customers that we've lined up with. I think our engagement with them, their engagement with us, their openness, it's just been really great. It's been really great to see and we're very happy with it. we would like to sell them more product. Our aim is to get them a lot more product. Our aim is to add maybe one more, maybe two more major customers, but we need to expand our supply first. So it's a bit chicken and egg. I think it's why we've hired somebody to help us as quickly as we can expand our production footprint, all so that we can meet the supply requirements to our existing and one or two new customers.

Thank you very much.

Your next question is from the line of Graham Price with Raymond James. Please go ahead.

Hi. Good afternoon. Thanks for taking the question. Just following up on the previous question, I guess the first capacity expansion in Argentina, once that comes online early next year, how long does that take to ramp up, to reach kind of steady state?

It depends on the time of year. Luckily for us, it's coming out in the summer, which means we can usually move the material through the process in a month rather than four or five months. That doesn't mean it'll take a month. Just making sure nothing leaks and everything works takes a couple of months. My expectation of the team is that they will be producing material that is capable of being used in a hydroxide plant before the end of the second quarter.

Got it. That makes sense. And then looking to Bessemer City, you mentioned that there is additional capacity for expansion there. Just wondering, you know, ultimately what the maximum capacity there would be and, you know, if you decided to. to expand the timeframe for that?

I think, I'm not sure there is a limit. It's a massive site. I mean, we used to mine there, right? And so 200 and something acres. And we put room down for a second 5,000 ton line to sit next to the first one. But frankly, I don't think it would take a huge leap to add multiples of that in Bessemer City if we could. Frankly, the biggest issue is just expensive to do it in the US. You know, it's all very well one in U.S.-based production, but someone has to pay for that. It's probably 10 times the capital of doing it in China. And when you actually think back, the nature of that particular beast is that it requires carbonate, so you also have to source the carbonate in Argentina. It's a pretty significant capital commitment to expand. So it really comes down to whether customers are willing to pay to make it worthwhile. I mean, we can keep doing it, I wouldn't say all day, all year, but we can certainly do multiple iterations in Bessemer City if the

if the customers are there for us. Got it. No, that's helpful. Thank you very much.

Your next question comes from the line of Joel Jackson with BMO. Please go ahead.

Hey, Paul. How you doing? Hey, Joel. I'll try this question, and maybe you'll run with it or not. Well, let's say that spot prices kind of stay where they are for the next couple years, okay? What would you think would be your average selling price? So you've got your fixed pricing locked in for next year. You've got new tons, some uncommitted ones. What would kind of liven, realize price gain, kind of be year over year in 23 versus 22? Maybe you can ballpark it, give us a range, assuming spot stay where it is, please.

I know you want me to run with that. I'm going to hold off running with it, but I will answer it next quarter when we give guidance for 23. It's going to be higher, right? One way that it's going to be higher, but that's not necessarily about the pricing environment. It's about us having more volume able to sell at that high price. And I think over time, I don't think, I really don't think that price you see in China is going to be the benchmark price for lithium pricing in the long run. I really don't. I just, it's too volatile. It's too variable. And I think too much of the supply chain now is pulling itself out of China for the long run. But for the next three or four years, everything's going through China still. Just forget that. There are no cathode plants in North America. There's limited cathode capability in Europe. Lithium's going into China today, largely. So that's why it's such an important price and why if you are in China with uncontracted volumes, it's a fantastic market to be in. But never where we've been. And I think if we were to turn around to all of our customers today, And so that's it. We're locking you in. You're going to pay whatever the China price is. I think we lose a lot of what we offer to these customers in terms of reliability, predictability, partnering. And I think that carries with it pretty big penalties for a business like ours that requires great visibility as to what the electrification roadmap is of our customers because it impacts what we do, what we make, where we invest. So I think it will certainly push up average prices in our industry, realized prices next year. for those of us that have a multi-year kind of portfolio of customer contracts. But I don't think anybody is going to reach an average realized price that is close to that China price.

Okay. I'm going to ask a two-parter for my second question. Just on Namaska, I think you said earlier you're looking at financing options. I mean, do you need to start raising capital in Q1? When is the capital intensity really starting to pick up? And the second question is... You know, there's a lot of feedback from investors, as you know, that, okay, it's as good as it gets in lithium, right? It can't get better, it can't get better. And $70,000 a ton lithium, you know, there's a reason why people say that. Okay. And a lot of things that people will cite as here's what's coming next, you know, whether it be battery inventories, cathode inventories, European EV demand elasticity, China, it's over, it's over. What would be your answer to that?

Yeah. So, look, I think, let me deal with that one first. My answer to that is pretty straightforward. I don't think in terms of average realized prices for liven, it's anything close to as good as it gets, not even close. And you and I have spoken about this, right? If the price in China dropped from the $80 that people are quoting today to half that much next year, our average realized price would still significantly go up. And likely if it stays there for a few years, our average realized price is going to go up for two or three more years. This is just a function of us, A, bringing on more volume, and that volume is going to go out the door at a higher average realized price than we saw in 2022, plus these fixed price contracts I mentioned expiring and being replaced with floating price contracts. So I don't know that for actual earnings delivery, for profitability, for cash flow generation, I really don't think that's as good as it gets. Is $80 as good as it gets? Our internal prediction is it's going much higher in Q4 than $80. We'll see because, you know, no doubt, As a former boss of mine said, you know, trees don't grow to the sky. At some point, it has to stop. At some point, this has to abate. And I think it's sort of somewhat masked a little bit at the moment. The strengthening of the U.S. dollar means that the prices have relatively constant in USD terms as it continues to climb in RMB terms. There comes a point that's got to stop, but it probably isn't due forward this year. And your question on the masker, I forgot what it was already.

It was, well... You got the capital call. Not the capital call. It's going to start coming quickly.

It's a lot, right? It'll be the back end the next year at the earliest. It won't be the first half of next year. We don't expect to have to. We're still not out there thinking we have a capital raising requirement from the master period at any point during the project. We won't see a big live and kind of market call for capital to fund the master. It's going to come out of existing cash flow. Or more importantly, there's other sources of financing. I mean, Damascus is standalone still. It'll sort its own financing out. Other than IQs, the shareholders will dictate what their financing looks like. It's not just going to be every dollar they get gets provided 50% or that they need gets 50% IQ. That's not how we're going to finance this.

Paul, may I ask one more on that? I think you guys are going to account for Damascus on what do you call it, like an equity investment kind of basis. Will it be like the Albemarle Greenbushes, JV? Are you going to? It's going to be after-tax net income before EBITDA. Can you tell us how you're going to do it on the income statement?

It's really simple. Unlike other situations, there will be no supply arrangement between Namaska and Liven. Namaska is a standalone company, and so we'll just represent our share of the profits of Namaska until we consolidate it. We will consolidate it at some point in the future, but until that point, we'll just capture 50% of the net income of Namaska in a single line item.

So not EBITDA? So it won't be an EBITDA, it'll just be a net income and EPS, correct?

The usual accounting is net income. It's not going to be a proportionate consolidation down the balance, down the income statement. It's going to be straight, single line, percentage of net income. Okay, thank you very much. But it doesn't really matter, Joel, because the mask is not producing or selling in the next two or three years. So it's kind of irrelevant, to be honest. It's only when it's up and running, at which point I would hope we're consolidating by that point, I would hope.

Your next question is from the line of Kevin McCarthy with Vertical Research Partners. Please go ahead.

Good evening. Paul, the theme of reshoring has gained a lot of traction over the last year or two. You've added five kilotons of hydroxide in North Carolina, and you're adding triple that amount, or 15 kilotons in China, maybe a year from now. I guess my question would be, How do you think the IRA will impact capital allocation moving forward? It seems you've got new credits stateside, but I think you also commented the capital differential is 10x. So as you look at future needs, how do you weigh those countervailing pros and cons in determining where to add capacity?

No, let me start by saying I don't think there'll be no response to the IRA in other parts of the world. I suspect that, look, maybe the IRA itself is the response to actions and incentives given in China. I don't know whether Europe is going to have to sort of really take a long hard look at itself and decide what it wants to be onshore and what it doesn't. It doesn't seem to have a particularly coherent policy and certainly doesn't seem to have a particularly well thought out incentive structure to onshore policy. But that may happen as well. I think it's a really difficult question because I think people ask, well, do you get reasonably differentiated pricing for products? I think that's quite possible. I think you may have regionally different expectations about how much capital a customer is forced to give you in order to incentivize you to produce. It's a big difference, though. It's a big difference that's going to have to be resolved. And I think in lithium and especially in areas like nickel, It'll be interesting to me because some of the big producing areas may make them double down and focus on China more and say, look, we just can't meet that. It's either too much capital or because we don't have a free trade agreement. And China actually may get a short-term big advantage out of this. And there may be more investment in China and around China in processing. Because bluntly, if you're producing Australian spodgy, you've either got to keep shipping it to China or you've got to build onshore hydroxide capability. We know how hard that is in Australia. in order to serve the U.S. I don't know many Australian miners are quite emotional about the investment decisions they make. I think they're quite hard-headed about it, and I suspect they're going to keep shipping to China.

Thanks. I appreciate the thoughts.

Our next question is from the line of Jeff Zakowskis with J.P.

Morgan. Please go ahead.

Thanks very much. Your sequential price mix in the quarter was zero. Is it the case that the 70 percent of fixed price contracts that you have that are longer extended are such that as a base case that revenue effect on those tons should be zero for the next five quarters? And for the 30% that's not fixed, how long should it remain zero? That is, you must have sold forward, I guess, at a certain price or made some commitments. Can you explain that?

Welcome to the call, Jeff. Thanks. I'm not quite sure I understand your point about sell forward. Look, it's really straightforward. Let's take a really simple example. If our mix of customers between Q2 and Q3 was exactly the same, and I sold exactly the same proportion to my fixed price contract, and I have different ones, right? So those proportions are the same quarter to quarter. My volume and the amount that goes into the market is also the same. Q2 to Q3 realized pricing wasn't massively different. It was a little bit higher in Q3, but not much. So you would expect price mix in that situation to not be massively different. If for whatever reason, and you may see this in Q4, the amount going to fixed price contract relative goes up, my price mix is going to be down. Unless there's a massive jump in the market-based piece of it to offset, it's going to go down, right? Because the mix works against me at that point in time. It's frankly just math. I mean, I think it's the danger of looking at it on a quarter-by-quarter basis. It's why we don't guide on a quarter-by-quarter basis. We don't really run the business on a quarter-by-quarter basis. We run it on an annual basis. And so I tend to encourage people to not get too hung up on that piece. While we're still on track for our full-year guidance, while all of our predictions as to average realized pricing and makes, et cetera, for the full year are what we said, I'd advise and ask you to not get too hung up or read too much into quarterly movements. I know it's a tendency to do that, to try and get more data, but more data doesn't necessarily give you a better decision or a better understanding in our industry.

Okay. Then I'll try a longer-term question. I apologize if it's too naive. What you said is that the costs of construction in North America are sometimes 10x what they are in China. And when you look at your lithium hydroxide expansion in China, where you're expanding 15,000 tons for 25 million, if we scaled that up to 34,000 tons, that would be 56 million. And at the Damasco plant or the hydroxide plant, The capital spending is $650 to $750. So do we get for $650 to $750 in Canada what we get for $56 in China? Or we get something more?

Fundamentally different projects. Fundamentally different projects. You could not build the Quebec, the Canada, the Damascus spodumene to hydroxide plant for $56 million in China. I mean, it's of a different scale. It's of a different complexity. Our carbonated hydroxide plants, bluntly, are quite simple processes. They shouldn't cost as much as they do in the U.S. They just do, and they would in Europe, too. So you can't compare those two. You can compare, essentially, the Bessemer City plant versus a China plant. And that's when I talk about, you know, an 8 to 10 times difference. And it's probably come down a little bit lately. China has got a bit more expensive, and we have found more efficient ways to do it in the U.S., but it's still five, six, seven times as much, and it's exactly the same plan, exactly the same capabilities. But like I said, don't compare it with Canada. Fundamentally different plan.

Great. Thank you so much. Your next question is from the line of Corinne Blanchard with Deutsche Bank.

Please go ahead.

Hey, good afternoon. Thank you for taking the time. My first question, I would actually get a little bit more color on the implied 4Q. So the guidance was narrowed up, but I think in one of the last slides in your presentation, pricing was flat in 3Q, and you mentioned expecting increased pricing going into 4Q. So I'm just trying to reconcile which kind of safe one share growth we can expect for EBITDA or are we looking at a flatish EBITDA quarter over quarter?

Yeah, look, I think you see our guidance range and you know what our year-to-date EBITDA is. And so clearly to me, our guidance range, EBITDA is going to be lower in Q4 than in Q3. It reflects a bunch of different stuff. It reflects mixed differences in Q4. We've seen increasingly end of Q4 shipping logistics gets difficult. And so we don't recognize revenue until the product arrives. If the product stays in the water an extra week over the New Year or two weeks, it can impact revenue for sure. We're expecting that to happen. We're expecting that to happen this year. So there's a whole bunch of different things going on in Q4 which bluntly sort of reflect the specifics of us. They reflect the specifics of the way our customers are taking product, where they're taking the product, what product it is, and also the fact that it's the end of the year. So it's I would describe Q4, the broad environment, to be probably slightly stronger than it was in Q3. I think the opportunity in Q4 for us is slightly stronger than it was in Q3, but we are more constrained into how much we can take advantage of that opportunity in Q4 versus Q3.

Okay, thank you. And then maybe just the follow-up question, going to switch. On the demand side, I think we're started to hear more and more concern about China easy demand and going into 2023 and, you know, putting more on macro. I know you have commented a little bit, but anything else you kind of had or have you seen any sign of softness going into the end of the year and next year?

You know, my only comment on this is, you know, when you have lithium growth being, you know, I don't know, 5%, 10%, quarter over quarter, and you have battery demand or battery production levels between Q2 and Q3 doubling in China. I think, yes, you've got a lot of room for softening of demand, in my view, of EVs in China, particularly without it making a slightest dent on the excess of demand over supply. I haven't seen any evidence of slowdown in China. I think there's a lot of expectation that it's going to come. I think there's a lot of nervousness in China about what COVID policies and others are doing to general levels of industrial production. EVs haven't been hit anywhere near as hard. Battery production has not been hit anywhere near as hard. There are more and more contracts being signed in Chinese battery companies to export into Western vehicles. So it's not just... the EV market in China that's driving battery production activity in China. So it's just one factor. It's a complicated market. There's a lot of pieces moving around. We've yet to find many examples of a single metric having a clearly determinative effect on lithium demand. It tends to be a bunch of different factors that are happening that will drive the impact on our industry.

Great. Thank you.

This concludes the Q&A portion of today's call. I will now turn the call over to Daniel Rosen for any closing comments.

Thanks a lot. That's all the time we have for the call today, but we will be available following the call to address any additional questions you may have.

Thanks, everyone, and have a good evening. This concludes the LiveIn Corporation third quarter 2022 earnings release conference call. Thank you. You may now disconnect.