I will explain

What is genuinely attractive

The resource is enormous: 946Mt at 50.1 ppm scandium, containing 47,357 tonnes of scandium metal, plus separate overlapping resources for gallium and rare earths. It is near surface, described as free-dig regolith, and only about 25 km from Esperance's deepwater port. There are also roughly 14,000 archived pulps still available for inexpensive re-assaying, so MRD can potentially increase the resource without spending heavily on drilling.

The Selectro process is probably the most interesting part of the story. Initial testwork achieved about 80% scandium recovery, 56% gallium recovery and 77–83% heavy-REE recovery from the same material. If that eventually works economically at scale, the co-products could dramatically improve the economics of what would otherwise be a very low-grade scandium deposit.

And the geopolitical story is real rather than marketing fantasy. The U.S. government has conditionally committed up to US$400 million of 25-year financing to Sunrise Energy Metals' Syerston scandium project. That is strong evidence that Western governments care about establishing non-Chinese scandium production.

But there is one enormous issue: 50 ppm is low grade

This is where I think the Cashu valuation becomes too enthusiastic.

MRD is 50.1 ppm Sc. The report's closest comparator, Rimfire, is around 142 ppm, while Syerston is around 414 ppm. The report acknowledges this, but then gives MRD a target valuation of A$4,000 per contained tonne of scandium, actually above Rimfire's roughly A$3,400/t comparable multiple.

That is not conservative in my view.

At MRD's reported 76.8 ppm Sc₂O₃ grade and 80% recovery, producing 60 tonnes of scandium oxide per year would require processing roughly 1 million tonnes of raw material per year at the average resource grade. That's perfectly possible for a mine, but it means reagent cost, beneficiation, water, impurity removal and plant throughput matter enormously.

And none of those economics have been established.

Cashu itself admits the 80% recovery comes from bench-scale tests on composite samples; it is recovery into solution, not a saleable finished product. Reagent consumption, impurity behaviour, downstream separation and capital costs remain unquantified, and there isn't even a scoping study yet.

That is the single biggest thing I would want resolved.

The peer valuation is less convincing than it initially looks

At the report date MRD was 3.2¢ and Cashu calculated EV/contained-scandium of about A$860/t. The stock has subsequently risen to 4.3¢, giving it a current market cap of roughly A$57m.

Using Cashu's 1.328 billion shares and A$1.89m cash, I calculate current EV at about A$55.2m, or approximately:

A$1,166 EV per tonne of contained scandium.

Rimfire currently has an enterprise value around A$29m and its attributable scandium inventory is roughly 9,444t, or about A$3,100/t.

So yes, MRD still appears much cheaper per contained tonne.

But here is the useful sanity check: Rimfire is roughly 142 ppm vs MRD's 50 ppm. If you crudely adjust Rimfire's EV/t for that ~2.8× grade advantage, its equivalent valuation comes out around A$1,080/t — remarkably close to MRD's current ~A$1,166/t.

That's not a proper mining valuation, but it illustrates the problem with Cashu's argument: some or even most of MRD's apparent discount could simply be compensation for the much lower grade.

The co-products, free-dig material and Selectro process could eventually justify a higher multiple — but first they have to be demonstrated economically.

I'm also cautious about the scandium price assumption

The report says scandium oxide sells around US$3,350–3,500/kg.

There really isn't one transparent scandium price. The USGS reported roughly US$640/kg for 99.99% oxide in 2025, while Shanghai Metals Market currently shows Chinese scandium oxide around US$590–690/kg depending on purity. Western strategic procurement and project assumptions can be much higher; Sunrise, for example, uses a US$1,500/kg long-term assumption, while some U.S. government purchases have been far higher still.

That enormous pricing dispersion tells you how immature this market is.

It's particularly important because the entire world currently produces only around 80 tonnes/year. MRD has 72,637 tonnes of contained scandium oxide in the ground — hundreds of years of today's global market. More contained tonnes therefore cannot logically be valued linearly forever. Offtake and actual market growth matter much more than simply proving another 10,000 tonnes of resource.

Dilution is another thing I would expect

Cashu's A$0.144 target explicitly assumes no dilution. Yet the report also says further capital raising is likely because MRD is pre-revenue, has only about A$1.89m cash, and needs metallurgical work, studies and eventually a demonstration plant.

That doesn't bother me by itself — explorers have to raise money. The current higher share price actually makes fundraising easier. But it does mean that 14.4¢ on today's 1.328bn-share denominator is optimistic. A few years of development could leave substantially more shares outstanding.

When it comes to Scandium

NioCorp seems to be ahead everyone else

NioCorp
Put them on your Radar
October 23rd 2025

When it comes to Scandium

NioCorp seems to be ahead everyone else

When it comes to Scandium

NioCorp seems to be ahead everyone else

After the announcement with Lockheed Martin

https://finance.yahoo.com/markets/commodities/articles/niocorp-signs-mou-lockheed-martin-145645612.html

NioCorp is Now at $4.04

And they haven’t even started delivering the Scandium to Lockheed Martin

Mount Ridley is at 31¢ per share
But they haven’t even started mining or have even signed any Memorandum of Understanding with any American or Australian or Euro Defense companies


Now what do you do?
Explain your strategy

https://youtu.be/RwH-CNpi3hM?