Liontown Resources shares slide after missing second-half guidance
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More news: Shares in Liontown Resources fell in afternoon trade after the lithium miner reported that it had missed second-half guidance for sales, production and operating costs.
At 12:09pm AEST, shares in Liontown Resources had slipped 3.5% to 84 cents.
Fourth-quarter spodumene concentrate production was 10% lower than the preceding quarter, although sales were 4% higher reflecting 51% lower inventories.
Liontown Resources misses second-half sales and production guidance
The news: Lithium miner Liontown Resources has missed guidance on the sale and production of spodumene for the second half of financial year 2025.
The numbers: Liontown sold 165,000 dry metric tonnes (kdmt), 3% lower than the bottom end of its guidance range of between 170kdmt and 185kdmt. Production for the second-half was about 9% lower than guidance at 155kdmt.
Unit operating costs exceeded the top end of cost guidance at $931 per dry metric tonne of spodumene concentrate sold. This was 9% above the top end of guidance.
Meanwhile, all in sustaining cost was $1,256 per dry metric tonne, which was within the guidance range. This reflected lower capital expenditure of $94 million, 5% below the bottom end of guidance.
Across the 11 months since first production in FY25, Liontown produced over 294kdmt and sold more than 283kdmt.
For FY26, Liontown is guiding concentrate production of between 365 and 450kdmt. Unit operating cost is expected to be between $855 and $1,045 per dmt sold while capital expenditure is expected to be between $100 million and $125 million.
All in sustaining costs are expected to be between $1,060 and $1,295 per dmt sold.
Liontown shares were up 0.6% to 87 cents at 11am AEST, having gained around 66% since the turn of the year.
The context: Trialling the processing of ore sorting product – lower grade ores – blended with clean ore affected lithium extraction outcomes for the second half of FY25. This is expected to be temporary but will continue in the first half of FY26.
Unit operating costs were also higher due to lower production and a larger than forecast inventory change because of stockpile utilisation, according to Liontown.
The company says that FY26 is set as a transition year focused on lowering costs before scalable operations are expected from FY27.
