The December quarter saw Lynas achieve the highest average rare earths price since the April 2023 quarter, supporting higher sales receipts and revenue.
Lynas attributed this increase, which saw the average selling price rise from $42.5/kg to $49.2/kg quarter-on-quarter (qoq), to the company’s focus on high-value strategic customers and an optimised product mix.
This enabled Lynas to generate the highest quarterly revenue ($141.2 million) since the June 2023 quarter, with a 17 per cent qoq increase.
Despite this, Lynas acknowledged that market prices remain subdued, with the NdPr price averaging $US51/kg.
“Market conditions remained challenging during the quarter as rare earths market pricing continued at low levels,” the company said.
“While there was a small improvement in the NdPr (neodymium-praseodymium) market price at the start of the quarter, pricing returned to prior quarter pricing levels in December 2024.
“These market conditions are expected to continue into the March 2025 quarter due to continuing subdued inside-China demand and the extended lunar new year holiday period.”
Lynas achieved several milestones during the December quarter, including the opening of its Kalgoorlie plant in November – recognised as Australia’s only operating downstream rare earths processing facility.
Lynas chief executive officer Amanda Lacaze said it was an “incredible achievement” to “construct, commission and commence operations of a facility of this scale and complexity” in less than two and a half years from when full approvals were achieved.
Lacaze said Lynas was also making strong progress on its Mt Weld expansion project, with the successful commissioning and integration of a dewatering circuit in the December quarter, representing the first stage of the project.
This sees Lynas targeting the production of enough feedstock to support 12,000 tonnes per annum of NdPr production.
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