00:04 [music] Hello everyone and welcome to another edition of Triangle Investor Interviews. I'm your host Lucian Walovich. And before I announce my guest, just a quick reminder of a disclaimer. This interview and all my interviews are not a recommendation to buy or sell any shares, products or services.
00:28 Always do your due diligence and consult with your financial advisor. Today I'm joined by Mart Walbert from Contrarian Codex, also known as Yellow Bull, one of the most knowledgeable voices in the uranium and commodity space and someone who has become a good friend of mine over the years. Mart, welcome back.
00:48 Always great to have you. >> Thank you, Lucille. And right back at you as well. I'm glad to be here. It's been too long since we last spoke and I want to apologize to all the listeners and the viewers right now. My webcam sadly broke down and I have not been able to acquire a new one in time.
01:06 So, but I will spare everybody the displeasure of having to look at my face while I talk. So, I guess it's >> not a big problem, Mark. Not a big problem. We will hear what you have to say and we will start that with London and the big uranium picture. You have just returned from the World Nuclear Association symposium that took place in London.
01:29 So what was the biggest takeaway for you and what did the mood among industry participants tell you about the future of uranium market and of course maybe the most important part beyond the headlines. What were the most important developments or conversations that took place over there? >> That's a good question.
01:49 I think that obviously it was a great conference. I put this on Twitter as well. It was very informative. And regarding the mood in the room, it reminded me a little bit of the conference a few years ago when for those who remember, I think it was 2024 or 2023, either one, you had the entire uranium equity space absolutely going down, being murdered, if you will.
02:13 And that meant that the kind of mood from investors viewing the conference from the outside was like everything is going bad. There must be a lot of supply out there. You name it, it was talked about on Twitter, on Reddit, wherever you may be discussing uranium, but the mood in the room at that point was very bullish given the prevailing developments.
02:36 I think this year was kind of similar. You saw the mood from uranium investors and the general sentiment which of course I track in every newsletter I write. You saw it being negative, borderline depression levels. And given what the equities have done over the past few days as we record this, we are firmly back into depression levels.
02:53 And of course, I don't blame people for kind of getting angry at that. Everybody always talking about these bullish catalysts and then the equity is basically punching them in the face. It's never nice to see. But the mood in the room from the people that run this sector, the buyers, the traders, the sellers, the utilities, the financial players, they were all ranging from super constructive to extremely bullish.
03:23 And in that range, you kind of see that the people that are best informed about this sector are very positive about where things are going. Now, of course, people are listening to this and I completely respect that view. They will hear me say this and say Mart this doesn't matter, the equities are going down.
03:40 What are you talking about? And as a counterpoint to that I will say this sector has been volatile since forever. It has swung up and down and you have seen higher lows and lower lows and it's just been all over the place for a long time and riding that volatility can be very important. So for example for last year we bought a bunch of chemical and energy fuels call options just to ride that wave. I am in part a buy and hold investor but in this sector you need to be a little bit more flexible if you will. You need
04:14 to sell into that if the sentiment indicator newsletter is saying we are at euphoric levels it might be time to take some chips off the table and right now depression levels it might be time to add some chips. That's a very long-winded answer to say yes the mood in the room was very good.
04:32 Yes I also get why there was frustration from uranium investors given prevailing price action from the equities but things were going well. Now that was a very long-winded answer. So now to the thing that actually people want to hear about, the conference itself. I think the core takeaway was summed up by one fuel buyer.
04:53 So a contact of mine spoke to this fuel buyer at the very start of the conference after which I spoke to the contact. I also spoke to fuel buyers but what this contact noted directly I think really encapsulates where we are right now and that fuel buyer noted that the main conversation that they used to have when they were securing supply was on the terms.
05:15 What price are we paying? What are the floors? What are the ceilings? Is it market reference or not? What are we looking at? That has shifted over the past few years to now firmly being less about the terms and less about price and far more about supply security, to whether someone can actually deliver.
05:37 And I think that this is due to just them and other buyers in the space being severely disappointed by brownfield restarts, by greenfield development, just timelines shifting, budgets going over multiple times, or some projects not delivering at all. And I think that this disappointment has now shifted their focus to saying okay maybe we don't go for the cheapest pounds available from XYZ developer, maybe we want more security and I thought this was also nicely encapsulated by my conversation with Cassandrom. So for everybody listening
06:19 to this, I wrote a 30-page WNA report on everything and it will provide a lot more details than I'm able to discuss right now because if we would go over all of that, Lucian and all the listeners and me would be sitting here for another six and a half hours probably. So I'm not going to put you all through that.
06:38 But my conversation with Cassandra basically also came down to the fact that over the past few years these more western orientated fuel buyers were not really willing to come to the table at the terms that were set by Cassadin but this year was different. This year they were more than willing to come to the table.
06:58 So what Cassadon recently also noted is that they have two parts of the company where they negotiate these contracts, where they speak to these fuel buyers. One more focused on western utility buyers and one more focused on eastern utility buyers. And for the past few years the, let's call it the phone center for eastern utility fuel buyers was ringing off the hook.
07:23 It was red hot and it remains red hot. But now finally the western side of the quote unquote fuel buyer call center is being more active and I thought that was really interesting, that the buy side had that wake up and smell the coffee moment. I felt like they had that last year as well and we did see price go up.
07:46 I mean it's up over $15 since the last fuel conference which was good to see on relatively minimal volume. That should be said as well. Relatively minimal relative volume compared to what you expect for price action. You probably know what I mean. But right now they are more than willing to come to the table for terms that previously they would have scoffed at.
08:09 They were like I am not signing that contract. Are you crazy? But right now with floors rising into the 80s and beyond and ceilings exceeding $150 if there is even a ceiling in any given contract, all with exposure to higher prices. Lucian, this is a sellers market that we are in and that has been talked about before, but >> we are firmly in a sellers market.
08:31 I think that's easy to state at this point with buyers and also I think that one thing that really encapsulates that is that I just mentioned the fact that these buyers have been disappointed by the supply response but I think they are even more disappointed with the supply response when you take that in context with the price already being $97 and I think that that makes for a completely different conversation than the conversations I had with them in 2021, 2022, 2023.
09:06 There's a big difference and of course you see that in term price and again I know people are listening to this and again I respect the sentiment even though term price is up some of the equities have not really done well, recent equity price action has been very painful but given everything that is building I am a buyer here. Of course all the buy signals and everything will be on the Codex but I am bullish here, I am a buyer here, not of all equities, of certain equities. Not every equity is created equally.
09:37 But given what is happening and of course feel free to interrupt me by the way if I'm talking too much but I'm trying to answer all your questions here >> but you are doing a great job please. >> Okay. Thank you man. Thank you. I hope the listeners agree to this as well. If not you can always use it to try to fall asleep because maybe it's a little bit monotone.
09:58 But you asked me also what is happening beyond the headlines, beyond >> what we've already seen come out of the WNA and I think one of the biggest conversations on the floor was the KHNP, so the Korean enrichment tender which was for 800,000 SWU a year. For those who don't have their SWU to million pounds of uranium calculator with them, that is about, depending on what tails you use, 26 to 31 million pounds of uranium across the lifetime of that contract. That is nearly three times the
10:32 size of the previous Korean tender. And I think that's a statement of intent for them. And I think there are very few suppliers that can match that. And there were other demand side signals as well, the US government RFI that was updated. It was originally posted on August 10th but it was uploaded right at the start of the conference.
10:56 That is for information on the possibility of delivery for roughly £4 million a year. For context, the entire US produced what? 2.12 million pounds a year last year. That was the best year since 2017. Listen, this is not the 1980s anymore. We're not going to produce 43.7 million pounds in 1980. It's not going to happen again.
11:19 I would be surprised if we get past 10 million pounds this cycle. And then you have the, well it's not directly the US government strategic reserve that was discussed earlier this year and last year as well but it is for potential very strategic uses. Let's put it like that because I do not have all the information right now.
11:42 I don't want to make any speculation because it is looking like it will be used for various strategic purposes and you're looking at 4 million pounds a year of unobligated uranium or around 1500 tons of UF6 from the early 2030s into the early 2040s, all domestically sourced, 40 million pounds or more of US domestic uranium that they want to bolster, not directly these strategic reserves but certain strategic reserves and I think that's just a massive statement of intent then because they're competing directly for US origin
12:19 uranium with US utilities. I mean we've seen a juke RFP recently, £400,000 a year for around 5 years into the 2030s with an option for around £300,000 a year for three years or more. That used to be considered not that significant. It used to be an RFP that would probably be met within the first few weeks of it being posted, if not the first week, but relative to now, relative to what is available at certain price levels, it is considered pretty big.
12:52 Let's see what else is there. We had BHP that had an M&A representative on the floor. >> Mhm. >> And I spoke to a few people about that. They were staking some land in the southwestern Aabaska basin, but they seem to be after something bigger. I can't really provide many more details on that front.
13:13 All I can say is that I think people should expect them to be more active. However they want to fill that in, that is up to you. But I do think that we will see more of them. We have seen, I heard one uranium safety veteran that I had the pleasure to speak with talk about hyperscalers being in frequent talk with enrichers, Centrus [auto: "centers"] possibly, and the hyperscalers were described as price insensitive and they were going about it the way that utilities would as well.
13:49 What it looks like right now is that they will play a part in the fuel cycle going forward. Slowly but surely they are kind of building those contacts and building that interest and they're going about it the same way a utility would, securing other parts of the fuel cycle first and then going after uranium later.
14:04 I mean I've even heard one of my contacts at the conference basically just coming out of a meeting and telling me all right at some point down the line these guys don't mess around. They might even buy a mine. I think that right now we're a little bit early in that speculation for buying a mine or buying 50 million pounds, I don't know.
14:23 But the fact that we're moving towards that, I think is also instilling a real urgency for other buyers in the space. Let's see. Oh, I also spoke to one major financial player who noted that trading houses that left in the bear market are staffing up again and that there are bigger balance sheets behind physical traders which I thought was interesting and yeah I think that about covers a few of the interesting things I've seen.
14:54 Of course there's way more in the WNA report that I wrote about, but I really can't go over everything right now, but it will go over a lot, explaining a bit of the current price action, a bit about what is actually keeping term and spot elevated right now. >> No, this was great insights and I want to sum it up.
15:15 So, to your point, utilities are waking up as you said, sentiment unfortunately is in the toilet. Stocks are under pressure. >> Yeah. On the other hand, the spot is going up, the term is going up and the main question is what the investors, I mean the current one and the potential new one want to hear: why are the equities dropping in that kind of really bullish environment.
15:46 And like you said, you are a buyer from here. Disclaimer, I'm a buyer from here as well. But is the pain over here? >> Is the pain over? I think depending on what the market itself does and I don't mean the uranium market. I mean the general market and I know that sounds painful to discuss because when we're talking about all these bullish catalysts and everything that is going right and how everything is building up and the buyers are agreeing to terms with sellers that they would have balked at a few years ago.
16:21 You would have reasonably, if you took all that information without the context of the price action, you would have reasonably been very bullish and expected to be closer to highs. But here we are with URNM being what 40% from that spike that we saw earlier this year at the end of January >> which we went over $80 and we did sell some into that >> because the start of the year just got too incredibly bullish. Things got too big for their own boots if you will and at that point what I told
16:55 what I said before as well is that it is very important to make sure that you are flexible in this sector. Right. At the start of the year, we also run a portfolio at the Codex. We sold a bunch of Dennis and we sold a bunch of Energy Fuels. We sold a bunch of gold and silver miners as well into that run.
17:22 And I think it's good to be flexible. And I also think it's good to note that this sector, given how small it is, and given that it is in parts at least beholden to overall risk appetite in the market, that it is dependent on said risk appetite, if that makes sense. It's kind of difficult to explain without, I'm better at writing this stuff than explaining it in interviews.
17:56 But for you, you read my reports as well and what we see is that I do a lot of macro analysis and it's safe to say that over the past few months it has been extremely rough for risk assets because things have just been so incredibly uncertain with the state of the US dollar, with everything that's happening on the geopolitical fronts, with the various kinetic conflicts that we're seeing, with of course a lot of uncertainty on the fiscal front when it comes to rate hikes, when it comes to US treasury market dysfunction and all of that just doesn't
18:33 really make for a very friendly environment for risk assets even when we see the underlying fundamentals being so strong. Do I think this will last? No, I don't. Do I think that down the line we will see uranium equities being able to quote unquote stand on their own legs a little bit more? Yes, I do.
18:55 We've seen glimpses of that before with the uranium market defying a stagnant broad equities market. I mean, at the start of the year, the broad equities market was relatively stagnant into January, slightly up, but mostly trading sideways and uranium and precious metals did exceptionally well, but that was more of a risk on period of the market.
19:17 So, I think that we are still beholden to that at least in part at least for now. But I do think that it is pretty inevitable that we see far higher prices. Do I come on here to predict a spike? No. No, I don't. I think >> more of a steady rise. Yeah, I think we see more of a stair-step approach upwards and I think that that will drag equities along kicking and screaming >> and yeah I think we are on the right track and I think that this right now presents more of an opportunity rather
19:53 than a trap. What I will say is that the near-term is extremely uncertain. So yes, while I am a buyer, I am managing the cash position that we built after selling into spikes, I am managing that carefully. But yeah, I think that right now, if you are willing to hold for the near-term volatility, I think there is real value here.
20:21 But for now, I think that being a uranium investor also means that you are subject to the waves of general geopolitical and fiscal uncertainty. >> Yeah. Yeah, definitely. Mart, let's talk a bit about the costs with mining labor, equipment, construction and financing costs rising. How is the cost of new uranium supply changing and what could this mean for the long-term price needed to incentivize production? What's your take? I mean at the start of the interview we kind of discussed already that the brownfield restarts and greenfield
20:59 supply, that the response has left a lot to be desired and I think that's putting it kindly and also one thing that people need to note is that of course we've seen costs rise, right, the cost of raw materials that we have seen rise, cost of equipment, cost of shipping, inflation has taken a bite out of literally everything. And what we have seen is that some utilities were still kind of expecting, okay, well, your cost on paper from your 2022 or 2021 feasibility study, it says it was $45.
21:37 Why are you not accepting current prices? Well, because two things. One, those prices are super outdated. >> They're basically double. >> Yeah. Yeah. Basically double. It's so ridiculous, man. And the second reason is we just went through, we're now firmly out of a grueling bear market but a lot of these companies did still go through 10, 15 years of just lower price and just utilities kind of setting the table, setting the rules, it being firmly a buyer market >> I do not blame these guys for saying now
22:12 hold on a minute, we've not waited all this time, burned all this cash, went through a painful bear market to now accept $5 over our C1 cash cost. No, no, no. We are looking at our all-in sustaining cost. Then we want some security in the terms on top of that. Then we want to return shareholder value.
22:38 Oh, and now that it's a sellers market, we also want a little reward for ourselves. So I do not at all blame them for this when literally the entire cost curve is just going up. I think regarding your question, I think the best example is Cassandrom. >> Mhm. >> Having spoken to them at the WNA, they weren't really, how do you call it, they weren't hiding the fact that their costs have gone up substantially.
23:05 I mean you look at their attributable C1 cost of 24.48 a pound. I hope I got that right. It was around 24.25 a pound >> against just under 18 the same period last year. It is up 37% in their C1 cash cost. Their all-in sustaining costs are now getting into the low $40s, that's up 25% year-over-year. All that we are seeing, it is just going up. If the lowest end of the cost curve is rising you can be absolutely sure that every other part of the cost curve is rising as well.
23:44 Of course, most of the damage, yeah, we were talking about the cost across the curve, the material that you need to actually mine uranium, the equipment that you need to actually mine uranium, that is going up. I mean, for them sulfuric acid did most of the damage. Their first half of 2026 weighted average purchase price of around 97.
24:05 3,000 10K per ton. That was up almost 40% year-over-year. It was triple 2022 prices. Acid is now over 15% of their cost base. And of course they're trying to build their own acid plant, the 800,000 ton TQC plant. But that has now slipped a few months to 6 months to maybe 12 months or more.
24:31 It really depends, from Q1 of next year to somewhere either Q3 of 2027 or maybe even 2028 given how acid hungry their assets are. It makes a massive difference. The reason for that of course is that the contractor for the TQC plant, they hit a potential archaeological discovery during the earthworks and heritage law in Kazakhstan has suspended construction and apparently they ran into some ancient rhino and they showed me a video of this at the construction site and it looked remarkable but it's also I think it's
25:12 the most uranium catalyst thing ever that 35 million years ago, this massive ancient rhino decided to die at the place where they now want to build an acid plant. And I just think that's the most uranium thing ever. So, that is super interesting, the fact that that happened.
25:35 But it's just one thing building after another. And again, I cannot stress this enough. Yes, I completely get it that the equities are not doing so well right now. I completely get it. The sentiment is in the toilet. Yes, you have a right to be pissed off at apparently all these catalysts not really doing anything.
25:55 But if you recall a few years ago, I noted that everything in the sector happens with a lot of volatility, but also everything happens slowly slowly and then all at once. And that I feel like is building again. We've seen a lot of those all at once rallies as well. You know how >> Yeah. extremely volatile and extremely sharp to the upside they can be.
26:17 And then every single time it's the same thing with sentiment. We go from there is way more supply out there than we could possibly imagine and this bull market is over. There is not. Otherwise, if there was a lot of supply out there, term price wouldn't be at $97 right now and continuously rising.
26:33 Two, at the top of the rally, nobody has any supply and all the fuel buyers are panicking and it's ridiculous. And it's just the same thing over and over again as the price just keeps grinding higher. But to kind of answer your question, and sorry for all the sidesteps people, this is just kind of the way I do things.
26:51 I promise my reports are a lot more concise and to the point. Yeah, I think that with Kazakhstan being responsible for 40% of world supply and their cost curve, their C1 cost rising 37%, their sustaining cost rising 25%, it is pretty ridiculous where we are heading. I mean Camo says that we need $120 for greenfield.
27:17 I spoke to Camo at the conference. They are extremely constructive on where things are going, to the surprise of absolutely no one of course but >> Lucian even if we get the right price, with all these rising prices and with everything going up and with us needing higher prices, I think it's going to speed it up a little but if you look at development timelines, the WNA report indicates that we are seeing development timelines going into 10 to 20 years and more before you see a
27:55 mine come online against a previously assumed 8 to 15 years. That is absolutely massive. And I think that given all the massive legacy mine assets that are coming offline over the coming 10 years, some of the biggest mines in the world like Cigar Lake of course, you have Cigar Lake extension, Cigar Lake phase 2 going past 2035, but McArthur River 2042, demand is not slowing down, it is accelerating to an extent that if you would have presented me with this sort of demand acceleration 5 years
28:34 ago, I would have called you crazy. But right now, what we're seeing is pretty incredible, that the market is still relatively calm. I mean, prices rising and fuel buyers, they are recognizing what is happening. But I think that we will see a lot more recognition over the coming years when they realize that all these old massive legacy deposits are rolling off and that we are just not seeing enough coming online.
29:04 So maybe we need alternative supply. I remember last year I wrote a massive piece about uranium extraction with phosphate. I wrote a massive piece about Western Australia mining, a little bit about uranium extraction from seawater, uranium extraction from polymetallic mine assets and all of that is contingent on higher prices for longer.
29:33 So [snorts] where do I think we go from here? I know you've not asked me this but given that I'm rambling I might as well add this as well. I [sighs] think there is a very very significant chance and I'm putting that at 85% or higher that we will see $150 uranium and that we will see probably more and that we will see triple digit uranium for longer than perhaps people expect just to make sure that we see enough discovery, we see enough development, we see enough investment into these mine assets to have a chance and in other extraction
30:11 methods as well to just make sure that we can feed what will be a massive and growing demand side. >> Yeah, I'm pretty much in line with what you said over here. But let me return to your words. Not enough supply coming online. That's the key word, key sentence here. How realistic is it that the new uranium development projects being discussed today will actually reach production on time and on budget with, as you know, some existing producers facing operational, financial and permitting difficulties. My question is are
30:45 industry insiders fully aware of how challenging it will be to bring enough new supply online? You probably hear that in the hallways of WNA. I mean I've spoken to a few buyers about this. Yeah. Especially my conversation with Fubar [a fuel buyer] last year which I discuss again in this WNA report that I brought to the Codex, in context of my conversations this year, which basically indicates that they are very much aware, or increasingly aware, that supply, pounds on your
31:26 balance sheet are not pounds in a reactor core and that the over time and over budget, not delivering at all that we've seen from brownfield and greenfield projects and all the rising costs that we've seen, yes they are becoming more aware, yes they are acting on it. I mean we've seen a rising price but still at this point I think that some of these reports on potential supply are a little bit too optimistic. I'm not going to name names. But you've seen several, I don't even have to name names. Anyone listening to
32:05 this that has invested in this space will probably know what companies I'm talking about. A lot of these companies have just failed to deliver in anywhere near the capacity that they perhaps promised in 2020 or 2021 or even 2 or 3 years ago. So given where we are right now on that front, I think that buyers are really starting to wake up to that.
32:28 And I think of course the big one and the big example of where there is perhaps a little bit too much optimism yet and there is a lot of room for a real shock moment which I think is Arrow. Of course they're targeting 2030 for Arrow to come online. And next has stated they want to produce tens of millions of pounds, almost 30 million pounds.
32:57 They even, I think I even saw a statement where they might want to push it beyond 30 million pounds. I already thought 29 million pounds a year was aggressive. Let's put it like that. I don't want to bash the company, but it's a very very large number to hit. And I don't want to go into too much of the company on why I believe or what I believe will happen.
33:23 I've written about that before so people know my stance about that. I discuss it a little bit in the WNA report as well. But I spoke about the >> the potential, the hypothetical situation with very large traders, with some buyers, with other very experienced industry participants. Basically, what you're seeing is that there is still a view that okay, maybe it's not 2030, maybe it's 2031, but then we see a lot of pounds come online.
33:57 What do you think happens to the market if it's not 29.5 million in 2031, but instead it's £16 million in 2034, 2035? What if they get bought and the mine plan needs to be revised and it gets put in for 2035 maybe again at a lower pound. Maybe it is £60 million and not almost 30. If that happens it will have an outsized impact.
34:31 It will be a shock because I don't think that the market is prepared for that. I think that we have properly run out of shock breakers with mobile inventories being low. Yeah. >> Well, available mobile inventories I should say, with prices being so high, with legacy contracts being by and large flexed up at lower prices. All these, I called them this last year and I want to call them this again.
35:03 All these sort of levers that they were able to pull to perhaps halt a more significant price rise and to give themselves more time. Most of them if not all of them have been pulled at least partly and most of them have been pulled all the way down and once that lever is pulled it cannot be pulled again. >> Yeah.
35:27 And I think that is very significant given the uncertain supply demand backdrop that we're running into. So I think that is absolutely going to have an effect going forward. And I think that this market, when I first started investing in uranium several years ago I honestly expected it to be shorter. I was completely wrong.
35:55 It has been going on for longer. Yes. A lot of people, myself included, expected equities to have done a lot better given the price that we're at right now. I know several of my subscribers have done well kind of trading some options, kind of skimming it off the top, but honestly, I will admit I could have done a lot better on that front as well.
36:20 Not everybody can trade it perfectly. And I'm still trying to improve that where I can. But I think we will have a lot more time to benefit from this bull market because given the way that things are developing right now, we have a long way to go. We need a lot higher prices for a lot longer than people think. >> Yeah.
36:39 Yeah. We didn't touch much on SMRs. SMRs were another important subject in London. Where do we stand Mark today? What did you hear and see when it comes to the SMR development and commercial deployment? How close are we to see a meaningful roll out and of course what would that mean for the uranium demand and a wider fuel cycle? I think to answer your question literally, you asked for when we are close to a meaningful roll out.
37:09 I think a meaningful roll out, we are talking about end of 2030s >> and I know that some people might be listening to this and saying okay end of 2030s so that is not really relevant for today. Why the hell are we discussing this? Because end of 2030s is already relevant here. That saying might be a little bit overused.
37:31 I will admit that. But a decade being tomorrow in this space, it's so true. It is overused because it's true. People in the industry are already preparing for what is going on 10 years from now. And you're already seeing SMR related developments, I don't want to say having a massive impact but already kind of shaping the forward demand curve and how that interacts with the supply curve.
38:01 So for example, I spoke at the conference to Westinghouse for their AP300. I spoke to G Venoa for their BWRX 300 and I spoke to Rolls-Royce for their SMR design. I spoke to a few others as well, but those are the main ones. So, what you're seeing right now is I think the first major catalyst you will see is the Darlington BWRX300 plant.
38:25 That construction started in May 2025 and the unit is expected to be completed in 2029 and in service by the end of 2030. Of course, this is the nuclear power industry. That timeline could shift by a year, maybe 2 years, who knows? But they are doing everything they can and right now it is looking very constructive. One US utility that shall remain unnamed at the conference noted that they are a big fan of SMRs.
38:50 They will be looking to implement those into their portfolio when the time comes. But they are not doing anything really constructive that will really have a lasting impact before you see Darlington being fully commissioned because they want to see how does this work? What is it going to cost? How much does it cost to roll out a bunch of these? And that is where you get to the meaningful roll out that you just alluded to.
39:22 >> Speaking to Genova, they noted that they could perhaps have, if everything goes well, 10 units online, which would amount to 3 GW by 2035 and potentially quadruple that by 2040 and then the snowball just keeps rolling if everything goes well. Rolls-Royce the same thing. The public position is first power in the mid 2030s and a final investment decision in 2029.
39:49 So what we're seeing right now for them is also they are expecting a lot of demand and I do mean a lot of demand. I provide more details on this, on the conversation I had, again in the WNA report that I wrote. But mapping this all out and what industry people are saying about it, it is pretty significant and that snowball, of course the field is pretty crowded.
40:16 Westinghouse, Holtech, Terra Power, Natrium, X Energy, Kyros, Olow, a few others. The field is pretty crowded and not everybody's going to make it to that starting line because we're not there yet, but once the starting line, once you see that starting shot being fired, [gasps] it will make a massive impact, I believe.
40:39 So, I think that people that are expecting massive roll out of SMRs in the early 2030s, so in the next five or six years, are going to be severely disappointed and I wouldn't count on that. But simultaneously, people that are overly bullish on SMRs, I would kind of temper expectations, especially the fact that we need to have a standardized fuel process, fuel procurement and fuel fabrication process for SMRs before we can get really bullish.
41:09 But at the same time for people that are more negative I would say that the general perspective of SMRs and how they will affect the demand side is underpriced in this market too, at some point I would even say severely underpriced and underestimated and I think that it will have a massive impact and I think that before this bull market is over, because no I don't think we will have another 15-year bull market or whatever because it remains a commodity.
41:38 But I think that before this bull market is over, over the coming few years, we will have seen that expected SMR roll out starting to have an impact. And I think that that is again somewhere between a little bit underpriced and perhaps more likely severely underpriced. So I think it will have an impact. Yeah, Mart, this has been a great conversation.
42:08 We covered a lot of ground from WNA symposium and the uranium market to the challenges facing the industry and what lies ahead. I still have, I got to be honest, a lot of questions here, but we don't want to keep you here all day. Let's leave something for part two maybe going forward. But before I let you go, how can my viewers, my subscribers become your subscribers? Where are you active? >> Well, I would love to welcome them at patreon.com/contrariancodex.
42:37 It is where I write bi-weekly newsletters, where I run the portfolio, share buy and sell signals and I do a lot more than just call for a uranium nuclear bull even though it is my main focus. >> Mhm. I also focus on general macro analysis because as I noted earlier in the interview where we are with regards to the overall macro picture and general risk on or risk off environment affects uranium and other risk assets as well.
43:05 I also cover oil related equities. I also cover precious metals. Some of our gold holdings have done exceptionally well. We've had one gold holding that went up into that February peak. I think we bought it at 60 cents and it went up all the way to over $12, which was absolutely remarkable.
43:24 So, we have a good focus on that. A few US industrial equities that I think will do exceptionally well over the coming years. That might be the one, together with gold and uranium, that might be the place where I am most bullish going forward. But of course, again, not every industrial equity is created equally and it will be very volatile given it's all early stage.
43:43 But I am very bullish on that. And also I do interviews, I do company analysis and a bunch of other stuff. And I hope that I will be able to welcome some people there. And if anybody has any question on it, feel free to reach out to me or reach out on Twitter at yellow1. And yeah, I thank everybody for listening.
44:04 I hope it wasn't too sleep-inducing and I hope everybody has a good and healthy rest of the day. >> Yeah. No, it wasn't. It was a great chat and thank you for the insights you covered here and Mark I look forward to host you again. Thank you so much for joining me today. >> Thank you my friend.