Lithium Americas makes 'superior offer' of $400 mil for Millennial Lithium

Lithium Americas has made an offer to acquire Millennial Lithium, saying Nov. 1 that it had offered approximately $400 million for the company. This makes it the third company to make an offer to acquire Millenial.

The company said that it had offered C$4.70 ($3.79) per share, payable in Lithium Americas shares, which would give Millennial shareholders around 9.9% of Lithium Americas.

In July, Millennial accepted Ganfeng Lithium's offer of C$353 million, or C$3.60/share.

However, battery maker CATL then made a superior offer of C$377 million, or C$3.85/share, in September, which was accepted later that month. This resulted in Ganfeng withdrawing its interest after receiving a $10 million break fee.

Millennial said separately Nov. 1 that Lithium America's offer was a "superior proposal," as it offered a 22.1% premium on CATL's offer and was a C$1.01/share premium on its Oct. 29 closing market price.

Lithium Americas has also offered to reimburse Millennial the reverse termination fee of $20 million that it will have to pay CATL to terminate their agreement.

Millennial is developing its flagship Pastos Grandes lithium brine project in Argentina's Salta province lithium triangle, where battery grade lithium carbonate of 99.96% purity was produced at the start-up of the pilot plant in April.

Pastos Grandes is close to Lithium America's Caucharí-Olaroz, making it an "attractive regional growth opportunity," Lithium America's CEO Jonathan Evans said.

"As we bring Caucharí-Olaroz into production over the next year and continue to advance our Stage 2 expansion planning, the addition of this highly complementary lithium brine resource further enhances our long-term growth strategy in Argentina and leverages our technical and development expertise," Evans said.

Millennial also owns the Cauchari East lithium exploration project at Chile's Cauchari salar.

Millennial said in its statement that its board had postponed the previously announced shareholders meeting to vote on the CATL agreement from Nov. 15 to Nov. 18.

It added that there was "no assurance at this time that the new offer will lead to a termination of the CATL agreement or the execution of a definitive agreement with Lithium Americas," and the board had not changed its recommendation regarding the CATL arrangement.