Mystery on big battery buyers

A COMPANY involved in big battery manufacturing projects in New York and Townsville has denied suggestions anything is amiss in dealings on its shares or progress on its plans.

The denial follows reports in The Australian newspaper that question who is signing up to buy the Imperium3 consortium’s batteries and the actions of Us-based funds cashing in most of the shares they were issued rather than holding on to the stock.

On August 4, Asx-listed Magnis Energy Technologies, the major shareholder in Imperium3 New York and Imperium3 Townsville, announced the New York consortium had signed an additional contract with an unnamed US government supplier for $US74M over four years, bringing total sales agreements to $US729M ($A994m).

But the identity of only one of the unnamed buyers has been revealed, an Indian-based company called Suhk Energy.

A story in The Australian newspaper published on September 15 said Suhk Energy’s filings with the Indian corporate regulator showed it had assets of less than $2000.

A Magnis stock exchange announcement on the same day said Suhk Energy was involved in the oil and gas industry, telecommunications and energy industries with contracts more than US$500M in total. On August 3, Magnis announced a $20m convertible note facility funded by the USbased The Lind Partners and SBC Global Investment Fund.

Filings show both investors cashed in some 54 million of the 71 million shares they received at 25c under the facility for much higher prices of between 39c and 42c in the nine days after the August 4 contract announcement.

Apart from Suhk Energy, the consortium said im3 was part of the supply chain for the US Department of Defence and supported electrification of several large US corporations.

When contacted by the Bulletin on Monday, Magnis chairman Frank Poullas said he would respond to questions after a Zoom meeting he had to attend but by Monday evening had not responded.

At the time he was contacted, he said their stock exchange announcements had “pretty much quashed” any queries raised by The Australian newspaper.

“We have some good things happening in Townsville,” Mr Poullas said.

According to The Australian report, a Magnis spokesman had said the sales contract agreements contained clauses requesting client details be kept confidential.

Townsville Mayor Jenny Hill said the council continued to work with Imperium3 on its proposed lithium-ion battery cell manufacturing facility at the Lansdown Eco-industrial Precinct about 40km southwest of the city.