nextgen energy analysis

Summary:  View help for Summary Description

Thesis

(NXE) NexGen’s Rook 1 Uranium mine that passed its final approval on November 18, 2024 is one of the highest grade uranium deposits and is set to be ~15% of global supply by the middle of 2028. It’s not priced that way though. NXE is a NYSE-listed Canadian Company.

• sp500 pe ratio
• vti vs itot
• schd vs dgro
• ixj vs xlv
• vwo vs iemg
• tip vs schp

Power Demand Theme

Old economy resurgence The old economy’s revival from populous demands of nearshoring / reshoring, electrification, and automation are starting to inflect in capital markets.  The stipulation for this resides on an overhaul on the domestic manufacturing plant and electrical generation/transmission. The treasury had written about this: 

• Electricity Metrics:
  • The International Energy Agency’s (IEA) Flagship 2024 World Energy Outlook forecasts global electricity demand to nearly double by 2050, rising to 50,000 TWh from 26,000 TWh in 2023. This is the equivalent to adding a demand the size of Japan each year. 

 

• Data Centers, Cooling, and EV’s: 
  • ~11,000 Data centers annually consume 500 TWh (2% of demand), but in 3-4 years consumption will double to 1,000 TWh. 

 

• By 2035, 1,200 TWh of additional generation for cooling is required, an amount greater than the entire Middle East’s electricity use today. 
  • Cooling’s effect on electricity demand is the most overlooked electricity demand, in my view. This is not simply from climate change or data centers. The IEA reasons that rising real per capita income of emerging and developing economies will instigate a revision of living standards and, along with that, a tailwind for air conditioning additions. Think of the population of Indonesia (277 million), Pakistan (240), Bangladesh (173), Vietnam (98), Philippines (117), Nigeria (223), Ethiopia (126) and many more. As the global south’s economies modernize, the increase in living standards and hence air conditioning may eclipse even EV’s role in energy demand. 

 

• Electricity demand from EVs rises from 115 TWh today to around 1 000 TWh by 2030 – also an amount equivalent to today’s electricity demand in Japan.

 

• Forecast expansion:
  • As of 2024, utilities have adjusted their forecasts to project a significantly higher average growth rate, rising from an expected range of 0-2% to as much as 4-7% through 2027-2028. While this may seem modest at first glance, the increase in load growth represents the equivalent of the entire current market size for new power generation development. Put differently, a shift from a 2% growth rate to 4% effectively doubles the demand for new-build projects.

 

Why Nuclear? And why now?

Nuclear power generates 9% of global electricity and accounts for nearly 30% of all emission-free power.  66 nuclear reactors under construction are expected to add 72 GW of capacity by 2030, with over 110 more planned. This will bolster the existing fleet of 439 reactors, which already provides 395 GW annually, marking a pivotal moment – where escalating energy needs intersect with critical supply considerations.Regarding it's environmental impact, a 1 inch Uranium Pellet is equal to 120 gallons of oil and 1 ton of coal in Btu (British Thermal Units). Additionally, All the waste generated by the commercial U.S. nuclear industry since the 1950s would only require the space of one football field 10 yards deep. By comparison, one coal plant produces as much waste by volume in one hour as nuclear power has in its history. Levelized Cost of Electricity estimates can be fallacious because the duration variable applied is 25-30 years, instead of their licensed 60-80 year lifetime. People on this website know how much a 30-50 year discrepancy can impact a forecast. Lazard is the only one that implements the proper time scale unlike the IEA and EIA (I do like both of these agencies though overall). https://www.lazard.com/media/xemfey0k/lazards-lcoeplus-june-2024-_vf.pdf Nuclear is 9% of installed electric capacity in the US but it accounts for ~19% of electric production and consumption. This is because of its +90% capacity factor whereas, for instance, solar’s installed capacity is ~17% of the generation capacity but its capacity factor is between 25-45% so it is about 5% of production and consumption. This nuclear industry is cumbersome. It’s the most regulated industry, rightfully so, in the world, in addition to requiring high capital costs for new plants, mines, and centrifuges. Higher interest rates don’t make things more comfortable. Governments and Institutions must be involved. At COP and G7 meetings the past few years, they urged financiers to engage with the reactor build out, and that momentum has reached the development/EXIM creditors. In addition, legislative syntax is being rewritten to ensure nuclears participation: 6/2023 - Sweden's parliament voted to change the country's energy target from '100% renewable' electricity production by 2040 to '100% fossil-free' electricity.  I've been following the Polish AP1000 financing and, in addition of Polish and French creditors, the US EXIM bank committed $16.9 billion for the project. So the financing is there. At COP 28 in 2023, countries listed below declared an intention to triple domestic nuclear generation by 2050. At the COP 29 in November of 2024 more countries followed: The 31 nations endorse the Declaration to Triple Nuclear Energy include Armenia, Bulgaria, Canada, Croatia, Czech Republic, *El Salvador, Finland, France, Ghana, Hungary, Jamaica, Japan, *Kazakhstan, *Kenya, Republic of Korea, *Kosovo, Moldova, Mongolia, Morocco, Netherlands, *Nigeria, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Sweden, *Turkey, Ukraine, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom, and the United States of America. *New endorsers, as of Wednesday 13 November 2024, at COP29 in Baku. Moreover, at the recent G7 meetings Nuclear additions have been a big talking point and they’ve been badgering Germany to reverse their anti nuclear stance. Quick note on China. This is obvious but China has 58 reactors and 29 under construction but they plan to build 36 more and 158 are proposed. The US is the world leader at 95 reactors for comparison. Chinese and Russian reactors are most of those being constructed today. But FID is boiling up everywhere, and theres demand for a non Chinese/Russian builds. Moreover, westinghouse has created VVER (russian reactor type) fuel so the incumbent VVER reactors in the former soviet block can source from western fuel supply chains. The US Department of Energy (DOE) released “Pathways to Commercial Liftoff: Advanced Nuclear” in Sept. 2024. The 83 page document recommends to both the US to collectively add 200 GW of Nuclear reactors by 2050. If the US and China both followed through on these plans (excluding China’s proposed), their combined output [(95+200)+(58+29+36)=418 reactors] would equal about today’s worldwide nuclear generation [440 reactors] without accounting for France’s 63 GW, Japan, South Korea, Russia or the COP29 tripling of domestic nuclear generation. This thesis works where the world decides to use Small Modular Reactors or Conventional GW scale reactors (SMR: <300 MWe; ⅓ of a conventional reactors)[AP1000 (westinghouse:USA), EPR (EDF:France), or VVERs (Rosatom:Russia)]. Thermal Spectrum Molten Salt Breeder Reactors will likely be the Gen IV reactor of choice but we have a long, long, long way(20+ years) to go before they’re implemented as the IAEA or NRC standard.  My bias is towards GW scale because the levelized cost of electricity is ⅓ cheaper, it’s already in operation, AND I have a little exposure in Cameco which owns half of Westinghouse. Here’s what the DOE recommendation boils down to (FYI they recommend AP1000): And of course you’ve heard through the grapevine amazon and talen, google and kairos, microsoft and constellation are teaming up and now meta is looking for a consort for 1-4 GW. Those are great tailwinds. But to speak on the recent FERC ruling that rejected amazon’s amended Interconnection Service Agreement step up from 300 to 480, I see it as a really encouraging decision. In my view, FERC indicated Hyperscalers need to invest in new builds and not show up and increase demand and pricing for electrons from the current general grid. This recognizes a wider need for electrical generation and transmission expansion. FERC was happy with Microsoft and Constellation's 3 mile island because the infrastructure is there, it was just disconnected. FERC sees 3 Mile as a capacity addition while the Talen plant is in operation. More obvious catalysts that I would break records talking about: Prohibiting Russian Uranium Imports Act, Russia’s amendment to Government Decree No 313, ADVANCE Act, Investment Tax Credit (ITC), Production Tax Credit (PTC), Electric Vehicles, lack of baseload capability in solar and wind, Data Centers.

Uranium Supply and Demand

Worldwide, Reactors annually consume 160 million lbs of U3O8 (triuranium octoxide; what is in the earth and oceans). U3O8 has ~0.7% U235 which is the fissile material used in reactors. Kazakhstan, Canada, Namibia, and Australia are the heaviest suppliers. A little foreshadowing… NexGen is licensed up to 30 million pounds of annual production; equal to the entirety of Canada's current annual production. There's also a dwindling secondary supply from the age of the Megatons to Megawatts program which is around 15-20 mlbs per year as well

Canada and Australia are the only supplier that aren't from state-sponsored entities and Australia's reserves cost about $35-$70 per pound to extract which I'll dig into later. The world nuclear association's upper scenario prediction is that by 2040, U3O8 demand will be 150k tons or 300 million lbs. The lower scenario prediction by 2040 is expected to stay flat around 75k tons of 150 million lbs. The graph depicts the expected scenario. Even if demand stays flat, the decommissioning of mines will leave room for new high grade mines to open. Now that I’ve gotten through the weeds, I can move onto the company I’m recommending. Thanks for getting to this point if you’re still reading. 

NexGen

NexGen has the largest source of low-cost uranium globally, delivering up to 30 million pounds of high-grade uranium per year, at the lowest quartile of the cost curve of USD$10 and could supply around 15% of global supply by H2 2028. Company history: NexGen has never operated a mine. They just recently bought Uranium as insurance and to supply contracts. They also just signed their first set of deals with multiple US utilities from 2029-2033 at a price range of $79-$150/lb, depending on market pricing at delivery, with 5% annual escalator. From 2013-2019 they commenced community engagement and data collection, finding some of the densest Uranium deposits to date at Arrow Rook 1. They started licensing and permitting in April of 2019 and have surpassed the EA and EIS (provincially and federally) and have strong support of 4 first nations tribes.  

Rook 1 Arrow deposit:

Cameco’s Cigar Lake and McArthur River are currently the bulk of Canada’s U3O8 production. The U3O8 grade of Cameco’s rock here is 5.3% and 2.3% U3O8 respectively. This is exceptionally high. Their highest grade is in the Undeveloped Fox lake of 7.99%. Kazakhstan’s grade is 0.03% U3O8, they just mine a ton of rock and leach out the uranium.  NexGen’s Arrow Rook 1 has a superstar section. Unlike any other mine. They’ve measured the A2 HG section at 16.65% U3O8! This is unreal. Out of the 441 tonnes of basement rock, the uranium yielded is 161.9 million lbs. That’s about equal to feeding all reactors worldwide for a year. In just one section of this mine. The remaining sections amount to 96 million lbs ranging from 0.79-9.92% with an additional 80 million lbs inferred.  This idiosyncratic U3O8 density is NexGen’s differentiator. Let me repeat: the annual production of Kazakhstan’s 55 million lbs comes from a 0.03% deposit, Cameco’s 30 million lbs comes from 2-5% deposits. NexGen’s measured average is 4.35% but 2/3 of that is 16.65% U3O8. 

Cost:

This brings me to the next point. NexGen’s cost is unmatched. Their production cost is $22/kgU or $10/lbU due to the density of the deposit. Kazakhstan quotes their deposit ranges from $10-$30/lbU with most being in the $15-20 range. Cameco quotes that going forward their cost per lb mined will be in the $25-$35 range. The long term Uranium’s price at $80/lb renders NexGen exceptionally profitable if these prices hold or rise(which I find likely and they are locked in a floor of $80 up to $150 with escalators of their first set of contracts). And if prices fall to $50 or $30 NexGen remains very profitable while Cameco is just scraping by (I still love Cameco though).This Exhibit 19 is a little outdated because it was from before Rook 1 was approved and doesnt incorporate any green in canada, which NexGen has. 

Cashflow

Rook 1’s Capex is about $1.5 billion in creating the mine. With their contracted price of an $80 floor, NexGen makes back the capital costs in a year. In an unlikely doomsday chernobyl event where prices fall 40% to $50/lb, NexGen pays off its capital costs in a year and a half. Nonetheless this is a FCF printer. The initial licensing is for 24-year mine-life for up to 30 Mlb per annum. This is only a section of their SW2 property, they have Uranium showings elsewhere on the property and also have a SW1 and SW3 property in addition to a ownership stake in ISO energy but in valuing NexGen I will exclude all of that and just focus on rook 1. 

Valuation:

Valuation sure is a bit tricky for this. NexGen mentions they want to be valued similarly to Southern Copper and Norilsk Nickel. They both have $1.5-$2.5 billion in annual Free Cash Flow and market caps of $79.3 and $23.6 billion respectively. I went a different route in valuing them. That route is too easy to get to a 80 billion valuation. Cash flows (gross margin actually, I’ll explain)Because the interest, depreciation, reinvestment, exploration, administrative, etc costs are very fuzzy and due to the clear nature of the newly secured $80-$150/lb contract with US utilities in addition to the $10 cost per pound, I figured doing a Market Cap to Gross profit margin multiple is the most succinct way to value NexGen, primarily because Cameco’s Mining is the only comp.  Cameco Clarification: Cameco is involved in almost everything, mining/milling, refining, conversion, enrichment(GLE), and fuel fabrication. I removed non mining Cameco operations from its market cap.  Half of Westinghouse was sold to Cameco at the end of 2023 for USD$2 billion. Let's add a 2x multiple on this to be safe. Fuel services generate ~$125 million. I can't find a multiple but let's do 10xish and consider it a billion. So let's subtract 5 billion from Camecos value ($4b for Westinghouse and $1b for fuel services). My valuation concludes that Market Cap/Gross Margin multiple with Cameco as the Comp, $62 per share is the expected price target by 2029, a 71% annualized return or a 746% return from today's market value. Another method is just taking the $1.88 bn in annual EBITDA at $80/lb contracted minimum sales price and slapping Cameco's EBITDA margin on of 40-60x over the past two years. 40x1.88... i'm not even going to calculate that. The market cap is $4 bn. This is trading at 2.12x 2028/2029 EBITDA. I understand that 2028 is far out. But Uranium is so inelastic and the reactors cannot be shut down. It costs far too much to abort incumbent Nuclear at the very least.


Other Uranium miners and holders: Look at the Canadian/US assets vs Kazakh and others. The other’s have heavy state involvement in operations and the market doesn’t like that. Australia’s cost per pound is north of $40 so It’s not super competitive although they have a gigantic amount of uranium. I didn’t take out Cameco’s other businesses because I wasn’t looking for price discovery here. I was looking at the regional valuation disparities. Nonetheless, NXE’s Market Cap per pound produced is beautifully undervalued. Because they aren't producing yet.  All in all, regarding valuation, I view this as a great investment because the cost is inelastic for utilities, supply is waning, demand is growing, and they just got through a 5 year regulatory shake down in November(2024). I expect that $62 per share to be discovered by the market by 2029. But If I’m wrong, and the price only gets to a third of my expectation at $20 per share, today’s ~$7.45 per share the annualized return by 2029 is 28%. The main risk is Chernobyl but those reactors earlier than gen 3 are phased out. Gen 3 and on have safety automation and the new age will have safer coolants and some won't be pressurized. I believe this is a win, even in the worst case. Of course I could be wrong and you can lose 100% of your money. DYOR.

Key risks

• Chernobyl type situation.
• Higher rates: negatively impact the nuclear industry due to high capital costs. 
  • (i believe the us is bound for more inflation and see much higher rates down the barrel within next 10 years)

• Operational Execution: They haven’t produced uranium before.
• Timing of Deliveries/Sales: revenue is recognized when the uranium has been delivered and accepted by the customer at a specified location. There’s a risk in earnings generation to the extent timing of deliveries/sales volumes are delayed.
• Commodity Prices
• International Trade uncertainty
• Environmental issue with the mine

 On Environmental issue possibility, the past 5 years were spent working with the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commision to ensure the plan and engineering is airtight (Metaphorically: I don’t know what the pressure is down there) and the change of environmental fallout is next to none. It’s Canada so they care about the environment and have a relatively trustworthy government compared to Namibia or Niger or Uzbek.

• best stock websites
• AI Stock Screener
• how to invest in SpaceX
• how to invest in OpenAI
• warren buffett indicator
• current yield curve

One more positive thing: potential for overfeeding. With an expansion of demand, enrichers are building more enrichment capacity but Russia controls north of 40% of enrichment. This leads enrichers to overfeed centrifuges.Simply put:The Sprott Physical Uranium write up does a good job explaining this on VIC. Check it out if you're interested. This is from that write up “The best analogy for SWU is a fruit juicer. You can get more juice by either juicing an orange multiple times, with each successive iteration giving you less juice, or by using more oranges.” The complex explanation for overfeeding:The cost of enrichment is exorbitantly high and as you enrich more it takes more separative work units (SWU) to make more enriched uranium. I’ll spell this out two ways. To enrich, one takes Uranium Hexafluoride and spins it until the U235(fissile material) separates from the more abundant U238 and one scrapes away the substance with more U235. At first the U235 shows up as 0.71% and the rest is mainly U238. After the first centrifuge, the uranium will enter the next with maybe 0.80% U235, then the next will be 0.89% u235 and so on until 3.5%-5% so there’s diminishing returns as the u235 builds up. This increases the SWU needed. SWU prices have skyrocketed so when SWU becomes too expensive the enrichers put more uranium in to overfeeding it rendering greater assay tails for the non targeted u235. Historically the substance that doesn't go in the next centrifuge is rendered to 0.25% U235 but if overfeeding occurs, it could march up to 0.30% tail assays. Nonetheless if overfeeding occurs more uranium will be demanded.