Pala Investments, a multistrategy investment company focused on the mining and metals value chain, recently launched Pala New Energy Metals, an investment fund dedicated to investing in raw materials critical to the energy storage and clean energy value chains. Pala New Energy Metals, which was launched with an initial capital of $150 million, has a mandate to invest in projects and businesses that provide leverage to the shift in the global energy mix, facilitated by advances in battery technologies and their industrial applications. Pala New Energy Metals will have the flexibility to invest across the capital structure, and will seek to invest in opportunities that include financing the development and production of battery metals as well as other minerals critical to renewable and energy-efficient technologies; intermediate products in the value chains for these industries; physical holdings of associated metals; passive holdings in equities and credit; and investing in non-extractive businesses supplying the battery and renewables industries, including processing and recycling.
“We are excited to launch a platform dedicated to investing across the battery and new energy space,” said Stephen Gill, manager partner of Pala. “We see the potential for a shift in the industrial economy that is both pervasive and long-lived. We believe raw material supply is not sufficient to meet projected needs over the next decade as a result of strong demand for electric vehicles, grid storage, renewables and energy-efficient technologies.
Pala has a proven track record of successfully investing across a range of businesses providing raw materials to the battery and renewable energy sectors, including its investments in cobalt, lithium, rare earths, tin, nickel, copper and processing businesses, the company said. Recent investments include the C $200 million public offering of Cobalt 27, a dedicated cobalt streaming company; and the US $100 million debt financing of Altura Mining Ltd., an Australian mining company currently developing the Pilangoora lithium mine in Australia; a number of physical and derivative commodity positons in new energy metals; and an actively managed portfolio of new energy-related equities and bonds.
