Mineral Resources keen to sell assets after $896m loss, while uncertainty clouds Chris Ellison’s succession
Mineral Resources’ key Onslow Iron project is hitting its stride but likely lithium mine sales, another truck rollover, and uncertainty about Chris Ellison’s tenure — and his voice — shows chaos is yet to fully leave the company.
The miner and mining services provider slumped from a $114 million net profit to a $896 million loss for the 2025 financial year during a period marred by operational setbacks at Onslow Iron, weak lithium prices, and corporate governance scandals revolving around Mr Ellison.
The MinRes boss conceded he got the lithium price “wrong”.
“Looking back on the last two years, I also acknowledge that we got the lithium price wrong, and our earnings and net debt levels have been greatly impacted,” Mr Ellison said.
“I’ve been in the lithium business for over 16 years, and I did not expect a return to prices around US$600 a tonne in my lifetime.”
MinRes announced Onslow Iron had been operating at full tilt this month and is on track this quarter to reach its nameplate capacity, which equates to 35 million tonnes of iron ore per annum.
But the good news was overshadowed by a jumbo truck tipping over along the Onslow Iron haul road on Saturday.
Road woes
It is the seventh truck accident on the pit-to-port road network since October, but the first on an upgraded portion of the main road. MinRes in February committed to spending $230 million to upgrade the road following cyclone damage and regulatory intervention after the spate of rollovers.
Mr Ellison pinned the latest accident on driver error.
“It was a little disappointing. We did have a truck that lay on its side on Saturday night, but look, fundamentally, it was just simply driver error,” he said on Thursday.
“The truck driver thought that he was nearing a rest bay, and he was about 180 meters from it when he took the truck off the side of the road, and when he saw where he was, he applied the brakes and the front prime mover and the two trailers just laid on their side.
“We’ve travelled almost 13 million kilometres accident free . . . we want to be totally accident free, of course, but these things are going to happen from time to time.”
Up for sale
MinRes is looking for ways to keep the lights on while Onslow ramps up. The company had $412m cash left in the bank by June 30, a decrease of nearly $500m, with $5.3 billion of net debt hanging over its head.
The company has ruled out a capital raise to fix its balance sheet, instead on Thursday stating it would be “exploring opportunities to accelerate our deleveraging inorganically” — corporate speak for selling assets.
But which assets are on the chopping block? MinRes has been strongly rumoured to have recently put its 51 per cent stake in the Mt Marion lithium mine in the Goldfields up for sale. Its stake is estimated to be worth more than $550m.
MinRes chair Mal Bundey did not deny the rumours on Thursday, but refrained from referencing which specific assets could be offloaded.
“We’re going through the assets that we have on our balance sheet, aligning on which ones we would call what I’ve been terming as ‘As, Bs and Cs’ ,” he said.
“A’s or crown jewels, we wouldn’t really consider moving. B’s really fall into a category of assets that are strategic and Cs have been strategic, but for the right price we might consider moving.”
MinRes has previously told the The West Australian it considers its mining services division to be the “crown jewels”.
What next for Ellison?
Mr Bundey said plans are still afoot to find a new boss to replace Mr Ellison, but a succession timeline has been tossed out the window.
In November, MinRes committed to an “accelerated” succession with the aim of finding a replacement for Mr Ellison by mid-2026 following a flurry of scandals that tarnished his leadership.
The company at the time said it would replace its co-founder and chief executive within “12 to 18 months”.
Mr Bundey, who started as MinRes’ chair on July 1, all but confirmed that timeline has now been scrapped.
“I think setting a date is one thing, but ensuring we’ve got a robust and carefully planned process is another,” he said.
“I’ve done management successions a number of times now, and this does have to be a process, not an event.
“My focus is to ensure that Chris’ succession is a robust process and carefully planned, and as I’ve said previously, in the best interests of our shareholders and 7000-odd people we need to consider and ensure we protect our business continuity.”
L1 Capital, the largest MinRes shareholder after Mr Ellison, has publicly expressed its desire for Mr Ellison to stay on indefinitely as CEO.
Another (less serious) Ellison scandal
The MinRes boss once called himself a walking headline and he did not fail to deliver from the get-go of the Thursday morning results call with financial analysts.
“I pre-recorded the opening address yesterday, it was my voice and it was me recording. So I’m not sure what the question is,” he said when quizzed about the glitch on a media call.
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