The Chalice Mining Ltd (ASX: CHN) share price is having a tough time on Tuesday.
In afternoon trade, the mineral exploration company's shares are down 5% to $1.80.
This leaves Chalice Mining shares trading within a whisker of their 52-week low.
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What's going on with the Chalice Mining share price?
Investors have been hitting the sell button today despite the company releasing an update on the ongoing metallurgical testwork and process flowsheet development at its 100%-owned Gonneville Ni-Cu-PGE Project in Western Australia.
According to the release, excellent results were received from new metallurgical work completed at the project.
In addition, recent bench scale hydrometallurgical testwork has confirmed that Gonneville intermediate products are highly suitable for hydrometallurgical 'midstream' processing.
Management notes that midstream processing and the opportunity to deliver United States Inflation Reduction Act (IRA)-compliant, value-added critical mineral products aligns with Western Government policies and Chalice is investigating strategic funding alternatives and partnership models for this part of the processing plant.
So why the selling?
Given that today's update was arguably a positive one, today's decline is a bit of a mystery.
However, it is worth highlighting that its shares have been under significant pressure this year due to the long timeframe that is expected before we see any real action at Gonneville.
For example, today's announcement confirmed that the company has commenced the pre-feasibility study (PFS) for the project, with a targeted completion date of mid-2025.
And that's just the PFS. There's still a definitive feasibility study (DFS) to follow and then construction.
This makes it hard to value the Chalice Mining share price today given that we have little idea what commodity prices will be at that point. Some investors don't appear keen to sit around for a few years to find out if today's valuation is a bargain or not.
