One of the biggest trends in our share market in 2023 was the rise of ASX uranium shares. Thanks to a number of factors, mostly a rocketing uranium price, uranium shares had a cracking year last year.
Take popular uranium stock Paladin Energy Ltd (ASX: PDN). Paladin shares spent the first half of last year essentially going nowhere. But between June and September, the company rocketed by more than 100%.
That trend continued into 2024, with Paladin shares gaining another 42.5% between 1 January and 7 February.
The gains were even more pronounced with the Boss Energy Ltd (ASX: BOE) share price. The period from March 2023 to February 2024 has seen the Boss Energy share price rise more than 200%.
But given the scope of these delightful share price rises, some investors might be thinking that the party is over for ASX uranium shares. Especially considering that Paladin Energy stock has lost more than 8% over the past week alone (Boss is down more than 10%).
Well, that's not the view of one ASX expert.
David Haddad, portfolio manager at Eiger Capital, recently penned a piece discussing the advantages of uranium-based electricity. It makes for some compelling reading for anyone with an interest in ASX uranium shares.
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Expert gives three reasons why ASX uranium shares are still a buy
Haddad starts off by listing several advantages that nuclear power has, in his opinion, over other renewable energy sources:
Besides being a low-carbon source of power, it offers several other advantages over most other renewables: long life; high reliability/efficiency; competitive life-time cost; less intensive use of raw materials; and lower physical footprint.
He goes on to list three reasons why Eiger Capital sees nuclear energy as an important player in the energy needs of the future.
Firstly, Haddad argues that nuclear reactors are relatively small, as "a 1GW nuclear power plant covers approximately 3.5 [square kilometres] while a coal plant of the same size is almost twice that".
Next, the Eiger Capital report notes that "the mining of uranium does not take much space relative to the output of a nuclear power plant". He estimates that a 1-gigawatt coal-fired power plant would burn 2.5 million tonnes of bituminous coal every year, or 6.5 million tonnes of brown coal. Haddad argues that a nuclear power plant of the same size would use just 27 tonnes per annum of uranium.
Thirdly, Haddad posits that nuclear power plants are highly efficient compared to other power sources, with "plant availability of more than 90% over long life spans".
As a result of this research, Eiger Captial concludes with this:
We continue to believe that nuclear energy will play an increasingly important role in providing the world with clean power and maintain significant positions in near-term uranium producers, Boss Energy and Paladin Energy.
No doubt fans of ASX uranium shares like Boss And Paladin will appreciate these insights. Let's see how they all play out this year and beyond.
