Shareholders in sin-binned lithium explorer AVZ Minerals face one of the biggest wealth wipeouts in sharemarket history after management said it will delist from the ASX on May 13 as it battles for control of the world’s largest hard rock lithium deposit in Africa.The Perth-based explorer has more than 21,100 shareholders with paper wealth of $2.8 billion tied up in the shares that last traded on the ASX in May 2022 for 78¢.AVZ Minerals is in a dispute over ownership rights to potentially the world’s largest lithium deposit. “After careful consideration, the AVZ board has resolved not to seek reinstatement on the basis a reinstatement at this time would not be in the best interests of AVZ shareholders,” the board said in a statement on Tuesday evening.It blamed the prospective delisting on the Democratic Republic of Congo government’s failure to comply with court orders, and multiple other legal battles it has with Chinese and Congolese mining rivals for control of the Manono tenement in the resource-rich country’s south-west.Shareholders took to social media and message boards to vent their frustration at the outcome with some blaming the miner’s management, while others blamed overseas corruption.
