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From Updated JORC RNS
>>Once, the maiden Mineral Resource has been defined for Ascot, we will update the open pit mining study, which will detail the economics of a 25Mtpa mining operation, based upon extracting both the Racecourse and Ascot Mineral Resources. We expect that the open pit mining study will be completed early in 2023."<<

Just to make things even more confusing LW

I thought Kevin made it more confusing ‘again’ the gist was payback after about 4 years with the remaining 3-4 years of the high grade giving high return of profit, then the next 16 years @$200m per annum based on $10,000 per ton

Please correct if that’s wrong

From July 2021 study >>>Shareholders should note that the Conceptual Study is preliminary in nature and includes inferred mineral resources that are considered too speculative geologically to have the economic considerations applied to them that would enable them to be categorised as mineral reserves. The Conceptual Study is based on low-level technical and economic assessments and is insufficient to support estimation of Ore Reserves or to provide assurance of an economic development case at this stage, or to provide certainty that the conclusions of the Conceptual Study will be realised. 

From updated JORC
>>> The Racecourse Mineral Resource contains 50Mt @ 0.25% CuEq which has been classified as Indicated in accordance with JORC (2012)

The question is, will 50mt indicated be sufficient to provide that economic assurance to a partner to come onboard of our 20% interest toward a 200-$250m investment toward capital outlay in a resource that can only be converted to a ‘probable’ ore reserve?

With eyes wide open, I think not!

Hence design and base the dtm on a much smaller starter pit and mining operation of 10,20,50ktpa to run ore offsite for sale or processing nearby with far less to finance and satisfy a partner.

The hurdle is to trigger the buy back above all else that is the most important thing.

Still think its premature to discuss a sale. Don’t think they have ruled out further drilling yet.

CB is cunning, he has only said they are not going to spend more money on trying to get to 2mt, and the DtM is the best option to spend shareholders money.

But, bear in mind the DtM only has to ‘potentially’ be based on a very small mining operation on a small portion of the overall resource at RC as the agreement is not specific in throughput to satisfy the agreement to engage AA’s response. It also doesn’t need infrastructure or processing capabilities so there is no huge capital outlay to fund. Plans could be for a small starter pit mine that will haul the ore off site to sell to a nearby plant.

So worst case some more definition drilling relative to the DtM. He also commented that “the 1.1 would maybe grow to 1.3mt when we make the circle a bit bigger with the opportunities that are there.” Indicating further drilling.

So if this is the way then that 3rd phase to test further the other highlighted areas could be on.

A JORC is normally updated at certain points to understand what to do next and what programs of work are required to reach the next key decision point. It wouldn’t just be a case of sticking a few more holes in, it doesn’t work like that wether you are resource building to sell on or a company is building the resource toward the actual mining and extraction process. There are contractual obligations to consider with drillers and supporting staff.

With the broader scope now that a 3rd drilling phase could reveal, and at $250 per metre drilling costs and a maximum realistic drill of 2,000m per month that would require about $500,000 per month for, say 4 months minimum then another 3-4 months assays and modelling. so about $2m plus other costs associated for a further drilling phase and another 9 or so months . It potentially won’t be that bad and will add value throughout a period where nothing is likely to happen anyway as we wait for copper to climb.

>>>Howezap, My fear is that the final set of results from Ascot showed a certain lack of copper for a proposed copper mine <<

Hi Eastern investor you’ve got to remember Ascot is relatively untested but does have more precious metals than RC with decent grade. Copper is extensive, and over a km of strike in 3 mineralised zones but it will be the gold that will have significant positive economic benefits for Ascot. It’s a shame they could not have drilled a couple or three more holes in phase 2 to extend shallower intersections of gold.

A second pit at Ascot will not have to carry the CapEx for plant and infrastructure as RC could cover that initial stage.

Due to the different mineralisation types between the two deposits I’m guessing that grade control and stockpiling of ore type and grade will be important if both mines were to share a central processing plant. Will have to look into that.

Xtract is not a one trick pony, even if that pony is considered a bit lame now by some ‘investors’ The other current assets can be further developed to increase mineral reserves and at fairbride to increase production capability too. Also deep drilling at Eureka to follow up with an exploration phase on the very high grade earlier drills to test for the sulphides that could prove to be a major discovery, maybe after a conclusion to BR when more time, resources and focus can be concentrated there. Well overdue on an update as to wether they have started up again flogging the ore for processing which was priority to get cash generated first.

Lots elsewhere going on I hope, but back to Ascot and the modelling due , to show the pit extension to the S/SW from the ‘saddle’ between RC and Ascot.
I dont have much doubt this will be viable at future, higher copper prices and considering it will not be mined until after RC has paid back all CapEx min 6 years time and dependent on when after that, due to the engineering and or economics involved in extending the pit.

This could be so big and if the potential is there to join up with Ascot, that too, has seen its open pittable potential upgraded with the last of the drilling there.

I think there will be a lot to come from the MRE of Ascot and how that ties in with the mining study.

The acquisitions of these small ‘producing’ mines they are looking at in Zambia. From their future growth strategy detailed in the audited report, The aim is to identify deposits of 1-5 years production capability in a safe jurisdiction at a rate of about 50,000 tonnes per year, that are near to production and importantly, ‘not too cash front end heavy’ and are nearby to offsite processing facilities.

Could the release now of RC estimate have anything to do with the acquisition process of these deposits? Such as toward credit worthiness obtaining the funding from elsewhere. Any interest would be cheaper than the effects of share dilution to market capitalisation.

He was referring to the conceptual Mining study, which will be pre feasibility level, ‘not’ a DFS

>> was there not a poster who had talked on one of the podcasts by the Sunday team?

Andy mills (Andmillsy)

Hi Stevem I’m sure what he meant with the decision to mine had been made comment was more to reassure shareholders that they will not be pursuing the 2mt with more drilling.

btw You were right all along in your interpretation of the 2mt could be made up of dribs and drabs across the ‘whole’ of the licence. With that 2mt threshold being just a number plucked out of the air for one of the options.
Jeez the amount of discussion on the depth of the agreements T’s&C’s we all had, when it was simply, what it said in all its simplicity.
Hey ho

Just considering as to why Fairbride appears to be slow in ramping up to more significant output. It’s gone into full production so that would imply that the plant had now been run in, and throughput is at or near capacity, but last comment was of about 35 kilos in September still due to lock up in the system.

A comment from CB that, “the gold will increase considerably when we get to the hard rock.” ( words to that effect without checking) could well mean they are continuing to use up, ‘all’ of the peripheral stuff they stripped off that was found to be mineralised and ‘not’ part of the mineral reserve. Is all additional and ‘free’ so worth using up.
Sound plausible?

Bit more on mining costs.
The cut-off grade is determined by ‘all’ the costs to mine the resource, and the price that a company can sell it for. With large porphyry deposits, there is consistency over many years not only in bulk of ore but operational costs that don’t change much.

There is no need to show an ‘accurate’ estimation of capital or operational cost toward project cash flow. Mining capital cost is usually huge and gobbled up in the initial development stage of mine life. But the mining study does not need to satisfy a financier or guarantee payback of that investment. It just needs to satisfy a buyer that the potential is there for them to have the confidence to take it to the next study level toward feasibility, where CB’s comment referring to a starter project comes from.

Many clearly do not understand what they have bought into.

Bushranger, has had and still has a very good chance it will go on to eventually be mined, the new mining study will no doubt confirm this, with the inclusion now of all the additional from phases 1&2 that was required to improve the economic viability, by increasing the size of the mineral resource with economically recoverable ore which both exploration phases have clearly been successful in doing. So there is a very good probability that it will be sold. That is the important factor that has not changed with this updated resource estimate. That is the driving factor to the success of this investment to return shareholder value, not how big the resource is.

I would also say don’t get sucked into believing that it is uneconomical to mine due to increased fuel costs. That’s simply not true. Typical operating costs include, staff, labour, supplies, equipment, plant and parts and processing. With fuel, lubricants, gas and power accounting for only about 9% of the overall operating costs for miners.

https://dxi97tvbmhbca.cloudfront.net/upload/user/image/GPoxleitner_OperatingCostEstimationForMiners_201620191128185443446.pdf

So, at least we now know what we have, 512Mt @ 0.22% CuEq at a cut-off of 0.1% containing 1.1Mt of copper equivalent. With the higher grade, shallow and to near surface initial phase that will be mined first. Is now large enough to extend that recovery phase from initial 4-6 now up to 8 years, where end of phase 2 evaluation showed ‘further’ infill was planned in a potential phase 3 drill programme. So that is really encouraging.

The conceptual mining study will be very interesting as this forthcoming updated one could point to utilise central processing capability….

>>…the open pit mining study for the Bushranger Project will be updated to determine the economics of a 25Mtpa open pit mining operation, utilising the Mineral Resources at both the Racecourse and Ascot prospects

This could be a positive indication that Ascot is now expected to be shown to be amenable to open pit extraction as last drills, had recently just ‘upgraded’ the potential for this.

An $8 Billion resource that puts a range of between 10-20p for just RC. Having this updated JORC will underpin a range of values the market can place on BR along with the anticipated income from full production. The financial model will be eagerly awaited.

Don’t listen to the noise.

With Caveatemptors notable absence now, I was reading back over Charles’s posts over weekend as we know , he knew Colin on personal terms and would often comment on conversations he had with him.
Here’s a couple in view of this weeks estimates that have a good degree of credibility coming from CE so certainly worth a repost

Talking of percentage of in ground copper value….

CE>>>There is no agreed percentage in the contract as far as I know???Colin has said in the past that it could be up to 5%, depending on locality, capex, structure of the porphyry and amount of copper. We will score high in all categories...??I think we use 3% as a way of keeping to a conservative estimate. In simplistic terms, if we get 3% of the total value of copper in the ground, POC is $9,000 and we have 2m tonnes in total = a buy-out price of about £400M.

CE >>>…..I was present at both meetings and can confirm both conversations with CB, however I do not see any conflict between the two.??At the investor event, my recollection is that CB was testing the water with the investors that were present and he was trying to gauge the minimum price at which the majority of shareholders would be willing to sell. This value at the meeting was agreed by common consent to be 25p - 30p, but it must be stressed that this was a minimum range.??At the AGM the discussion was more along the lines of what we could expect to ask for the licence, given the open pit capex, POC, size of porphyry and commercial jurisdiction.??It is therefore my opinion that CB has clearly given a range for possible negotiations with a top end figure of 6-8% of contained copper as an opening gambit for negotiations and a clear red line has been drawn between 25p and 30p per share.??Of course this was long before Ascot was discovered, so the red line will now be at a higher level, as will be the value of our opening gambit.?

Copper futures fell to $3.7 per pound from the five-month high of $4 hit on November 11th, as signs of weaker demand and a rebound for the US dollar outweighed looming concerns of supply shortages. Data from top consumer China showed that industrial production slowed more than expected in October, while house prices declined for the sixth consecutive month. Meanwhile, China reported the first Covid deaths in six months as Beijing cases rise increasing the possibility of economic restrictions. Still, copper prices remain 6% higher since the start of November on looming supply concerns. Commodity trader Trafigura warned that global copper stocks have fallen to record lows, with current inventories enough to supply world consumption for just 4.9 days. Freeport-McMoran was also vocal about shortage risks, stating that low prices do not reflect the tightness of the physical market.
• tradingeconomics. Com

Fully agree with what you saying cardo, was simply bringing up footrot as I believe this was largely missed and I know results have been asked about recently. But then also to ‘add’ that it should not been seen as the holes were complete duffers as they were successful in what they were, reconnaissance holes.

Just to add.
Footrot analysis reports

The core analysis from
Bushranger asssys and update RNS from 7th July stated.
>> Two exploratory drillholes completed at the Footrot prospect 7km to the southeast of Racecourse (FTDD-22-001 and FTDD-22-002) encountered weak copper mineralisation along with much disseminated to semi-massive pyrite and pyrrhotite within porphyritic intrusives, providing encouragement that the Bushranger project area contains potential for multiple porphyry copper-gold targets

Then in half year report was confirmation they were sent for assays
>> Two drill holes, for 804.4m, were completed at the Footrot Prospect, approximately 5 kilometres to the south of the Racecourse, to test a combined soil geochemical and MIMDAS anomaly. The results from these two holes will be available during the next reporting period.

Lastly from final assays of ascot 6th oct RNS in summary down bottom
>> In addition to the Ascot drilling, two exploration drill holes, FTDD-22-001 and 002 completed at the Footrot prospect, about 7km south-southeast of Racecourse, intersected lengthy intervals of alteration and iron sulphide mineralisation along with traces of copper and possible gold indicator minerals. This could suggest proximity to a mineralised porphyry - further modelling of the geophysical results here will be required.

This would certainly confirm footrot assays are back and probably not worth releasing on their individual merit. But they were still successfull in adding further credence to the geophysics that the anomaly there is mineralised.

Hey cardo you are so right of course, I think the only one that we do have a good idea of is Footrot as although both exploratory boreholes hit traces of copper they were sub optimal, that only showed they were in proximity to a mineralised porphyry :-((

We do already have a conceptual model it just needs to be updated with the latest JORC by the independent consultants, Optimal Mining Solutions ( if they use same consultants as before)

ZM to work out the economics, they need to know the strip ratio which is just one but an important factor. So once this is determined a pit design is relatively simple as slope angle will be known. Remember this is only a concept. The actual mine planning and engineering stage will only be finalised once there is a proven mineral reserve.

I too, listened again to the podcast regarding the begging bowl comment. Could have simply been Colin just bigging up the fact ‘proudly’ that they haven’t, in front of other CEO’s