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Fully agree with that synopsis Cygnus,

re dirty mining, environmental impact and social acceptances of open pit surface mining in particular is rapidly changing and new mines will have huge hurdles to overcome in getting their permissions. Finding a concept centred around bulk sorting pre concentration that ‘eventually’ works is key in Oz toward those ESG compliances. Also is likely for new big mines to comply they will have to be powered by renewable energy. So BR in NSW will go on to have the best chance of ticking the boxes.

Majors are under huge pressure to clean up their act and projects will ‘have’ to be sought for their green credentials likely in tolerant jurisdictions over just to profit.

So don’t ‘anyone’ write BR off 😉

In the meantime while accumulating waiting for Zambian projects to mature more than happy for share price to stagnate.

Subject seems appropriate

Been seeing across many different boards that folk are fed up for whatever reason and going to be getting out on the next spike. I wonder if any kind all sharing person could let me know just how to do that?

Who does have a target price to rebalance or to want out completely?

I’m looking toward an initial 2-3 year plan from here to then re evaluate. No firm price target just accumulate whilst low for now.

“Out of interest do you know if £2m investment for drilling is for both licenses.”

The $2m USD minimum spend is to satisfy the JV terms of a 65% buy in. If not all of the $2m exploration budget is spent before a resource is defined and any sale then Xtr will have a 55% interest

But yes 2mill min over max of 2 years on one or other, or across both licenses.

I would say though, that if their intent is to start within the larger of the two licenses as per captainbob feedback from GM, that will be the main focus to then concentrate defining any resource found there alone. It’s not likely they would then concurrently embark on exploration within the other smaller license.

Seen similarly with the BR project that concentrated solely on the one license that had the best potential to monetise.

Hey Dani, no not at all. However, I have been studying ‘African Earth Science journals’ to try to at least have a basic understanding that backs up the companies theory that Kamoa is hosted in a continuous line and shares characteristics with some of the Zambian deposits in the central copper belt that also substantiates that theory.

I certainly don’t profess to know any more about geology than the next person.

Very true Jez, but it does take all sorts of buying rationale along with plenty of liquidity with sells too to raise a market cap for it to be sustained.

With stronger fundamentals and a healthier balance sheet, shares will increasingly end up with genuine investors and not immediately flipped for quick profit. Of course not all but theoretically enough for demand to slowly outweigh supply.

Without quality assets though, that will not happen, so over to you Colin.

Has been usual, for GLR and AFP along with XTR to generally move in unison, but not today, so far at least.

Whether is cash position starting to be realised or maybe something else outside of the new projects that is attracting some buying?

We will see the whole resource sector start to rerate once it kick starts with M&A activity increasing which will see market caps of companies holding desirable assets start to increase under even limited buying pressure (seen historically.)

Particularly if a resource is defined in Zambia from phase 1 and certainly when BR economic performance with a desirable IRR is on a par to compare with similar projects.

One of those sold will see a big jump in share price, but for now I would support Andrews opinion. Let’s not get carried away again.

So digging a little deeper, it seems that with access to Anglo’s historic data pack, it has enabled the fast tracking of the early stage exploration strategy. It will save an estimated US$1.5M in direct exploration costs during the first Phase 1 of the Joint Venture.

Reading between the lines there could be good reason to be confident of finding something.

Worth pointing out that there will be quite a significant difference to the task of defining a resource this time round from the Zambian licences to what was required on Bushranger.

The different characteristics in the types of mineralisation that are evident in Zambia, will not be disseminated or spattered in nature and difficult to follow any trend like BR porphyry’s did. Where it constantly thickened and thinned and meant was unpredictable and so needed more intensity of drilling to define a resource. Those earlier drills were simply to just try to ‘delineate’ or outline an ore body.

So if there is a find, of which there seems to be a firm belief from others directly involved that they expect results. It will not follow the same exploration path as BR took. A resource can be more confidently defined with far less drilling intensity.

So when you hear Colin state that the plan is to loosely define a resource to sell it on there is not technically any reason to disbelieve him or accuse BS in that respect.

Thanks Bob was part in jest of course, but it does open up some questions, like were those artisanal workings mined for copper or are they associate indicators that coincide with a trend? Have Xtr already commissioned any of their own air or ground surveys in that area yet that supports that starting location? Or are those the first steps?

Any thing else you can recall mentioned from GM however insignificant?

I think we are all thirsty for more news around what is already known now.

Not being cynical when I say that, if after months of expert analysis and geological mapping to determine the architecture from all historical and all other more recent data, the highly experienced geologist team have decided to just drill near where there are artisanal workings evident. I hope that’s not what you are implying Bob 🤔😉

‘Laughs nervously’

Hi James

There are different processes that can and cannot be controlled, toward bringing a deposit into an operating mine as opposed to running an efficient mining operation.

A start up is initially determined as a result of the geological processes that have been carried out along with environmental and social governance and all the other hurdles that simply have to be overcome first.

Generally most of the issues that can prevent a mine ‘toward’ getting its permits are outside of the companies hands and the due diligence that can be done at particular stages. Which is why there is a low success rate, it’s not often down to economics either.

The difficulty where Colin’s experience and skill set come into it is, with what can be controlled by the company that lie with how to keep an operating mine running whilst keeping creditors, partners and shareholders all happy and then you have the mines sustainability to consider on top.

Just as has been seen with Manica, although with Xtr subsidiary with a non controlling interest. It is Colin’s experience in mining that led to knowing when to walk away. He has spent his career running mining operations so that is where his experience and skills comes into it. I do understand your point of monetising in the first place though James but I believe there are no skill sets that can help overcome those hurdles. That is why this is such a risky sector to invest in.

The previous deal with KPZ had arguably soured for any number of the reasons that were previously touted on here that led to them being impaired. The company gave plausible reasons for Kalengwa and eureka but it clearly wasn’t a sound partnership in the end as KPZ were supposedly in financial difficulty. So it’s arguable if was down to poor due diligence or those projects were just not viable.

I think as a company and like any in any sector, there still needs to be evolution to grow. Small to medium scale Joint ventured, in line with its laid out strategy to mine and with the expertise and experience there is in the company (particularly Colin) is the one way they can take active control toward its evolution as a company. The larger exploration plays have that control taken away as are reliant on other parties desire to aquire them at a later date.

So equally there are no guarantees, but at least they can actively take control toward being a sustainable company.

It may not mean much to shareholders short term but sustainability is ultimately what any company doing what Xtr do will work toward. Xtr will continue with a successor so for CB to make rash decisions now that may have detrimental impact on the companies financial standing later after he has parted, would not be passed by the rest of the board.

If these small mines can get working and running the ore. Will they just be mined for revenue or will there be ongoing exploration to increase LOM towards being sustainable for longer?

Any indications from GM or other?

Appeared from early indications that Kakuyu could see it being developed ‘toward’ a larger operation with mine longevity.

hi again iwto

there’s a reasonable assumption a sale of br will happen at some point, copper price is the ultimate driver of course. the economic model is currently going through the simplest and cheapest optimisation first i would say, of cap/op costs including further metallurgy to increase recovery rate as first round had an anomalous low reading from one high grade sample.

tomra ore sorting wasn’t amenable to the important higher grades that are crucial to have the most profound effect on the economic model as will ,

• reduce processing and operating costs

• reduce pre-production capital expenditure due to a significantly smaller concentrator

• improve concentrator recoveries due to higher feed grades

• generate more co**** dry rejects that are easier to manage

• reduce the size of the tailings dam due to less concentrator feed.

other sensor based tech is highly likely to be looked at as it can reduce concentrator capacity down front 20mtoa to 10mtpa, whilst we wait for interest rates to come down that will see fuel, power, materials etc costs all come down to increase the economic performance. there is still option to increase resource to nw so can’t rule out more drilling while we wait.

seems likely the buy back agreement was exploited as a marketing tool throughout as now it has been suggested that there is an inexpensive exit strategy as decision to mine to trigger the buy back process is not an option.

as for value, away from valmin a dcf model can maybe then be used, so with viable economics at conceptual study level, an acquirer should pay for what is in the jorc but will be largely discounted as the resource will not support ore reserves. only 50mt is indicated rest is inferred.

think that is a fair ‘objective’ view overall.

short version…. no one has a scooby doo

It was important to drill the bit in middle, the main reason being to establish if there was enough continuity of viable resource to join RC and Ascot up. It was these subsequent grades that was the main disappointment as it meant that Ascot was required to now be standalone as a separate entity for its resource to be exploited. As we have now seen will need a further extensive explotation programme to increase and establish a viable resource there now as it would not be viable to be reached through a series of push backs from RC. This down to the grades being just too low and outside of the stripping ratio tolerances that would allow it to be mined once the CapEx payback phase was completed.

A point of interest.

A comment Martyn C made whilst speaking about another of the groups projects, may explain why those high gold grades from Ascot drilling of 14m at 1.96g/t Au and 2m @ 15.5g/t Au were not followed up.

MC….“Can’t lose focus on their goal by chasing narrow high grade veins as it would be far more difficult to put a resource together, with the main focus concentrating on the bulk tonnage.”

This would so easily be the case for the work that was required to build the BR resource. Makes good sense now and could explain why, as at the time it was so frustrating that it wasn’t investigated further with a hole or two at the end of phase 2, choosing instead to test mineralisation at depth below hole 35 If I recall.

Sorry bit random but I’m sure others may have had similar thoughts at that time. 🤷

No need for apologies Analytical, input which is both relative to NW Zambia and informative is very welcome if is helpfull to build the overall picture for shareholders and ‘generally’ should not under these fairly unique circumstances be seen as any kind of cross ramping

Thank you for sharing, is all helpfull information if encourages much overdue quality dialogue. 👍

(I’m not invested in GLR)

Does feel is the right direction to go now, to focus efforts. There is an obvious and very clear advantage to having a group of companies in the CB stable, with multiple licences and ability to share expertise, and data within the group to help understand the geological trends.

Also to consider with our access to self fund, the expertise and experience of Xtract people and ability to create revenue from the opportunities that are definitely out there. Been saying for some time now that there will be countless project or small mine owners out there in this economic climate that are now unable to get their mines to final production through inability to self fund. With the added bonus that production facilities are also needing ore to process. Xtract are in a strong position to pick and choose.

What is so encouraging is that we have now had others directly involved supporting Colin’s early optimism over the Zambian venture.

In the Zambia copper special with Tolai Sikumba, the CEO of their JV partners is really positive and ‘expects’ to see results

https://audioboom.com/posts/8450336-midweek-takeaway-zambia-copper-special-with-colin-bird-exec-chairman-xtract-resources-and-tol

More importantly we hear from Martyn Churchouse, a senior consultant geologist across the group in the mining Indaba podcast who gives real credibility to the reasoning behind concentrating efforts there, to back up Colin’s earlier efforts to sell the idea to shareholders.

https://audioboom.com/posts/8454846-midweek-takeaway-mining-indaba-2024-special-umr-maru-neo-afp-xtr-atn-glr-ura-k

If shareholders are not keen on getting onboard with what Colin says, believing it to be just chasing the next big thing! it is a little more difficult to ignore MC.

It’s no surprise Alex Terry has increased his stake