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Commodities live in the now unfortunately, prices are not affected by sentiment or long term outlook. Copper is falling against a strong US dollar and pessimistic industrial sentiment and macroeconomic headwinds in China. Their warehouse inventories have also soared by over 120% ytd to nearly 70,000 tonnes.

Wonder how long they can hold copper furures back so they can build up their inventories cheaply?

Could well be the reason there have not been any operational updates on those other projects already Bob, including Chongwe it seems too???? That until there is resolution to the disposal of Manica it would have been unwise to fully allocate treasury funds to advance the other projects beyond just technical work.

Donna feel there is a lot of news to come it’s hotting up.

Cyber

A good rule of thumb is that the average of a good deposit grade should be at least double the cut off grade across the whole resource.

So with current racecourse estimate of 512Mt @ 0.22% with a cut-off of 0.1% is clearly within that range. 


Not to forget that the cut off only takes into account mining costs and not any CapEx outlay. So generally the ratios do compare with similar projects, also with currently operational high tonnage low grade mines. Take aitik in Sweden for instance.

It’s not about the grades, it’s about what they can initially show what can be economically exploited.

Those smaller open pittable operations being targeted will potentially be the bread and butter that will cover ongoing operating costs and fund those larger exploration projects. Those smaller projects will not require large expenditure to get them into production which will be assigned a project manager to run so the take up is not too limited.

The company has a clear strategy for growth to bring online small to medium open pittable operations to bring in revenues under equally joint ventured deals giving far better operational control and risk mitigation and that target copper projects that are central to that strategy. Taking a step back now in principle, paves the way with financially security to fully commit the treasury to progress better options for medium to the longer term.

There are no guarantees that a second phase will actually happen. Full economic feasibility will be required to warrant underground mining, it really isn’t as straightforward as open pit. A lot of the deposit becomes sterile and unmineable due to the need for large supporting pillars to be created. The economic risks are far too much to commit to buy into.

Billy, if we keep Manica, it is a high probability that a fund raise will be needed to just progress to the next feasibility study toward a plant extension or new plant. It has been made fairly clear that it is not an option to just carry on receiving 23% profit share as a minority partner.

Copper needs to hit $6.26lb just to be worth the same value once you take into account inflation adjustment alone since the $4.62lb high of 2011. That is without any of the expected demand needs that copper is central to, for the world to decarbonise and reach net zero.

$4-$5.lb is well within reach.

>>>With no covid, no fall in POC, no change in economic conditions, no war the sp would still have fallen as reality and results was seen to be nothing like CBs comments and predictions. .

The above has increased interest rates, fuel and power costs, labour, construction. Just about every aspect that has increased CapEx and Op costs that have had a profound negative effect on the updated economic study.




Not being critical of your post btw Andrew was more of a ‘let’s not forget’.

>>>If you can't trust a word the CEO says then it doesnt give you much confidence in him delivering.

BR was more or less on track until the economic fall out from Covid and global recession hit.

Think where the price of copper particularly, could be now if it were not for the crash. The reasons that many consider as to why the share price trajectory has been on a downward spiral to where it sits now, has seriously been amplified by the economic climate. 


Like I said, ruthless! Their presence could affect competition for M&A’s as they will certainly want to acquire prospects to increase their foothold.

I think many are just looking at the disposal on face value and not considering the real implications that phase 2 of the mine could have on costs.

Look at it this way, It could very well be that Explorator and MMP may now have different expectations on the timeframe to progress phase 2 or on outlook of the financial returns they expect from the operation through the JV. Colin is clearly not happy to be involved in an underground mine, that is not what the company specialise in.

So for a minority partner is not a comfortable position to find themselves. So the disposal would be the sensible thing to do in that respect.

Not wrong at all irishdemon. With this deal, the exploration in Zambia can be far more progressive toward defining a resource to put the project in the forefront when M&A activity steps up.

Just recently reported was that Chinese state owned jiangxi copper are in talks with First Quantum on the sale of stake in Zambian mines.

They are keen to get an operational foothold in Zambia which is a really positive move. Currently jiangxi are a significant shareholder already in FQM with a ‘standstill agreement’ that prevents their stake in FQ from increasing more than 20% from current 18% is their opportunity to take advantage. They will be relentless and potentially ruthless in their search for assets to increase that foothold and could see serious competion for regional exploration projects with defined resources increase even further.

Too much emphasis is being placed on profitability of the project, there is a big difference in drilling and proving up a resource to take it toward mining it themselves, to selling it on.

They are just outlining a project that will show good enough economics along with geological justification for an acquirer to see that there is a business case to take it further.

It is still conceptual and will not be robust economics anyway.

Hi Jez It’s not that grades are uneconomic. That is such too vague a statement. US$10,000 was a targeted price for copper to see the resource of this nature to be economic from as far back as the ‘21 conceptual study, and is evident that has not changed.

The economic limits of the deposit were initially calculated as part of a pit optimisation assessment using Deswik's pseudoflow module.

Using Deswik’s pseudoflow instead of the usual Whittling open pit optimisation software, with Deswik’s they have to calculate the revenues and costs for each block in the block model themselves, so have more input control. Potentially they could have been too cautious in overestimating those CapEx and OpEx costs, hence now why these are seeing some further optimisation as they fine tune the model as well as extra metallurgy to increase recovery rate.

Had a listen too James again last night and thought the same thing, but also I think its important they do a bit more recon drilling at BR, After all, Colin only implied in the podcast there will be ‘no more’ drilling to increase the resource up to 2mt. That does not mean that there will not be any more drilling to increase the resource to north of RC to improve the economic performance, or to test ‘other’ anomalous targets from those initial ground and air surveys to identify further porphyry.

This could be of importance if it is to show the possibility that any other porphyry, share the same style of mineralisation spread as Ascot, which was referred to as a semi-porphyry, in that any gold if present is exhibited in skarns or dykes similar to Cadia. Which could be of significance in the supporting evidence to an acquirer as could add significant ‘future’ value to make the project more desirable now.

Not saying they will, but why not if this latest round of optimisation still doesn’t get it there, they will be sourcing a drill rig to go north anyway.

Just tbc an acquirer will only pay for what is in the JORC.

Benn waiting for it to die down, there is a lot of negativity regarding the decision to sell Manica. Had my concerns about deeper underground mining, and the risks, just one of the issues. The next phase needs to be fully understood before even deciding if there is justification for a new plant. So can appreciate and accept the company do not want the exposure and are doing the right thing and above all, in the interests of shareholders long term. There is still no reason to believe there will not be a positive outcome for BR, with a lot more to come from Zambia in the coming months.

It is solid income that some can ‘all’ be used for developing small scale mining opportunities that will then continue to pay for ongoing exploration and also on other assets. There is still no need whatsoever for raising extra capital for general operational costs. If they do want to down the line, it will be because it will be for a genuine growth opportunity as the company will have afforded for it to be further scoped prior to making a more rash decision on a major exploration programme.

By investing in Manica to be able to make development and operational decisions, it will be more likely there will be a far higher chance of dilution due to less allocation of treasury funds toward its growth strategy and ultimately ‘that’ shareholder value in the long term.

Don’t see why there wouldn’t be some sort of update re Zambia licenses to follow. Their focus appears to have shifted there so you would assume there has been an urgency to get going.

They are in the rainy months now from Dec through to feb so that would affect throughput by around 20-30% down at fb.

MMP agreement runs for 10 years with option to extend but it would still then continue at the current 23% of after tax cash flow.

If they were to contribute toward any new plant or plant extension to accept ‘all’ other ore types, it would see an amendment or a new agreement with improved terms. Unclear if will be greater share of profit or of gold produced though

Anyone ?

Im not ignoring you Dani, been busy earning more pennies.

Buyers should start returning to the resource sector soon so xtr should now have much news to come across all its projects to stimulate some interest again from investors old and new.

-This websites closing percentages have been sh*te for a while now, ignore them 


Yes, but isn’t ignorance bliss. I think Its up over 150% since new year yippeeee

There’s a well known saying in stock markets that “price is what you pay and value is what you get”.

But that all depends on what you paid. 😢