The latest Investing Matters Podcast episode featuring Jeremy Skillington, CEO of Poolbeg Pharma has just been released. Listen here.
Https://lexingtongold.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/2023-06-02-Lexington-Gold-WRE-Acquisition-Circular-v5-Final.pdf
A lot of this is recapitulated from the announcement 3 weeks ago, but this is the statement of the BOD that they are unanimous in recommending the deal to S/H's .
I would be less worried about SA than the Beeb! They have an agenda, and since most gold miners are still controlled by the evil white man, they tend to over egg the situation. Yes, power supply has been an issue, but they are working on it. Also, bear in mind that there is tons and tons of solar power potential there too!! Its going to be a long time before we need to power a gold mining/processing facility, at least 5 years I would say, and I am sure that the short term prospect, the Harmony JV have already addressed this!! Also, proving up resources in SA because of the nature of the deposits, (large, flat, concentrated), you do not need to do anywhere as much drilling to prove up a resource compared to other jurisdictions. Take a look at civil law in SA too, it is still ranked as the 3rd best jurisdiction in Africa to do business. There are good reasons for that. If it were such a bad place to do business, why are all the major gold miners still doing biz over there? And it looks like our concessions are shallow!! In other words, very cheap to mine!!
Looks like today, finally, the market is sitting up and taking notice. Decent volume today and some sound looking buying in good chunks going on.
Methinks that the community is getting hung up on stuff which is not really relevant!! Lots of people here seem to focus on why Creasy is selling out. Well he is not. He is well known for investing in mining juniors in Australia in particular. Surely, the fact that he has got on board a group of managers who know and/or live in South Africa, should count for something? He retains between 30 an 40% of the business potentially. Loads of incentive to support existing management. And there is low hanging fruit there for us.... The Jelani Joint venture with Harmony. Technically, they will be waiting for AGM approval, but I think you can bet your bottom dollar, the phones will be ringing already to get this one back on track. Management would not risk approval of the deal by an AGM/EGM being rejected if they had not already had a quiet chat post deal announcement with the major shareholders and got their approval...
We need to relax, and look forward to the slow realisation that this is going to be a 37,000,000 ounce company, not a 200K ounce one, and let management get on with it!!! The potential is there...
Agreed, However, you can't ever keep everyone happy, but I thought the bit about the depths of the prospects at 2-400m is very telling. You don't even need to put shafts in at those depths, you can spiral down and put a basic rail transport system in as I understand it. MUCH cheaper........... I am sure that we will hear more about this as things develop. But really, it seems to me that it is the absolute massive size of what we seem to be getting into that is fascinating, not to mention game changing. Going from 0.22mn Oz to potentially 37mn, is pretty bloody amazing.
I hear you SJH. If you look at the trades yesterday, most of them were what I would call "junk trades", there was really no evidence at all of concerted selling by major holders. Just 1 X 200k, 1 X 150k and 1X 100k, on a volume of 2.8mn which is less than 1% of the company. This share is still very tightly held.
Someone was also questioning why WRE was put through business re-organisation. I have n idea about that as someone who has been through this process before,. If you are a sensible business person, its a very neat solution to quite a few things and cleans up very potentially messy situations. 1) Creasy, as the major creditor would always be in control of the process, but much more importantly re-organisation would achieve, 2) getting rid of all old debts to suppliers (if any) and 3) would ensure a sale of up to 100% of the company totally wiped clean of previous shareholders and potentially a useless Black Empowerment operator (and there are many of those in South Africa). This is great for Creasy, great for LEX. Clean clean clean!! The government sponsored process GUARANTEES a shiny new asset which has been totally laundered of any nasties. It will be interesting to know who LEX chose to become their BEE partner. There are actually some very good ones too.
Hi there Panda, re your point about he Jelani JV with Harmony being too deep. That is not an issue, there is already a mine , 3 mineshafts in place with all the ventilation etc. Go to Harmony's annual report and look up the Target 1 mine I think it is. As to the others, the RNS states that the targets are between 300m and 1200m deep. Its the Jelani JV with Harmony that is deep, I am sure that the company will clarify the depth of the others sooner rather than later, but White Rivers was quite unabashed to say it was looking for shallow mines or mines with infrastructure already in place.
Someone else mentioned dilution, as I said earlier, if I am getting a 16,000 times potential uplift in reserves from what we have already, I don't really care if the dilution is 75%. I've still got more money in the bank. Worth also noting that there has been lots of drilling there already. If it can be proved that the old drilling is accurate by punching a few holes nearby that match the old results, you are allowed to use all the old results for JORC purposes. Therefore, it may be nowhere near as pricey as you think to get serious upside from here.
As to Creasey's motivation to sell, well I am not a mind reader, but he is getting on a bit, 78. and he still has a ton of stuff on his plate in Australia from what I can see. But really, perhaps we should be focusing on the fact that he still wants in, hence the option, which he is PAYING for.
Anyway, time will tell. It will all out in the end!! I am still massively excited by this and am looking forward to learning more.
I have now picked myself up off the floor and I can confirm that I WAS NOT Hallucinating when wrote below. Its real!!!!!
See below the presentation from 2017:
http://www.shango.co.za/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/White-Rivers-Exploration-April-2018.pdf
Wowweee!!! I am just picking myself up off the floor after a brief scan of the announcement. So they were not joking late last year when they said they were talking with parties interested in doing things with LEX. And guess what? Its in South Africa, where CEO Bernard is from and where Chairman Ed Nealon had some of his big breaks with Aquarius. Rumour has it that he knows the Witwatersrand from days at Aquarius Platinum. In a nutshell:
1) LEX is acquiring White Rivers Exploration, previously owned by Mark Creasy, Australia's most famous private prospector. Most of the listed vehicle he invests in "turn to gold". He has an incredible track record!
2) We are acquiring 5 properties which have had varying amounts of drilling on them in the past.
3) They reckon around 37mn Oz are in place though needs to be further confirmed as a JORC compliant resource.
4) One of the prospects, Kroonstadt, has up to 60+ million oz, and is effectively a new gold field.
5) The geology of this area is some of the best known in the world.
6) There is a joint venture already in place with Harmony Gold at their Target Mine.
This is mind blowing. We are morphing from a junior miner with only 220K oz, to potentially a monster with nearly 40mn or possibly more oz. There are only about 10 companies that have 25mn oz plus in the world. We potentially could slot in at No 8. And yes, there will be dilution, potentially up to 40%. But if that is the price for upping our reserves by 16,000% from 220K oz to 37mn oz, I will happily take that.
Strap on your seat belts!!! Oh, and yes, Fill yer boots!!!!!
Hahaha Doggy!! I actually have brokers that speak real words too as opposed to a computer screen!!! If Laurel and Hardy have a number, would live to have it, then I can have a broker that not only is human (Yes!! Really human!!) but also has a sense of humour!! This would be an unbeatable combo. And yes, of course, the suggestion that the fundamentals of gold as a commodity could be driving this move as well as the "PH" factor, could be bang on.
A couple of my brokers have been in touch with me and said they reckon MM "PH" are short..... and have been bidding it up. Can never be sure, but even MMs get it wrong sometimes!!!
Flops, maybe this is why the price is moving, bit of a long shot, but in the mysterious world of Junior Miners, anything is possible!!! Keep it up I suppose, if you'll excuse the pun!!
Gas, I think actually, if I am not mistaken, we are waiting more for soil samples and trenching results from Jennings Pioneer. This should be very interesting as the preliminary results reported earlier seemed to indicate that the old Barite Hill mine structure extends on to our land and that there are various anomalies that could easily be turned into drill targets. Those results should be out any time is my guess. Hold on to your hats!!!!
Hope springs eternal. And I hope U R right.... Its time us long suffering Lexaholics had a serious drink!!!!
Where do you get your insider info Paris? I need more....
Deal or no deal, there be some sellers in them thar 'ills today...
Hope springs eternal, especially in this sector!! I would only say that in one of the RNS last year, CEO mentioned that they had been approached by parties anonymous to join forces. But its never done till its done!!! As they say. But holding up nicely, have to admit...
Well well!! I had no idea my writing of earlier today was going to be as prescient!! So the Chairman has lent the company $150K, unsecured, at 5% for a year. Never mind the "Gnomes of Bangkok", they stepped up late last year with cash, now we've got none other than the Chairman, Ed Nealon, coming to the party. They are taking the cash to :
"evaluate potential additional new gold projects/opportunities both in the Carolinas and in other well-known, global gold producing jurisdictions.
ยท The Loan Facility serves to avoid equity dilution for existing shareholders at the current time"
Now if that doesn't sound like bridging finance to you all, then I'm a Frenchman!! This looks to me like a pretty monstrous hint that they've found a deal, either to be acquired, or to acquire something pretty soon. Rather than raise capital when they are so close to the finishing line, they're best off to borrow the money from major shareholders/management. Its a bit like sticking a billboard outside the office telling the world what's going on!!
Its also worth pointing out that Ed Nealon is the self same person who, 20 years or so ago, led the charge when Aquarius Platinum went from a $10mn junior to a $4bn market cap stock in 5 years. He was also involved with Sylvania Platinum as I recall in the early days. He is a player. If he is prepared to lend money to LEX unsecured, he must have very good reason to believe that he will get every last cent of his hard earned cash back, and a nice kicker to boot!!
Bring it on LEX!! Intriguing!! As I have been known to say to friends, "A nod's as good as a wink to a blind donkey"!
Lyddon, just read your post in a little more detail and you seem to imply that management would sell out for a pittance to the first offer that came along. Well, I am not so sure. Remember that group who were christened "The Gnomes of Bangkok" back in 2021? It seems to me that they would have a lot to say about selling on the cheap. They pretty much control the company by now with around 50% of the stock or more (who knows what they have stashed away in nominee/offshore companies?). So really, we have to say to a certain degree that we are all in their hands.
The good news is that usually junior mining stocks that have a strong owning group and management who have a good sized stake in the business, and it looks like LEX has both, are usually the winners as they take a long term view towards developing an asset!! I certainly take heart from that and hark back to the CEOs comments last year that offers are coming to them from inside and outside the USA which could be worth looking at.
I reckon its all to play for and now the stock has dipped below 5p/share, I would be looking to pick some up. We also have the Jennings Pioneer and Argo soil test results due quite soon as well. Maybe we'll also get an idea as to what they 2023 drilling program may look like....and which undrilled anomalies around JKL that they'll be poking drillbits into. Oh! Yes! And Lyddon, well done for picking a few up. I am sure you will be richly rewarded as am I going to be!!
Interesting post Ippy. One of the most intriguing things about it is the fact that the cut off grade with the Pancon resource at Sawyer is 0.4g/ton. Our most recent one at Jones Keystone is 0.5g/ton. Their deposit is close to surface, so is ours. I reckon that changing the cut off grade is an ace in the hole for management further down the line. At $1800 bucks an oz, its got to be worth mining down to that grade. Just given what we have now, I am pretty sure, though I am not a geologist, is would seem quite within the bounds of possibility that this alone would raise our reserves from 210K oz to 240-250K.
Well I am just parroting what CEO Bernard said a few months ago. Crucially, the announcement also said that the opportunities were not just in the USA, they were international/global as well. Some of the directors have been on the precious metals/resources patch for many years now and must have excellent rolodexes which I am sure that they are not too old to use.... Let's see how things pan out, but I have to say that the share price has been behaving very well the last few days....