Member Info for TigerByTheTail

Hi Beamer!
Remember that the Techmet deal dates back to the time when there was still hope that Rainbow could hit its production targets and make a profit out of the narrow vein mining. Also, there was no Lind "death spiral" finance in place then.
Whether TechMet would get involved with Rainbow again, knowing what we all know now, must be a question.
Anyway, we should get some quarterlies next week, so we'll be able to see if there has been any progress on the ground.

Endeavor is a Canadian company - TSX:EDV.
4 mines - 2 in Burkino Faso, 2 in Cote d'Ivoire plus other exploration in West Africa.
They had a go at merging with Acacia a few years ago, but pulled back in time, just before the Tanzanian Government took against Acacia.

I'm going to go the "full Sherlock" on the Burkino Faso mystery...
Based on the admittedly limited evidence before us, I hypothesise that this is what has been and is going on behind the scenes:
1. Centamin felt they had to make a choice between developing their exploration assets in Cote d'Ivoire and those in Burkino Faso. They plumped for Cote d'Ivoire, and decided to put the Burkino Faso assets (mining licence and all) up for sale (or possibly to be joint ventured). That's why they've stopped talking about Burkino Faso entirely and they slipped in the line about the disposal of non-core assets in the RNS that Cowichan spotted.
2. Endeavor, the owner of two gold mines in Burkino Faso, naturally took a look at Centamin's Burkino Faso assets as part of their own well-documented expansion drive. In the course of this process, their 30% major shareholder, the Egyptian billionaire and gold bug Mr. Sawiris, started to think about a takeover of the whole of Centamin. (After all, he has the connections in Egypt to make such a deal work, and he understands the exploration potential there).
3. Endeavor poached Centamin's C.O.O., Mark Morcombe, back in February. (It's one way of doing thorough due diligence!). Centamin were caught on the hop by this move, and (unusually) made Mark Morcombe work out his 3 month notice period (see last RNS; note also the lack of the typical expression of gratitude for his service). Centamin then appointed an ex-Endeavour employee as their new C.O.O.
4. The two companies are currently discussing a merger, with Endeavor pushing the idea. I don't know if they'll reach an agreement or not, but if they did, it would certainly be good for their shareholders! I'm confident that the two companies put together are worth more than they are separately.
Elementary? Or completely wrong?

I saw the Telegraph article about TechMet over the weekend, made the connection, and thought about buying back in here. However, in the end I decided to pass, essentially because the Lind death spiral financing arrangement is still in place, and that will act to grind down the share price.
IMO, mining the narrow veins doesn't offer a way forward for Rainbow. The veins are so narrow, and they require so much stripping, and transport costs are so high, that it simply isn't a viable business. At the very best, with four mine areas operating, Rainbow might get to break even.
The best that can be said about the current narrow vein operation is that Rainbow have proven that they can manage the very considerable risks of operating in Burundi - actually, no small achievement.
IMO, Rainbow does have considerable exploration potential, especially if Kiyenzi turns out to be a large carbonatite type deposit. But this requires a lot of drilling etc., and if successful, it would require building a new processing plant. etc. In short, it would cost a lot of money Rainbow don't have. Investing here now is gambling on Rainbow finding a partner / purchaser willing to invest a lot of money into Burundi. I'm not sure I like the odds of that happening enough to put money into this company again.

If we are musing about a possible Endeavor Mining and Centamin merger (which IMO would make a lot of business sense), then we shouldn't forget a key fact:
Endeavor is 30% owned by La Mancha, the gold investment vehicle of EGYPTIAN billionaire Naguib Onsi Sawiris.
I've always thought that, in practical terms if not de jure, the Egyptian state would have to consent to any takeover of Centamin. Perhaps Mr. Sawiris is the man to obtain this permission, to resolve the court case, and to develop other mines in Egypt? After all, the Nubian Shield is one of the last great under-explored gold regions in the world and a very very tempting prize!

Yes, I'd agree that today's RNS is largely old news.
I don't see any reason either to buy or to sell based on it.
And so we wait some more.

Hi Chas!
I struggled through the conference call - Andrew Pardey really has no communication skills whatsoever! I still believe he has been over-promoted, and he is basically unsuited to being the CEO of a PLC.
That said, the actual substance of the call was OK.
Q2 production was hinted to be a little stronger than Q1, which if you keep in mind the 45%/55% H1/H2 split in production this year, would put Centamin on a path either to reaching the top end of guidance or to exceeding it. The company was also confident it could reduce costs further, despite high Egyptian inflation.
Management also ran through exploration results in Egypt and Cote d'Ivoire, but made no mention of Burkino Faso. It's like it's vanished into thin air. Unfortunately, none of the analysts asked about it, but I'm left with the impression that some corporate activity is definitely in the air. FWIW, I agree with Gold Gnome's hunch about a tie-up with Endeavour, but I've got no firm evidence to back it up.

Hi Plumbus!
To state the obvious, Sable isn't set up to recover any silver or germanium from the Star Zinc ore.
So how are GLR going to actually extract those metals and receive that $70 per tonne credit?!?
It seems to me that Colin Bird was getting way ahead of the facts when he said that.
The facts are: 1. so far GLR don't have a deal with Jubilee to send their ore to Sable for processing; 2. The GLR ore from Kashitu is interesting as it only needs to be transported a few hundred yards, and just like the Kabwe spoils it contains vanadium as well as zinc (which Sable will be set up to process); and 3. Star Zinc is 25km from Sable and still needs further drilling, a mining licence, and a fair amount of finance.

Annual guidance is 490-520K ounces @ $890-$950 AISC, with 55% of production coming in H2.
Q1 actual production is 116K ounces @ $898 AISC.
Q1 production (116K ounces) is 23% of midpoint of annual guidance (505K ounces).
Therefore, we should expect a roughly similar production number for Q2 production, given the 45/55 H1/H2 split in annual guidance.
Also, if you straightline Q1's AISC figure over an assumed annual production of 505K ounces, it would come in at a very attractive $826 per ounce. (However, this number is probably "wrong" as the company has phased its sustaining capital investments). Still, Q1's AISC is not bad.
The solar farm isn't included in any company figures yet, as it has been given the official go ahead. The sooner they get started on it the better, as far as I'm concerned.

Hi Prof!
That puzzled me as well - it's like some kind of weird job switch!
I can't help speculating that it might be somehow linked to Burkino Faso; sale of JV of BF assets to Endeavour in the offing?!?

I'd agree with most of that.
Production numbers ahead of guidance. Drill results good. We even have a new C.O.O. (though I'm sure we'll never get to know why the last C.O.O. departed).
Barring a slump in the gold price, I think this will turn out to be the bottom of the SP's fall.
Still radio silence on Burkino Faso. My take on that is that the assets are up for sale and negotiations are ongoing. I could be wrong, but what else could it be?

Oh come off it - this is complete nonsense.
Vast have just lost its one decent producing asset - one that Vast shareholders poured huge amounts of money into to develop. It's a disaster for the company, plain and simple.
And Vast are still hamstrung by their debts. They owe Mercuria $4m, and Mercuria hold security over Manaila and partially over Baita Plai. How are they going to pay that money back now? Vast won't even be able to borrow money to develop Baita Plai until the Mercuria debt is sorted out.
If you believe in AP's pie in the sky with diamonds, then fine. But I don't.

Hi Kaiser B!
Jubilee own 29% of BMR, the previous owner of Kabwe and Star Zinc, and not Galileo.
Personally, I don't think it's worth buying out Galileo. Just do the deal with them to provide extra feed for the Sable plant.
IMO Jubilee doesn't need to get involved in mining. It should concentrate on metals recovery from waste material; there are lots of low cost high return opportunities in that area, and Jubilee have a lot of expertise to offer.

Hi TotalTrader!
Here's what I know - I hope it helps!
1. JLP doesn't need GLR / Star Zinc / Kashitu at all, as such. I make it that "Life of Mine" for the Kabwe / Sable operation (based on the tailings alone) is about 18 years. At current metals prices and estimated production this will yield about $100m in revenue per year. It's impossible to accurately estimate a profit margin based on the figures we have, but as the source material is already mined and milled, I think it will be very healthy.
2. However, that said, adding GLR ore from Kashitu / Star Zinc might increase the mine life and/or current production.
3. Kashitu is a smallish area within the Kabwe mine property which has very high zinc content (based on 2m augur drilling carried out by BMR). It makes sense for both GLR (who have the licence on this deposit) to dig up this shallow easily obtainable ore and to sell it to JLP to mix it in with the tailings. Doing this will probably increase the zinc (and possibly vanadium) yield from the processing. It's not a huge deal but it should be a nice simple little earner for both parties.
3. Star Zinc is further away (25km), and requires more complicated mining. The zinc yields of the willemite ore at Star Zinc is sometimes very high - up to 30% in some places. Eventually, it might make financial sense (for both GLR and JLP) to add the Star Zinc ore into the Sable processing as well to increase zinc yields. However, I don't see how the silver and germanium that the Star Zinc ore also contains could be commercially extracted; IMO Colin Bird was talking nonsense when he talked about a credit of $70/ton for these by-product metals.
4. In short, all of this matters a whole lot more to GLR than to JLP. For JLP it's a question of a bit of extra income and a bit longer "mine life" for Kabwe, which is already an excellent project. For GLR it's pretty much a question of commercial survival or not.

Hi Shareminator!
You may wish to take another look at the Q2 2018 RNS before stating that this company has been honest with its shareholders. Also, their entire communications on the subject of Bunker Hill. (How they must wish they had the $2m + that they blew on that scam now!)
There may come a time in the future when investing in HUM is a good idea. But firstly the share price will need to be much lower (which may well happen when a couple of institutional investors finally sell up), and secondly the greedy and incompetent current management will need to be forced out, and thirdly, new capital will need to be raised.
Until then, IMO this is a bargepole stock.

GLR RNS released this morning - placing to fund Star Zinc + outline of plans for it.

My take on today's placing RNS from GLR is that it is big news for them, but only slightly relevant to JLP.
Eventually, toll processing GLR's Star Zinc ore at JLP's Sable refinery may provide an extra income stream for JLP. But this is several years away, and the earnings from it will be relatively small compared to the earnings from processing the Kabwe waste dumps.
In the meantime, where are those quarterlies?

Well, I just added ahead of the quarterlies. Happy to buy for the long haul at anything like these prices.
The quarterlies should make pretty good reading, with a sizeable increase in earnings (and yet they should also leave lots of room for the Q2 and Q3 quarterlies to report growing earnings as well).

But who would buy Dugbe with the gold market as it is?
Yes, the resource is big, but it is low grade and hard rock, and country risk and costs are high. Just because HUM have spent $60m on it doesn't mean it is worth $60m, or anything like that amount.
If you were looking for a gold project to buy, there are far better ones on sale out there!

Hi Sands and Soutie!
Read the RNSs and work it out from the Coris debt repayment schedule.
Overdraft facility clearly secured (company has NOT provided a further update) and drawn down.
I predict a $10m equity raise at about 15p coming in the next quarter. That should give HUM enough breathing space to get through the rainy season.
This is all a bit Aureus Mining redux. A lot depends on how loyal the institutional investors turn out to be. If one decides to sell out, this could get ugly.