Rosebank Regulatory News (ROSE)

5 Sep 2006 07:02

Vane Minerals PLC05 September 2006 5 September 2006 VANE Minerals Plc (AIM: VML) £750,000 Raised By Way Of A Convertible Loan Note Vane Minerals Plc ("VANE" or "the Company") is pleased to announce that it hasraised £750,000 through a convertible loan note agreement with City NaturalResources High Yield Trust Plc and Geiger Counter Ltd, who have loaned £450,000and £300,000 respectively. The funds raised will be used to primarily accelerate the exploration anddevelopment programme for the Company's portfolio of uranium properties inNorthern Arizona and South-eastern Utah and in addition to finance theconstruction of a mill at the Company's producing Diablito gold-silver mine, inNayarit State, Mexico. This will be of great benefit to VANE, as in addition toeliminating scheduling bottle necks at the custom mill, this facility willgreatly reduce overall costs, especially transportation costs. The principal terms of the loan note are: • The loan note is unsecured and has a maturity date of 30th August 2010 • The note attracts interest at 8% per annum, paid quarterly • The loan note is convertible at the option of the holder at any time prior to the maturity date at a price of £0.12 per share, a premium of 33% to the share price of 9p on the day of issue (31st August 2006) • After the initial 24-month period, if the 20-day average closing price of the Company's shares at any time attains £0.18 or more, the Company may call the convertible loan note for conversion at the conversion price • The number of ordinary 10p shares to be issued upon conversion of the note are subject to proportional adjustment to reflect stock dividends, share splits, reverse share splits and other anti-dilutive events • Upon a change of control involving the acquisition of voting control or direction over 50% or more of the ordinary shares of the Company, City Natural Resource High Yield Trust Plc / Geiger Counter Ltd has the right to require the Company to repurchase their loan note, in whole or in part, at a price equal to 101% of the principal amount, plus accrued and unpaid interest thereon Michael Spriggs, Chairman of VANE commented, "I am delighted to be able toannounce our first fund raising undertaken since we achieved our quotation onAIM in May 2004. Whilst the monthly income generated by our Diablito mine hasenabled us to achieve our principal objective of becoming a self-fundingexploration company, these additional funds will crucially serve to acceleratethe development of our uranium portfolio, at a time when the uranium market isvery robust. The construction of our own mill at Diablito is also an importantdevelopment for the Company because, as well as allowing us to make significantcost savings, it will streamline our operations and give us the potential foran increase in production, resulting in better cash-flows going forward." About VANE Minerals: VANE Minerals was founded by the former international exploration team ofFreeport McMoRan Copper & Gold Inc., one of the world's largest producers ofcopper and gold. The team negotiated exclusive access to Freeport McMoRan'sglobal exploration database, made up of 7,000 plus files generated over nearly100 years of exploration and, following the review of these files, VANE isideally placed to capitalise on project acquisition opportunities. The Companyhas assembled a highly qualified and experienced management team with a proventrack record in exploration and development, who have spent their entire careerssearching for and defining large scale mineral deposits. The Company's principal objective, as set out at the time of its listing in June2004, is to be a self-funding exploration company. As such, the initial focushas been to identify high grade gold-silver projects which can be brought intoproduction as quickly as possible in order to provide revenue towards fundingthe development of potentially much larger projects. VANE is well on its way toachieving this objective as production began at the Diablito mine in Mexico inNovember 2005. The Company will use the revenue generated by this firstproducing mine to help fund development work across its attractive portfolio ofgold, silver, copper and uranium assets in Mexico, Paraguay and the US. For further information, please review: www.vaneminerals.com. Enquiries: VANE Minerals Plc Ambrian Partners LimitedMatthew Idiens Richard Brown+44 (0) 20 7667 6322 +44 (0) 20 7776 6417 Parkgreen Communications Daniel Stewart & CoCathy Malins / Annabel Leather Dan Willmott+44 (0) 20 7493 3713 +44 (0)20 7776 6550 This information is provided by RNS The company news service from the London Stock Exchange