Automated transcript · Written by software from the replay's audio. It can mishear names and figures; the replay is the record.
25:50 as a CEO, one of my mantras is to get out the way of the talent and in the way of the problems. And so a strategic problem we've got is that, how do you build in the flexibility? So that if the guys wanna follow up on something that they're into or they spotted, how do you build that in? In our case, part of it was the attraction of brownfield. There's always the ability to potentially drill underground So to then extend the season that way, we've acquired a fully winterized camp that would enable us then to extend the season. And you mentioned it, it's the shoulder seasons that are really the most challenging, as opposed to the summer itself or the winter within reason.
26:35 And so that's the kind of approach that we've taken. The marketing, communication side of it, there's a lot of information that you can gain and gather that doesn't, you know, that you can't publish immediately. So you try to fill that gap in that way as well with studies and preparation then as you get into the new year, for example, into what, you know, forward, more forward-looking opportunities. So you can plug some of the gap that way. But in our case, that was actually part of the reason for the Antiox transaction that we've now announced. It's at way lower elevation. It has a different, longer season. And again, what we're trying to do is to smooth out that cyclicality that we all know and all of the dis-benefits that come with it. But I think the guys are absolutely right to focus on the benefits of it.
27:30 And that's certainly been really, you know, our experience, That 6 month hiatus has been an opportunity to gather results, really think about the season. And then as I mentioned, focus on efficiency and effectiveness. And that also then counteracts some of the additional cost that we experience. If we're getting the most bang for buck out of every dollar we're spending, then we're doing the best we can. Well put. And so we'll transition over here. I mean, obviously in the 21st century, community engagement is critical to any resource exploration story. In the north, I would guess probably, if anything, that's even further sort of emphasized, right? I mean, these are remote areas, but they're by no means unpopulated, and a lot of the populations have a sort of deep history with their land. And so I guess, I'll, so Chad, then Fletcher, then Simon, I'll ask you just in terms of, you know, when you talk about First Nations or local community engagement, are there differences in your approach from Southern Canadian areas or even other areas in the world, pardon me, similarities or differences, or even just what steps do you take that you to ensure kind of ongoing evergreen positive relations with local communities?
28:43 Well, you know, It's top of mind. It's important, it's necessary, and quite frankly, it's the right thing to do to engage with the local communities, whether they're First Nations or not. And to answer your question, no, we don't approach the First Nations any differently than we would non-First Nations. The First Nations are very sophisticated, very well educated, especially in the Yukon. They've got a track record, like where we operate, the Nacho Nayak Dun, they've got a track record of being involved in exploration, being knowledgeable about exploration, mine development. And this is not just over the last couple of years, this is many generations. Minings occurred in their ancestral territory for many, many generations. So this is nothing new. There's an established, more or less established path to how we interact with them, how we communicate with them and so forth.
29:49 And as you know in the Yukon, all the territories, the First Nation territories, essentially all of them have been resolved and settled so there isn't a lot of debate about which band has power or not over which part of the land. So that facilitates things. So, you know, again, there are obvious disadvantages to being where we are, but there are obvious advantages. One of them is the level of knowledge of the First Nations and they're, you know, at the end of the day, they're in favour, generally, not all of them, of course, but generally in favour of mineral exploration and mining.
30:40 Fletcher, any difference in approach or anything that you think might be unique in terms of engagement with local communities in the North versus elsewhere? Well, I don't have experience of the elsewhere. So what I can speak to is my first impressions as I got involved in the sector around 12 years ago, fully immersed, Already at that point, we had UNDRIP and obviously in the case of BC, the implementation of that has been at the forefront of quite a lot of the consultation that's been happening with First Nations, certainly in our area. It's been hugely positive. I think the rest of the world is going to follow, even if they don't want to or they're going to be slow on the uptake. It's coming. And that puts Canada ahead. And, you know, in our case, in our area, it puts us way ahead of the curve and it's definitely something to lean into.
31:40 I've been very lucky and people who've followed our story and seen other webinars with me have heard me say this before. So I apologize for repeating myself, but we were blessed to be able to work out of the gate with an individual by the name of Kristy Smith. She's an MBA, she's a published author of working in allyship and partnership with local communities in the natural resources sector. And she's a First Nation heritage herself. And I cannot speak highly enough of having someone like that who presents you the vision of how to do it properly and also then guards that vision. And if you look at our corporate deck, that's the one slide that has never changed. Everything else changes. What we discover, how much money we've got, how many shares there are, all of it. The team, the one slide that never changes is how we approach this.
32:33 And it's for all the reasons that have been mentioned is they're so experienced, they remember everything that's happened before and they are very entrepreneurial. Some of the most entrepreneurial people I've come into orbit with are from the local communities and are way better entrepreneurs than I will ever be. And I learned something interesting yesterday. For example one of the groups one of the First Nations is about to launch an air service from South Terminal I think at Vancouver Airport up to the one of the big airstrips near us to service the Tudor-Gaume District. I mean, like, that's unbelievable. And it will make exploration easier, more efficient. It'll mean visits can happen more regularly from other groups coming up to check out the area.
33:19 Oh my gosh, they're on the front foot. They're very, very well organized. They grew up, as Chad mentioned, with natural resources as part of their business opportunities that were in front of them. Many of them have embraced it and more power to them and let's get it on. Everywhere else is going to have to do this too. We're lucky that we've already, you know, I've been doing it since I got involved in this sector and there's no plans to change that approach. And Simon, maybe this is a good way for you to end. I know you've been around the world in terms of your own discoveries and your own prospecting. Is there any of you, can you give us any sort of salient differences or differences in approach? I think it's the same, you know, communication, consideration for the people in the area where you're working, consideration for the environment, but communication important, you know, getting there, letting people know what your plans are, why they're that way, that you're not mining, you're exploring. I mean, there's a lot of, especially in Latin America, there's a lot in the smaller areas or the more remote areas. There's a lot of miscommunication that people think the bags of dirt that you've taken away are actually got gold in them, as opposed to soil samples. So you really need to keep the communities involved in what you're doing, why you're doing it, and try to employ as many as you can and make sure that you generate as much employment as you can in the area.
34:41 I mean, that's always a big case in Latin America, rather than getting a cat in, get 30 people fixing the road, et cetera. So, you know, we haven't, where we are in the Yukon territory, that's very remote, we're a few hundred kilometers from any of the communities, but we, you know, the area that we just staked last year, we just opened up for industry by the South Sudanese and the Northwest Territories government. So they want to see industry in this part of the Northwest Territories. So that was a very positive move. So yeah, no, I think it's the same everywhere. Communication, consideration. No, fair enough. Just an authentic efforts. And so I will, I'll just take a moment here and I'll encourage people if you have any questions. I see there's a couple that's gotten typed into the chat, but yes, there will be time at the end for investor-based questions, so take a second there. But maybe let's transition into company-specific questions, and Simon, I'll bounce this one right back to you. I mean, you mentioned, right, Snowline, obviously, and then the reduced intrusion-related gold systems.
35:41 Maybe I kind of just braid the lead around to my own question, but why is this deposit, Why is there so much sort of excitement and hype around these right now versus, you know, like as you kind of said yourself, previous waves of exploration booms? Yeah, well, they're number 1, they're very large. They're world class gold systems, right? Snow lines, 8 million ounces, banyan, about the same. You know, they're very large systems. They're usually very simple metallurgy. They're open, pittable, right on the surface generally. And there's some big ones. I mean, Snow Line's discovery really got me back into the play. I lived in the Udawson City back in early 90s and I explored the Tombstone Mountains then. In fact, the first company I listed was called Tombstone because it was based on those intrusive suites.
36:28 But so when I saw Snowline's discovery, I did all that research to the east of Snowline and nobody had ever walked inside those intrusives to the east of Snowline in the Northwest Territories. They'd explored the sediments around them for lead, zinc, tin, tungsten, but as soon as they got to the intrusive they took them back down the creek again because that's not what they were interested in. You know, those the ones in the eastern Yukon were known to be tungsten rich and gold poor. Well, Snowline contradicted that, so I, you know, did all the research and then just began staking all the intrusive bodies and getting boots on the ground inside the intrusive. The system's a large, simple metallurgy and open pitable. That's the attraction to them. And new.
37:13 They're relatively new. I mean Fort Knox is probably the first one in Alaska that was about 12 million ounces. That was a free limb play way, way back when. But since then, I think in the U-Cum has been now with Snowline probably around 30 million ounces found within these intrusive suites that have not been looked at before. No, excellent. And Chad, 1 for you, your own resume, you're a markets-based CEO rather than coming from the geological side of things, right? And so I guess just in your own experiences, how does that result in a, maybe a different approach to exploration decision-making for you and your team? In terms of these particular types of deposits, you mean? No, just as it just in general with your leadership, right? You're bringing a skill set that you know, that you're bringing your skill set. And then how do you work as a team then from there, if you're not a geo like me, I'm not a geo rather, pardon me, but if you're not a geo, how do you make sure that you're, how do you work as a team to make these decisions?
38:12 How do you rely on your team? Right, yeah, I mean, to your point, my background is mostly in finance, although I am a mining engineer, so I look at the technical aspects, the practical technical aspects. And you know, I have the deepest respect for geologists, I actually wanted to be a geologist when I was younger because geologists have to look outside the box, it's more of an art than a science, but at the end of the day the art has to become a business and so you know it doesn't, we've been very active on the M&A front over the last 4 years, and we've acquired our assets through acquisition, not through discovery.
39:00 And by the way, the assets that we've chosen to acquire are assets that we feel are on the right part of the value proposition curve in the sense that grassroots exploration, if you do find something, you've got a huge win, right? But the reality is the odds are not in your favor why not buy something that's already discovered already known but not appreciated so that's what we've been focused on buying and accumulating that's what we have today But all of these assets have to pass the test of, you know, what will make them economic? What, you know, this is not a science project, this is not a hobby. You know, what will we have to do to make these projects become mines, become something that are, things that are much more valuable.
39:52 And so, you know, we touched on infrastructure, we touched on, you know, grade, size, size is, you know, as Simon said, you know, these types of deposits, all of a sudden, they're monsters, right? So if you've got a 2 million ounce deposit, like for example, if Snowline only had a 2 million ounce deposit, I don't think people would be very interested. It's just not enough. It doesn't make it. But because they're probably going to be a 15, 20 million ounce deposit, nobody really knows, then all of a sudden it will bring the infrastructure to it. So the conclusion really of what I'm trying to say here is that It's great to explore and try to find something, but at the end of the day, there's got to be a financial return. It's got to be practical, because Mr. Market, the investor, will always...
40:46 Every day they vote, right? Whether they buy or sell your stock and they have to make the, you know, they've got to realize whether this thing is gonna become something that has potential in the future rather than something that just fizzles out, huh? So it's got to satisfy lots of criteria. It's not a simple thing. And that's why I would challenge the investors. I'm very convinced that Simon and Fletcher have projects that satisfy these constraints or these criteria. But it's one thing to get a good drill hole, but it's another thing, it's many, many, many other things to get a mine. Lots of things have to go right.
41:31 And so unfortunately in our industry we've got lots of promoters, speculators and you know investors tend to get burnt. But at the end of the day you know do your own due diligence, talk to the experts and make sure that what you're investing in has credibility and it's legitimately a good target to advance. Now, Matt, you're on mute. It's my turn. Thanks. Okay, so Fletcher, I've got one for you here. You kind of mentioned off the start, you know, AMARC and what they've done in the Tudogon is sort of, you know, everything changed, I think was what you said there. And obviously, I mean, that was a surprising and impressive discovery that they pulled off. And maybe do you want to, and we'll, like I said, this is kind of part 1 of 2, where we'll talk about Aniox next, but how, I mean, how, what has been the change up in the Tudor gone from there? I mean, how, how, how dramatic has it been? What, I mean, what are the, how, how much has it changed since, since that day in terms of just interest?
42:35 Yeah, no, like, it's a paradigm shift for the for the district. It's not that these shallow porphyries weren't predicted there. I don't know if there's over 10 PhDs written, suggesting that there could be this kind of discovery. You may be aware that Comess itself is to the south, the southeast of the Aurora discovery. And there's a billion dollars of infrastructure, copper gold focused infrastructure sat there on care and maintenance. And I know Sentara put out a news release relatively recently that showed for the first time the condition that that infrastructure is in and it's in fantastic condition. They themselves now have invested into our neighbours to the northwest.
43:22 So you're really the layers to the onion here are starting to peel back and reveal themselves and there's a lot more to come. But a paradigm shift is really undersells what's happened. That discovery itself, given the kind of calculations I've seen, it's hugely significant. And just to sort of pick up what Chad said, minds are made by people. Discoveries happen with all the science, et cetera, but the minds themselves take people. And so you start from this fantastic discovery, you calculate the resource, et cetera. And then after that, it really is a lot more, there's so many things involved in order to get something through to that mine development stage.
44:14 And for us, what that discovery meant was it attracted, in our case, Skeena to come and get involved in the district. The Tudigong itself has this endowment of gold, silver, epithermal style mineralization that was really the focus in our part for the last sort of 5 or 6 years. Simply put, you've seen about $350 million of modern exploration in the Tudor gone since, you know, our neighbours to the Northwest, you know, started plugging away. I think it was in 2016, 2017. Well, you're about to see $100 million spent in the Tudor God in this year alone. And it's not just going to be us. It's going to be work going to the to the northwest, work going on by Centera down to the southeast.
45:02 And then obviously, on our eastern boundary, Freeport has now signed a joint venture with Finlay Minerals. So this exploration area is about to step up a level, the kind of level of investment that we've seen in parts of the Golden Triangle. We're now about to see in the Tudor Garn for effectively the first time with modern exploration techniques. So, hugely impactful. And for us, stating the obvious, it took our share price from where we were up to where we are roughly now, attracted in a strategic investment from Skeena. And then we've been able to use that as a platform now to really think about what's the vision for the company And where do we want to see ourselves in the next year, 3 years, 5 years and beyond?
45:50 No, excellent. And I kind of warned you the follow up Ben is with that, right, with that sea change that is occurring up there because that remarkable discovery, you know, And as you said, I mean, the amount of interest shown in your company in the market now. So then why would you with this newly proposed recent merger with Aniox stepping out of the Teutogon, right? You did touch on this, right, in terms of what your vision with the company, what you want it to be, but then why, right? You've had this amazing kind of response to the Teutogon. So why are you kind of stepping beyond its boundaries now and expanding into the Golden Triangle itself with Aniox? It's a great question. I'm not going to say everything that I can say about Aniox and what excites us about it. There's a lot more to come on it. But I will start from the top down. So the vision for TDG is to become a preeminent copper gold exploration company starting in B.C. But obviously Canada is where it's a twinkle in our eye.
46:48 You know, the Antiox copper acquisition gives us a new dimension to the company. It's not just about the seasonality, it's about the diversification geologically. It's a VMS deposit. The guys that have been in the background putting Antioch's together have been plugging away there. They've put over 10,000 hectares together in essentially a forgotten district of British Columbia. I challenge anyone out there to tell me another forgotten district with a history of prolific mining where you could walk in and actually be a first mover. And when this came across our desk, when it was proposed, it raised our eyebrows and we really were forced to take a deeper look and to obviously do the due diligence.
47:38 And the more we pushed it around amongst ourselves, the more we felt that it would make sense and that now was the right time. You never know when exactly the right time is. But $5 copper, which I think we've we've crossed today, and we're believers in copper over, you know, certainly the mid and longer and longer term. And we're obviously big believers in precious metals right now. And it's the right fit at the right time and it takes us an enormous step forward. There's a lot more to come in terms of the information on Antioxin and the rationale. It's at an earlier stage to the Teutogon. One of the key things that we stipulated is it mustn't distract away from what we're doing in the Tudogon and it won't. It's an earlier stage, it needs more compilation work, it needs more grassroots, you know, geophysics and sampling work, et cetera. But we're getting the sense already that this is something like the Tudor goal was in 2016 and 2017.
48:43 And I just, you know, throw it out there. If you could now go be a first mover into the Tudor gone for the kind of entry price that we're we're contemplating paying for this proposing to pay for this project. If you if you knew then what you know now, which would you do it? And the answer unequivocally is yes. And so these opportunities don't come along very often. And when they do, you have to do your due diligence. You don't walk in lightly, but you take it seriously. And this elevates TDG's profile and relevance on a number of different strategic aspects. And so there's so much to come here. We're super excited, but the focus right now is the Tudor Gone and welcoming that bought deal financing that we announced when it closes, that will give us additional firepower to really focus on not just the area around the Aurora Discovery now, but up that 12-kilometer corridor that we've identified. So, you know, watch this space. The team is getting better.
49:46 The project portfolio has been enhanced. The Treasury is there to support what effectively is world-class exploration. And that's what you need to be doing, we think, at this point in the cycle. Thank you. Well said. A couple left here, and then we'll transition into investor questions. There are a few in the chat here, and again, I'll encourage people here. We're nearing the end, but I think we'll be able to fit these in if I don't get too loquacious. But Chad, I'll push off to you here now. Honeybadger, you have quite a few projects across a few different jurisdictions in the north in a variety of geological settings. And so, I mean, simple questions, you have a lot of hungry mouths to feed. How do you feed them all? Well, they're not that hungry in the sense that our holding costs in aggregate are $65,000 a year for all 7 projects. So one way to look at them is they're essentially free call options on the commodity prices.
50:43 So I talked about the silver but we've got billions of pounds of zinc. I don't hear too many people jumping up and down about zinc, but at some point, possibly that'll be worth a lot of money. And you know, people, as I said earlier, people always ask us, you know, 7 is a lot. You've got to focus and I mentioned PLATA and NanoCivic are the 2 projects that we will be working on this year. They are the most, let's say, drill-ready, obvious. I mean, to me, they're both phenomenal. You know, NanoCivic, just to talk about that for a second, NanoCivic, as I said, was a mine, Strathcona Mineral Services, very well-operated mine. You know, it stopped mining, they stopped mining essentially. There were other operators after that, but the zinc price went to 25, 30 cents a pound.
51:40 And what's very typical, once prospectors make a discovery, they turn it over to exploration geologists, who then turn it over to mine geologists, and then at some point, the exploration stops. And we inherited, you know, we talked about, Simon talked about the government, you know, the fact that we're blessed with the data being available. We, for a Guinness, the pint of Guinness 1 day, we, one of the members of our team, Mike Jaladin, ran into, because Mike used to work there, and he ran into a geologist that worked at NanoCivic, one of his co-workers, former co-workers, and the guy said, hey, I've actually got a bunch of boxes of data, And so we went to pick it up in Florida.
52:32 And the mineral endowment, the export, it's dozens and dozens of kilometers of geophysical and geochemical anomalies that were never followed up. And to me, it's mind blowing how this could be in this day and age available. We staked it for $18,000. That was our acquisition cost. Are there other nanocivics on our property? I can't prove it to you, but my gut says yes, there's going to be several others. I mentioned the hundred million ton pyrite deposit that's sitting there and everybody on the line knows that the world needs more sulfuric acid. Well what's that worth? And as I said it's got germanium and gallium in it. So, you know, I'm salivating and I can go on and on talking about NanoCivic. I don't think our investors really understand or appreciate how good of an asset this is, mostly because it hasn't been a mine for 30 years.
53:31 And, you know, I guess really at the end of the day, it's up to me, it's up to us to inform and educate investors, the street markets analysts about how good this target is for us. Excellent, Chad. And then so Simon, a couple here back to back for you, I'll roll 1 in here from the audience as well, but you just, your bite zone discovery, Bonanza Gold, 92 grams, excuse me, was the highlight there, but also puts the bite in bite, bismuth and tellurium also with exceptional concentrations. Why is this such a significant discovery for your strategy and your geological thesis? Well, geological thesis, I don't know I had one. I mean, you know, all of these intruders had never seen boots on the ground.
54:17 Snorlax's discovery showed that there was potential in the Eastern Belt, so I got boots on the ground. And that was the thesis. I mean, I've made quite a few discoveries over the last 20 years, but I've never seen anything quite like the grad system. I've got a cliff 450 meters high that's cut so much with shaded veining, it's almost like a schist. This is a granodiorite intrusive that's cortesis in age, just shattered by veining. I mean, they are high grade, but like all these systems, it's visual goals. So the 92 grams really is not significant, but the high bismuth and tellurium is. It's a very powerful system. It shattered this whole mountainside. You know, I'm very excited by the target. Let's get the drill turning in a week and see if we can show the continuity that is needed to make a mine.
55:06 Well, then really quickly back to you, Simon, just can you, this is from Bluefin, can you just tell us about the Baby Bite, Ogre or the visuals of your other reduced intrusion related gold systems, the targets? We've staked a bunch of other targets in this area. The ground we had to the north, further north, as I said, we hit all these intrusives, walked through them, identified some anomalies, drilled, sated them. The other ones to the north didn't work out. This area where we are now with the grad is a very exciting target. We haven't had time yet for all the other small intruders in the area where we are to explore them because we just focused on the bite at the fall last year when we found it. I'll let you know in the fall what the others look like. You got to feed someone.
55:52 Yeah, well, good enough, Yeah, good enough. And then we got time here. One more, Tom has a decent question. Think Simon and Fletcher were kind of riffing on the large kind of historical databases that are accessible to Canadian explorers. He's out on the street for being here. I hesitate to use the 4 letter word AI, but are you implementing AI to manage and assess or access the big historic databases that exist in Canada? And I guess Fletcher or Simon or Chad, did anybody, any words on that one? Yes. No. Yes. Yeah, we use AI and it revealed some very interesting things. It's a good tool. It's just a tool. It's one of many tools, but it worked for us. Yeah. We're taking a bottom-up approach. No, that's okay. Bottom-up approach. We're trying to use AI to assist us with real-world tasks rather than trying to put in place some big AI overarching strategy that's too much change too quickly.
56:54 We're asking the really pertinent question, which is can it really add value? And if so, where? And so we're walking slowly into AI in terms of our adoption, but what we're seeing so far, yeah, really impressed. So I hear from everybody is that the AI, it's not the carpenters, the tool at this point, right? And make sure to use it appropriately as such. Anyway, gentlemen, I think that's it. That's all the questions in the chat and that's all the questions I have. So thank you, it was illuminating and maybe a little bit badgered here and there, not to get too punny with honey badger, but a little bit of a rocky start, but I think we had some pretty good content here. So appreciate it guys and hey. Okay, thank you, Matthew. Great job, Matt. Great job. Thanks, everyone. Thanks, Matt. Thanks, Matt.
