It would be great if Stuhini could have a strategic partner come in to move this basically “shovel ready” molybdenum deposit forward. During the last moly price cycle, this moly deposit was the only one that had a positive decision to go into production by the former operator Adanac Moly Corp. Adanac even obtained an $800 million credit facility to fund construction, just before the 2009 crdit crisis hit and moly prices dropped from +$30/lb to less than $10/lb .
At the current time however, preserving cash seems to be the prudent thing to do. No sense diluting the share structure much more with an already well delineated pit constrained 476 million pound open pit molybdenum deposit in measured, indicated and inferred resources.
Personally, I would eventually like to see a number of deeper holes punched into the ground in the area of drill hole AD417 which bottomed out in 45 meters of 0.23% moly.
If further high grade intercepts were encountered, It might go a long way in establishing the potential for an underground mining component in addition to the proposed open pit at Ruby Creek.
Also note that the AD 417 drill hole is outside the current pit constraint resource.
Having a strategic partner enter the picture for a 10% or 20% stake in Ruby Creek could see the environmental studies and permitting updated to current, and potentially fund some drilling in the
AD 417 drill hole area and deeper, to see just how much larger and how far down the high grade zone goes. Also of interst is the potential for a satellite deposit at Volcanic Creek... potentially like "cluster" of moly deposits that Freeportmines at their Climax and Henderson operations
https://jobs.fcx.com/Climax-Molybdenum/content/About-the-Company/?locale=en_US
Looking at Moon River Capital’s recent PEA, their CAPEX came in at $575 million including a $108 million in contingency funding to mine and process their high grade underground resource of approximately 44 million tonnes grading 0.21% moly at a 7000 tpd rate with OPEX still coming in just under $10.00 / lb.moly
What would Stuhini's CAPEX and OPEX be for their Ruby Creek open pit with approx. 8-9 times the tonnage in their current pit constrained resource estimate at roughly 1/4 the grade ?
Moon River Capital retained A-Z Mining Professionals Ltd. (AMPL) to prepare their Sept 2023 Technical Report for their Davidson moly project .
Note on page 10 "Introduction 2.0" of that Technical Report that Stuhini's V.P of Exploration Ehsan Salmabadi was involved with the preparation of that AMPL Technical Report .
AMPL was also hired by Moon River Capital to prepare the recently released Feb 2024 Preliminary Economic Assessment for Davidson.
With Ehsan Salmabadi's participation in the AMPL studies for Moon River, I would have to believe that Stuhini’s V.P of Exploration should have a very good working knowledge of the current costs for CAPEX, as well as OPEX, at Stuhini's Ruby Creek Project.
Will be meeting up with CEO Dave O’Brien and his Stuhini management team at PDAC tomorrow.
GLTA !