Takeover speculation from The Gold Report.....
TGR: Moving on to copper, we’ve seen three companies with advanced projects taken out this year: Lumina Copper Corp., Augusta Resource Corp. and Curis Resources Ltd. Who’s next?
OG: There aren’t many attractive cooper projects left that are controlled by junior miners. I’ll name two. The first is Reservoir Minerals Inc.’s (RMC:TSX.V) Timok project in Serbia. This contains a large deposit with extremely high copper and gold grades, so much so that copper major Freeport-McMoRan Copper & Gold Inc. (FCX:NYSE) will pay for Timok all the way to a bankable feasibility study in exchange for 75%. That means zero cost for Reservoir with unlimited exploration and development potential. As Reservoir owns a very large, diversified and promising project portfolio next to many active mines in Serbia, and Freeport always targets large world-class deposits with attractive locations, I think it’s more than obvious that Reservoir will be taken over by Freeport, perhaps sooner than later.
The second junior copper company with takeover potential is Excelsior Mining Corp. (MIN:TSX.V), with its Gunnison in-situ project in Arizona. The company released a stunning prefeasibility study in early 2014 with industry-leading economics. More than 25% of the company is now owned by Greenstone Resources, a solid London private equity fund. At its current share price, Excelsior offers fantastic leverage on the copper price.