RE:RE:huge volume todayI would say the company will be declaring commerical production at Caribou Jan 1st and we are only 5-6 weeks away from that Date. That will be a big announcement and will be a big turning point for TV. Till then, concentrate produced from Caribou can still be sold. As long as the company has completed it's capital spend, it should be able to preserve and spend cash accordingly, with both mines producing at cash costs well below the current (depressed) price of zinc. In the worse case, they can drag payables out a few more weeks untill cash starts rolling in, or they can get a bridge loan from one of their big institutional investors, or from Glencore, or even from a Canadian bank (given that the secured assets are in Canada), or even get some advances from the mills whom they would be selling to, or do a sale-leaseback of some of their mining equipment. There are other options as well, including deferring exploration on the company's other properties unitl the treasury improves.
I don't know why everyone is assuming that a big dilutive financing is coming. I have been a simlar situation several times with companies I have been CFO of, and it is important to say that operating companies like TV have several options - some of which are listed above. However, junior exploration companies (like TV used to be) don't have any optioins other than to issue more shares. I don't know why they issued more flow-through shares subsequent to quarter end, but I think they got the message - that current investors didn't like that. Therefore, I don't think there will be another dilutive financing, no matter how small. If at all necessary, I think they will pursue one of the other options listed above. While each has a cost, they are not dilutive.
Unfortunately, many of their institutional investors were selling this week, for one reason or another. Remember this stock was a $2+ stock a couple of years ago. Some institutional investors can't hold penny stocks in their portfolios, and are forced to sell when a stock goes below a certain level. Some may have just been fed up with the whole mining space, and some may have just gotten spooked from the drop in Zn prices. The fact remains, that operationally Caribou is ramping up according to plan, grades are high, and the mine and mill are operating as well as can be expected. Also, management has one other mine operating smoothly, so getting Caribou up and running is not by "trial and error". These guys know what they're doing.
Regardless of how you cut it, the fundamentals are there, everyone is projecting Zinc to be in defecit this coming year, and the company is way undervalued at current levels. No wonder the analysts have targets all north of $1. When everyone is forced to sell, that's when it's time to buy if you have the stomach. I was a big buyer today at over 200,000 shares!