The sum of the parts - it's geological details that matter!Team LME
I'll start with the point I am trying to make - the recent airborne survery is an indication of very positive things for LME.
It positions leadership to "show" the geology of the Ishkoday in a way that they have never before been able to demonstrate it in the past. Armed with the highest possible level of computer modeling, I beleve the next step is for management to "show and tell" potential buyers what is now a very compelling fact set about the Ishkoday.
I have been posting for some time advocating for LME based on the sum of the LME parts, noting the obvious advantages that the Ishkoday has - location, past producing mines, a trove of positive historical and recent assay results, access to roads, power and a workforce, plus good progress on permitting and relationships with first nations groups. These facts combine to give the property a baseline economic value that is above the current share price.
The recent completion of the property wide airborne survery is a key element in establishing the true value of the Ishkoday. It's the game changer that we've been waiting for. One that I believe will lead a buyer to conclude that the sum of the gold deposits across the property is material and that the data is reliable enough to make an offer on the property.
My notes below are somewhat technical but worthy of keeping in mind since management appears to be seeting aside producing a 43-101 and instead using modern computer modeling combined with assay results to establish the geological fact set of the Iskoday.
Below is why the airborne survery is worth paying close attention to.
First, it is important to note that this type of survery provides the highest possible quality of electronic survery data available in the market. Managements decision to complete the survery - at an estimated cost in excess of $100K - demonstrates that there may be sufficent interest from a potential buyer to get this level of detailof the entire property. It also indicates there is enough proven assay derived data on hand that can serve as a fact based launching point for the computers to produce a survey model that meets the highest geological standards in the market.
The data from the recent aerial survery would be uploaded to a number of 3D modeling tools - GOCAD and Leapgrog for example - to produce underground models of the property. Computer advances in geophysical interpretation, modeling and inversion allow today's geologists to create a more accurate - much higher defintion - model of a property. Getting the highest possible confidence in understanding geological structures requires quality data processing to help minimize exploration risk and effectively define new targets.
When teams collect multiple sets of surface and borehole geological and geophysical data, one of LME's software providers called Mira Geoscience uses the Common Earth Model framework to integrate all data sets for interpretation and better decision-making.
In the case of porphyry copper-gold deposits, the identification of a high temperature hydrothermal centre often associated with magnetite is frequently an attractive exploration target. Traditionally, magnetic inversion models derived from surface or airborne data are used to identify magnetic bodies at depth.
However, regional magnetic trends and/or the presence of high magnetic susceptibility geological units may obscure the magnetic signature of such discrete bodies. By combining ground or airborne magnetic survey data with measured drillcore susceptibility data, the resolution and geometrical accuracy of the magnetic inversion is greatly increased.
Utilizing drillhole magnetic susceptibility measurements, through the re testing of previous drill holes that LME mentioned they have been doing, would be used to build a starting susceptibility model for the magnetic inversion, and then fixing the model susceptibility where intercepted by drilling, effectively using all available sources of subsurface magnetic information.
This approach allows LME's team at Mira Geoscience to improve the representation of drilled magnetic zones within the inversion model to highlight residual susceptible material in underexplored areas.
In conclusion, leadership can now "show" in high definition what they suspected always existed across the entire Ishkoday.
The question is : Who is willing to listen to them and bet on the computers vs who will sit on the sidelines and demand an old shcool 43-101 be completed before they make an offer?
My bet is that forward thinking firms - private equity, family offices, venture captial for example - are much more likley to make a move to acquire this property relying on modern computer modeling coupled with assay results, rather than the boards of large publicly traded mining operators who will insist on traditional 43-101 reports.
Open to questions and comments.
Until then, I remain long on LME.
Time and Money