Aris Mining Corp T.ARIS

What will the next 24 hours bring?

[tobinator01]

I've been musing about the unusual trading behavior concerning Aris for several weeks.  Nearly every Gold miner I track was down today, but Aris was up 2.4% on combined Toronto/US volume of 1 million shares.  There is nothing in the last press release last month that should give investors excitment for an upside surprise in Q1 earnings.  Yet, on the earnings-eve, the stock rallies against negative sector headwinds.

Tonight I looked back over the last month for the returns of Gold, HUI and Aris.TO.  Gold is down 1.7% and the HUI is up 5.3%.  Aris, on the other hand is up 24%, or nearly 5 times the HUI over the last month.

24 hours from now Aris will post earnings as their communication black out will be over.  So why has the stock taken off?  Looking at the chart, the trade action has been a relentless push higher without correction for about 7 weeks in a row.  Stocks can and do this type of trade but there has to be a fundamental push or consensus anticipation of big news ahead.  I just don't see any.

It would not surprise me in the slightest that some friendly merger is announced with another miner taking out Aris at some premium.  The other miner would likely be one associated with Telfer, Woodyer or Giustra.  All of these primaries are wheelers and dealers.  From a suitor point of view, it is better to make a deal now before Aris likely doubles a year from now to catch up with peers.

I cannot come up with reasonable explanation for the Aris trade these last 7 or so weeks.  It makes sense to me that Institutional friends would be called upon to get the price to a point so that all Aris investors get on board for a suitor's premium.

My preference is for Aris to just execute per guidance, start Segovia production at the 300k rate in Q1, 2025 and let my warrants ride.  My second preference would be to have the warrants convert to the suitor's capital structure with the same terms and expiry.  The least desirable for me, eventhough would make sense for the suitor, is to pay fair value cash for the warrants and then cancel them.  A 30% premium bid on the stock at $6, would likely result in each warrant being paid out roughly C$1.50 each using a the stock's historic volatility of around 42%.  Any speculators out there could buy A series warrants for 50 cents tomorrow and see them the next day at $1.50.  Only if these tea leaves I'm reading prove out to be correct.

Who knows, maybe Colombia gave them the environmental permit for Soto Notre?  I believe the anticipated decision was to be late this year, but you never know.

[ppp]

Could be this check out around the 23 minute mark https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GQLMw6M2Y-I

[domcolumba]

ppp Many thanks for posting this fantastic interview with Ole Hanson. Dom