Most here are familiar with the fact that Mr. Storm, now Tudor's CEO, was instrumental in the development of the Malartic in Quebec, Canada. It sold for big $$$$$$ as in $billions. Some excerpts from several sources are copied and pasted here. Notice the grades and the fact that the gold was locked in pyrite. As to where this information can be found, the bashers can go find it themselves. At this early stage of discovery the grade and metallurgy is not of concern. Nor is the gold being associated with pyrite. The bashers are twisting and distorting to portray a false concern and sow doubt. This is an orchestrated attempt. Don't fall for it. Canadian Malartic is the largest operating gold mine in Canada. The mine was developed by Osisko Mining Corporation (Osisko) and began commercial production in May 2011. In June 2014, Agnico Eagle and Yamana each acquired a 50% stake in Osisko and created the Canadian Malartic Partnership.
The Canadian Malartic deposit is a large-tonnage, low-grade Archean gold system, consisting of a widespread shell of disseminated gold-bearing pyrite mineralization hosted by porphyritic felsic to intermediate intrusions and altered metasediments. The mine and plant are designed to process 55,000 tonnes of ore per day. The plant includes conventional crushing, grinding and leaching circuits, where the gold and silver are recovered and poured into dor bars.
Mineralization in the Canadian Malartic deposit occurs as a semi- continuous shell of 1 to 3% disseminated pyrite that encloses fine native gold as rounded inclusions with an average of 15 microns diameter.
The Feasibility study was completed by December 2008, outlining Proven & Probable reserves of 6.28 M oz gold (183.3 M tonnes @ 1.07 g/t Au with lower cut-off of 0.36 g/t Au at US $775 gold).
Conclusions
The Canadian Malartic story is an excellent example of how the application of modern empirical ore deposit models to new areas, even using old databases, can achieve success and lead to world class discoveries. Although not a new concept, finding new mines next to old mines requires a “paradigmshift”, not only at the level of preconceived notions of exploration potential, but at the level of what constitutes an economic ore deposit in a given geographic area.
The Canadian Malartic bulk-tonnage deposit was discovered by applying the porphyry gold model to the Malartic area, on the premise that bulk tonnage mining of 1.0 g/t Au ore could be economic in the Abitibi, and by using established data bases to generate the target. Hence, data mining tailored to a new model and simple drill testing of the geological target were the tools that led to the discovery. The deposit did not respond to ground magnetic, electromagnetic nor IP surveys, and is invisible to airborne geophysical surveys, with the possible exception of radiometrics that should in theory give a response on the potassium channel, although this could not be proven at Canadian Malartic due to masking by the tailings ponds.
Since the success of Osiskos Canadian Malartic project, which was well known by 2007 and went from discovery to production in a short 6 years, a “paradigm shift” has occurred within the junior exploration community in Canada. Large tonnage, low grade, bulk tonnage gold deposits were previously of little interest to companies exploring the Superior craton, and now a significant number of other such gold discoveries have been made. All are in different stages of development and all involve near-surface resources of at least 3 M oz gold that range in grade from 0.8 to 1.5 g/t Au. Interestingly, the vast majority show different deposit characteristics from those of Canadian Malartic and do not have any obvious affinity to porphyry magmas. We are therefore witnessing a new era in gold exploration in the Canadian Shield that will undoubtedly lead to new ore deposit models for Archean gold deposits and a renaissance, we hope, of the classic Canadian gold mining camps.