Weekly Metals Mining Rundown and Peer Table - Free Edition for Week Ending 28 Feb 2025

This past week’s metal price and top & bottom mining company peer group movers include:

This past week’s top 40 performing metals mining stocks (out of Peer Table’s 426) include (share price rounding errors apply, as sourced from Google Finance):

Metals mining announcements incorporated into this week’s Peer Table (resource updates, economic studies, changes in attributable project ownership) include (as recently reported in recent daily Rundowns / slightly outdated):

• 27 Feb 2025 (after-market TSX) - Lithium clay (and lithium hard rock and uranium) developer American Lithium (TSXV:LI) announced a resource update for its flagship, PEA-stage TLC lithium clay project in Nevada (company also has 2 other PEA stage projects: Falchani hard rock lithium project in Peru and the Macusani uranium project in Peru). The updated resource increased measured resource tonnes lithium carbonate by 47% to 6.17 Mt lithium carbonate grading 849 ppm Li, with the measured + indicated grade increasing 4% to 839 ppm Li (from 809 ppm Li). This should bode well for future possible maiden reserve estimate in a pre-feasibility and/or feasibility study. The overall resource estimate including inferred resources was down slightly, although grade was slightly higher suggesting a tighter resource. TLC’s company wide resources fell 4 % on this news to 20.4 Mt LCE (96% from lithium, rest uranium), which trade at market cap/t LCE resource of US$3.26/t LCE ($0.83/oz AuEq) - exactly in-line with our Peer Table’s lithium clay developer peer group median (despite having a 43% larger resource base than the peer group median 14.3 Mt LCE).

• 27 Feb 2025 - Lithium hard rock developer Avalon Advanced Materials (TSX:AVL) announced a 28% increase in measured and indicated resources at its Separation Rapids JV project in Ontario (to 12.98 Mt M&I grading 1.34% Li2O, 100% basis), of which AVL owns 40%. AVL’s 40% share of total resources now stands at 0.8 Mt LCE resources, which trade at a market cap/t LCE of US$53/t LCE ($14/oz AuEq) - a 59% discount to our lithium hard rock developer peer group median market cap/t of $130/t LCE ($33/oz AuEq).

• 26 Feb 2025 - Silver producer Silver X Mining (TSXV:AGX) announced a significant increased mineral resource estimate for its Nueva Recuperada mine in Peru, including a higher-grade portion at its The Plata Mining Unit development project (formerly Esperanza). Total company wide mineral resources increased by ~35% to 182 AgEq (2.1 Moz AuEq) - with a relatively high 56% of the resource metal value coming from Ag. AGX trades at the bottom of our silver producer market cap/oz pecking order, at market cap/oz of $0.15/oz AgEq ($13/oz AuEq), which is an 88% discount to the silver producer peer group median of $1.23/oz AgEq ($106/oz AuEq).

• 26 Feb 2025 - Copper (polymetallic) producer 29Metals (ASX:29M) announced its annual resources and reserves update for its Australian mines and projects. Reserves remained flat at 35.7Mt, demonstrating solid reserves replacement and conversion of resources over past year at the company’s two, high-grade long-life Australian mines. Overall resources were down slightly to 7.7 Blbs CuEq (grading a solid 2.9% CuEq, 62% from Cu, rest Au-Pb-Ag) or 12.1 Moz AuEq (from 12.1 Moz AuEq). 29M stock trades at a market cap/lb of US$0.02/lb CuEq - an 81% discount to our 24-company copper producer peer group median market cap/lb of $0.108/lb CuEq, after the stock got a +2.9% boost today intraday ASX (vs. group median performance of negative -1.2% including TSX movements yesterday and vs. today’s ASX mean performance of +0.3% - on a slight boost that is possibly related to Trump’s announced executive order along with the resulting uptick in coper price.

• 20 Feb 2025 - Last week, intermediate gold producer IAMGOLD (NYSE:IAG) announced its annual reserves and resources update, which had included an updated resource estimate for its 100%-owned Nelligan Project where indicated ounces grew by 56% to 3.1 Moz Au at a 13% higher-grade of 0.95 g/t Au, with inferred ounces growing by 33% to 5.2 Moz with grade up 14% to 0.96 g/t Au. Although mineral reserves were down a slight 5% after accounting for depletion, overall measured and indicated (“M&I”) resources (inclusive of reserves) were up a slight 3% with overall total resources including inferred increasing by ~6%. So the previous year’s stated reserves were not quite fully replaced, significant reserves remain, and total mineral resources look to be growing more substantially, paving the the way for more conversion to reserves in the future. IMG trades just below the middle of the pack of our intermediate gold producer peer group on market cap/oz resource at $101/oz Au, which is 8% below the peer group median of $110/oz AuEq, despite AIG resources being 100% gold (no other metals/gold-equivalents) and that fact that IAG’s overall resource size of 32.8 Moz Au far exceeds the peer group median and mean of 7.2 and 11.6 Moz AuEq.

• 23 Feb 2025 - Intermediate gold producers Equinox Gold (NYSE:EQX) and Calibre Mining (TSE:CXB) announced a friendly at-market merger, whereby EQX will acquire all outstanding shares of CXB to create a major Americas-focused gold producer with mines operating in 5 countries anchored by two high-quality, long-life, low-cost Canadian gold mines (the Greenstone Gold Mine in Ontario which achieved commercial production in November 2024 and the Valentine Gold Mine currently under construction) with anticipated production of 0.95Moz gold in 2025 (excluding Valentine and Los Filos). The at-market deal pricing resulting in no share premium for CXB shareholders does not appear so attractive for CXB shareholders at a first glance, who are awaiting first gold pour at Valentine Lake targeted for mid-2025, and from which a 66.7% approval will be required for this merger to go through. Although, if CXB faces risks of capex over-runs at Valentine (Lake) mine, for which construction was announced to be 73% complete on 9 July 2024 (in a release that included a photograph showing liner installation progressing on a large tailings dam that was reported to be 96% complete), may have suggested that 73% of initial capex of C$463M (reported in 2022 FSU update) had been spent and that 27% or C$125M had been remaining. Although in the quarters that followed (Q3 and Q4 2024), CXB reported company-wide growth capex of C$261M, and today’s announced merger also included a separate private placement of convertible notes worth US$75M being issued to a group of investors which included EQX (funds to be used for “funding expenses related to the Transaction, and general corporate purposes until completion of the transaction”), which could possibly include some provisions to mitigate capex overrun risks at Valentine Lake. And so CXB shareholders may very well accept this at-market merger (acquisition) that is targeted to close Q2 2025 (around the time of Valentine’s first gold pour), as is currently implied by the CXB and EQX share prices (suggesting a 77% likelihood that the deal will go through, and an arb spread of ~0% on CXB shares). Until the deal does close, we keep both old EQX and CXB in our Peer Table, and add a new hypothetical/proforma entity “New Equinox” alongside both companies in our intermediate gold producer peer group, except with an additional 264M shares out (vs. old EQX) for 720M shares (which excludes additional potential shares from concurrently announced convertible notes that are separate from the merger) and with mineral resources of both CXB and EQX combined for, which trades at a (hypothetical) market cap/oz resource of US$91/oz Au - a 17% discount to peer group median $110/oz AuEq while also having a large market cap of US$4.8B (vs. group median $1.2B).

  

  Valentine Gold Mine Tailings Management Facility (dam embankment liner at 96% complete) (Source: Calibre Mining, Press Release 9 July 2024).

  

• 24 Feb 2025 - Silver (and Zn-Pb-Au) producer Aya Gold & Silver (TSX:AYA) announced a significant increase to its resources at its 85%-owned Boumadine project in Morocco, resulting in a 120% increase in that project’s indicated resources, a 19% increase to the project’s inferred resources since the last (April 2024) update, and a ~22% increase to overall company-wide mineral resources to ~5.5Moz AuEq from ~4.5 Moz AuEq (~476 Moz AgEq from ~371 Moz AgEq) which are 38% Ag and rest Zn-Pb-Au by metal value, and include the company’s 100%-owned, producing, pure-play silver mine (Zgounder, also in Morocco). AYA trades at a market cap/oz of US$133/oz AuEq ($1.54/oz AgEq) - a slight premium to the middle its silver producer pack (median) market cap/oz of US$104/oz AuEq ($1.20/oz AgEq), which appears well-deserved in part due to: (a) the rare/scarce pure-play silver nature of AYA’s production from its flagship Zgounder mine (silver is usually produced alongside other secondary metals or as a byproduct/secondary metal itself), and (b) major upside from its much larger Boudmadine project that is next in line. All of this might make AYA an ideal take-out target for larger silver producers such as Coeur Mining (NYSE:CDA) whose market cap is $3.4B vs. AYA’s $1.1B (or $220/oz AuEq vs AYA’s $133/oz AuEq). CDA recently closed its acquisition SilverCrest and also has a fairly high silver share of resources & production.