Why Is a $27M Nevada Gold Junior Still Lagging the Market? | Viva Gold CEO Interview

Summary

• Nevada Gold: The discussion centers on Viva Gold’s Tonopah project in Nevada’s Walker Lane, pursuing a modest open-pit heap leach and CIL operation focused on cash flow.
• Ticker Highlight: Viva Gold (VAU) is profiled in depth, including its ~0.5Moz Au M&I resource plus Ag, PEA-stage moving to feasibility, institutional ownership (incl. Dundee), and valuation per ounce.
• Permitting Window: The guest stresses a unique U.S. permitting window and plans to file a Plan of Operations and EIS, noting permitted Nevada assets can command roughly a 3:1 premium versus unpermitted.
• Water Management: Key risk addressed via reinfiltration rights, dewatering plans, potential commercial water from Tonopah Public Utilities, and a robust hydrological baseline with 36+ monitoring points.
• Financing Strategy: Options include vendor financing, capital leases for mining fleet, prepaid gold forwards, and selective equity raises, with an investor outreach tilt toward Europe.
• Project Advancement: Target is to complete feasibility, convert resources to reserves through infill drilling, and submit permitting documents with an estimated two-year path to final permits.
• Valuation Upside: Management argues re-rating potential from roughly $30/oz to $100–$170/oz upon permitting, with a plan to build to cash flow and expand via hub-and-spoke M&A.
• Risks and Mitigation: Permitting remains the primary risk; mitigants include dense drilling (mostly M&I), oriented core and geotechnical work, metallurgy confirmation, and active community engagement.

Transcript

Today on the CEO barbecue, we're looking for gold in Nevada together with Viva Gold. For a bulletoint summary of this and all other CEO interviews, please go to resourcealks.com and subscribe to our free weekly newsletter. The company you're about to hear from has not paid us for the production of this interview, but this interview is still intended only for experienced speculators because this is venture capital and mining is a very risky industry where failure is the norm. All conversations are general and impersonal in nature and they contain forwardlooking statements. I'm not a licensed financial adviser and my business sells content producing services which also makes me biased. So before continuing on, please talk to an independent investment adviser with a good long-term track record because your capital is at risk. And also visit setterplus.ca where you'll find the company's official filings. If you're not 100% sure you understand all the biases and the disclaimers that I just showed you, please go to the last section of this video and do not consume this content unless you fully understand and agree with everything said herein. That all said, the focus for Viva is the Tonopa gold project in the Walker Lane lane trend of um western Nevada. Tonopa is a neosurface oxidized epiothermal gold silver system with mineralization in veins and breast within a broader halo of lowgrade disseminated mineralization. Now this is not a big acid and the updated 2025 resource shows about a half a million ounces of gold, 1.7 million ounces of silver. That's in the measured and indicated categories and then also a bit of gold and silver in inferred as well. That's all constrained within a conceptual open pit shell at 15 g per ton cutoff. This is a PA stage acid though, but it is in Nevada and it's a proposed open pit mine with CIL. So it's your carbon in leech mill and the heap leachch circuit for the lower grade stuff as well which in this part of the world could pose water challenges. So, that's definitely something I'll be asking James about later on in the conversation. Now, Viva is listed as V AU on the TSXV, where the average 3-month volume is about 170,000 shares. The stock's 52- week high is 20 cents and its 52- week low is 8 cents. With a market cap of just over 26 million Canadian dollars and just over 145 million shares outstanding today, this is an 18 cent stock with a 50 and a 200 day moving averages at respectively 15.4 and 14.5 cents which means the stock is now trading above both of them indicating positive momentum. Moving on to the share structure, the public float is estimated by the company at 45%. There's Dundee Corporation in there owning 20%, management owning 4% and the remaining 30 or so percent is being held by institutions. There are close to 39 million warrants outstanding. Just over onethird of which expire in March of next year. They do so at 23 cents and another almost third expires in December of next year at 18 cents. And then there's more at 22 17 cents well into 2028. There are also 10 a.5 million options adding up to 195 million fully diluted shares. Meaning an increase of about 34% in shares outstanding could happen if all the dilutive securities get exercised which would then result in about a 25% ownership dilution if and that's always a big if. But if all dilutive securities get exercised and of course none of this accounts for potential dilution down the road which is not unlikely given that this is a pre-revenue company that operates in a capital intensive industry. Talking about Capital, I'll now go through their latest financial statements which show me the numbers as of July 31st, 2025, which do keep that in mind. That's about five months ago now. At the time, the company had in total just over 1.1 million Canadian dollars in current assets, most of which in cash, and there has not been a capital raise to my knowledge since. Terms of liabilities, there was about 50 grand in account payables and about 350,000 in non-current liabilities. But those are your um asset retirement obligations and the deferred lease income. So that's not money that's due immediately. Moving on to the P&L for the nine months that ended on July 31st, the total amount recorded as non-exloration expenses for the period shows up as about $550,000. So that's an average of about $60,000 a month with investor relations being the largest chunk of that expense costing them about half of that money. As to the exploration, about a million and a half went into the ground over the last 9 months. So that's about 163,000 a month on average with the largest chunk there being drilling itself. So about a third of the money was spent on drilling. As always, I've got two ratios here for you. The first one is the exploration to administration ratio, and that's at about 3:1, meaning almost three times as much money was going into the ground as what was spent on running the company. In percentage terms, that's about a 75 to 25% ratio for exploration to administration. And then I've also got the drilling to marketing ratio here. That was about a 2:1. So almost twice as much money was spent on drilling as what was spent on marketing. Again though, this is a PA stage asset. As always, I would also like to remind you that the financial situation for exploration businesses can change quickly. So please visit setterplus.ca and look uh for the up-to-date numbers yourself. And of course, stick around for the latter part of the conversation where James and I will be talking money as well. Now, for this to actually become a conversation though, I'm going to have to shut up already. And James, I'll give you the word here. But first of all, thank you for sitting down with me today. >> Well, thank you. Pleasure being here. >> Pleasure is mine. And since this is your first time on the barbecue, we're going to have to go through the smell test first before we actually get into the barbecue. Uh, which is going to intend to understand more about what the incentives and the track record of management are. But just before that, James, the first thing that I noticed after I I met you in in Zurich is that your stock price is lagging the move up in gold as well as so the I mean the gold price itself as well as the GDX and the GDXG that they are outperforming gold. So lagging that too. Um how come? What do you think is happening here? Why is the market not giving you the value that you think you deserve? Uh I believe it's probably uh due to the size of the asset. Um and you know I am not a promotional individual so I don't sit there and wave my arms at millions of ounces. Um we tend to base our numbers solely on fact. I do believe ultimately that this project will build be a million ounce project. But um what we do have that's really key is a uh well drilled core of mineralization that'll justify um the construction of a project. And what we do have in the US at this point in time is a very unique window of opportunity for permitting. And so do you continue to drill drill drill or do you stop with a well- drilled core and go to permitting? It's probably the best window of permit opportunity that I've seen in the last 20 years in this country. um and get a project into permits. Per per permitted assets in the state of Nevada draw a huge premium over unpermitted typically a factor of about 3 to one. >> So where do you build the greatest value for your shareholders at this point in time? Yeah, that's something that I do want to talk about. Specifically, permitting. And again, as I mentioned, water is going to be a big part of my uh or is a big part of the list of questions that I've gotten here for you, James. And it opens what you said here opens the door nicely for a couple of things down the road as well. But I'll be starting off with um yourself and and your track record. Who are you and have you made more money for shareholders than you've spent during your career so far? >> Yeah, I cannot honestly say I have. Um by background um I'm a mining engineer and mineral economist by training and uh you know I started my career back in the late 70s was immediately uh moved overseas where I ran operations um uh you know my first job was an underground engineer in Greece of all places. It was an underground shrinkage stoope mine. I went from there to Southeast Asia um and ran open pit operations for industrial mineral products. Uh had a mine in the Meong River Highlands on the Tailaw border, one in the southern Thailand and I built the mine in Malaysia. Um so those were all export operations. Made quite a bit of cash in those operations. Uh I was then transferred to uh uh the Canada and I built a mine um was producing uh locally produced products under the national energy policy of Trudeau Senior. Um and I built a mine in the Yukon uh one in Nova Scotia. We built a plant in St. John's, Newf Finland. Imported order to that one. uh but I was supplying the uh um oil field drilling of bulk commodities for uh drilling muds. Uh so you know that was a lot of commercial experience as well as building experience in those uh different products. Um after that I spent time consulting. Um, it was basically the uh '8s by that point and doing uh a lot of feasibility studies for uh open pit heat bleach mines in Nevada. Um probably about a half a dozen feasibility studies there. A lot of the mines are still operating today. Um so, you know, I've wound up in the copper business after that. um doing uh M&A work as well as uh um positions as chief engineer technical manager at some of the big copper perferies in Arizona. um went on from there to uh um banking structured uh mining finance with NM Rothschild and Sons um the London Bullion Bank and then came out of that and moved into the junior sector and since then I've had uh four public companies. >> Um >> what do you have now? Now, is it do you currently hold any other executive report positions within any of those companies or I don't know other companies? >> Yeah, I'm uh currently on the board of Solidario Resources which is uh has zinc assets in uh uh Alaska and Peru. Uh we've got a gold exploration project, very sexy one in uh in uh South Dakota. Mhm. >> And then we've got uh additional uh copper Molly and copper gold uh parfree um expiration assets in uh Colorado. >> Yeah. So, how much of your time would you say goes toward Viva? How many hours a week are you putting in? >> Uh it's the bulk of my uh bulk of my time. Um, you know, I'm I'm really the only uh um employee of Viva. Uh, we structured this company and it's why we have such a low overhead cost. We structured it um with home office. Uh the only office we have is the uh office in Tonapa. project office and all of uh my people are contract uh people who work when we have cash to pay them. >> Mhm. >> And so they're all people who I have uh who have worked for me on and off over the last 20 to 30 years. And so we have a great working relationship and uh they like the way it's currently structured. >> How many shares do you currently own of uh Viva? And what's kind of the average cost that you've paid for those shares? >> I've got about 2.5 million shares of Viva right now. Um uh 2 million shares of that came about as the restricted stock grants when they uh um basically floated the company. Um, you know, this Viva had been a uh uh capital pool company on the shelf on the next exchange and I activated it by acquiring the uh Tonopod deposit and then floating it out on to the Toronto Venture Exchange. >> Mhm. Yeah. So, what's the what was the average cost at the time? Uh it's it was kind of irrelevant because it was a shell company with a um excessive valuation on a share market basis. Um so you know that's not a relevant question. >> Well really what I'm looking for here what would be relevant is how much skin in the game do you have? How much of your own money have you actually put at risk here? >> It's a lot of time and time is money. Um, you know, I started this company in late 2017. That's when I went active on the venture exchange. So, I've been working this project along. We had a lot of stuff to sort out on it. And I started this company with u um 350,000 cash and today it's worth over 30 million. So, what has that time been worth? um you know it's been worth quite a bit. Um so you know that is that is my contribution to it is seeing it along from square zero. It's my first zerobased startup of a company. There was nothing here before. Skin in the game still remains important for me for you and the team to know that everyone's um properly incentivized and total insider ownership is about 4% which again is not all that high for a junior of this size. Is there an active plan in place to increase that uh for you or other insiders? I mean I do see that you've been buying some shares in the market recently, >> but is that something you'll be doing more of in the future or how do you look at insider? Yeah. I mean, the way uh my board is a non-paid board and they're incentivized through stock options. >> Mhm. >> Um that's how they get paid for their position. So, when they do well, the company has done well. >> Yeah. >> And that's really your skin in the game. It's uh um you know, time. Well, talking about alignment and and mentioning those options, I also want to know what drives VIVA operationally. So, what are the KPIs or targets that determine that insider compensation including the options and uh and everything else? >> Well, over the last uh number of years, it's been creating a resource at all. Uh we now have about a 600,000 ounce total resource. Um, and that was grown from uh when we picked up the property, the only declared resource was about 30,000 ounces. So, that's gone up by orders of magnitude. We've completed our second PA now. Uh we've got a very strongly um potentially viable project and really it's it's just the advancement of the project. Uh we've uh got it substantial completion on a lot of the required environmental baseline study as well. And when I talked about permitting, um you cannot initiate permitting without having uh um those baseline studies completed. >> Mhm. >> And that's what many people do. They get get through, they do a PA, they do a prefeasibility study, they say, "Right, we're ready to start permitting." and they're already three years behind schedule because they didn't do consecutive baseline study and that's what we've done and that's a matter of experience uh with the US permitting process. So we're already years ahead on the permitting process and ready to move forward. >> Well, and and that again is something that I I'm hoping we're going to discuss as well. Um just on the point of I'm just reminded you said you you know you essentially floated the company. Do you or anybody else directly involved in in the management of the company personally own a royalty on um on the project? >> No. No we don't. >> Good the the royalty we've got 508 mineral claims. Out of the 508 128 of them have royalties on them. Um, and no, that's a 2% NSR royalty. It's conventional royalty. And uh um we have the option to acquire 1% of the 2% for a million dollar US. Um when I acquired this asset, I acquired it from the bankruptcy estate of Midway Gold Corporation. And at the time, there had been an old school index royalty on the asset that went to 7% NSR at a $700 gold price. Um, obviously the royalty had been around for a few years. U, but that level of, uh, royalty burden had actually shelved the project historically. >> Mhm. Um, and that's that's why I was able to pick it up for pennies on the dollar. >> Yeah. And I guess that Well, I I'll get to the history a little bit here maybe in a second. But I think that about does it for the smell test. Maybe I maybe I can move on and talk about or ask about the business strategy here. And essentially ask you how you plan on making shareholders money from here on out. Um, and and to put it simply, do you want to build this asset or are you looking for someone to buy it off of you? The answer to that is yes. Um, look, I've always approached my projects from the viewpoint that I'm going to build them. And I've built about eight mines in my career. Um, the bottom line is is that if you don't approach them that way, you're never going to be taken seriously. So whether I sell the asset or build it myself, I'll only sell it if it's accretive to the overall shareholding. Um, now the greatest way you build accretion in this business is you can either discover a project and this one was already discovered so that wasn't an option or you can take a project through the permitting stage and it's the other half of the Lan curve. It's the back half where you get the greater value than you do on it on the expiration hit. And that's what most people ignore because they've been trained to do that by the letter writers and uh you know Bay Street. Um but that's where you gain your greatest value. Now permitted assets in this part of Nevada and I can point to the recent acquisitions by uh um Angloame by S Centur Gold in in our district. Well, they were paying between $1 and $170 an ounce for uh um permitted resource ounces um on on the four acquisitions done in the last 3 years and uh those ounces and some of them are quite a bit smaller than ours are highly accreative to shareholders. We're currently trading at about $30 an ounce. So that's between a three and a 10 time multiple from where we're sitting. >> That's how you gain value for shareholders. >> G, who do you think this asset fits with though? And again, this is going back to the size that I mentioned there that this it's not a big asset. So if there was a potential acquirer, and I understand that's a, you know, it's forward looking here. We're in the hypothetical realm, but who who does this asset fit with? >> Well, let's let's step back about production reality. Now, the last open pit mine I built was the Briggs mine in California. We started that mine with 370,000 ounces of uh reserve and we actually closed it after mining 980,000 ounces. That's production reality. This pipe dream of trying to drill out an entire deposit before you do anything. Well, that's a way to make Bay Street quite wealthy and that's what they promote. Um, so that you know that is that is a uh um construct. If you're going to build operations, you need to drill enough to uh justify your mine and then get it into production and drill from cash flow after that. Now our our deposit would produce enough gold in the 7-year mine life it in today's market that gold production would have valuation about $1.5 billion >> and of that amount the capital load is about 15% of that total for the construction capital. So, you know, look at your math. Don't look at the ounces. Look at the math of the cash flow. That's where you gain true value for shareholders. >> Well, so here's the thing that I'm thinking about in that case when I hear you saying that, James, is that this doesn't sound like a complicated strategy here. It doesn't sound like complicated math. Even I can do it. How come nobody's done it already on on this project? I guess this might be a good point for you to talk more about the history of the Tanopa project. And if it's as good as you see it becoming, how come nobody beat you into it and built it already? >> Well, we're over 50% institutionally held. Somebody's done the math. >> Yeah. Boy, nobody built the project yet, though. >> Well, it needed a lot of work. And two, um, not everybody look, you know, everybody's looking for that multi-million ounce project. Um, that's about a one in a realistically that's about a, you know, one in a thousand. The type of project I'm building is maybe the one in a 100 or the one in two or 300. But, uh, you know, it can be a mine. It can be good, great cash flow. and you can use that as a hub to move forward on. You know what we're taking a look at at this project is it'll have a heat bleach facility. 80% of the tons goes into heat bleach, 20% into a mill circuit. Well, at the end of the day, after your seven or eight year mine life, which is probably likely to be more, you know, closer to 10 years, you then have a paid for process facility. That paid for process facility can be used in a hub and spoke concept for M&A activity in a district. And there's a lot of gold and silver in the Tonapod district. Uh, so you have knock-on strategies. It's just where do you start? And as a junior company, you have to make your pro your projects bite-sized so that you can actually raise enough capital to do them. >> Mhm. >> And so th those are really the complexities of doing a simple strategy, but that's the reality. Or I could stop and I could spend it raise another hundred million in equity and spend it all on drilling. >> Yeah. >> So those are the options. This comes down to pure economic math. And keep in mind I'm an economist by training as well as an engineer. >> So I tend to lean towards more the cash flow versus the ounces. How do I turn ounces into cash flow? Because keep in mind, gold is money. >> Yeah. Well, you you've also spent uh some money on on doing PAS over the last couple of years. I think you've done three since uh 2020. >> Two of them. Two. Yeah. >> This is the third one then now or two in total? >> No, it was the second one. >> Okay. So, two since 2020. Do you think this is going to be the last one? >> Um yeah. I'd like to move this project into feasibility. Um because in order to initiate the permitting process from the feasibility study that fully describes the impact of the project on the land, well, you wrap that up in a thing called a plan of operations and that's what you submit to the uh government to initiate the permitting process. that plus all the baseline study work because the baseline study work is actually the science that goes behind the permits you know it's all the proof on the environmental work and then you have what are you going to disturb and that's how you start permitting so the way I view it is over the next uh year is to complete the uh feasibility work and and as part of that create this plan of operations and submit that to the US Bureau of Land Management along with my baseline study work which we're we are currently submitting to the uh bureau already and uh um all of that comes together to initiate the environmental impact study the EIS process >> and that's how you get permits in the US it's very wellcodified permitting process, but it's key to moving forward and that's where you truly get the rewriting for the shareholders. >> Is that what you think? You know, I normally uh go back to that business strategy that that people tell me about and I ask what's the biggest challenge going to be in that strategy of yours and you've mentioning the permitting process here a couple of times. Do you think that's going to be the biggest uh risk or challenge that you're going to encounter in that process or what do you think is going to be what keeps you up at night? permitting is always your big risk, okay? Um on any project. And so if you're not moving or actively thinking about that, you're not thinking about anything but a drill hole promote. Um you know, when you're thinking about a real project moving forward, you have to think about permitting. >> Yeah. So you think that's going to be the biggest challenge then for you or do you foresee something else taking you know the majority of your time as well? >> Well money raising is always time consuming. >> Um and you know investor relations and raising funds for for this work is always a key time consumer. But your biggest risk is dealing with the permitting process to move to the next step. And uh that is why when it's completed, there's always a big financial reward for doing so because not everybody can do it. >> Yeah. I I do want to talk about financials and we'll definitely get to it as I mentioned. Um but I want to talk about maybe some some of the other potential challenges here. maybe um t take it kind of step by step that I've noted here as as I was looking into viva going back to what I said earlier again Nevada open pit heap leech and the first thing that I'm thinking about is is water and it seems like your project sits in the same groundwater system that feeds the town of uh tonopa or tonopa which has um an almost 2,000 people population if I if I've read that correctly and your pea also calls this out as one of the one of the risks what exactly is the situation here do you foresee a hydro geological ical conflict along the way and and could dewatering and water rights become the thing that slows you down or or maybe even stops you? >> Water in the western United States, water is the the number one issue. It's the issue that defines most mining operations and uh the availability of water as well as the disposal of water. Um the uh Rip Patch Basin that we're in is one of the only underallocated basins remaining in the state of Nevada. Um there's a lot of demand on the waters in the state. Um the town of Tonopod does have uh um well systems in the basin for uh providing that's Tonapa public utilities and their pipeline actually crosses our claims and uh uh two of their major production wells are on the edge of our claims. Um now going back in time uh our projects and the VA valley we're in sits on the confluence of uh major drainages coming down the Walker Lane and water coming out of the uh Monitor uh valley. These drainages are prolific. you know, there is subsurface flow and uh pretty well all of the uh valley floor mines in Nevada experience that >> and uh there's a lot of history behind that. The state of Nevada does recognize uh something called a reinfiltration right where you can dewater your mind by pumping it out, >> never touching the water and then reinfiltrating it into gravels down drainage. So you never actually uh impact the the water supply. So that's one way that you do it in dropping the mine. Um, you know, we are a valley floor project. It will have uh uh you know, the need for dewatering and that's in our PA that was fully costed. And then uh um you know interceptor wells to drop a con depression under the pit. That's pretty standard. and uh you know in terms of water rights uh it's applying for reinfiltration rights and then uh we've got a public utility whose pipeline crosses our property so we can buy commercial water from the town. Town's got water rights that go back into the 1800s. Um you know they're they're first in. Uh, so they've got senior rights, they've got huge excess rights, and not all of them fully per perfected legally. So, we can help with that by using the rights. And, you know, it's a win-win. The town wins because we utilize their water. It's a pay for system, so there's income. And uh uh you know all these rural uh water systems are fairly broke because people don't pay their water bills. Uh so you know they really look forward to having a new major client. Uh so I see it as a win-win uh between us and the town. Mhm. The permits though that you have right now with regards to water, they are all scoped to exploration as far as I know and not an open pit mine, right? Which is is very different. And so maybe you can walk me through that exactly what what exactly do you need in terms of permits um you know, NEPA EIS, BLM state or whatever to go from what you're allowed to do now to you know actually moving dirt, processing it, hopefully selling some gold on the back of that. Yeah, we do have expiration an expiration water well on the property where we supply water and we've got permits for that to pump water um for expiration. Um what we have to do is uh as part of our process uh we've been doing uh pump down tests. Uh we've been doing uh um baseline water sampling for over 7 years now. uh we've been doing all of the science all the data collection required to create a complete hydraologic flow model in the valley. We have over 36 different u monitoring points. Uh these are wells. Most of them are u expiration holes that we turned into a well. >> Um and then >> how deep is it by the way? I mean just because you said most of them are is we talking diamond holes are seen. How deep is the water table? >> The water table's in this uh case is only about 30 m deep. So it's not it's not a deep water table. Um and you know as we abandon expiration holes uh we periodically uh cement and place pisometers down hole for continued uh water water measurement over time and those work off the telemetry. I I can actually pick up the uh water data on my uh smartphone. >> Um so the technologies come a long way there, but it's how do you get multiple uses out of an expiration hole? And that's one of the ways. >> So we've turned our expiration holes into the water monitoring system. Uh we've been doing, as we said, uh pump down tests. That's where you pump the water and you're testing the flow rates in the aquifers etc. So we've got a pretty good idea as to what sort of pump volumes we would need to keep a mind dry um and what to do with the water. So all of this has been a matter of uh you know I've got a really experienced team when it comes to this. Uh we've permitted a number of mines in Nevada over the years. I've permitted three of them now. Um, and one in California. And it's always been the same story. It's all about the water. And if you don't understand your water, you haven't done anything. Um, >> yeah. >> And so just drilling for gold, that's not enough in today's world. >> That's absolutely true. Especially in well, pretty much everywhere really, but especially in the Western United States. Is that >> Yeah. >> Everything that you're telling me here, J. No, go ahead. I thought you wanted to ask. >> Yeah. No, go ahead. >> I was just wondering if if everything that you're telling me here is has been properly communicated with the community of Tonobo. Was it 2,000 people almost who live there at least officially? >> Yeah. I mean, um I've had uh I've actually uh presented at town board meetings and we've had members of the audience stand up and uh support our project. Uh, you know, it's a mining focused town and it's a town that could use good paying jobs. They they they're scared to death of a monster project coming in, but we've got a the right size project for the town. Um, you know, there's limited housing in town, limited resources. So, um, you know, all of that's got to be considered in the development concept. So when you talk to them, what are they what are they asking you? What are they asking you about? How does that conversation go? Well, you know, along the lines, uh they're worried about housing supply and um basically among all of the uh uh there is a group we get together periodically uh to discuss uh you know different ways to approach housing and that's all the development companies in uh this part of Nevada. Um that's the miners, that's the solar operators, etc. um you know you don't want to create a uh boom time town sort of concept because uh it has a lot of negative con connotations go with it. Uh so you got to plan ahead for those things. Um you also have the concepts of uh um you know there is there is ample power um tonopause got a major substation in it and then uh um uh several major lines come together in Tonapa and then we've got uh um you know major transportation etc. there is a major highway that runs through the town. Uh so those aren't really issues and then it comes down to this water use and uh water demand um in the valleys there and there's quite a bit of it. I know Anglo is struggling for water for its projects down in the Batty district. You know, Cantara is going to be looking at water in the Goldfield district. And then of course we've got um you know we'll be looking at water in our area and Kin Ross is uh you know they have major water rights up in the Round Mountain district. >> Uh so you know those are all issues that uh are part and parcel of the permitting process. Why I'm really asking about the community here, James, is because your your business case um you know, depending on on kind of building it small and maybe operating a cash flow focused mine, which might, you know, might make business sense, but does it make sense for the community to kind of take any kind of risks to its water source for what would be a again a rather small operation? That that's really what's on my mind, you know, listening to you talking about this. Yeah, their water sourcing can be gained up upstream from our site up drainage and the two major wells that were put in in 2012 by the town were both up up drainage and it was based on water data pro data provided by our project. So, we showed the town where to find clean water because we've got the information. Um, the water that comes down the um um Walker Lane drainage has elevated natural arsenic in it. The failed EPA arsenic standards back in 2012, the T when they did drop the standards. Um, you know, we uh um you know, we would need to move the remainder of the historic well field up drainage, but that's already been discussed. And uh you know, again, that's a win-win because it goes into cleaner water, >> right? >> Um and that was a primary focus of mine from day one on this project. Well, and you also talk about the the TPU. So that's Tonopo public utilities, I guess. Um, yes. You call that a logic logical provider of water. So, you know, you essentially, I assume, have to close a deal with them. >> What would that look like? What would a potential deal with the town utility have to look like here? >> It'd be it'd be paid for on volume. uh how much water you pump. It's just like paying a water bill. >> So So it's just volume and and pricing essentially that you would have to negotiate, right? Or like >> or would anything else come into play as well? >> No, that's about it. Uh we may have to provide some uh upgraded facilities, but again, that's a win-win for the town. >> Okay. How far away are you from actually having to talk to them about this? Uh we've talked about it in the board meetings, town board. So th those precursor discussions have already been held. >> Okay. So yeah, in terms of timing, what are you thinking? >> Well, it's it goes hand inhand with the whole permitting process, >> right? >> Keep in mind, part of the permitting process in the US is extensive public comment. Right. >> Uh so you you know you want to have these things in deep discussion by the time you initiate that process and the permitting process the EIS process has a statutory timeline of about one year. So you have to do your technical work and town hall meetings in that timeline. >> Mhm. Realistically, going from today, just literally this conversation to you being fully permitted to actually, you know, pull dirt out of the ground, how how many months, years, what are we talking about here? >> It's basically from this point forward, uh, I've got a plan for a, uh, two-year process to final permits. uh that includes feasibility study, plan of operations, permits and metals and EIS. >> Are you basing it on a on a comparable or where is that timeline coming in from? >> Partly experience, partly comparables. >> Who's your comp in this situation? Well, the comps include the uh um Gemfield project, which is Centara's project down in the Goldfield district that was recently, you know, that's been completed over the last few years. I did complete uh one permitted mine in uh the Batty district south of that. It's one of the projects recently acquired by Anglo, the reward gold project. I actually took that one from initiation of permits to uh final record of decision in 18 months. >> Um that was back uh that was almost 10 years ago now. But that was a project that I completed myself. So like I said, partly experiencing and partly comps, but you can look at the uh local comps. There's enough of them to give you self timelines. That's that's actually an interesting point because you're that was under a different administration though. I see. What do you think anything would change now in the US under the current administration? >> Yeah, the current administration's trying to um blow up bureaucracy and accelerate it. That's why I say we've got one of the best permitting windows in my experience right now. Um, you know, I've been in this business for, um, I hate to say it, but it's, you know, I graduated in the 70s, so it's been 40 years. Um, uh, you know, we've got u um an excellent timeline. So really, I'd like to get this permitting process deeply underway under the current administration and grandfathered in place. >> Mhm. >> Um because it is highly favorable right now to be doing permitting, >> right? Yeah. And I suppose maybe only slightly related to this topic, but I'm I'm also thinking about metallurgy just before we lose kind of the the the topic of of water here. Uh I'm bringing it up because when when the Tonopa public utility studied their original water well, they found the water had too much arsenic in it. Uh or at least too much for it to be labeled. Yeah, that was EPA changed its arsenic standards back in 2010 and when they did so they knocked a lot of these rural utilities in Nevada out of standard. Um so you know it's we've seen it over time is that as measurement technologies improve the regulators tend to drop the standards. H >> um so you know it's a continuous chase down to uh um you know lower numbers over time and that's been the history of uh water utilities. Uh so you know as you do that then you're thinking about well cleaner water supplies andor um water treatment. In the case of Tonapa Public Utilities, there was a cleaner water supply available and that was demonstrated through work that came from our the Tonapa project. Uh we knew where the cleaner water split was. >> Yeah. >> Um but that was a win for the town. Um the next win is to remove right now they're kind of blending water to uh um and they achieve standards through blended water and we can further uh improve that water by moving more of the system up drainage. And you know these are not deep wells. They're only probably 100 m, 150 m. And uh you know, it's about the cost of a large diameter um uh um core hole to put in. Uh so moving the rest of the well field up drainage is not a huge uh task. >> Uh and you know, that's something we'd probably pay for. Um, but it would guarantee a cleaner water supply and also guarantee that we don't get in each other's way. >> Yeah. Well, I'm asking where I'm coming from is is obviously thinking metallergy. ask it but just um you know or metallergy essentially for you as well but um I'm also thinking if you would use you know water that's arsenic heavy for operations some of it will eventually end up uh into the solution in the heap you know well he circuit right so will that mess up your recoveries or reagent consumption or something else like that >> no it wouldn't um you know you simply adjust for that the uh the bottom line is it doesn't impact the metallurgy. Um in mineralized districts, uh arsenic in the in the ground is ubi you know it's ubiquitous. It's everywhere and that's part of the natural mineralization process particularly in gold districts. Um so it's pretty common. Uh you got to keep in mind too that all US mine sites are operated as zero discharge facilities. You don't discharge water that doesn't meet EP, you know, standards. That's why we do so much baseline study work. >> Mhm. >> So we know exactly what the quality of water was before and where it'll be after. Um, but that's all part of the science of building a mind. >> Mhm. >> And you know, it's what most expirationists ignore. >> Yeah. It it that last part specifically. Uh, true. That's where I'm coming from with these questions. We can switch gears maybe here a little bit and and and talk about money as well. Or another touch point that I wanted to discuss here is the capex. you know, cap capex doesn't seem high on first glance, especially relative to uh most companies I talked to, but it's also not nothing for again going back to the size of the operation that you want to be running here. So, your payback is is over three and a half years in in the base case. Do you think uh capital or capex might be a challenge finding a way to finance the buildout or something like that? Um, you know, I believe that once you have permits that, um, capital won't really be that much of an issue. >> Mhm. >> Um, you know, being a gold project, uh, my last gold project, uh, well, the Briggs mine in California, um, I did bring in some equity by doing a merger. I married a little bit of money but it brought some equity in but basically I financed that project. A third of the financing came from uh vendors. Um you know uh in that case Kamasu gave me a uh um very competitive terms on a capitalized lease program to buy the entire mining fleet. I was able to buy crushers under the same sort of terms and that provided a third of the capital. Um so and then um in that project in particular I was able to sell prepaid gold forwards and I brought in I I sold about 15,000 ounces of gold that was structured as a bond on repayment and sold that in uh London and Zurich and that created the a big chunk of the project finance. So, you know, I took very unconventional routes and financed the mine. Um, and that was a smaller mine than I'm looking at here, but that mine ran for quite a bit, quite a few years after that. Um so you know gold being money there's different ways to um use that to finance uh um an operation moving forward and it's not the way that most Canadian companies approach it. It is these are things that I did learn working for a bullion bank in London. um would you want to finance it on on your own? Do you think it makes sense to go for um project level partnership or or maybe even uh an equity level strategic? >> It all depends on terms. um it's not a huge project so you you can't slice and dice it a lot of ways and still give your uh um shareholders be a creative for your shareholders. So that's what that's the fundamental thing you always have to keep in mind is what >> how do I enrich my shareholders at the end of the day because they are the ownersh. >> Mhm. >> Essentially what it comes down to me or where I'm coming from with a lot of this James is just thinking about how much time it's going to take you. Talked about permitting you said uh those couple of years there and also how much money. So on that topic, how much more money do you foresee having to spend between now and actually, you know, having a kicking off the buildout? And and I'm not talking about the capex, so let's forget the capex for a second, but between now and the time that you actually have to spend the >> Yeah, I I need to raise somewhere between uh somewhere around 5 million US to do do the task required. >> How much um so f five million? How much do you have right now by the way? >> Um well we had a million on our last report. Uh and our spending this quarter has been quite low. So uh not too much below that. >> Why I'm asking this because timing in terms of financing matters. We're going into December. Nobody likes raising money in December. So just wondering when do you think you might need to go out and raise money? Who do you go out and raise it with? and um and all those things is kind of what I'm thinking about, you know, financing strategy for between now and and the buildout and also just one financing, more financings. All those things are kind of playing around in my head. >> Yeah, we're currently working on that right now. Um you know, that's why I'm doing these non-deal road shows and uh I'm doing uh you know, attending these conferences, >> right? I'm talking to a lot of people and uh you know that's that's the only way you develop the answer to that question. >> Yeah. >> Um you know and uh for the type of concept we're looking at uh the savier investors are quite interested >> um you know these are people who know the business. H do you think you're going to have to do a warrant given the uh the backdrop of the market? >> Well, you know, warrants are certain people like them, certain people don't. Um >> people who like them, they're called bankers. That's right. >> What's that? >> People who like them are called bankers. >> Yeah. But guys who are invest really truly investing in equity don't like it. >> That's right. Um, so you know, I've always got that uh stress and uh you know, it depends who's sitting there with their checkbook open. >> Mhm. >> As to whether I issue a warrant or not. And I have issued no warrant deals in the past. >> Dundee came in on a no warrant deal. >> What is Dundee's involvement, by the way? I did mean to ask that. I mean at at 20% uh doesn't seem like your metallurgy is going to need their glass lock um business that tends that deals with arsenic. You said you don't need that. So what's uh what's Dundy's deal? What do they want with you? >> Well, they mainly see a production opportunity and the rewriting that occurs from that. Look, this rewriting that occurs on permits is not new. It's just not promoted much in the Canadian market. >> Mhm. >> Um because Canadian market focuses on that first hump, it the expiration discovery hump. >> Yeah. >> Um when you talk to US investors, they want to talk uh cash flow and earnings. When you talk to Canadians, they want to talk discovered. >> Yeah. >> It's difference between the two markets. Yeah. >> What else are we not We didn't really talk too much about geology. Um and and I I did maybe want to talk a little bit about it. You maybe you come back another time and we talk about it more in depth. But thinking about operational challenges and stuff like that and how well you really understand the ore body because what I wrote down kind of looking into into your technical report that you have there the NI43101 you've got 14 modeled faults and uh you're also making some assumptions about geometry as well and it's it's also under my volcanic cover. So there's a couple of things where I'm like you know I've just been putting question marks to them. How well do you actually understand all that and how challenging is it? Well, the bottom line is we've got a lot of drilling and drilling takes away uncertainty. Um, you know, so a well- drilled or body has less risk than a poorly drilled one. You know, for all those people that are standing up with majority inferred resource, well, that may or may not exist. Mhm. >> Um, you know, that's a pure risk item. Uh, you know, we've got primarily measured and indicated. 86% of our total is measured and indicated. Uh, that tells you that it's been well drilled. Well, the drilling gives you the lithology. It gives you the structure and it gives you the grades. Um, and we can also tell because of density of drilling what the continuity is. Uh so we can demonstrate good continuity, we can demonstrate our structural model and we can demonstrate our lithologic model quite well and it's all a matter of drilling densities. That's why measured and indicated was created as concepts, >> you know. Um it's all about drill spacing. Inferred is way the hell out there. Um, >> yep. >> So, you know, as a mining engineer, uh, I wasn't even exposed to inferred until I got into the Canadian scene because in the US scene, it wasn't allowed. We only had we didn't have measured, indicated, inferred resource. We had mineralized material and proven probable reserve. That was under the US uh um scheme. Yeah, it took the more promotional Canadian and Australian markets to create measure to indicate and infer. >> But in your case, I'm thinking also about um how does your p optimization handle potential faults or fault offsets that aren't yet drilled through? There must be some of those, right? Even though it is it is well drilled as you said. what what kind of slope or pit wall domains are going to be most sensitive to those structures? That's that's where I'm coming from. >> Well, you do uh um in doing when you analyze your pit slope angles, that's what you're talking about. Yeah, >> you're taking oriented core and we do have uh now over 60 oriented core holes in the deposit and you're using these days you're using downhole teleview. You've actually got got it on camera and you're driving the camera down the hole and looking at the structures. Uh so that all goes into a 3D model. Uh you're also doing um um testing on the rock as you you know on your core you're doing coaxial unaxial compressive strength analysis to see what the bearing capacity of that rock is. So all of that's part of your geotechnical analysis. And we we do have a report that's been completed uh um by a well-known geotechnical firm out of uh Tucson, Arizona. They work for me on most of the copper deposits I worked on in the past. Uh so those were major pits. Uh but they're globally known. And uh that was the basis for the pit slope angles in the PA. >> Mhm. >> And that was done to prefeasibility level. Uh since then we've done additional oriented core work. We've done additional uh uh strength analysis. We've upgraded the lithologic models and the structural models. And all of that will go into a revised geotechnical model for pit slopes. Well, really where I'm or where where this came from is those 14 faults, though. And some of them are described as speculative. And just thinking about h how how confident or how how do you even know that some of these faults are not going to offset the or body in in ways that is going to impact impact your your pit design or or continuity or something else that >> you know, you can only really know after you start mining it. >> Yeah. You know, some of that you'll only ever know once you start mining, but you've done the best estimate you can do with the information at hand. And we've done a lot of work on that estimation. Um, and so it's the type of work that you typically don't see at a project at at the quote level that we're at right now, but there's been a lot of technical work done on this project. Um, you know, our PA to be honest could have been, you know, a lot of people would have called it a prefeasibility. Um, that's the level of detail we put in it. Um, and I have I've actually built mines with less data than I've got on this one. >> Um, uh, so I feel we're in pretty good shape as far as moving forward. It's all about mitigating the risk through data capture. And uh we've captured an awful lot of data on this project and we we haven't rushed at it um because we've taken the time to properly understand the project. Once we saw that it had economic potential that was the uh PA the first PA then we started slowing down and uh doing a better job of analysis and that led to the second PA. It's interesting actually that that you put it that way uh that it's kind of like a PFS level PE. Uh do you feel like you understand the transition zone well enough between oxide and sulfide? How sharp is that? And and how could Yeah, go ahead. >> This deposit is intensely oxidized and we really haven't um seen uh any sulfides worthy of note in the deposit. Um it it's very heavily oxidized. >> Yeah. How how deep does that go? Ox the oxid oxidized >> uh we've got holes down about 250 m and we're still in oxidized material. >> So like having that meiosene volcanic cover there has not been an issue for any of that um for understanding any of that. >> No. No. >> Okay. I mean it's all drill hole base. >> Yeah. Geometry then in that case as well. I mean you feel like you properly understand the geometry or or could the cover you know make that more difficult for you as well? >> You know this was a blind discovery. It was discovered through geoysics. >> Yeah. And u um you know the bottom line is we've gained all of our information through drill hole and uh you know because you can't see outcrops some of the geos think that puts them at a disadvantage but let's face it all deposits are dis are outlined through drill hole and very little of it on the surface expression. >> Yeah. Um, so it's not a disadvantage. >> Yeah, it might be good actually to once you have more news about that and I know you're going to need more drilling in the meantime and and hydrogeeological potentially stuff like that. Um, might be worth it to sit down and just talk geology um or or mining engineering at a certain point in the future. Looking at >> I mean I've been been speaking mining engineering pretty heavily here. >> I would be out of my depth anyway. So you could lie to me James. I wouldn't know it. Uh that makes it easier, I guess. >> Yeah. Um but yeah, I'm a professional engineer and have been for over 40 years. And uh you know, I've built mines and I've been a technical consultant specialist. I've been a bank engineer, all the rest of it. And uh uh you know, you learn over time where the is and where it isn't. and uh you know >> yeah that's that's at least half of my job here that's at least what I'm trying to do. Um would you be looking for other projects in the meantime though James? Do you feel like you you want to build this first and and and see it come through or would you be yeah trying to do something else as well? Um, basically when I see companies like ours picking up additional projects, it's usually because they're worried about their existing project and they're trying to shift notice. Um, the answer is, you know, if I've got money right now, I'm going to put it into this project because it's got merit. >> Yeah. That's that's clear and and um it makes sense to me as well. Do you think your GNA might have to go up between now and and actually starting on the the build out because you said I mean it is on the lower end about 60 grand a month on average. Do you think that's going to go up? >> Well, I'll have to bring some additional support in. Whether it shows up in GNA or project uh costing is the question. um you know it quite likely I would bring it in as consultants and it would go on to the project. >> Mhm. >> Um but the additional project support um you know until I have a rationale for putting on employees um you know it you know when you bring on an employee it's a cash burn whether you got work or not. uh when you bring on a consultant, you send them home. >> Yeah. Yeah. What about marketing in that case? I mean, marketing was about half of your G& um looking at it. Do you want to increase that, decrease, keep it here? What do you see it? >> Well, I tend to judge that by need. And the need is how much money do I need to raise? If I need to raise more, I'll put on more um marketing capital. um or spend more marketing costs. But uh that's the only time I do additional marketing is when I've got got to do raises. >> Yeah. Well, you said you're going to have to do a raise sometime soon. So, and you've doing you've been doing more marketing. Um are you planning on ramping it up? Are you targeting a specific group like mostly US people? Like who are you targeting with your marketing? >> Right now I'm targeting uh Europe. Uh Europeans are very hungry for uh near-term gold production. Uh they don't understand expiration. They do like production. Um and so, you know, we're a good story for them. And I had tremendous uh attendance in Zurich uh for the story. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. >> Um you know, the Canadian market that wants not, you know, wants expiration is not as good a market for me. H. Yeah, that makes sense. That makes sense. Um, I'm sure I'm I'm missing a couple of things, but I also know that you don't have all day here to sit and look at my face, James. So, I'll start wrapping it up here. What's the most fear criticism that you've heard of Viva Gold now that you've been pitching the story to, you know, different markets? >> Well, some people don't like the size of the deposit. They want the multi-million ounce thing. Okay, I'm the wrong audience. Um, and then other people, you know, they're saying the capital was too high, but um their impression of capital is not current market. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. Mostly the the criticism comes out of uh a lack of current knowledge. Um, you know, the same thing that you got to keep in mind, gold is money. And why is gold worth 4,000 bucks? And what does that mean that the dollar is worth today? >> Yeah. >> And I'm not talking the Canadian dollar. I'm talking the big dollar. >> Real money, not not Arctic peso as they call it. Um, >> yeah. So, you know, it it just is a demonstration of how badly the dollar was debased over the last uh four or five years. >> Yeah. Yeah. What's your u most fair criticism of me? What did you come here hoping to talk about that I failed to bring up? >> Oh, you've been pretty thorough, so you you know, you're doing a pretty good job there. Um better than most of the uh analysts do. >> Thank you for saying that. I really do appreciate you seeing it. Um, and uh, yeah, I'm interested to keep following the story and hopefully we can do this again. When do you think the next time is going to be that you and I are going to be chatting? When are you going to have something u more material to share with the market? >> Um, I think it'll be early in the new year. um you know as we're uh uh raising additional funds and then moving forward on some of these projects uh you know we've been um we've you know right now I've got a third party consultant taking a look at the uh you know an independent set of eyes on the expiration potential on the project. Um he brought the individual brought up a couple points were kind of like head smackers. Why didn't I think of that? Um so you know that's positive too. So we may have some discussion along that line. And then of course I've been talking with all of my consultants about uh you know costing for uh uh the geotechnical work, the metallurgical work uh all the rest of it that needs to go into feasibility. >> Mhm. >> I do have a drill program for uh final infill drilling. trying to get another uh some more of that inferred material into measured and indicated. Um and that's simply because in a feasibility uh you can no longer use inferred. Uh so the inferred ounces disappear and you've only got then that turns it into proven probable reserve and uh you know so the next disco after the next study I do plan to be able to talk reserves instead of resources. >> Yeah. Yeah. >> And so that's a material step function change for a junior company at this time. >> For sure. Yeah. >> Yeah. um you know so that again is a derisking you know a resource is still a resource is a resource it's not not a reserve for production >> when when's that coming again when did you see >> that would be uh next year >> well sure but next year is like >> it's really the discussion is once we get some financing in then it's all the uh planning around that. >> Okay. Yeah. >> And what the work program really looks like. >> I've written down so I'm going to follow up uh once you have those news and and then hopefully we can sit down again. But it really has been a pleasure. Thank you so much for sitting down with me James. >> Well thank you. And uh yeah you got questions after the interview just give me a ring. >> And as always thanks to everyone for watching Resource Talks. I have a couple of more things to say though. The fact that this company was interviewed here today does not mean that they're necessarily a good or a bad company. I'm not here to endorse nor attack anyone. I am simply here to ask some questions. If you find that I have failed in asking a question that you would have liked to hear an answer to, which will happen as I'm not an experienced interviewer, please let me know and I will try to correct that mistake in a future interview. As mentioned at the beginning, please understand that mineral exploration and development is an extremely risky business. Losing money is the norm and should be the expectation. This is a very complex sector and the performance of individual companies typically depends on many different moving particles including company specific factors like geology, financing ability and many others really as well as particles that are outside of the company's control like geopolitics, macroeconomics, commodity prices and many more. most of which are nearly impossible to fully understand. 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This is all to say, I know it's a lot of lawyer talk, but this is all to say that you shouldn't blindly trust me or anybody on the internet, and you should do your own research. Once again, social media is meant for entertainment. It is set.ca where you do your research. That's where you'll find a company's official filings. And I encourage you to read and analyze the management information circular, the financial statements, the management discussion and analysis, and whenever available, the NI43101 technical documents. If you don't understand everything in those documents, the chances of you losing money are even higher than they normally are in the space. And as mentioned earlier, the chances of even the best analysts in this sector lo losing money are extremely high since this is venture capital and it is not for everybody. I'll leave you with one of Charlie Munger's quotes which I wish I had listened to more often earlier on which says quote if you don't understand it don't do it.