Market Outlook: Guests largely view recent weakness as a consolidation within a bull market, citing inflationary policy and supply-chain reshoring as commodity-supportive forces.
Gold Bull Market: Extended discussion on gold’s surge, volatility, and historical analogs suggests continued strength, even if equities take time to digest vertical moves.
Junior Miners: Emphasis on survival and value creation via strong balance sheets, flexible spending, liability management, and the ability to raise capital even in tougher markets.
Exploration Success: Discovery is highlighted as the key countertrend driver in bear markets, with historical examples showing outsized equity gains from high-grade drill results.
Key Companies: Barrick Gold (GOLD) profiled through its discovery-led rise; Alamos Gold (AGI) praised for buying grade and Island Gold performance; Maple Gold Mines (MGM), Riverside Resources (RRI), and Element 29 Resources (ECU) detailed with funding runways and upcoming catalysts.
High-Grade Focus: “Grade is king” underpins strategies, enabling margin resilience and outperformance for quality mines and advancing projects across cycles.
Copper: Structural demand growth and scarcity are stressed, with deglobalization and electrification themes supporting exploration and development agendas.
Funding & Risks: Companies underscore managed dilution, permitting milestones, and JV/major backing as buffers, while acknowledging cyclicality and the need to time financings.
Transcript
Thank you for watching Resource Talks and welcome to Zurich, Switzerland, where I'm out and about being annoying to junior mining companies. Once again, today's topic of nuisance is, are we back in a bare market? Did we just miss out on the bull market? And then more important, I think that's a bit of an overdone topic anyways. But then more importantly, when I go and talk to these CEOs, I'm going to ask them, but what if we were in a bare market though? Would you still be able to make money for shareholders even in a bare market? Having a plan is an important part in that process. So, that's about it for an intro. Let's just go and talk to these people and see where that gets us. [music] Before we get into any of that though, [snorts] as always, please pause the screen, read all the disclaimers shown on there because your capital is at risk. Not only is mining a very risky business, junior mining is venture capital, which means it's even riskier. On top of that, I'm not your financial adviser. I'm a part-time clown and full-time paid by the companies you're about to hear from. So, to stay on the safe side, to stay on the safe side, consult a licensed financial adviser and do further due diligence on Setter Plus.ca since everything in and on this video is general and impersonal in nature and you are responsible for your own decisions. All right, Dave, I want to talk to you about the state of the market. Uh, do you think we're still in a bull market? We had a blip there. A lot of people freaked out. Is this the start of the bare market? What's going on? >> Yeah, I'm never sure. I mean, I think that $4,300 gold, uh, which was achieved vertically. I mean, everything went vertical. The the mining equities went vertical. >> The gold chart went vertical. That's very troubling. And whenever you see movements like that in charts, I think it's going to take some time for them to resolve. And the probability that you've hit a peak is I mean it's pretty high. And whether it's the peak, whether it's going to be the end, I mean, no one really knew that $850 gold was the peak in uh 1980 until maybe 1990. I mean, Franco, Nevada was created in 1983. >> Bareric was probably created in 1983. And so uh there was a very vibrant market for gold equities uh right from let's say 83 to 87 interrupted by uh the uh the market crash and I really think that that market continued almost all the way to Brix. So, if we topped out uh at 4,300 over gold, and if that's a 20-year top and we're going to go into a 20-year bare market, as we did uh in uh in the 80s and '90s, uh people probably won't notice for a decade. >> That'd be would have been a pretty disappointing bull market though that, you know, was all of two months, I suppose. >> Well, I think it was a little longer than that. I mean, gold's been going up since uh March of 2024 and and probably before that as well. So, I mean, it really got I think um uh a turbo boost when Trump came into office and uh and and then, you know, very quickly went into into trade war with the entire world. And I mean, I suppose if you project linearly uh American [snorts] policy at the moment, it would seem to me that every country is going to need to have their own rare earth mines and rare earth uh metals processing capacity. And every country is going to need to have their own copper mines and their own nickel mines and and pod ash mines. And so I don't think we're going to go quite that far. But we've now taken this de-industrialization trend and this trend towards a very very stretched and efficient global supply chains and started to work them in reverse. And I think that that's an extremely commodity intensive process even if it isn't going to be fully played out uh and uh markets see that and they're they're on it in the same way they were on lithium when electric car or EV mandates came in came into place. So policy at the moment looks inflationary and commodity intense. Gold is uh always going to be uh uh sympathetic to that because it means I mean no one generates enough GDP to actually fund those kinds of programs. So the money will have to be borrowed and I suppose to some extent printed and uh so let's break gold off from the rest of the commodity complex. Has it peaked? I mean I don't think so. But if it has, I think we still have, you know, the potential for a decade like the the 80s in in gold equities. And, you know, again, we won't know for 10 years probably. There's so much going on, yet nothing ever happens as as the saying goes. Uh, and es especially in in mining stocks, like I feel like we're always like we lag to the upside, but we're the first ones to go, especially in in junior mining stocks. Mhm. >> Um, and I'm going to go around here and ask people like what if and and and what like we are going to go into a bare market eventually. What are they going to do? How are they going to still make money for shareholders? Cuz why otherwise would someone own, you know, juniors if they're not planning on making them money? >> Mhm. >> What do you think it takes for a junior to make money for someone in a in a bare market? >> Well, that's very tough. If you're in a bare market, by definition, the the broad majority of equities are are going down. And of course, these companies don't earn anything. So, uh, given they're not making money to begin with, shareholders are going to watch shareholder equity evaporate during a bare market. But the things that counteract bare markets, uh, I mean, the most obvious thing is exploration success. So, you can look back at at all of the great bare markets uh, and see stocks that ran counter to it in in mining because they made discoveries. And Bareric is the best example of that since we just talked about the decade of the 1980s. The gold strike discovery uh probably happened around 84 85 and I mean people have been talking about it recently. Uh you know Rick's doing a lot of podcasts these days and and Bareric seems to be a constant subject of that. But I mean you know when you drill 100 meters of an ounce or 200 meters of an ounce or something like that uh the stock's going to go bananas. And Bareric was just a penny stock. I mean, it was a failed oil play and Peter Monk started uh rolling up old gold properties in the shadow of this fantastic peak in gold in 1980. uh people wanted more gold producing equities and Peter bought Camflow and he bought Mker in Utah and then he bought uh the the Nevada properties from from western states and very soon got into these fantastic Carlin intervals and Bareric was the most successful stock on the TSSE in the 1980s and probably early 1990s and uh and a financial juggernaut and and and and really sexy. So you know [laughter] um so expiration success is is is something that will always be likely sorry be counter trend. Uh and then when it comes to controlling the damage uh companies just need to run a flexible business model and be able to shrink to fit into the available capital envelope. So it it it better management teams usually build out their businesses in modules and are able to shut those modules down quickly when capital gets tough. Uh and maybe you know if they if they're really good management teams they will have raised well when capital was easy and so maybe have a longer balance sheet than than others. And then finally, I think the thing that isn't done enough and that's really uh necessary or sort of not necessary but value AC value building in in bare markets is uh working on the liability side of your balance sheet. So almost all companies have carrying costs. Uh many many companies option properties and when you're in bare markets and they're be becoming long uh in duration, you go to the underlying vendors and you change those deals. you get payments reduced, you get royalties reduced. If you have holes in your land package that you want to fill, you go and buy the ground during that period. And uh and so sometimes you don't have the money to buy things in in bare markets, which again is the obvious thing to do. If you raise money in bull markets, you buy things in in bare markets, but you can almost always do something to the liabilities associated with your property package to build value in the company when when times are tough. How much runway would you typically be looking for? You said you you know smart managements raise money during the good times, spend them maybe during the bad times. Yeah. How much how much of a storm should they be able to to better? >> Two years, three years. I mean, I think most companies uh don't get uh given that much capital by by investors. But generally I think that companies that are funded for 2 years uh at a minimum you know are are resistant to the sort of cycles uh that happen in this market where for instance you have good investment or good good drill success and then maybe you're seasonal. You know Rob Carpenter in the Yukon at Prospector just you know the stock went up probably 5x on one fantastic hole. Rob raised 10 million bucks from B2 and then another 20 million bucks from from uh from Alex Gubbins. I mean, that company was broke and it was 10 cents 18 months ago. And now he's [snorts] got $40 million in the bank and a dollar stock price. Uh and uh and so that that's pretty clever work on Rob's part and it's going to give him a capital base for years to come and then you know he can go to flow through markets seasonally to get more drilling money if he needs it. So that kind of thing is is you know superb execution. >> The the thing is also what juniors is that what you actually just said earlier is like we would go into these bare markets where it's like a prolonged period. So even two years not really going to save you. A lot of these companies are going to have to raise most of them have raised capital during bare markets as well. >> What is kind of the profile of a junior that is able to raise capital during a a bare market under reasonable terms? Um, is it kind of is it project specific that I'm looking for, jurisdiction, specific teams? What am I looking for? Well, going into a bare market, companies that have money will be able to raise money because uh investors uh will understand that they aren't broke and they aren't on their knees. And if they want to participate at lower stock prices, uh the fact that the company has money in the treasury and doesn't have to issue means that they won't, you know, uh they won't they won't get their full 5-year warrant and all of the other perks and emolments that that Rick is looking for, for instance. So, ironically, having a good balance sheet means you're going to be able to raise in a in a tough market. So, you know, making sure you have that that that duration to your balance sheet at all times uh will allow you to be a preferred funer when when times are tough. Now, when it comes to uh what what sorts of businesses uh can be funded in bare markets, I mean, it's just going to be the best companies with the best prospects and with the best exploration upside. And we're speaking specifically about my cohort which is you know exploration and development. >> Yeah. What what does the best look like in that case? Is it great? Is it is it jurisdiction is part of of being the best I suppose? Uh yeah what's what's the best for you? >> Yeah. I mean I think ultimately in bare markets higher grade opportunities will be more attractive to investors. typically that means the commodity price is coming down and so you're going to want to have a a lower cost higher margin operation and I mean if you look at Alamos as an example John did a great job buying grade when he went out and bought Richmond and there were some complaints about him paying north of a billion dollars but has been a spectacular mine and the one thing that happens when you're in tough markets uh for your underlying commodity if you have an asset like island and you can hyigrade which isn't a great idea. I mean, you'll be sterilizing some of the future potential if you do. You can always increase your cash flow despite the fact that you might have a a declining gold price. Now, John never had to do that and uh an island has evolved into an asset that investors need to own. Alamos, Lundine, the two sexiest mid-tier producers and you know, just rocket ships in terms of stock performance. uh over the past few years, even though it was a terrible market for gold assets, Alamos and Lundine both outperformed because they were high-grade opportunities and high margin operations. >> I fully expected it to be like best is uh Finland and there's a certain company there. [laughter] >> I try not to grind my own axe unless I'm invited to. And well, that's an invitation. Let's not take it for today. [music] >> [music] >> Ivan, I want to talk to you about uh the state of the market. Are we in a bare market already or is the bull market going to continue? >> Oh, we're absolutely in a bull market. This was a seasonality. Everything that just happened last few weeks was on the seasonality charts of gold and other commodities and uh it's now ending and gold's bouncing. It's right on time. So, for me, this is exactly what was expected in the current uptrend. >> I do hope you're right. Um, my money is also where my hopes are. So, what if you're not though? What if we did go into a bare market? How would you still make shareholders money if if it was a bare market? Oh, great question. You know, seasonality is all relative to out of control things, black swan events that can occur. Um, in that case, for us, we've been very defensive with our capital. We've been very limited with our spending, giving ourselves a lot of longevity. You know, we have money until June, July of next year, so we could weather any kind of short-term unexpected Black Swan events. If it went beyond that, I'd personally write a check. I've written checks before in the company to get to a point where we could finance again and catch a better market trend. But right now, our confidence is extremely high. And you know, from what we're doing, it's rare, it's big, and it has a lot of grade, and that's the thing that's going to work in all markets. So, we have an all market type of project that could perform. Depending on the market we go into, how would your strategy change um operational strategy? How would you take advantage of a bull market or how would you try to survive and thrive in in a beer? >> Yeah. So, so in the last 6 months, we we really curtailed spending. We curtailed staff everything. We've done short contracts of people working for us in Peru. As we go into the bull market, we staff up. We do a lot more work. We collect a lot more data and we do a lot more marketing. So, we we we flex and we contract. We're very nimble. That's the power of a junior. But also being through many cycles, I've seen how quick the market can turn. But my key has been watch delution. Make sure capital is being spent really intelligently as the market picks up or goes through it turns. How much money do you have right now? What's the runway that that buys you? And what else does it buy you? >> Yes. So, $4 million in the treasury as we stand here today. That gives us money into July of next year. Uh this gives us a chance to achieve some incredibly important permits, which we're just filing this week, which will give us a chance to go and drill some of our most robust targets on the property. We're also doing a lot of surface work, channel sampling, and trenching, which is recently what's been triggering the stock price to perform, and there's a lot more of that to come. So, we have some really key milestones that we're going to achieve. Getting drill permits prior to we're running out of capital. That's our anticipation. When we get drill permits, people tend to speculate. These are some very, very unique targets. You've got tens of meters of 1% copper on surface. You've got some past drilling, some great copper hits that we're going to be expanding and discovery here in the not too far future. So, this is what's going to really drive prices. Um, as far as financing goes, it's a very competitive environment for this scale of a project. We have two corporate investors, Tech and Numont, that owns large positions and there's a lot of others looking at the opportunity and looking to consider investing into it. >> Staying in the the hypothetical realm and the what if if if we went into a bare market and you had to raise capital, could you still do it in a bare market? Is it do you have the the project and the jurisdiction and the team that still raises capital in bare markets? >> Yes. Yes. That's exactly what I've been financing for the last three years. uh probably raise of $150 million for a group of companies I'm involved in collectively through the bare markets that we've been through the kind of the worst turns we've seen. Um the trick there is having the right project. Everything goes around the asset. If the assets good enough, you can raise money in any market. Uh these are tier one potential, meaning top 10 discovery in the world potential type of projects that we're after. And so yeah, it's not guaranteed we're going to find it, but it's certainly getting the attention of both majors and as well as investors. And that's always going to give us a chance to survive. >> [music] >> I think the fundamentals probably say that the gold price should actually pick up again. Um, but yeah, I'm I'm not the that expert to say whether it is or it isn't, but uh I think the fundamentals are there to say that we're going to head up like the gold price will keep going up in the future. I'd be concerned if a junior ever told me we were actually going into a bare bare market. So that there's that. But I do want to ask you, would you be if we were though? What if what if we were going into a bare market? Would you be able to make money for shareholders even in a bare market? >> I think we're in a fortunate position where we can um be I mean uh everyone always talks about grade being king and we've definitely got a project which is delivering consistent grade. Um, so you know, even at I mean at the gold prices that we're at, like we've got an attractive project no matter what. So we're well funded. We've still got newmont funding as well. Um, so we can deliver on project objectives towards feasibility whether it's a bull market or a bare market. So, we're we're not we're not in a in a position where we're having to walk in to try and raise money in a in a difficult market. We're we're well funded. And I think there is always going to be funding for projects that have uh production potential or, you know, going into feasibility and and near-term production potential. >> What would you do differently though if you could um what would you do differently in a bare versus a bull market? What would what would your operational strategy be in a in a bare? >> I think if we were in an absolute bare market where we had to think about how that that cash is is deployed um there would be a prioritization on um the [clears throat] resources and putting putting through the feasibility um to to deliver that value. I think there's significant value on the project that we will deliver uh on those on feasibility putting out our first resource going into the PA and PFS studies. Um you know whether new months or not there is significant value to deliver for a while and our shareholders from that. Um, and then you know if you you you if you've got really good exploration targets, I think you're always going to drill them because they can deliver big like big step ups in in value for a company as well. So you just keep working up those targets in the background like we did before like you know BBM we actually did all the geochemistry for BBM when a walle had no money. We collected all these samples. We did PXRF targeting and then once we had some money, we started to send them all in for gold assay in the lab and we made a discovery at BBM. So you would keep doing all those things uh as well to build targets that you think can actually create significant value change when you actually drill. Um, but putting the bulk of your drill dollars into delivering resources and feasibility studies. >> If there was a storm, could you weather it? And and how how long of a storm could you survive? As in, how much money do you have? How far does it get you? What are you buying with it? >> Right. So, we got 15 million in cash at the moment. Um, I think we can punch through 80 to 80 cents um once we've delivered our first resources. So, that's worth in warrants. that's sort of worth about 8 million Canadian to us as well. So, um we've got significant runway depending and and depending on whether you know Newmont keeps funding and all those sorts of things as well. We've got runway for quite a few years to come. Um, and if we're going intensively on expiration, you know, 15 million plus that 8 million, um, you know, that's that's still would give us 2 years of runway um, drilling, a lot of discovery drilling alongside spending new money on the on feasibility studies. If Newmont weren't there, those things that we just talked about would start to come more into play on on delivering um, the feasibility side of things for a while. But we've still got the funding to do that. So, um I think we're in a good [clears throat] position. Yeah. >> Could you raise money in any kind of market, whether it was a a bear or a bull? Is this the kind of project, the kind of jurisdiction, the kind of team that can make it happen in any kind of market? >> I think now that with the discoveries that we have made and where we're going, the answer is yes. >> Yeah. I I think your cost of capital is going to be more if if if if your you know, your share price is not necessarily going to be reflected in in what you have in in those markets. So I think in a in a bull market generally you've got a higher share price and you cost the capital but is is less but um with the project that we've got I don't think we've got an issue with with um being able to continuously drive it forward. >> All right, John Mark, I want to talk to you about the state of the market. Uh, do you think we're going into a bare market for mining or are we still in the bull market? >> I think we're still in the bull market. I think this is a consolidation. I think probably a lot of the other people are are telling you that as well. And the reason for me I seeing that is especially kind of on the silver side is all these different things are actually just consolidating, but it actually hasn't really rolled over and the fundamentals are still strong and they continue to be there. And secondly, there's more and more people still coming. I'm more and more busy with people coming and having an interest. So there's no conservativeness or people pulling out. They're all just flooding in and my inbox is getting more and more full every day. So I'm actually feel we're still going strong and getting stronger. You know, I like what ifs. So what if we were in going into a bare market, would Riverside still be able to make money for shareholders? >> Yeah. So if we were going into a bare market, then we would be doing certain actions that we are actually doing right now. Not that we're going into a bare market, but that we're actually capitalizing that we've moved in a in a in a market upward. So, we do need to actually take advantage of that and we've done the share spin out. So, in a bare market, we make money for shareholders by making sure first off that we have money so that we don't actually have to capitalize. Also, if we're going into a bare market to make sure we do grab capital so that we do we are in a good situation and bring in capital at this level. If we're going to go down lower, then you'd actually do it. Of course, it's only in hindsight you'd know that. But that's what you'd want to do. I think the third thing is to use the end of the bull market as you go in to try to get some new deals that'll carry you through the bare market. Last time that was with BHP, we did that with Ken Ross. We did that with Centara where during the as we went into the bare market, we were able to lock in long-term agreements with the majors to carry us through. And that helps us to go 2, three or four years without having to go back for capital. >> How does your strategy change with the market then? In that case, when you go into a bull market, what would you do different than in the bear? >> We quickly actually divide the company up. So Blue J came out immediately. Blue J could get financed. Last time Capitan came out, we immediately got it financed. So in these when we're in a bull market, we can actually unlock the value so rapidly. If we're still in a bare bull market now, we're trying to actually do that with yet another company. See if we can get a double bagger out of this bull market. So, we're working very hard, weekends included, to try to see if we can do that. >> How much money do you have right now? What What are you going to buy with that money? What's kind of the runway for the company from here on out? >> So, right now we have 3.5 million cash with no debt. That's good. We also have perhaps another 2 million coming in from Fresno in November of the next year. So that would be more capital coming in. The runway right now we spend about a million a year of loss and we've been able to do that for the last 18 years. So the runway right now would be about 5 years given that type of runway. So that's a good situation. What are we buying right now is we've been buying Mexican properties, paying the back taxes, consolidating us, and then getting that money paid back rapidly with the deals we do where the person coming in is reimbursing us. And so then we go forward. And so recently we invested 250. Turn that into a million dollar investment back into the project. So it turned out to be a four times gain from our investing in. So we are investing but we're actually getting a return for that investment. >> Can you raise money in a bare market? Have you done it before? Do you know how it is? And are do you think you could if we went into a bare market today? >> You know, I'm [snorts] really lucky. This is the 36th time I've come to Zurich. I've been here. If we need to raise money, we have 40% European owners. I also always write a big check. I'm always part of that. So, if I'm writing a check, they write a check with me. If we are doing a check in a bare market, then I'm glad to write a big check cuz I'm going to be through it a long time and that's good. So, it's and we can raise money. I hate to do it because it's quite dilutive to the corporation and I always try to make sure we go back to the existing shareholders if we do have to do it. We were really lucky for 15 years. We almost always were able to do it at a pretty high time in the market just by chance. And when you looked back, we'd been within the upper part when we had to do financings in the past. So, we've been lucky almost always to be able to do it. That's why we only have 75 million shares out after 18 years was we didn't have to do it in a bare market. Always trying to have capital. [music] [music] >> Are we going into a bare market here? I don't think so. I think that there are enough systematic factors on a macro scale that are just going to increase demand from gold as well as we'll see supply side constraints because with gold price this high, all the easy stuff is being mined as fast as it can. I mean, you would if you're running any kind of large mining operation, you're going to want to try and get it out and sell it at these prices. So I think we're going to see demand for more exploration plays coming in as the easy gold gets exhausted. >> If we were to go in a bare market though, can you as Yukon Metals still make money for shareholders? >> Oh, absolutely. It's uh we have a healthy treasury and we've got a very good understanding of the terrain that we work in, so we're able to work quite efficiently. >> How would your strategy change though depending on where we go from here on out? Like we seem to be taking a breeder. [snorts] It's going to be the size of moment. We go up or we go down from here. If we were to go down, what are you going to change in your strategy? And if we were to go way up, what would you then at that point change in your operating strategy? >> Well, the state of the market is uh it dictates how hard you push the gas pedal. So, if with a a strong bull market, you're just looking at more properties. You're doing more drilling. You're doing it faster. Whereas in a slower market, you spend more time thinking very carefully and making sure you maximize the the shareholder dollars you put into the ground. >> So what would you know pressing the gas paddle harder? What would that mean for you? Do you go to more than three properties or what would that look like? >> I think uh pressing the gas paddle harder just means more density of drilling. It's uh then you be getting quite a bit more aggressive on the properties you already have and really try and build out the the story on each one. You mentioned you had um a healthy treasury right now. How much money do you have right now? How far is that going to get you or what is that going to buy? How many meters? How much you know how many years of of GNA and so on? >> Right. It's uh we have 8 million in the treasury right now and that gives us a very healthy season for next year. So as far as Peteridge, we can't really say until we start drilling. That fluctuates, but uh that's enough to give us several properties of very comprehensive exploration. >> Mhm. >> What about runway? How much uh runway is the 8 million going to mean for you? >> Oh, that's uh that's the foreseeable future for us. We've got very low GNA expenses. So, uh we can run for for quite some time. >> Yeah. Do do you feel like you have a portfolio of property that can also attract capital even if it were a bare market? Can you still raise money and keep going? >> Oh, absolutely. Because we have so many properties. We have 17 properties that cover all manner of different commodities and uh those range from very small properties that are easy to explore to vast properties like the AZ property that are essentially a district in their own right. So I've got no doubt [clears throat] that we can target according to what the market demands. All right, Karen, are we in a bare market already or is the bull market over or is this just a blip? Uh, >> I'd say decidedly a blip. I mean, corrections are always healthy in any, you know, long rally that we've been in a pretty steep run up in gold prices. And I've said this in another interview. I was in Montreal at a conference last week. When you see a bit of pullback in the gold price, um, you know, that's healthy because there's been a lot of speculative money flowing into the sector. Um, you know, the juniors tend to get pounded a little bit more heavily. like we we tend to lag when the gold price is moving up and then when the gold price moves down they're the first to probably feel it. Um so it's a bit asymmetric there but I think that's really where the value opportunities lie is the fundamental story hasn't changed. >> Could you I if this was a bare market though this is a start of just a new bare market a couple of years could you as Maple Gold still make money for shareholders in a bare market? >> Absolutely. Because one of the things that Maple is not dependent on is this high elevated gold price. Our resource estimate was done in 2022 using an $1,800 gold price. Um the kind of exploration work that we're doing is trying to focus on systematic stepouts that are expanding and particularly expanding into high grade. Um grade is always going to be king. Multi-million ounce deposits with infrastructure, you know, in Canada where the Canadian dollar gold price has been flying because the Canadian dollar has performed so poorly. Um, as we've seen with recent M&A, which is starting to, you know, take place and and that market everybody's been waiting for for quite a while. We've seen three deals announced uh for Canadian companies over the last 3 weeks. You know, two junior companies in Northern Superior and Probe um getting acquired by IMold and Fresno uh respectively and then a larger deal with uh with uh core acquiring new gold for for 7 billion. So projects like Maples which have multi-million ounce endowments with lots more exploration upside adjacent to existing infrastructure um and and and an already established ounce that's ounce count that's a couple hundred million ounces sorry million ounces um is always going to have some value. Yeah. >> How's the strategy going to change depending on where the market goes from here on out and and I mean corporate strategy if we if we were to go in a bear or a bull from here what would be different for you? What would you do differently? Um that's an interesting question right like I think my view as I said in the beginning is that this is just a bit of a pullback it's not the turning into a bare market and we've certainly functioned in a capital deprived you know bare market environment uh for quite a long time up until this last you know year and a half where we started to gain some attention for the good work and the fundamentals of of Maple. Um look we've tightened our belt over that time. We're going to continue to maintain our cost discipline. Um, as I mentioned to you in a couple of interviews, you know, we've tightened our GNA from 6 to2 million a year. We're staying with that, uh, guidance. Uh, we've also brought our drilling cost per meter, you know, all in from, you know, $400 per meter under the joint venture down to $300 per meter. [snorts] That's going to be consistent for us. So, look, I think the thing that we are focused on is 30,000 m worth of drilling, which is starting, you know, in the next week to 10 days. um that drilling if for example we turn into a bare market tomorrow we wouldn't just shut the drill rigs down because I I believe that our shareholders especially the ones that have just recently invested in the company long-suffering shareholders know that we've really started to gain value based on the fact that people are recognizing with the caliber of investors that we've attracted with the execution uh that the team has uh has demonstrated and the track record that there's something substantial here. Um, but the new investors in particular are putting money into the company because they realize just how much exploration ground we control that hasn't had a single drill hole put in it. And as we know, whether it's a bare market or a bull market, there's a scarcity factor for these high upside, you know, established ounce but growing ounce, you know, high margin type ounces. anytime you've got a a discovery that moves the needle when you see these companies like uh the ones in the Yukon or in the you know in the Gana Shield for example they don't have the infrastructure advantages that the Abbot Tibby does but they happen to be generational discoveries I have a belief uh fundamentally I wouldn't have stayed with Maple if it weren't the case that there's a lot more gold to be found on our land package so bare market bull market we're going to keep going with a focused exploration and disciplined development approach and look if we show because of the focus just like our major partner Agniko is focused on margin, right? They're focused on keeping their cost consistent and benefiting from, you know, really leverage to the gold price because they're creating that much more free cash flow by keeping their cost consistent. A junior company like us, we're focusing on adding high quality ounces to our endowment as opposed to just lowering cutoff grades and bringing in as many ounces as we can so we can shine it up and have somebody else take it on. >> How much money do you have right now? What's the runway? What else are you going to buy with that money? >> Uh we're not buying anything. We're we're uh we're supporting our team. We're supporting a good exploration program. We've got 21 million in the bank. Uh it's about 20 million as of today. Uh it's $13 million worth of uh flow through money which needs to be spent by the end of 2026. Uh and $7 million worth of hard dollar. Uh so on that lower GNA budget, you know, we've got more than two years worth of run room. uh and fully funded catalyst both exploration and development coming up over the next uh uh 12 to 15 months. [music] >> Do you think the bull market is over? Are we in a bare market? >> I don't think so. I think uh even though the price of metals have come up a lot uh I think everything has been happening in the United States and all of the tariffs have really put a lot of light on mining and metals commodities. So I think people are starting to realize now that you know these things are hard to find and you can't just find them in your country. You have to go find them wherever they exist. Therefore, if you're looking to build inventory of critical minerals, metals, you have to go around the world looking for them. So, it's creating a huge demand that I think is going to continue to grow. >> Why investors care about that, I suppose, is because a lot of them or a lot of us really think that we can only make money in a in a bull market. Can you make money for shareholders in a bare market? Is it something you can do specifically for Element 29 to make money in a bare market? I think we're going to continue to derisk our projects and I don't think like I mean I I've been involved in exploring for base metals for a very long time and I know they're really hard to find. So you will go through cycles and you know uh the big thing is really to be able to anticipate the bare markets and be ready to have enough money in the bank to sort of continue working and uh so that's sort of our main objective and to continue de-risisking our projects. >> How would your strategy change depending on whether we go into a larger bull or a bare market from here on out? What would you do differently if if we went into a bear? Would you conserve cash and drill less? And if we were in a bowl, would you drill more and do more marketing or how would that change for you? >> Yeah, so our projects we own 100%. So, you know, we can shut down expiration any time. We don't really want to do that, but if we get into a really big like strong bare market, you know, our cost of owning ground is like $3 a hectare. So, you know, we can really cut back on our our operating costs quite a bit and corporate costs. Ideally, you don't want to do that. We're going to try and be ready uh so that we're actually able to continue to advance our projects cuz we do feel that you know I've been involved in exploring for copper projects for a very long time. They're very hard to find and uh you know they're predicting what about a million tons of extra copper inventory needed per year and that's like the equivalent of finding an Escandida every year and I mean you know that's the largest copper mine in the world so very difficult to find. You said you have um money to keep going. How much money do you have right now? What's the runway? >> Yeah, runway is pretty good. Uh we uh we raised uh 6.3 and netted 6.1 back in late August. And we also had uh about 18 million warrants get exercised and with that so we put $10 million Canadian in the bank and we're sort of actively spending that. So, and our cost per meter drilling is roughly 500. We've got a 7,000 meter program laid out. So, you know, we should have enough money to finish that program. >> What What else does that buy you? Is it only drilling? Do you are you including GNA in that? What else does the money that you have right now buy you? >> Yeah, I think it'll get us our 7,000 m program, including our uh plus our GNA and marketing costs. Yeah. >> If this was I mean, if if the market changes from here or not, it's it's a bear or a bull, could you still raise money in a bare market? Do you think like financing risk is a is a serious risk for you or or does your project attract capital even in a bare market? >> Well, that's a tough question obviously. Uh we would hope that it would continue to at least attract uh some funding with our key shareholders that we want to see the project continue to advance, but we would probably want to make sure that we uh cut back on drilling. And what you don't want to be doing is spending money now that we basically replace at a lower valuation. >> And as always, thanks to everyone for watching Resource Talks. I have a couple of more things to say, though. 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Are Mining Stocks Going Into a Bear Market Soon?
Summary
Transcript
Thank you for watching Resource Talks and welcome to Zurich, Switzerland, where I'm out and about being annoying to junior mining companies. Once again, today's topic of nuisance is, are we back in a bare market? Did we just miss out on the bull market? And then more important, I think that's a bit of an overdone topic anyways. But then more importantly, when I go and talk to these CEOs, I'm going to ask them, but what if we were in a bare market though? Would you still be able to make money for shareholders even in a bare market? Having a plan is an important part in that process. So, that's about it for an intro. Let's just go and talk to these people and see where that gets us. [music] Before we get into any of that though, [snorts] as always, please pause the screen, read all the disclaimers shown on there because your capital is at risk. Not only is mining a very risky business, junior mining is venture capital, which means it's even riskier. On top of that, I'm not your financial adviser. I'm a part-time clown and full-time paid by the companies you're about to hear from. So, to stay on the safe side, to stay on the safe side, consult a licensed financial adviser and do further due diligence on Setter Plus.ca since everything in and on this video is general and impersonal in nature and you are responsible for your own decisions. All right, Dave, I want to talk to you about the state of the market. Uh, do you think we're still in a bull market? We had a blip there. A lot of people freaked out. Is this the start of the bare market? What's going on? >> Yeah, I'm never sure. I mean, I think that $4,300 gold, uh, which was achieved vertically. I mean, everything went vertical. The the mining equities went vertical. >> The gold chart went vertical. That's very troubling. And whenever you see movements like that in charts, I think it's going to take some time for them to resolve. And the probability that you've hit a peak is I mean it's pretty high. And whether it's the peak, whether it's going to be the end, I mean, no one really knew that $850 gold was the peak in uh 1980 until maybe 1990. I mean, Franco, Nevada was created in 1983. >> Bareric was probably created in 1983. And so uh there was a very vibrant market for gold equities uh right from let's say 83 to 87 interrupted by uh the uh the market crash and I really think that that market continued almost all the way to Brix. So, if we topped out uh at 4,300 over gold, and if that's a 20-year top and we're going to go into a 20-year bare market, as we did uh in uh in the 80s and '90s, uh people probably won't notice for a decade. >> That'd be would have been a pretty disappointing bull market though that, you know, was all of two months, I suppose. >> Well, I think it was a little longer than that. I mean, gold's been going up since uh March of 2024 and and probably before that as well. So, I mean, it really got I think um uh a turbo boost when Trump came into office and uh and and then, you know, very quickly went into into trade war with the entire world. And I mean, I suppose if you project linearly uh American [snorts] policy at the moment, it would seem to me that every country is going to need to have their own rare earth mines and rare earth uh metals processing capacity. And every country is going to need to have their own copper mines and their own nickel mines and and pod ash mines. And so I don't think we're going to go quite that far. But we've now taken this de-industrialization trend and this trend towards a very very stretched and efficient global supply chains and started to work them in reverse. And I think that that's an extremely commodity intensive process even if it isn't going to be fully played out uh and uh markets see that and they're they're on it in the same way they were on lithium when electric car or EV mandates came in came into place. So policy at the moment looks inflationary and commodity intense. Gold is uh always going to be uh uh sympathetic to that because it means I mean no one generates enough GDP to actually fund those kinds of programs. So the money will have to be borrowed and I suppose to some extent printed and uh so let's break gold off from the rest of the commodity complex. Has it peaked? I mean I don't think so. But if it has, I think we still have, you know, the potential for a decade like the the 80s in in gold equities. And, you know, again, we won't know for 10 years probably. There's so much going on, yet nothing ever happens as as the saying goes. Uh, and es especially in in mining stocks, like I feel like we're always like we lag to the upside, but we're the first ones to go, especially in in junior mining stocks. Mhm. >> Um, and I'm going to go around here and ask people like what if and and and what like we are going to go into a bare market eventually. What are they going to do? How are they going to still make money for shareholders? Cuz why otherwise would someone own, you know, juniors if they're not planning on making them money? >> Mhm. >> What do you think it takes for a junior to make money for someone in a in a bare market? >> Well, that's very tough. If you're in a bare market, by definition, the the broad majority of equities are are going down. And of course, these companies don't earn anything. So, uh, given they're not making money to begin with, shareholders are going to watch shareholder equity evaporate during a bare market. But the things that counteract bare markets, uh, I mean, the most obvious thing is exploration success. So, you can look back at at all of the great bare markets uh, and see stocks that ran counter to it in in mining because they made discoveries. And Bareric is the best example of that since we just talked about the decade of the 1980s. The gold strike discovery uh probably happened around 84 85 and I mean people have been talking about it recently. Uh you know Rick's doing a lot of podcasts these days and and Bareric seems to be a constant subject of that. But I mean you know when you drill 100 meters of an ounce or 200 meters of an ounce or something like that uh the stock's going to go bananas. And Bareric was just a penny stock. I mean, it was a failed oil play and Peter Monk started uh rolling up old gold properties in the shadow of this fantastic peak in gold in 1980. uh people wanted more gold producing equities and Peter bought Camflow and he bought Mker in Utah and then he bought uh the the Nevada properties from from western states and very soon got into these fantastic Carlin intervals and Bareric was the most successful stock on the TSSE in the 1980s and probably early 1990s and uh and a financial juggernaut and and and and really sexy. So you know [laughter] um so expiration success is is is something that will always be likely sorry be counter trend. Uh and then when it comes to controlling the damage uh companies just need to run a flexible business model and be able to shrink to fit into the available capital envelope. So it it it better management teams usually build out their businesses in modules and are able to shut those modules down quickly when capital gets tough. Uh and maybe you know if they if they're really good management teams they will have raised well when capital was easy and so maybe have a longer balance sheet than than others. And then finally, I think the thing that isn't done enough and that's really uh necessary or sort of not necessary but value AC value building in in bare markets is uh working on the liability side of your balance sheet. So almost all companies have carrying costs. Uh many many companies option properties and when you're in bare markets and they're be becoming long uh in duration, you go to the underlying vendors and you change those deals. you get payments reduced, you get royalties reduced. If you have holes in your land package that you want to fill, you go and buy the ground during that period. And uh and so sometimes you don't have the money to buy things in in bare markets, which again is the obvious thing to do. If you raise money in bull markets, you buy things in in bare markets, but you can almost always do something to the liabilities associated with your property package to build value in the company when when times are tough. How much runway would you typically be looking for? You said you you know smart managements raise money during the good times, spend them maybe during the bad times. Yeah. How much how much of a storm should they be able to to better? >> Two years, three years. I mean, I think most companies uh don't get uh given that much capital by by investors. But generally I think that companies that are funded for 2 years uh at a minimum you know are are resistant to the sort of cycles uh that happen in this market where for instance you have good investment or good good drill success and then maybe you're seasonal. You know Rob Carpenter in the Yukon at Prospector just you know the stock went up probably 5x on one fantastic hole. Rob raised 10 million bucks from B2 and then another 20 million bucks from from uh from Alex Gubbins. I mean, that company was broke and it was 10 cents 18 months ago. And now he's [snorts] got $40 million in the bank and a dollar stock price. Uh and uh and so that that's pretty clever work on Rob's part and it's going to give him a capital base for years to come and then you know he can go to flow through markets seasonally to get more drilling money if he needs it. So that kind of thing is is you know superb execution. >> The the thing is also what juniors is that what you actually just said earlier is like we would go into these bare markets where it's like a prolonged period. So even two years not really going to save you. A lot of these companies are going to have to raise most of them have raised capital during bare markets as well. >> What is kind of the profile of a junior that is able to raise capital during a a bare market under reasonable terms? Um, is it kind of is it project specific that I'm looking for, jurisdiction, specific teams? What am I looking for? Well, going into a bare market, companies that have money will be able to raise money because uh investors uh will understand that they aren't broke and they aren't on their knees. And if they want to participate at lower stock prices, uh the fact that the company has money in the treasury and doesn't have to issue means that they won't, you know, uh they won't they won't get their full 5-year warrant and all of the other perks and emolments that that Rick is looking for, for instance. So, ironically, having a good balance sheet means you're going to be able to raise in a in a tough market. So, you know, making sure you have that that that duration to your balance sheet at all times uh will allow you to be a preferred funer when when times are tough. Now, when it comes to uh what what sorts of businesses uh can be funded in bare markets, I mean, it's just going to be the best companies with the best prospects and with the best exploration upside. And we're speaking specifically about my cohort which is you know exploration and development. >> Yeah. What what does the best look like in that case? Is it great? Is it is it jurisdiction is part of of being the best I suppose? Uh yeah what's what's the best for you? >> Yeah. I mean I think ultimately in bare markets higher grade opportunities will be more attractive to investors. typically that means the commodity price is coming down and so you're going to want to have a a lower cost higher margin operation and I mean if you look at Alamos as an example John did a great job buying grade when he went out and bought Richmond and there were some complaints about him paying north of a billion dollars but has been a spectacular mine and the one thing that happens when you're in tough markets uh for your underlying commodity if you have an asset like island and you can hyigrade which isn't a great idea. I mean, you'll be sterilizing some of the future potential if you do. You can always increase your cash flow despite the fact that you might have a a declining gold price. Now, John never had to do that and uh an island has evolved into an asset that investors need to own. Alamos, Lundine, the two sexiest mid-tier producers and you know, just rocket ships in terms of stock performance. uh over the past few years, even though it was a terrible market for gold assets, Alamos and Lundine both outperformed because they were high-grade opportunities and high margin operations. >> I fully expected it to be like best is uh Finland and there's a certain company there. [laughter] >> I try not to grind my own axe unless I'm invited to. And well, that's an invitation. Let's not take it for today. [music] >> [music] >> Ivan, I want to talk to you about uh the state of the market. Are we in a bare market already or is the bull market going to continue? >> Oh, we're absolutely in a bull market. This was a seasonality. Everything that just happened last few weeks was on the seasonality charts of gold and other commodities and uh it's now ending and gold's bouncing. It's right on time. So, for me, this is exactly what was expected in the current uptrend. >> I do hope you're right. Um, my money is also where my hopes are. So, what if you're not though? What if we did go into a bare market? How would you still make shareholders money if if it was a bare market? Oh, great question. You know, seasonality is all relative to out of control things, black swan events that can occur. Um, in that case, for us, we've been very defensive with our capital. We've been very limited with our spending, giving ourselves a lot of longevity. You know, we have money until June, July of next year, so we could weather any kind of short-term unexpected Black Swan events. If it went beyond that, I'd personally write a check. I've written checks before in the company to get to a point where we could finance again and catch a better market trend. But right now, our confidence is extremely high. And you know, from what we're doing, it's rare, it's big, and it has a lot of grade, and that's the thing that's going to work in all markets. So, we have an all market type of project that could perform. Depending on the market we go into, how would your strategy change um operational strategy? How would you take advantage of a bull market or how would you try to survive and thrive in in a beer? >> Yeah. So, so in the last 6 months, we we really curtailed spending. We curtailed staff everything. We've done short contracts of people working for us in Peru. As we go into the bull market, we staff up. We do a lot more work. We collect a lot more data and we do a lot more marketing. So, we we we flex and we contract. We're very nimble. That's the power of a junior. But also being through many cycles, I've seen how quick the market can turn. But my key has been watch delution. Make sure capital is being spent really intelligently as the market picks up or goes through it turns. How much money do you have right now? What's the runway that that buys you? And what else does it buy you? >> Yes. So, $4 million in the treasury as we stand here today. That gives us money into July of next year. Uh this gives us a chance to achieve some incredibly important permits, which we're just filing this week, which will give us a chance to go and drill some of our most robust targets on the property. We're also doing a lot of surface work, channel sampling, and trenching, which is recently what's been triggering the stock price to perform, and there's a lot more of that to come. So, we have some really key milestones that we're going to achieve. Getting drill permits prior to we're running out of capital. That's our anticipation. When we get drill permits, people tend to speculate. These are some very, very unique targets. You've got tens of meters of 1% copper on surface. You've got some past drilling, some great copper hits that we're going to be expanding and discovery here in the not too far future. So, this is what's going to really drive prices. Um, as far as financing goes, it's a very competitive environment for this scale of a project. We have two corporate investors, Tech and Numont, that owns large positions and there's a lot of others looking at the opportunity and looking to consider investing into it. >> Staying in the the hypothetical realm and the what if if if we went into a bare market and you had to raise capital, could you still do it in a bare market? Is it do you have the the project and the jurisdiction and the team that still raises capital in bare markets? >> Yes. Yes. That's exactly what I've been financing for the last three years. uh probably raise of $150 million for a group of companies I'm involved in collectively through the bare markets that we've been through the kind of the worst turns we've seen. Um the trick there is having the right project. Everything goes around the asset. If the assets good enough, you can raise money in any market. Uh these are tier one potential, meaning top 10 discovery in the world potential type of projects that we're after. And so yeah, it's not guaranteed we're going to find it, but it's certainly getting the attention of both majors and as well as investors. And that's always going to give us a chance to survive. >> [music] >> I think the fundamentals probably say that the gold price should actually pick up again. Um, but yeah, I'm I'm not the that expert to say whether it is or it isn't, but uh I think the fundamentals are there to say that we're going to head up like the gold price will keep going up in the future. I'd be concerned if a junior ever told me we were actually going into a bare bare market. So that there's that. But I do want to ask you, would you be if we were though? What if what if we were going into a bare market? Would you be able to make money for shareholders even in a bare market? >> I think we're in a fortunate position where we can um be I mean uh everyone always talks about grade being king and we've definitely got a project which is delivering consistent grade. Um, so you know, even at I mean at the gold prices that we're at, like we've got an attractive project no matter what. So we're well funded. We've still got newmont funding as well. Um, so we can deliver on project objectives towards feasibility whether it's a bull market or a bare market. So, we're we're not we're not in a in a position where we're having to walk in to try and raise money in a in a difficult market. We're we're well funded. And I think there is always going to be funding for projects that have uh production potential or, you know, going into feasibility and and near-term production potential. >> What would you do differently though if you could um what would you do differently in a bare versus a bull market? What would what would your operational strategy be in a in a bare? >> I think if we were in an absolute bare market where we had to think about how that that cash is is deployed um there would be a prioritization on um the [clears throat] resources and putting putting through the feasibility um to to deliver that value. I think there's significant value on the project that we will deliver uh on those on feasibility putting out our first resource going into the PA and PFS studies. Um you know whether new months or not there is significant value to deliver for a while and our shareholders from that. Um, and then you know if you you you if you've got really good exploration targets, I think you're always going to drill them because they can deliver big like big step ups in in value for a company as well. So you just keep working up those targets in the background like we did before like you know BBM we actually did all the geochemistry for BBM when a walle had no money. We collected all these samples. We did PXRF targeting and then once we had some money, we started to send them all in for gold assay in the lab and we made a discovery at BBM. So you would keep doing all those things uh as well to build targets that you think can actually create significant value change when you actually drill. Um, but putting the bulk of your drill dollars into delivering resources and feasibility studies. >> If there was a storm, could you weather it? And and how how long of a storm could you survive? As in, how much money do you have? How far does it get you? What are you buying with it? >> Right. So, we got 15 million in cash at the moment. Um, I think we can punch through 80 to 80 cents um once we've delivered our first resources. So, that's worth in warrants. that's sort of worth about 8 million Canadian to us as well. So, um we've got significant runway depending and and depending on whether you know Newmont keeps funding and all those sorts of things as well. We've got runway for quite a few years to come. Um, and if we're going intensively on expiration, you know, 15 million plus that 8 million, um, you know, that's that's still would give us 2 years of runway um, drilling, a lot of discovery drilling alongside spending new money on the on feasibility studies. If Newmont weren't there, those things that we just talked about would start to come more into play on on delivering um, the feasibility side of things for a while. But we've still got the funding to do that. So, um I think we're in a good [clears throat] position. Yeah. >> Could you raise money in any kind of market, whether it was a a bear or a bull? Is this the kind of project, the kind of jurisdiction, the kind of team that can make it happen in any kind of market? >> I think now that with the discoveries that we have made and where we're going, the answer is yes. >> Yeah. I I think your cost of capital is going to be more if if if if your you know, your share price is not necessarily going to be reflected in in what you have in in those markets. So I think in a in a bull market generally you've got a higher share price and you cost the capital but is is less but um with the project that we've got I don't think we've got an issue with with um being able to continuously drive it forward. >> All right, John Mark, I want to talk to you about the state of the market. Uh, do you think we're going into a bare market for mining or are we still in the bull market? >> I think we're still in the bull market. I think this is a consolidation. I think probably a lot of the other people are are telling you that as well. And the reason for me I seeing that is especially kind of on the silver side is all these different things are actually just consolidating, but it actually hasn't really rolled over and the fundamentals are still strong and they continue to be there. And secondly, there's more and more people still coming. I'm more and more busy with people coming and having an interest. So there's no conservativeness or people pulling out. They're all just flooding in and my inbox is getting more and more full every day. So I'm actually feel we're still going strong and getting stronger. You know, I like what ifs. So what if we were in going into a bare market, would Riverside still be able to make money for shareholders? >> Yeah. So if we were going into a bare market, then we would be doing certain actions that we are actually doing right now. Not that we're going into a bare market, but that we're actually capitalizing that we've moved in a in a in a market upward. So, we do need to actually take advantage of that and we've done the share spin out. So, in a bare market, we make money for shareholders by making sure first off that we have money so that we don't actually have to capitalize. Also, if we're going into a bare market to make sure we do grab capital so that we do we are in a good situation and bring in capital at this level. If we're going to go down lower, then you'd actually do it. Of course, it's only in hindsight you'd know that. But that's what you'd want to do. I think the third thing is to use the end of the bull market as you go in to try to get some new deals that'll carry you through the bare market. Last time that was with BHP, we did that with Ken Ross. We did that with Centara where during the as we went into the bare market, we were able to lock in long-term agreements with the majors to carry us through. And that helps us to go 2, three or four years without having to go back for capital. >> How does your strategy change with the market then? In that case, when you go into a bull market, what would you do different than in the bear? >> We quickly actually divide the company up. So Blue J came out immediately. Blue J could get financed. Last time Capitan came out, we immediately got it financed. So in these when we're in a bull market, we can actually unlock the value so rapidly. If we're still in a bare bull market now, we're trying to actually do that with yet another company. See if we can get a double bagger out of this bull market. So, we're working very hard, weekends included, to try to see if we can do that. >> How much money do you have right now? What What are you going to buy with that money? What's kind of the runway for the company from here on out? >> So, right now we have 3.5 million cash with no debt. That's good. We also have perhaps another 2 million coming in from Fresno in November of the next year. So that would be more capital coming in. The runway right now we spend about a million a year of loss and we've been able to do that for the last 18 years. So the runway right now would be about 5 years given that type of runway. So that's a good situation. What are we buying right now is we've been buying Mexican properties, paying the back taxes, consolidating us, and then getting that money paid back rapidly with the deals we do where the person coming in is reimbursing us. And so then we go forward. And so recently we invested 250. Turn that into a million dollar investment back into the project. So it turned out to be a four times gain from our investing in. So we are investing but we're actually getting a return for that investment. >> Can you raise money in a bare market? Have you done it before? Do you know how it is? And are do you think you could if we went into a bare market today? >> You know, I'm [snorts] really lucky. This is the 36th time I've come to Zurich. I've been here. If we need to raise money, we have 40% European owners. I also always write a big check. I'm always part of that. So, if I'm writing a check, they write a check with me. If we are doing a check in a bare market, then I'm glad to write a big check cuz I'm going to be through it a long time and that's good. So, it's and we can raise money. I hate to do it because it's quite dilutive to the corporation and I always try to make sure we go back to the existing shareholders if we do have to do it. We were really lucky for 15 years. We almost always were able to do it at a pretty high time in the market just by chance. And when you looked back, we'd been within the upper part when we had to do financings in the past. So, we've been lucky almost always to be able to do it. That's why we only have 75 million shares out after 18 years was we didn't have to do it in a bare market. Always trying to have capital. [music] [music] >> Are we going into a bare market here? I don't think so. I think that there are enough systematic factors on a macro scale that are just going to increase demand from gold as well as we'll see supply side constraints because with gold price this high, all the easy stuff is being mined as fast as it can. I mean, you would if you're running any kind of large mining operation, you're going to want to try and get it out and sell it at these prices. So I think we're going to see demand for more exploration plays coming in as the easy gold gets exhausted. >> If we were to go in a bare market though, can you as Yukon Metals still make money for shareholders? >> Oh, absolutely. It's uh we have a healthy treasury and we've got a very good understanding of the terrain that we work in, so we're able to work quite efficiently. >> How would your strategy change though depending on where we go from here on out? Like we seem to be taking a breeder. [snorts] It's going to be the size of moment. We go up or we go down from here. If we were to go down, what are you going to change in your strategy? And if we were to go way up, what would you then at that point change in your operating strategy? >> Well, the state of the market is uh it dictates how hard you push the gas pedal. So, if with a a strong bull market, you're just looking at more properties. You're doing more drilling. You're doing it faster. Whereas in a slower market, you spend more time thinking very carefully and making sure you maximize the the shareholder dollars you put into the ground. >> So what would you know pressing the gas paddle harder? What would that mean for you? Do you go to more than three properties or what would that look like? >> I think uh pressing the gas paddle harder just means more density of drilling. It's uh then you be getting quite a bit more aggressive on the properties you already have and really try and build out the the story on each one. You mentioned you had um a healthy treasury right now. How much money do you have right now? How far is that going to get you or what is that going to buy? How many meters? How much you know how many years of of GNA and so on? >> Right. It's uh we have 8 million in the treasury right now and that gives us a very healthy season for next year. So as far as Peteridge, we can't really say until we start drilling. That fluctuates, but uh that's enough to give us several properties of very comprehensive exploration. >> Mhm. >> What about runway? How much uh runway is the 8 million going to mean for you? >> Oh, that's uh that's the foreseeable future for us. We've got very low GNA expenses. So, uh we can run for for quite some time. >> Yeah. Do do you feel like you have a portfolio of property that can also attract capital even if it were a bare market? Can you still raise money and keep going? >> Oh, absolutely. Because we have so many properties. We have 17 properties that cover all manner of different commodities and uh those range from very small properties that are easy to explore to vast properties like the AZ property that are essentially a district in their own right. So I've got no doubt [clears throat] that we can target according to what the market demands. All right, Karen, are we in a bare market already or is the bull market over or is this just a blip? Uh, >> I'd say decidedly a blip. I mean, corrections are always healthy in any, you know, long rally that we've been in a pretty steep run up in gold prices. And I've said this in another interview. I was in Montreal at a conference last week. When you see a bit of pullback in the gold price, um, you know, that's healthy because there's been a lot of speculative money flowing into the sector. Um, you know, the juniors tend to get pounded a little bit more heavily. like we we tend to lag when the gold price is moving up and then when the gold price moves down they're the first to probably feel it. Um so it's a bit asymmetric there but I think that's really where the value opportunities lie is the fundamental story hasn't changed. >> Could you I if this was a bare market though this is a start of just a new bare market a couple of years could you as Maple Gold still make money for shareholders in a bare market? >> Absolutely. Because one of the things that Maple is not dependent on is this high elevated gold price. Our resource estimate was done in 2022 using an $1,800 gold price. Um the kind of exploration work that we're doing is trying to focus on systematic stepouts that are expanding and particularly expanding into high grade. Um grade is always going to be king. Multi-million ounce deposits with infrastructure, you know, in Canada where the Canadian dollar gold price has been flying because the Canadian dollar has performed so poorly. Um, as we've seen with recent M&A, which is starting to, you know, take place and and that market everybody's been waiting for for quite a while. We've seen three deals announced uh for Canadian companies over the last 3 weeks. You know, two junior companies in Northern Superior and Probe um getting acquired by IMold and Fresno uh respectively and then a larger deal with uh with uh core acquiring new gold for for 7 billion. So projects like Maples which have multi-million ounce endowments with lots more exploration upside adjacent to existing infrastructure um and and and an already established ounce that's ounce count that's a couple hundred million ounces sorry million ounces um is always going to have some value. Yeah. >> How's the strategy going to change depending on where the market goes from here on out and and I mean corporate strategy if we if we were to go in a bear or a bull from here what would be different for you? What would you do differently? Um that's an interesting question right like I think my view as I said in the beginning is that this is just a bit of a pullback it's not the turning into a bare market and we've certainly functioned in a capital deprived you know bare market environment uh for quite a long time up until this last you know year and a half where we started to gain some attention for the good work and the fundamentals of of Maple. Um look we've tightened our belt over that time. We're going to continue to maintain our cost discipline. Um, as I mentioned to you in a couple of interviews, you know, we've tightened our GNA from 6 to2 million a year. We're staying with that, uh, guidance. Uh, we've also brought our drilling cost per meter, you know, all in from, you know, $400 per meter under the joint venture down to $300 per meter. [snorts] That's going to be consistent for us. So, look, I think the thing that we are focused on is 30,000 m worth of drilling, which is starting, you know, in the next week to 10 days. um that drilling if for example we turn into a bare market tomorrow we wouldn't just shut the drill rigs down because I I believe that our shareholders especially the ones that have just recently invested in the company long-suffering shareholders know that we've really started to gain value based on the fact that people are recognizing with the caliber of investors that we've attracted with the execution uh that the team has uh has demonstrated and the track record that there's something substantial here. Um, but the new investors in particular are putting money into the company because they realize just how much exploration ground we control that hasn't had a single drill hole put in it. And as we know, whether it's a bare market or a bull market, there's a scarcity factor for these high upside, you know, established ounce but growing ounce, you know, high margin type ounces. anytime you've got a a discovery that moves the needle when you see these companies like uh the ones in the Yukon or in the you know in the Gana Shield for example they don't have the infrastructure advantages that the Abbot Tibby does but they happen to be generational discoveries I have a belief uh fundamentally I wouldn't have stayed with Maple if it weren't the case that there's a lot more gold to be found on our land package so bare market bull market we're going to keep going with a focused exploration and disciplined development approach and look if we show because of the focus just like our major partner Agniko is focused on margin, right? They're focused on keeping their cost consistent and benefiting from, you know, really leverage to the gold price because they're creating that much more free cash flow by keeping their cost consistent. A junior company like us, we're focusing on adding high quality ounces to our endowment as opposed to just lowering cutoff grades and bringing in as many ounces as we can so we can shine it up and have somebody else take it on. >> How much money do you have right now? What's the runway? What else are you going to buy with that money? >> Uh we're not buying anything. We're we're uh we're supporting our team. We're supporting a good exploration program. We've got 21 million in the bank. Uh it's about 20 million as of today. Uh it's $13 million worth of uh flow through money which needs to be spent by the end of 2026. Uh and $7 million worth of hard dollar. Uh so on that lower GNA budget, you know, we've got more than two years worth of run room. uh and fully funded catalyst both exploration and development coming up over the next uh uh 12 to 15 months. [music] >> Do you think the bull market is over? Are we in a bare market? >> I don't think so. I think uh even though the price of metals have come up a lot uh I think everything has been happening in the United States and all of the tariffs have really put a lot of light on mining and metals commodities. So I think people are starting to realize now that you know these things are hard to find and you can't just find them in your country. You have to go find them wherever they exist. Therefore, if you're looking to build inventory of critical minerals, metals, you have to go around the world looking for them. So, it's creating a huge demand that I think is going to continue to grow. >> Why investors care about that, I suppose, is because a lot of them or a lot of us really think that we can only make money in a in a bull market. Can you make money for shareholders in a bare market? Is it something you can do specifically for Element 29 to make money in a bare market? I think we're going to continue to derisk our projects and I don't think like I mean I I've been involved in exploring for base metals for a very long time and I know they're really hard to find. So you will go through cycles and you know uh the big thing is really to be able to anticipate the bare markets and be ready to have enough money in the bank to sort of continue working and uh so that's sort of our main objective and to continue de-risisking our projects. >> How would your strategy change depending on whether we go into a larger bull or a bare market from here on out? What would you do differently if if we went into a bear? Would you conserve cash and drill less? And if we were in a bowl, would you drill more and do more marketing or how would that change for you? >> Yeah, so our projects we own 100%. So, you know, we can shut down expiration any time. We don't really want to do that, but if we get into a really big like strong bare market, you know, our cost of owning ground is like $3 a hectare. So, you know, we can really cut back on our our operating costs quite a bit and corporate costs. Ideally, you don't want to do that. We're going to try and be ready uh so that we're actually able to continue to advance our projects cuz we do feel that you know I've been involved in exploring for copper projects for a very long time. They're very hard to find and uh you know they're predicting what about a million tons of extra copper inventory needed per year and that's like the equivalent of finding an Escandida every year and I mean you know that's the largest copper mine in the world so very difficult to find. You said you have um money to keep going. How much money do you have right now? What's the runway? >> Yeah, runway is pretty good. Uh we uh we raised uh 6.3 and netted 6.1 back in late August. And we also had uh about 18 million warrants get exercised and with that so we put $10 million Canadian in the bank and we're sort of actively spending that. So, and our cost per meter drilling is roughly 500. We've got a 7,000 meter program laid out. So, you know, we should have enough money to finish that program. >> What What else does that buy you? Is it only drilling? Do you are you including GNA in that? What else does the money that you have right now buy you? >> Yeah, I think it'll get us our 7,000 m program, including our uh plus our GNA and marketing costs. Yeah. >> If this was I mean, if if the market changes from here or not, it's it's a bear or a bull, could you still raise money in a bare market? Do you think like financing risk is a is a serious risk for you or or does your project attract capital even in a bare market? >> Well, that's a tough question obviously. Uh we would hope that it would continue to at least attract uh some funding with our key shareholders that we want to see the project continue to advance, but we would probably want to make sure that we uh cut back on drilling. And what you don't want to be doing is spending money now that we basically replace at a lower valuation. >> And as always, thanks to everyone for watching Resource Talks. I have a couple of more things to say, though. 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