U.S. Declares Silver Critical: Could Apollo Silver’s Calico Project Be the Best Silver Play?
Summary
0:00 Intro 2:05 Disclaimer 2:35 Silver Added to Critical Minerals List 13:50 Water Rights 16:10 New Investors in Silver Market …
Transcript
Silver uniquely, I think, uh, took a backseat for a while. It it perked up a fair bit this year in sympathy with gold, but I think now is going to get some added attention because it was added to the critical minerals list because, among other things, I think it's going to get a lot of investors to re-examine, well, gee, what is the silver market like? What are the dynamics? Have we been missing a story? And I think investors have been missing a story with silver. I know you agree with that, Andy. What I've always liked about the silver trade is that, you know, you get a precious metal side to it and you get the industrial demand piece to it. What I'm excited about is that I really believe that we're heading into a a global economic cold war and two markets for everything. And I think the opportunity for us in the Western world is significant because for ever since I've been around, we've tried to globalize everything and we pushed all of the exploration, development, production, refining, smelting. We've pushed everything offshore. We look for cheaper and cheaper labor forces, cheaper costs for the basic commodities. It's all gone. And now this globalization trend is coming to an end. And nationalization is becoming more important. And your own security is becoming more important. And so the money and the energy that's going to have to go into developing our own resources, our own supplies, and our own production is significant. It's going to last. And so that's what gets me up at night so excited. I just been around a long time and I I think I think we're about to see the biggest bull we've ever got to see. For disclosure purposes, our site does not make recommendations for [music] purchases or sale of stocks, services, or products. Nothing on our site or this podcast should be construed as an offer or solicitation to buy or sell products [music] or securities. All investing involves risk and possible losses. This podcast is for entertainment purposes only. For disclosure purposes, Apollo [music] Silver is a paid for client on the investor ideas website. Chris and Andy, it's so great to have you both back on the show. Uh we're here today obviously to talk about the big news in the silver space that has been added to the critical minerals list for 2025, which has been a rumor and now finally true. Um Chris, I would love to hear your commentary just on the macros of what this is going to mean possibly for the supply chain going forward that now it's not just a precious metal, it's an essential metal. And then Andy, I would love some of your commentary on the significance of this for the Calico project as this, I'm assuming, would be a door opener um into the future for federal grants and etc, etc. >> Look, the the gold price has led everything for about the last year or so and it's in large part due to the fact that the global markets are now viewing what they call a debasement trade. You know, precious metals over the years have had swings up and down basically on account of is inflation bubbling up? Is it going to settle back down? Are we going to go back to disinflation so that we don't need precious metals? But now we're beyond even the whole inflation debate and increasing number of people's views. And this is all about debasement globally. I mean there there is no more money to print without just really trashing all of these fiat currencies. So that means everything is going to rise in price because the money is that much cheaper. Silver uniquely I think uh took a backseat for a while. It it it perked up a fair bit this year in sympathy with gold, but I think now is going to get some added attention because it was added to the critical minerals list because among other things I think it's going to get a lot of investors to reexamine, well gee, what is the silver market like? What are the dynamics? Have we been missing a story? And I think investors have been missing a story with silver. I know you agree with that, Andy. >> What I've always liked about the silver trade is that, you know, you get a precious metal side to it and you get the industrial demand piece to it. And clearly the US is saying now that it's well, I think the US has a couple reasons. It's critical one because they've got a a reliance on on Mexican silver and we're, you know, trying to deal with a bigger problem that's in Mexico right now. And so uh developing domestic supply for for for silver is important. Put it on the critical list and you'll get um ease of permitting, government financing support. You know, one of the two of one of the guys two of the guys from our office were at the Pentagon last week talking to them about critical about several critical minerals that we have under our umbrella here. but but one of them being up in silver. And so, yes, I think that that uh it being added to the critical mineral list is going to help us significantly. It says, hey, it's essential to the to the US economy, to national security. We want to make sure our supply chains aren't aren't vulnerable to disruption. Um, and it's essential in our manufacturing. and we're talking solar panels, computer chips, EVs, a variety of things. So, I think it's fabulous. We've all been waiting for it. I think it's a long-term um opportunity for us and and yeah, let's get into it a little more. I was just um actually reading that not not only just for solar and a lot of the things that we know silver to be useful for, but even as far as nuclear um for the reactors, you need a lot of silver for the rods to actually create that. With this whole commodity super cycle and energy transition, especially with nuclear being pushed all over and now silver being a critical mineral, how much do you think this will affect like Chris, I'd love your commentary on the supply chain going forward and how valuable is a US based project? Because obviously um we've seen all different countries starting to um stockpile silver from Russia to India and world. It's [laughter] going to be interesting. A lot of folks don't realize that of to when you look at total silver consumption globally a third of it is for electronics. >> All right. And you can branch out from that and talk about the nuclear plant applications uh uh sh you know memory chips a lot of different things but because of its properties of conductivity malleability all these different kind of things you can't replace silver. People would be shocked to know how many things in their household contain silver that they never thought of, whether it's their TV, their smartphone, or whatever the case may be. Companies like Apple and some others, they want more manufacturing within the US. Well, if we're going to have more manufacturing of some of these electronics in the US, that means we need a larger domestic supply of silver. And as of right now, we import half of that, as you pointed out, Andy, comes from Mexico of that total. and then then Canada and several other countries comprised the rest of that mix. So uh you know the the big deal really technically of getting silver as well as a number of other things in this go round added to the US Geological Surveys critical minerals list is that by definition legally that opens up silver projects to funding under the defense production act. talk about the fact that you have the second largest undeveloped silver project in um the US right now and the significance. >> Yeah. And so and so what you're referring to is Calico and Calico has it's a big project but it's got two main deposits on it. Waterlue which is 125 million ounces of measured and indicated silver primarily measured and uh and Langree right next door to it uh that has 57 million ounces inferred and we would expect that most of that would go to measured and indicated as well with a little more drilling density but you know combined there's 185 million ounces of silver there now on the critical list. Uh it's on private land in San Bernardino County, California, which is a known mining friendly jurisdiction. In fact, the project sits between Equinox's Castle Mountain Gold Mine that just got a big expansion permit approved uh to its east and to the west Riotinto's borax mine. And there are 90 plus other operations in San Bernardino. So, it's in the right place. It's on private land. That's land that we pay taxes on. FE simple land. It's already got designated land to cover the deposits, land to cover your layown area, your processing area, and a mill site. And it's in an area where there's good infrastructure. So, in addition to the silver, there's some couple other minerals there. There's barite, also on the critical list, and there's some zinc. So, three economic minerals there. All three on the critical list. and and now we're in in the federal government sites. You know, we're not on BLM ground, so it's not like we need the federal government to get the BLM to approve us advancing the project forward, but as uh Chris has pointed out, uh federal government funding would be fabulous. And look at the government money that's going into San Bernardino already. Um, and Chris might speak to this, but $500 million from the Pentagon or what's it called now? The Department of War, >> right? >> Yeah. >> Put $500 million into Mountain Pass just up the street from us. >> And I I mean, just up the street, it's on the same highway. But, >> you know, in the same county, so 500 million there. And and Apple followed that up with another big huge investment in Mountain Pass. So, so the Cavalry is coming. This is the second largest primariest silver deposit in the United States. Second largest undeveloped. So, you know, does uh do we get our chance here? I think so. I think it's going to be good for us. And uh you know, it's just beginning. >> You know, as we have all talked about Apollo Silver over time and and mentioned to our respective audiences or whoever we're talking to that it's in California, all of a sudden you kind of get this right here. California. Who wants California? But people don't realize what San Bernardino County is as far as a mining area. And that MP materials deal that you just alluded to with Mountain Pass, Sandy. I mean, that really exploded San Bernardino County on the map for people again and help people understand that this is a happening place. If you know, we're not trying to mine in Los Angeles or San Francisco or in in Yoseite National Park. This is a mining area. and Equinox, you mentioned they got fast 41 designation uh several months ago to expand their their their mind there. So, yeah, this is a very good jurisdiction to be in and especially as you point out when you're on private land as well. So, you've got less hoops you've got to jump through when you get to the development stage. >> Yeah. And you know, and then I look at the deposit itself and and Waterlue again, the larger piece of the calico silver deposit has a 08 strip ratio. I mean, it sits at surface. So, you're not going to have a big hole. You're going to terrace the side hit the side of the slope. Um, and so backfill legislation in the early 2000s. And so, not critical minerals, but precious minerals or metallic minerals. So copper, iron, ore, gold, silver, lead, zinc, those deposits, if you dig a hole to mine them out, you have to fill the hole up when you're done. That's backfill legislation. But critical minerals can be exempted from that. Number one. Number two, the strip ratio at Waterlue being 08, you're not digging a big hole. It's right there. And if you look at the topography, it's a bump. So, I think everything's lending to a pretty good permitting environment for us and and so, you know, we've got to get it through economic study and and once we get sort of at the PFS level of environmental study, uh hopefully within the next 18 months, you get down that path and and then you're able to start the the permitting process. And and I think that's where all of this critical piece is going to where rubber hits the road. >> Do you think that with silver becoming a critical mineral as well and you have as you mentioned barite and zinc the like the only real hurdle that you had mentioned before is the possibility of the water rights there that this will be another key factor in um getting that done or helping that move along. As most people know in this industry, if you're it doesn't matter what you're mining, unless it's plaster or gold in Western Australia, you pretty well need water to to get the metal out of the rock one way or another. Water is used in in mineral processing. We'll need water. There is water at Calico. Uh we've drilled three water wells on the property. We don't own it. So we and it's an adjudicated basin. So that means that the rights are already established for for certain right holders in the basin. You've got to go and purchase rights from people, negotiate, trade, um some sort of barter system. And and so one of the things that we look to is there is a Yurmo is a small town that's about five Well, it's even less than five miles. I mean, it's probably 2 miles right off of the Calico Silver Deposit. And there's a marine base that's a 2-minute drive from the project. And that marine base has been shut in. There's there's very little going on there now. Maybe a little bit of logistics work, but but that that marine base has has water rights with it. And so there's some federally owned water rights that are potentially available for us to try and negotiate on. And again, the critical the critical mineral piece will help with us negotiating those. Same with some old alalfa pivots that are in the region that aren't productive and not being used anymore, but those farms still have some water rights and we could potentially negotiate on those. It's not something that we're unfamiliar with. one of the other companies that we run out of here has spent millions of dollars buying water rights in in the state to the east in Nevada. So, at some point we're going to have to start negotiating for those. I I'm going to step out on a limb and say that's sometime in the next 12 to 18 months. Chris, do you think as silver is now not just again a precious metal and this is going to be a catalyst for new investors to start looking at the silver space that it's not just you know the silver bugs and now that it's on the critical minerals? Well, I think it's going to be a net positive, Cali, for sure that uh you know the the whole narrative generally of critical minerals reshoring getting off of China, Russia, whoever dependence on different minerals and things like that. That is an investment theme that has become ever more solidified in the recent past. You know, it started out as half of a fad really over EVs a few years ago and it drove lithium and nickel and cobalt metals like that to really big spikes and then they came back down and they're trying to all find their bottom and get up off of the mat. Um, but now it's a much bigger deal and with the trade battles with China with needing to get off of enriched uranium from Russia and all the rest of these things. So, I do see a lot of evidences out there. I'm going to give you one in just a second of the broader investment community starting to look at these kind of themes generally. Now, an example I want to share and I and I may have shared this with the two of you in the past, but I get emails several a week from investment banks, mutual fund and ETF purveyors and others that have all got webinars that if I watch them, I get continuing education credit, you know, and this is for people that have an investment advisor license and things like that. you need to every so often get so many CE credits by, you know, taking these classes or sitting through webinars, whatever to get up to date so you're not a complete idiot out there. And I have noticed for quite a while now, and I would say that it's 25 to 30% of all of the different courses that an investment advisor can get CE credit for have to do with critical materials, energy, power grid, all of these different themes that dovetail into all of these critical metals and energy and, you know, national security needs and so forth. So, this is something that's been slowly making a comeback in the broad markets, in investment advisory and brokerage circles. It's still not what it used to be. You know, the average broker, the average adviser, the average economic pundit is still all gaga over AI stocks and how much dopier can we make the prices for an Nvidia or a Palunteer or whatever. Okay, but they're all starting to figure out that down the food chain, you know, where does the power come that's going to drive all of this AI comes from uranium, it comes from natural gas, it comes from base metals to build plants and infrastructure and power grids and and things like that. So, it's coming and and so I I think that generally speaking, it's not enough. It's not as much as people should be paying attention, but uh definitely this new USGS list helps a lot. You've got silver, you got copper on it, you got zinc, you've got berate, you've got even phosphate and some of the agricultural minerals, a lot of which we still import. Andy, do you have commentary? Have you seen from your side new investors or new uh fresh look at silver since that being added to the silver criticals list? >> Yeah, we're starting to see increased volumes of trading. We're starting to see broader distribution in the United States. definite interest from political forces. We were actually in Washington to talk about tungsten and some other things but silver came up and that's when that was more that that became part of the discussion and we weren't initially expecting it to and you know I think that you know we've we operate things in Mexico out of here as well. Uh I've worked in Mexico since the mid 90s and you know one of the I still like Mexico for for exploration and development uh and have some investments there as you know Apollo does as well but the US trade war fentanel war political influence I don't want to call it a war because it's not but but the situation between the countries is getting worse. And there's there's I mean there's been a bunch of protests and union strikes and all kinds of things going on in Mexico in the last few days and shut down Mexico City and a bunch of states. And um I think that the situation's going to get worse there. And I don't know what the US administration's going to end up doing there. But if they do um cause any potential um um trade restrictions or or tariffs or other sort of import problems for for Mexican silver that just bodess even better for for our deposits at Calico. >> I'd love for both of you to give your commentary. We all know that we're going back into a commodity super cycle or we're we're at the start of one. What what I've had commentary from the last few people is that what makes this one different is that it's a supply chain and how absolutely far behind I just saw a chart that shows like how many thousands of years for some of these metals we would need to actually get the full energy transition to get it the production in. Um I love both of your commentary on that. What I'm excited about is that I really believe that we're heading into a a global economic cold war and two markets for everything. I think that we're going to have the Western world led by the US and Europe fighting for their own domestic supplies and domestic production of everything. And then you're going to have the BRICS countries, China, Russia, Brazil, and whoever else wants to join them on that side. And I think the opportunity for us in the Western world is significant because for ever since I've been around, we've tried to globalize everything and we pushed all of the exploration, development, production, refining, smelting. We've pushed everything offshore. We look for cheaper and cheaper labor forces, cheaper costs for the basic commodities. It's all gone. And now we're we've this globalization trend is coming to an end and nationalization is becoming more important and your own security is becoming more important. And so the money that and the and the energy that's going to have to go into developing our own resources, our own supplies, and our own production is significant. It's going to last. And so that's what gets me up at night so excited. I just been around a long time and I I think I think we're about to see the biggest bull we've ever got to see. >> You're absolutely right. And it comes from that economic and national security, you [clears throat] know, impetus both combined. Like you said, Andy, you know, a lot of people forgot that, and I alluded to this a few minutes ago, back when you had the peaks in lithium and nickel and cobalt and things like that, benchmark mineral intelligence, which is one of the big think tanks and and policym outfits in the in the world when it comes to battery metals and things like that. They were trying to promote the idea of of multi-tiered pricing in the world for different commodities because one of the issues that we still have in North America is that we cannot compete head-to-head with China when China has been able to build all this lowcost manufacturing. I said to people earlier in the year when the president first signed one of his executive orders, you know, the the broad one to try and, you know, have permitting reform, stoke critical mineral development stuff in the US and so forth, said, "Hey, that's great, but there's not a single development stage copper nickel project that became any more economic after that executive order than before because we live in a different world." And getting back to MP materials, Andy and and Cali, what was most important about that particular deal with the government was it recognized this pricing differential that we cannot live in a world where we're going to be hostage to pricing in China cuz that's what they want. That's how they've cornered the market on all these things. We need to have an e economic model from the mine through development through the labor force to the finished products that everything reflects western pricing, first world economics, first world standards and good labor and all the rest of this stuff. So when they guaranteed basically double the current China influence market price for the product coming out of MP materials that to me is the single biggest and most important transaction the administration has done but it's got to be replicated all across the food chain to other different metals and minerals and it's got to be way beyond the scope of what we've seen so far. We have to do it. We're going to do it. The question is, do we have the foresight now to put these things in place or are we going to be doing it from a more frantic position? If a year or two from now, you know, between Fed and the administration, they can't keep all these bubbles inflated, we get a collapse in the markets for a while, they've got to reinflate it. That means they've got to reinflate commodities again, too, because they'll come down with everything else. But, but how do we get from point A to point B? So anyway, not to ramble anymore, but I I think long-term because of all the shortages, because we need to reshore these things, I'm wildly bullish on commodities long-term, pretty much everything, even though we're not going to get from point A to point B in a straight line. Do you think Chris with um as you just said all that commentary for MP and that's a good um standout project of what needs to be done with the US adding uranium, silver, all those um new add-ons that that's a signal that they're getting their um butts in gear for next year and that's a possibility. >> It's not enough of one in my opinion. Cali, I'll give you a quick example. Um, as you I think know and maybe you know Andy, one of the causes legislatively that I'm carrying water for is a bill that just got reintroduced in the House again in September. It calls for a national infrastructure bank. And the importance of this is that it would be an offbudget thing. It would provide trillions of dollars by essentially leveraging Treasury bonds that have already been issued. Okay? And I won't get into all the details of this. provide trillions of dollars for infrastructure and things like this that we need because the federal government out of the normal budgetary process is not going to have nearly the room to do what needs to be done as quickly as it needs to be done to provide the kind of investments that we need in a broad sense. And we're not even close. I mean, I I had I responded to somebody on social media the other day that had a a little mockup of Chris Wright, the energy secretary, and he said, "We've got $377 million that we just uh allocated for such and such for critical metals and downstream processing technology." Said, "Well, that's wonderful, but if that million had a B in it, it'd mean more cuz that's what we need. >> And the money's not there out of the budget. We need somebody to sit down and get the best minds together and craft a major industrial policy and financial policy to fund it >> that's going to get us where we need to get because among other things in case the two of you missed the news it was just out in the last couple of days that October set a record uh and this was from an administration that was going to get you know we're going to we're going to get the budget under control. There's never been an October ever that had as large a budget deficit, almost $300 billion to start this fiscal year. Okay, we're going to have two plus trillion dollar deficits as far ahead as the eye can see if we don't have a recession. Okay, let alone how much more it'll be if we do. So, there is simply not room in the federal budgetary process. And I would urge everybody listening to us not only to take a look at Apollo Silver, which is a hell of a story. It's one of my recommendations, but to get a hold of your members of Congress, tell them that they need to really get serious about this cuz, you know, we we still, for all the good stuff that has gone on, and I'm not diminishing any of it, we're still bringing a water pistol to a gunfight when it comes to global competition over commodities. We need to get our act together yesterday. >> That's an excellent analogy. And that's right. I Yeah, >> that's the exciting piece. >> It is. I mean, we and and fortunately, as far as policy is concerned and at least an acknowledgement of the problem, we're there. We've turned a corner. I mean, this is the best policy tailwind of our lifetimes, Andy, in this industry. >> But we've got to there's a lot more pieces that need to be put on this a lot faster. >> You bet. You bet. Chris, um, on our last podcast, we talked about a couple of the stories that, uh, we felt were, um, recession proof over the next while, and Apollo is obviously one of them. I would love for you to just reiterate while we have Andy on the show of why you, I guess, love the project and why you think it can probably um, ride the storm no matter what we've seen the market over the [laughter] next. >> Well, look, nothing's guaranteed and, you know, Apollo share price has had a great run. deserves it. Even at the present valuation after a nice run, it's still cheap when you look at the value of the commodity there and a 180 million some odd ounces of silver in the ground, etc. the barite, the gold resource that's there now too, uh, the zinc, everything. Um but look, I think that going forward and I mentioned a few minutes ago the increased belated awareness that generalist investors, investment houses, advisors have now to commodities. One of the things I like about Apollo is a couple of the things that are going to be at the top of the list for new investors to look at, they've got they've got season management. I mean, there's I've said it before and I'll say it again, Andy. There's not there's a handful of people in this entire industry that can raise big slugs of money on their name and on their track record and you're one of them. So, that's one of the things that people look at because of the past success of management. You know, it's my old saying, you bet on the jockey. If if you've got an average horse, the best jockey is going to get it across the finish line. And the other thing is the economics. I mean there's there's a lot of companies still out there today and I was just in New Orleans uh at that annual conference. Huge attendance. I mean it's been a long time since there was over a thousand people at the New Orleans investment conference. So again an indication that a lot of people are waking up to not just gold but a lot of these other commodity themes. But still there's a you know there's probably too many companies there that really don't have viable projects. they're riding the coattails of the market or whoever their favorite analyst is that that's fgging their story or whatever the case may be. So the other thing besides management, my point is is you look at the resource because people coming back into this space, generalist investors, investment houses, they're all about show me the money. Okay? You don't drill for press releases. You drill to prove economics and the eventual profitability of a project. and and you're farther along in that than the average project, too. And that's the other big reason I think that Apollo is going to do well. >> We talked a little bit with Ross last time of just go over the potential timeline for the Calico project into the next uh 6 to 12 months of what's in the pipeline. >> There's some other exploration work that could be done there. Um and and that might, you know, cause some interest for additional investors, but but let's face it, there's a beautiful plum of a deposit there now. They we need it. The the country needs it. It's it's time. So I I think you know Michael Steinman the CEO of Pan-American has always said that Waterlue that's the primary in Calico is a great deposit. He always had his concerns and keep in mind that they have the NSR on it. He always had his concerns with the peritability of it. And we're in an environment now where that permitting is becoming less of a question and more of a certainty. And so I I I think it's going to get exciting for it over the next couple years. There is a big prize in this company. It's called Cinco de Mayo. The the world knows Cinco de Mayo. We have a five-year option on it to restore our right to go back to work on it. It's in Chihuahua State. It's worth looking at. We're not ready to make public comments yet because we don't want to skew a process that is well down the road. But, uh, I think, and again, I'm getting a little forward-looking here, but but I've operated in that country for a lot of years. I've got some very good people down there that know what they're doing and and live 2 hours from that project. And I think that we could have some interesting things to say about it in the next 60 days, maybe sooner. So it viewers should keep their eyes on that, should get to understand it a little bit cuz it it will it will hold up in the spotlight as well as Calico does. So something to pay attention to in the coming weeks. >> I'm looking forward to that.
U.S. Declares Silver Critical: Could Apollo Silver’s Calico Project Be the Best Silver Play?
Summary
0:00 Intro 2:05 Disclaimer 2:35 Silver Added to Critical Minerals List 13:50 Water Rights 16:10 New Investors in Silver Market …Transcript
Silver uniquely, I think, uh, took a backseat for a while. It it perked up a fair bit this year in sympathy with gold, but I think now is going to get some added attention because it was added to the critical minerals list because, among other things, I think it's going to get a lot of investors to re-examine, well, gee, what is the silver market like? What are the dynamics? Have we been missing a story? And I think investors have been missing a story with silver. I know you agree with that, Andy. What I've always liked about the silver trade is that, you know, you get a precious metal side to it and you get the industrial demand piece to it. What I'm excited about is that I really believe that we're heading into a a global economic cold war and two markets for everything. And I think the opportunity for us in the Western world is significant because for ever since I've been around, we've tried to globalize everything and we pushed all of the exploration, development, production, refining, smelting. We've pushed everything offshore. We look for cheaper and cheaper labor forces, cheaper costs for the basic commodities. It's all gone. And now this globalization trend is coming to an end. And nationalization is becoming more important. And your own security is becoming more important. And so the money and the energy that's going to have to go into developing our own resources, our own supplies, and our own production is significant. It's going to last. And so that's what gets me up at night so excited. I just been around a long time and I I think I think we're about to see the biggest bull we've ever got to see. For disclosure purposes, our site does not make recommendations for [music] purchases or sale of stocks, services, or products. Nothing on our site or this podcast should be construed as an offer or solicitation to buy or sell products [music] or securities. All investing involves risk and possible losses. This podcast is for entertainment purposes only. For disclosure purposes, Apollo [music] Silver is a paid for client on the investor ideas website. Chris and Andy, it's so great to have you both back on the show. Uh we're here today obviously to talk about the big news in the silver space that has been added to the critical minerals list for 2025, which has been a rumor and now finally true. Um Chris, I would love to hear your commentary just on the macros of what this is going to mean possibly for the supply chain going forward that now it's not just a precious metal, it's an essential metal. And then Andy, I would love some of your commentary on the significance of this for the Calico project as this, I'm assuming, would be a door opener um into the future for federal grants and etc, etc. >> Look, the the gold price has led everything for about the last year or so and it's in large part due to the fact that the global markets are now viewing what they call a debasement trade. You know, precious metals over the years have had swings up and down basically on account of is inflation bubbling up? Is it going to settle back down? Are we going to go back to disinflation so that we don't need precious metals? But now we're beyond even the whole inflation debate and increasing number of people's views. And this is all about debasement globally. I mean there there is no more money to print without just really trashing all of these fiat currencies. So that means everything is going to rise in price because the money is that much cheaper. Silver uniquely I think uh took a backseat for a while. It it it perked up a fair bit this year in sympathy with gold, but I think now is going to get some added attention because it was added to the critical minerals list because among other things I think it's going to get a lot of investors to reexamine, well gee, what is the silver market like? What are the dynamics? Have we been missing a story? And I think investors have been missing a story with silver. I know you agree with that, Andy. >> What I've always liked about the silver trade is that, you know, you get a precious metal side to it and you get the industrial demand piece to it. And clearly the US is saying now that it's well, I think the US has a couple reasons. It's critical one because they've got a a reliance on on Mexican silver and we're, you know, trying to deal with a bigger problem that's in Mexico right now. And so uh developing domestic supply for for for silver is important. Put it on the critical list and you'll get um ease of permitting, government financing support. You know, one of the two of one of the guys two of the guys from our office were at the Pentagon last week talking to them about critical about several critical minerals that we have under our umbrella here. but but one of them being up in silver. And so, yes, I think that that uh it being added to the critical mineral list is going to help us significantly. It says, hey, it's essential to the to the US economy, to national security. We want to make sure our supply chains aren't aren't vulnerable to disruption. Um, and it's essential in our manufacturing. and we're talking solar panels, computer chips, EVs, a variety of things. So, I think it's fabulous. We've all been waiting for it. I think it's a long-term um opportunity for us and and yeah, let's get into it a little more. I was just um actually reading that not not only just for solar and a lot of the things that we know silver to be useful for, but even as far as nuclear um for the reactors, you need a lot of silver for the rods to actually create that. With this whole commodity super cycle and energy transition, especially with nuclear being pushed all over and now silver being a critical mineral, how much do you think this will affect like Chris, I'd love your commentary on the supply chain going forward and how valuable is a US based project? Because obviously um we've seen all different countries starting to um stockpile silver from Russia to India and world. It's [laughter] going to be interesting. A lot of folks don't realize that of to when you look at total silver consumption globally a third of it is for electronics. >> All right. And you can branch out from that and talk about the nuclear plant applications uh uh sh you know memory chips a lot of different things but because of its properties of conductivity malleability all these different kind of things you can't replace silver. People would be shocked to know how many things in their household contain silver that they never thought of, whether it's their TV, their smartphone, or whatever the case may be. Companies like Apple and some others, they want more manufacturing within the US. Well, if we're going to have more manufacturing of some of these electronics in the US, that means we need a larger domestic supply of silver. And as of right now, we import half of that, as you pointed out, Andy, comes from Mexico of that total. and then then Canada and several other countries comprised the rest of that mix. So uh you know the the big deal really technically of getting silver as well as a number of other things in this go round added to the US Geological Surveys critical minerals list is that by definition legally that opens up silver projects to funding under the defense production act. talk about the fact that you have the second largest undeveloped silver project in um the US right now and the significance. >> Yeah. And so and so what you're referring to is Calico and Calico has it's a big project but it's got two main deposits on it. Waterlue which is 125 million ounces of measured and indicated silver primarily measured and uh and Langree right next door to it uh that has 57 million ounces inferred and we would expect that most of that would go to measured and indicated as well with a little more drilling density but you know combined there's 185 million ounces of silver there now on the critical list. Uh it's on private land in San Bernardino County, California, which is a known mining friendly jurisdiction. In fact, the project sits between Equinox's Castle Mountain Gold Mine that just got a big expansion permit approved uh to its east and to the west Riotinto's borax mine. And there are 90 plus other operations in San Bernardino. So, it's in the right place. It's on private land. That's land that we pay taxes on. FE simple land. It's already got designated land to cover the deposits, land to cover your layown area, your processing area, and a mill site. And it's in an area where there's good infrastructure. So, in addition to the silver, there's some couple other minerals there. There's barite, also on the critical list, and there's some zinc. So, three economic minerals there. All three on the critical list. and and now we're in in the federal government sites. You know, we're not on BLM ground, so it's not like we need the federal government to get the BLM to approve us advancing the project forward, but as uh Chris has pointed out, uh federal government funding would be fabulous. And look at the government money that's going into San Bernardino already. Um, and Chris might speak to this, but $500 million from the Pentagon or what's it called now? The Department of War, >> right? >> Yeah. >> Put $500 million into Mountain Pass just up the street from us. >> And I I mean, just up the street, it's on the same highway. But, >> you know, in the same county, so 500 million there. And and Apple followed that up with another big huge investment in Mountain Pass. So, so the Cavalry is coming. This is the second largest primariest silver deposit in the United States. Second largest undeveloped. So, you know, does uh do we get our chance here? I think so. I think it's going to be good for us. And uh you know, it's just beginning. >> You know, as we have all talked about Apollo Silver over time and and mentioned to our respective audiences or whoever we're talking to that it's in California, all of a sudden you kind of get this right here. California. Who wants California? But people don't realize what San Bernardino County is as far as a mining area. And that MP materials deal that you just alluded to with Mountain Pass, Sandy. I mean, that really exploded San Bernardino County on the map for people again and help people understand that this is a happening place. If you know, we're not trying to mine in Los Angeles or San Francisco or in in Yoseite National Park. This is a mining area. and Equinox, you mentioned they got fast 41 designation uh several months ago to expand their their their mind there. So, yeah, this is a very good jurisdiction to be in and especially as you point out when you're on private land as well. So, you've got less hoops you've got to jump through when you get to the development stage. >> Yeah. And you know, and then I look at the deposit itself and and Waterlue again, the larger piece of the calico silver deposit has a 08 strip ratio. I mean, it sits at surface. So, you're not going to have a big hole. You're going to terrace the side hit the side of the slope. Um, and so backfill legislation in the early 2000s. And so, not critical minerals, but precious minerals or metallic minerals. So copper, iron, ore, gold, silver, lead, zinc, those deposits, if you dig a hole to mine them out, you have to fill the hole up when you're done. That's backfill legislation. But critical minerals can be exempted from that. Number one. Number two, the strip ratio at Waterlue being 08, you're not digging a big hole. It's right there. And if you look at the topography, it's a bump. So, I think everything's lending to a pretty good permitting environment for us and and so, you know, we've got to get it through economic study and and once we get sort of at the PFS level of environmental study, uh hopefully within the next 18 months, you get down that path and and then you're able to start the the permitting process. And and I think that's where all of this critical piece is going to where rubber hits the road. >> Do you think that with silver becoming a critical mineral as well and you have as you mentioned barite and zinc the like the only real hurdle that you had mentioned before is the possibility of the water rights there that this will be another key factor in um getting that done or helping that move along. As most people know in this industry, if you're it doesn't matter what you're mining, unless it's plaster or gold in Western Australia, you pretty well need water to to get the metal out of the rock one way or another. Water is used in in mineral processing. We'll need water. There is water at Calico. Uh we've drilled three water wells on the property. We don't own it. So we and it's an adjudicated basin. So that means that the rights are already established for for certain right holders in the basin. You've got to go and purchase rights from people, negotiate, trade, um some sort of barter system. And and so one of the things that we look to is there is a Yurmo is a small town that's about five Well, it's even less than five miles. I mean, it's probably 2 miles right off of the Calico Silver Deposit. And there's a marine base that's a 2-minute drive from the project. And that marine base has been shut in. There's there's very little going on there now. Maybe a little bit of logistics work, but but that that marine base has has water rights with it. And so there's some federally owned water rights that are potentially available for us to try and negotiate on. And again, the critical the critical mineral piece will help with us negotiating those. Same with some old alalfa pivots that are in the region that aren't productive and not being used anymore, but those farms still have some water rights and we could potentially negotiate on those. It's not something that we're unfamiliar with. one of the other companies that we run out of here has spent millions of dollars buying water rights in in the state to the east in Nevada. So, at some point we're going to have to start negotiating for those. I I'm going to step out on a limb and say that's sometime in the next 12 to 18 months. Chris, do you think as silver is now not just again a precious metal and this is going to be a catalyst for new investors to start looking at the silver space that it's not just you know the silver bugs and now that it's on the critical minerals? Well, I think it's going to be a net positive, Cali, for sure that uh you know the the whole narrative generally of critical minerals reshoring getting off of China, Russia, whoever dependence on different minerals and things like that. That is an investment theme that has become ever more solidified in the recent past. You know, it started out as half of a fad really over EVs a few years ago and it drove lithium and nickel and cobalt metals like that to really big spikes and then they came back down and they're trying to all find their bottom and get up off of the mat. Um, but now it's a much bigger deal and with the trade battles with China with needing to get off of enriched uranium from Russia and all the rest of these things. So, I do see a lot of evidences out there. I'm going to give you one in just a second of the broader investment community starting to look at these kind of themes generally. Now, an example I want to share and I and I may have shared this with the two of you in the past, but I get emails several a week from investment banks, mutual fund and ETF purveyors and others that have all got webinars that if I watch them, I get continuing education credit, you know, and this is for people that have an investment advisor license and things like that. you need to every so often get so many CE credits by, you know, taking these classes or sitting through webinars, whatever to get up to date so you're not a complete idiot out there. And I have noticed for quite a while now, and I would say that it's 25 to 30% of all of the different courses that an investment advisor can get CE credit for have to do with critical materials, energy, power grid, all of these different themes that dovetail into all of these critical metals and energy and, you know, national security needs and so forth. So, this is something that's been slowly making a comeback in the broad markets, in investment advisory and brokerage circles. It's still not what it used to be. You know, the average broker, the average adviser, the average economic pundit is still all gaga over AI stocks and how much dopier can we make the prices for an Nvidia or a Palunteer or whatever. Okay, but they're all starting to figure out that down the food chain, you know, where does the power come that's going to drive all of this AI comes from uranium, it comes from natural gas, it comes from base metals to build plants and infrastructure and power grids and and things like that. So, it's coming and and so I I think that generally speaking, it's not enough. It's not as much as people should be paying attention, but uh definitely this new USGS list helps a lot. You've got silver, you got copper on it, you got zinc, you've got berate, you've got even phosphate and some of the agricultural minerals, a lot of which we still import. Andy, do you have commentary? Have you seen from your side new investors or new uh fresh look at silver since that being added to the silver criticals list? >> Yeah, we're starting to see increased volumes of trading. We're starting to see broader distribution in the United States. definite interest from political forces. We were actually in Washington to talk about tungsten and some other things but silver came up and that's when that was more that that became part of the discussion and we weren't initially expecting it to and you know I think that you know we've we operate things in Mexico out of here as well. Uh I've worked in Mexico since the mid 90s and you know one of the I still like Mexico for for exploration and development uh and have some investments there as you know Apollo does as well but the US trade war fentanel war political influence I don't want to call it a war because it's not but but the situation between the countries is getting worse. And there's there's I mean there's been a bunch of protests and union strikes and all kinds of things going on in Mexico in the last few days and shut down Mexico City and a bunch of states. And um I think that the situation's going to get worse there. And I don't know what the US administration's going to end up doing there. But if they do um cause any potential um um trade restrictions or or tariffs or other sort of import problems for for Mexican silver that just bodess even better for for our deposits at Calico. >> I'd love for both of you to give your commentary. We all know that we're going back into a commodity super cycle or we're we're at the start of one. What what I've had commentary from the last few people is that what makes this one different is that it's a supply chain and how absolutely far behind I just saw a chart that shows like how many thousands of years for some of these metals we would need to actually get the full energy transition to get it the production in. Um I love both of your commentary on that. What I'm excited about is that I really believe that we're heading into a a global economic cold war and two markets for everything. I think that we're going to have the Western world led by the US and Europe fighting for their own domestic supplies and domestic production of everything. And then you're going to have the BRICS countries, China, Russia, Brazil, and whoever else wants to join them on that side. And I think the opportunity for us in the Western world is significant because for ever since I've been around, we've tried to globalize everything and we pushed all of the exploration, development, production, refining, smelting. We've pushed everything offshore. We look for cheaper and cheaper labor forces, cheaper costs for the basic commodities. It's all gone. And now we're we've this globalization trend is coming to an end and nationalization is becoming more important and your own security is becoming more important. And so the money that and the and the energy that's going to have to go into developing our own resources, our own supplies, and our own production is significant. It's going to last. And so that's what gets me up at night so excited. I just been around a long time and I I think I think we're about to see the biggest bull we've ever got to see. >> You're absolutely right. And it comes from that economic and national security, you [clears throat] know, impetus both combined. Like you said, Andy, you know, a lot of people forgot that, and I alluded to this a few minutes ago, back when you had the peaks in lithium and nickel and cobalt and things like that, benchmark mineral intelligence, which is one of the big think tanks and and policym outfits in the in the world when it comes to battery metals and things like that. They were trying to promote the idea of of multi-tiered pricing in the world for different commodities because one of the issues that we still have in North America is that we cannot compete head-to-head with China when China has been able to build all this lowcost manufacturing. I said to people earlier in the year when the president first signed one of his executive orders, you know, the the broad one to try and, you know, have permitting reform, stoke critical mineral development stuff in the US and so forth, said, "Hey, that's great, but there's not a single development stage copper nickel project that became any more economic after that executive order than before because we live in a different world." And getting back to MP materials, Andy and and Cali, what was most important about that particular deal with the government was it recognized this pricing differential that we cannot live in a world where we're going to be hostage to pricing in China cuz that's what they want. That's how they've cornered the market on all these things. We need to have an e economic model from the mine through development through the labor force to the finished products that everything reflects western pricing, first world economics, first world standards and good labor and all the rest of this stuff. So when they guaranteed basically double the current China influence market price for the product coming out of MP materials that to me is the single biggest and most important transaction the administration has done but it's got to be replicated all across the food chain to other different metals and minerals and it's got to be way beyond the scope of what we've seen so far. We have to do it. We're going to do it. The question is, do we have the foresight now to put these things in place or are we going to be doing it from a more frantic position? If a year or two from now, you know, between Fed and the administration, they can't keep all these bubbles inflated, we get a collapse in the markets for a while, they've got to reinflate it. That means they've got to reinflate commodities again, too, because they'll come down with everything else. But, but how do we get from point A to point B? So anyway, not to ramble anymore, but I I think long-term because of all the shortages, because we need to reshore these things, I'm wildly bullish on commodities long-term, pretty much everything, even though we're not going to get from point A to point B in a straight line. Do you think Chris with um as you just said all that commentary for MP and that's a good um standout project of what needs to be done with the US adding uranium, silver, all those um new add-ons that that's a signal that they're getting their um butts in gear for next year and that's a possibility. >> It's not enough of one in my opinion. Cali, I'll give you a quick example. Um, as you I think know and maybe you know Andy, one of the causes legislatively that I'm carrying water for is a bill that just got reintroduced in the House again in September. It calls for a national infrastructure bank. And the importance of this is that it would be an offbudget thing. It would provide trillions of dollars by essentially leveraging Treasury bonds that have already been issued. Okay? And I won't get into all the details of this. provide trillions of dollars for infrastructure and things like this that we need because the federal government out of the normal budgetary process is not going to have nearly the room to do what needs to be done as quickly as it needs to be done to provide the kind of investments that we need in a broad sense. And we're not even close. I mean, I I had I responded to somebody on social media the other day that had a a little mockup of Chris Wright, the energy secretary, and he said, "We've got $377 million that we just uh allocated for such and such for critical metals and downstream processing technology." Said, "Well, that's wonderful, but if that million had a B in it, it'd mean more cuz that's what we need. >> And the money's not there out of the budget. We need somebody to sit down and get the best minds together and craft a major industrial policy and financial policy to fund it >> that's going to get us where we need to get because among other things in case the two of you missed the news it was just out in the last couple of days that October set a record uh and this was from an administration that was going to get you know we're going to we're going to get the budget under control. There's never been an October ever that had as large a budget deficit, almost $300 billion to start this fiscal year. Okay, we're going to have two plus trillion dollar deficits as far ahead as the eye can see if we don't have a recession. Okay, let alone how much more it'll be if we do. So, there is simply not room in the federal budgetary process. And I would urge everybody listening to us not only to take a look at Apollo Silver, which is a hell of a story. It's one of my recommendations, but to get a hold of your members of Congress, tell them that they need to really get serious about this cuz, you know, we we still, for all the good stuff that has gone on, and I'm not diminishing any of it, we're still bringing a water pistol to a gunfight when it comes to global competition over commodities. We need to get our act together yesterday. >> That's an excellent analogy. And that's right. I Yeah, >> that's the exciting piece. >> It is. I mean, we and and fortunately, as far as policy is concerned and at least an acknowledgement of the problem, we're there. We've turned a corner. I mean, this is the best policy tailwind of our lifetimes, Andy, in this industry. >> But we've got to there's a lot more pieces that need to be put on this a lot faster. >> You bet. You bet. Chris, um, on our last podcast, we talked about a couple of the stories that, uh, we felt were, um, recession proof over the next while, and Apollo is obviously one of them. I would love for you to just reiterate while we have Andy on the show of why you, I guess, love the project and why you think it can probably um, ride the storm no matter what we've seen the market over the [laughter] next. >> Well, look, nothing's guaranteed and, you know, Apollo share price has had a great run. deserves it. Even at the present valuation after a nice run, it's still cheap when you look at the value of the commodity there and a 180 million some odd ounces of silver in the ground, etc. the barite, the gold resource that's there now too, uh, the zinc, everything. Um but look, I think that going forward and I mentioned a few minutes ago the increased belated awareness that generalist investors, investment houses, advisors have now to commodities. One of the things I like about Apollo is a couple of the things that are going to be at the top of the list for new investors to look at, they've got they've got season management. I mean, there's I've said it before and I'll say it again, Andy. There's not there's a handful of people in this entire industry that can raise big slugs of money on their name and on their track record and you're one of them. So, that's one of the things that people look at because of the past success of management. You know, it's my old saying, you bet on the jockey. If if you've got an average horse, the best jockey is going to get it across the finish line. And the other thing is the economics. I mean there's there's a lot of companies still out there today and I was just in New Orleans uh at that annual conference. Huge attendance. I mean it's been a long time since there was over a thousand people at the New Orleans investment conference. So again an indication that a lot of people are waking up to not just gold but a lot of these other commodity themes. But still there's a you know there's probably too many companies there that really don't have viable projects. they're riding the coattails of the market or whoever their favorite analyst is that that's fgging their story or whatever the case may be. So the other thing besides management, my point is is you look at the resource because people coming back into this space, generalist investors, investment houses, they're all about show me the money. Okay? You don't drill for press releases. You drill to prove economics and the eventual profitability of a project. and and you're farther along in that than the average project, too. And that's the other big reason I think that Apollo is going to do well. >> We talked a little bit with Ross last time of just go over the potential timeline for the Calico project into the next uh 6 to 12 months of what's in the pipeline. >> There's some other exploration work that could be done there. Um and and that might, you know, cause some interest for additional investors, but but let's face it, there's a beautiful plum of a deposit there now. They we need it. The the country needs it. It's it's time. So I I think you know Michael Steinman the CEO of Pan-American has always said that Waterlue that's the primary in Calico is a great deposit. He always had his concerns and keep in mind that they have the NSR on it. He always had his concerns with the peritability of it. And we're in an environment now where that permitting is becoming less of a question and more of a certainty. And so I I I think it's going to get exciting for it over the next couple years. There is a big prize in this company. It's called Cinco de Mayo. The the world knows Cinco de Mayo. We have a five-year option on it to restore our right to go back to work on it. It's in Chihuahua State. It's worth looking at. We're not ready to make public comments yet because we don't want to skew a process that is well down the road. But, uh, I think, and again, I'm getting a little forward-looking here, but but I've operated in that country for a lot of years. I've got some very good people down there that know what they're doing and and live 2 hours from that project. And I think that we could have some interesting things to say about it in the next 60 days, maybe sooner. So it viewers should keep their eyes on that, should get to understand it a little bit cuz it it will it will hold up in the spotlight as well as Calico does. So something to pay attention to in the coming weeks. >> I'm looking forward to that.