January 15th, 2025 - The Mine Wire

METALS MARKET

WTI Crude has continued its strong start in 2025, pushing up to nearly $80 a barrel at one point this week. Gold managed to hold steady as U.S. inflation data was a bit softer than expected on Tuesday, indicating that the Federal Reserve may have room to cut interest rates later this year.

Copper also saw it’s highest level in the past few months as data out of China showed that imports of unwrought copper and copper products surged 18% in December of last year, potentially signaling a rise in manufacturing activity.

^{**For our chart above we are taking prices from Tuesday 4pm EST to Tuesday 4pm EST, so not the typical week of Monday through Friday.}

KEEPING AN EYE ON GOVERNMENT DECISIONS

Here are some of the notable government policy moves this week:

• 🇺🇸 President Biden’s administration is finalizing rules that would essentially ban Chinese vehicles from America. We can’t imagine President-Elect Trump disagreeing with this move. Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo told Reuters, "It's really important because we don't want two million Chinese cars on the road and then realize ... we have a threat.” Looks like things are only going to heat up further between the US, it allies and China. On a different note, the Yangwang U8 pictured above goes for a cool $150,000 USD. Did we mention it can float on water? (Reuters) & (Wired on U8)

• 🇺🇸 The U.S. Department of Defense established a Strategic and Critical Materials Board of Directors, pursuant to the Stock Piling Act and the Federal Advisory Committee Act. The board will advise on strategies around sourcing and stockpiling and will be appointed at some point in 2025 by a host of departments that are involved. Would love to be the government relations executive getting my CEO on this board! (U.S. DoD)

• 🇺🇸 The Export-Import Bank of the United States (EXIM) approved a new financing tool designed to strengthen U.S. supply chains, reduce reliance on China for critical minerals and rare earth elements, and safeguard American jobs. The Supply Chain Resiliency Initiative (SCRI) will provide targeted financing to develop projects that secure critical minerals and rare earth elements, essential for transformative technologies like battery storage and semiconductors, from trusted international partners. Might be worth looking into assuming there is no Chinese involvement in your project. (EXIM)

• 🇺🇸 🇳🇴 The U.S. Department of Commerce and the Norwegian Ministry of Trade, Industry, and Fisheries issued a report presenting their shared understanding of non-market policies and practices (NMPPs) of certain third-party countries that may distort critical mineral markets. The Report finds that, absent action by market-oriented countries, in partnership with industry and other stakeholders, critical mineral supply chains are likely to remain vulnerable. We haven’t looked at the report but imagine it is worth a read. (U.S. DoC)

• 🇨🇦 The Yukon's Minister of Mines, John Streicker, has confirmed toxic water at the Eagle Gold mine is escaping one of its newly-built storage ponds. Certainly not a great development for the community and the territory. (CBC)

• 🇨🇦 Ontario’s Premier and Minister of Mines announced a new “Fortress Am-Can” strategy in response to President-Elect Trump’s tariff threat. The strategy at this stage is mostly a list of things government has promised to do, is already doing to some degree, or is within the Federal government’s jurisdiction. We do think price stability for critical minerals is an important initiative particularly given the practice of some jurisdictions to mine at any cost. We also like that the Premier has repeatedly emphasized the importance of critical minerals and mining production to the United States economy. It will be very interesting to see what happens next Monday/week. (Ontario Government)

• 🇲🇱 Oh Mali… The African nation seized roughly 3 metric tons of gold from Barrick’s operations this week, worth roughly $245m. In response, Barrick said that it would shut down mining operations at its Loulo and Gounkoto mines in the country. Barrick has filed a request for arbitration proceedings against Mali with the International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes. (Reuters)

• 🇿🇲 Zambia has re-introduced a 15% export duty on emeralds which impacts miner Gemfields. The new duties directly impact the emeralds mined by Kagem Mining Limited which is 75% owned by Gemfields and 25% owned by the Zambian Government’s Industrial Development Corporation. (Gemfields)

• 🇨🇳 The Chinese government announced that the Chinese Geological Survey has boosted its global share of lithium reserves from 6% to 16.5% due to increased exploration activities and data. This would give China the 2nd largest lithium reserves globally if true. (The State Council - China)

• 🇧🇷 Brazil is offering roughly $815m in financing for projects focused on the development of strategic minerals. The funding will be provided through BNDES and government funding agency Finep and will include credit lines and equity investments. (BNN Bloomberg)

• 🇪🇺 The European Union will propose a ban on Russian aluminum in it’s next round of sanctions. Imports in 2024 made up only 6% of imports, down from 11% and 19% in the prior two years. (Reuters)

• 🇸🇦 Last, but certainly not least - Saudi Arabia hosted its fourth annual international ministerial meeting of mining ministers on Tuesday. The meeting included representatives from 85 countries and was well attended with 50 Ministers. Saudi Arabia’s Energy Minister, Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman, also announced that the country plans to enrich and sell uranium used in nuclear reactors. The Kingdom continues its push to diversify its economy. (Reuters) & (Saudi Press Agency)

THE 8th ANNUAL GROUNDUP NETWORKING RECEPTION

The Mine Wire & Investor.Events Present the 8th Annual GROUNDUP Networking Reception at the PDAC featuring VIP Poker Tournament - Register here:

• The GROUNDUP Networking Reception (4pm to 7pm)

• VIP Poker Tournament (7pm to 11pm)

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CONFIRMED INDUSTRY SPONSORS: Maptek, Venture Liquidity Providers, Corpay, Endeavour Trust, Winning Media , CEC Mining Systems, AMIX Systems, UPLISTING Advisory Services, OTC Markets, Mitsubishi Motors, Whitewater Management, Int-Elle, Mining Hub, Paycore Drilling, Garfinkle Biderman LLP, Perves Redmond Limited, 6ix

MINING MATTERS FROM AROUND THE WORLD 🌎

• 🇨🇳 Zijin Mining is in talks to acquire shares in Chinese miner Zangge Mining. With a market cap of around $6.4bn USD, Zangge primarily drives revenue from its potash operations, but also produces lithium extracted from salt lakes in Qinghai. With a handful of projects in Argentina, The Democratic Republic of Congo and China, Zijin is looking to further expand its exposure to the important battery metal. (NASDAQ)

• 🇦🇺 Australian junior miner Minerals 260 (ASX: MI6) announced that it will purchase Zijin Mining’s Bullabulling Gold Project in Western Australia for a cash consideration of A$156.5m plus A$10.0m of Minerals 260 shares. This represents a purchase price of A$74/oz at a 2.3m oz estimated reserve. (Minerals 260)

• 🇨🇦 B2Gold Corp. (TSX: BTO) reported a year on year decrease in gold production and revenue for Q4. The company’s total production for 2024 was 804,778 ounces which was on the lower end of the 800,000 to 870,000 guidance. B2Gold also announced it would be cutting its quarterly cash dividend in half, from $0.04 cents to $0.02 cents. With a number of projects in development, the cut will help the company fund its “growth” phase. The company’s issued production guidance for 2025 is 970,000-1,075,000 ounces. (GlobeNewswire)

• 🇨🇦 🇺🇸 Congratulations to Arizona Sonoran (TSX: ASCU) which secured a private placement investment from Hudbay Minerals (TSX: HBM) for CAD$19,911,467. Hudbay is paying $1.68 per share, a 15% premium on the 5 day moving average. This will give Hudbay a 9.99% stake in Arizona Sonoran. The stock is up around 9% since the news broke. (Arizona Sonoran)

• 🇸🇪 🇧🇪 Sweden’s Hexagon announced that it will be acquiring Beglium’s Septentrio NV, a leading OEM provider of Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) technologies. It is Hexagon’s second acquisition in as many months. Septentrio has around 150 employees, and is expected to generate revenues of over 50m EUR in 2024. (Hexagon)

• 🇦🇺 🇮🇩 Congratulations to Australian mining contractor Macmahon which was awarded a $463m mining services contract from PT Masmindo Dwi Area, a subsidiary of PT Indika Energy, for the Awak Mas Gold Project in Indonesia. Certainly a nice win for the company. (Macmahon)

• 🇺🇸 United Rentals announced that it will be acquiring H&E Equipment Services, Inc. for a cool $4.8bn or $92 per share. The stock shot up 105.48% on the news as H&E closed at $43.94 the day before. As far as we can tell, the previous high was around $65 per share, so this is quite the premium and roughly 6.9x EBITDA according to the press release. Was this a good deal and more importantly, how did we miss this? (United Rentals)

MINING BITS

• 🇺🇸 BlackRock, the world’s largest asset manager, with $11.5 trillion under management is leaving the Net Zero Asset Managers Initiative, the environmentally focused investor group. The move is seen as a response to pressure from Republican politicians. BlackRock’s statement included, “"However, our memberships in some of these organizations have caused confusion regarding BlackRock’s practices and subjected us to legal inquiries from various public officials.” (Reuters)

• 🇨🇦 Congratulations to Emmanuelle Toussaint who has been appointed President & CEO of the Québec Mining Association. Ms. Toussaint looks like a great hire with a lot of private and public sector experience. If you have operations in Quebec, reach out and wish her congratulations. (CISION)

• 🇺🇸 A round of applause for Alta Resource Technologies which secured $5.1m USD in seed funding from a host of investors as well as a nearly $1m USD government grant. Alta’s technology uses custom-designed proteins that act like microscopic robots to separate high-purity rare earth elements and other critical minerals with unprecedented selectivity and cost-effectiveness while reducing the environmental footprint - sounds like a winner to us! (businesswire)

• 🇺🇸 Champagne must be popping in Houston as XtremeX Mining secured $11m in Series A funding, lead by GoGreen Partners. The company announced its cutting-edge AC-electric automated coiled tubing and electric top-drive diamond core drilling rig. Further, the company will perform a funded field trial with Ivanhoe Electric (NYSE: IE ; TSX: IE) at the Santa Cruz copper project in Arizona. Definitely worth checking them out if you are in drilling or operations. (businesswire)

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