January 29th, 2025 - The Mine Wire

METALS MARKET

🇯🇵 The Bank of Japan raised interest rates by 25 basis points to 0.50%, the highest level in 17 years. 🇨🇦 The Bank of Canada is expected to make another 25 basis points cut later today. It is currently sitting at 3.25%.

🇺🇸 Meanwhile, in the United States, President Trump took a shot at the Federal Reserve and said he wants interest rates to come down. Trump said, "I think I know interest rates much better than they do, and I think I know it certainly much better than the one who's primarily in charge of making that decision." The Federal Reserve is expected to keep rates steady for the time-being. This should be a “fun” one to watch.

🇨🇳 And finally, in what had to be the biggest news this week, Chinese AI Tech Startup DeepSeek, dropped a free open source competitor to ChatGPT that became the number 1 downloaded app on Apple’s iPhone. So what you say? Well, according to the Chinese, this startup developed its language model for a fraction of the cost of American companies and allegedly, runs on less A.I. chips and energy.

The result - The U.S. stock market had its largest one day drop in history as tech stocks like NVIDIA dropped nearly 17% on the day. Uranium and other energy stocks were collateral damage as investors worried forecasted energy demand to support A.I. may no longer be accurate. Yesterday, things did seem to calm down as analysts had time to look more into DeepSeek and what it may mean moving forward. Definitely one to watch.

^{**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:

• 🇨🇦 The Canadian government announced that Foran Mining (TSX: FOM) has been awarded CAD $41m through the Federal government’s Strategic Innovation Fund (SIF). This will support the company’s $263.7m project to adopt and integrate clean innovative technologies at Foran’s McIlvenna Bay mine in Saskatchewan. Through this SIF contribution, Foran will be able to purchase a battery-electric vehicle fleet, purchase and integrate a ventilation-on-demand and heat recovery system, develop a water recycling system, and integrate a pyrite removal system at its facility. A big salute to Foran Mining! (Canada Government)

• 🇨🇦 Nova Scotia’s Premier suggested that the province should remove their uranium mining ban among other things. Sean Kirby, the executive director of the Mining Association of Nova Scotia, said, "There is huge need globally for uranium and Nova Scotia has potential to provide it. So we should lift the ban and allow exploration for it to start again so we can see whether we're actually able to have economically viable mines." (CBC)

• 🇨🇦 Geoscience BC announced the launch of a digital compilation of Mine Tailings and Waste Rock for British Columbia. The digital compilation includes mineral occurrences, geographic, environmental and infrastructure data to produce a geospatial project containing the location and known characteristics of more than 1,000 tailings and waste rock sites from more than 500 current and legacy mining sites with critical minerals. Certainly a host of companies working on extracting critical minerals from tailings and waste will be interested in this data set. Maybe a good exercise for other jurisdictions to follow. (Geoscience BC)

• 🇦🇺 The Western Australian Government has decided to double its Exploration Incentive Scheme (EIS) to AUS $18m. The move was quite obviously welcomed by the Association of Mining & Exploration Companies (AMEC). The next round of applications for funding open February 3rd, 2025. (Government of Western Australia)

• 🇬🇧 The National Wealth Fund announced a £28.6m direct equity investment into Cornish Metals Inc. This will allow the company to reopen the South Crofty tin mine in Cornwall. The company is in the process of raising a total of £56m to help reopen the 400 year old mine that closed in 1998. (BBC)

• 🇮🇩 There have been a lot of reports about Indonesia taking steps to curtail Nickel quotas in order to help the price of Nickel rebound. Not even a week ago, Reuters reported that the government would cut the quota from 240m metric tons in 2024 to 200m in 2025. Well just a day later, it was reported by Reuters that the country’s nickel miner association told a parliamentary hearing that the government approved 298.5m wet metric tons for 2025 compared to 271.89m wet metric tons in 2024. I guess someone in the government didn’t get the memo on oversupply and its impact on prices. (Reuters) 

• 🇨🇩 The Rwanda backed M23 rebels captured Goma, the largest city in eastern Congo, with a population of around 2m people. The city sits on the border with Rwanda. Despite a contingent of Uruguayan U.N. Peacekeepers in the city, the government forces have not been able to maintain control over the city. The U.N. and others have condemned the attacks and asked Rwanda to pull its support of the rebels. Hopefully this one is resolved soon and doesn’t turn into a broader conflict. (AP News)

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MINING MATTERS FROM AROUND THE WORLD 🌎

• 🇨🇦 Newmont Corp. (NYSE: NEM, TSX: NGT, ASX: NEM) announced that it has agreed to sell its Porcupine operation in Ontario, Canada to Discovery Silver Corp. (TSX: DSV) for up to $425m in total consideration. The miner has been on a tear to offload non-core assets and confirmed it will deliver up to $4.3bn in total proceeds from non-core asset divestitures and investments. Franco-Nevada Corp. (TSX: FNV) is financially backing the move with a number of terms and conditions. (Newmont) & (Franco Nevada)

• 🇨🇦 Another global mining giant is also considering the sale of one of its Canadian operations. Vale Base Metals has launched a strategic review to explore and evaluate a range of alternatives, including the potential sale, of its mining and exploration assets in Thompson, Manitoba, the Canadian-based subsidiary of Vale SA. As the miner looks to invest in the Carajas region of Brazil, CEO Shaun Usmar said, "This process is aimed at seeing if a new owner may be better suited to invest the capital and resources needed to unlock the vast mineral potential of the Manitoba assets." (Cision)

• 🇦🇺 FMG Pilbara Pty Ltd (FMG), a subsidiary of Fortescue Ltd (ASX:FMG), has offered $254m for Red Hawk Mining (ASX: RHK) which has an iron ore project in Western Australia. The increased offer price of $1.20 per share (if FMG gets 75%+ interest in Red Hawk shares), is a 46% premium over the last closing price of $0.82 per share. Not surprisingly, the stock surged to $1.20 per share on the news. (Red Hawk Mining)

• 🇰🇿 Cameco Corp. (TSX: CCO) put out a statement that they were informed by their partner, National Atomic Company Kazatomprom JSC and Joint Venture Inkai LLP that the Inkai operation has resumed production. Cameco and Kazatomprom are now working with JV Inkai to determine the impact of the production suspension on the operation’s 2025 production plans. While the stoppage was concerning news, it is certainly positive that this has been resolved and relatively quickly it seems. (Cameco)

• 🇲🇱 B2Gold Corp. (TSX: BTO) let it be known that it was earmarking $10m for further exploration activities in Mali. Clive Johnson, CEO of B2Gold, said, "From a B2Gold perspective, we have seen a reduction in risk since the signing of our settlement agreement." Certainly given what Endeavour Mining & Barrick Gold Corp. have gone through, some may question the move. However, it could also be the contrarian play especially if others pull back from investing in the African nation. (Reuters)

• 🇸🇪 Global equipment giant Sandvik, reported Q4 earnings. The Swedish company had total revenues of SEK $32.151bn (USD $2.871bn) which increased by 1% compared to last year. Stefan Widing, President & CEO, said in a statement, “Strong momentum was noted in the aftermarket business with double-digit growth, and while equipment orders were stable year on year, our equipment divisions saw a more favorable demand picture during the quarter.” (Sandvik)

MINING BITS

• 🇦🇺 🇺🇸 Congratulations to Earth AI which raised $20m in a Series B financing round. Earth AI's model is focused on identifying mineral deposits using AI, validating them through drilling and then selling the multi-billion-dollar mining rights to large cap mining companies. (PR Newswire)

• 🇨🇦 A high five for Toronto-based Cyclic Materials which received $2m investment from InMotion Ventures, the investment arm of Jaguar Land Rover. Cyclic Materials is an advanced recycling company building a circular supply chain for Rare Earth Elements and other critical materials. Certainly always positive news to get investment from well-known global brands. (Cyclic Materials)

• 🇦🇺 BHP is investigating a potential corruption scandal across its coal operations in Queensland, Australia. Apparently, contractors were hired for it’s Saraji mine where the work may or may not have existed or may have been greatly exaggerated. A whistleblower told The Australian newspaper, that tens of millions of dollars are involved. While we don’t know the specifics as of yet, it is a good reminder for all companies to stay vigilant on contracting and expenditures and to have mechanisms in place for whistleblowers to come forward. (Stockhead) 

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