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McEwen Spins Out Argentinian Copper Project, Announces Financing

Written by Nicholas LePan | Jul 9, 2021 3:13:00 PM

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McEwen Spins Out Argentinian Copper Project, Announces Financing

McEwen Mining (NYSE, TSX: MUX) announced plans to spin out two assets into a new company, McEwen Copper, and plans to raise $80 million through a private placement and seek a public listing of the company. The newly formed company would hold the Los Azules copper project in San Juan, Argentina, and the Elder Creek exploration property in Nevada.

Los Azules is an advanced large-scale porphyry copper exploration project located in the Andean Cordillera copper belt, about 90 kilometers north of Glencore’s El Pachón project near the border with Chile. According to a 2017 Preliminary Economic Assessment (PEA), the copper resource contains 10.2 billion pounds in the Indicated category and 19.3 billion pounds in the Inferred category.

The PEA used assumptions of $3.00 per pound of copper, $1,300 per ounce of gold, and $17 per ounce of silver, from which the Los Azules project could generate a $2.2 billion After-Tax Net Present Value (NPV) (discounted at 8%) and 20.1% After-Tax Internal Rate of Return (IRR).

The Elder Creek property is an early-stage copper-gold porphyry exploration project located in northern Nevada, approximately 9 kilometers from SSR Mining’s Marigold mine complex.

Upon creation of the new company, a private placement was arranged for up to eight million common shares of McEwen Copper priced at $10.00 each. McEwen Copper currently has 17.5 million common shares outstanding.

McEwen has committed to a lead order to purchase 50% of the offering. His investment corporation, Evanachan Ltd., would buy four million shares and is ready to close this financing as soon as possible.

According to reporting from the Northern Miner, McEwen says management is aware that developing the project themselves could create massive dilution of shareholders, despite there not being many large copper deposits in the hands of a junior company.

There 1256 technical reports for copper projects on Prospector Portal.

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Australian Coal Projects Must Consider Climate Costs, Court Ruling

Australia’s Federal Court ruled in a case that Australia’s Minister for the Environment to consider the risks carbon dioxide emissions pose to young people when approving new coal mines or expansions to existing ones.

The case, brought by eight students and a nun, Sister Marie Brigid Arthur, focused on Whitehaven Coal’s (ASX: WHC) planned expansion of its Vickery project in New South Wales. The project aims to produce up to 10 million tonnes a year of metallurgical coal, used in steel-making.

While Federal Court Judge Mordecai Bromberg had dismissed the original claim seeking to stop expansion of the coal mine, the July 8 judgment could be a precedent for fossil fuel projects in Australia, the world’s second-largest coal exporter by volume.

Judge Bromberg said that the minister could foresee the possibility of future damage caused to the children by the increase in carbon dioxide emissions from Whitehaven's expansion and therefore must recognize a duty of care to the children when approving it.

The New South Wales state regulator approved the expansion in August; Whitehaven plans to increase coal extraction by nearly 25%, but will hold off on making any final investment decision this year.

The federal court’s ruling in Australia came in the wake of a report that showed the emissions from coal mined down under, but exported and burned abroad, were almost double the nation’s domestic greenhouse gas footprint in 2020.

Ava Princi, 17, one of the students that brought the suit said in an article by Reuters:

"We understand it is the first time a court of law, anywhere in the world, has ordered a government to specifically protect young people from the catastrophic harms of climate change."

There are 98 coal projects with a technical reports on Prospector Portal.

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