Kootenay Silver's La Seguera PEA moves the company from explorer to developer
CEO James McDonald says the new PEA at La Seguera — USD $763 million after-tax NPV and a 41% IRR at $50 silver — makes Kootenay Silver a developer as well as an explorer, while Columba expansion drilling and a fall gap program set up a catalyst-heavy rest of 2026.
Investor angle
Kootenay Silver enters the second half of 2026 with a PEA-backed project for the first time. The numbers management cites — USD $763 million after-tax NPV and a 41% IRR at a $50 silver price — are PEA-level estimates: early-stage, based on indicated and inferred resources, and sensitive to the silver price assumption. The near-term catalysts are concrete: a roughly 10,000 m fall drill program testing a gap at La Seguera that could add 10 to 20 million ounces the PEA valued at zero, a year-end resource update at Columba from a 60,000 m program, and potential PEA refreshes at both projects. Note that this interview was paid for by the company according to the video description, and every company claim here comes from management and the host — verify against company filings before acting.
Kootenay Silver has crossed a line most junior explorers never reach: it now holds a project with a positive Preliminary Economic Assessment (PEA — an early, approximate study of whether a deposit can support a profitable mine). Speaking on Commodity Culture on June 29, 2026, CEO James McDonald said the study moves the company from pure explorer to developer-explorer, and argued the market has not recognized the change yet.
## The La Seguera PEA
The PEA, released just over a week before the interview, covers La Seguera, one of the company's four Mexican deposits. McDonald said the study used a consensus long-term silver price of $50 per ounce drawn from bank forecasts, and produced an after-tax net present value (NPV — the value of future cash flows discounted to today) of USD $763 million and an internal rate of return (IRR — the project's annualized return) of 41%. He also cited a 14-year mine life that produces more than 6 million ounces of silver per year over the first five years — output he described as huge for a standalone silver producer.
The resource behind the study stands at 60 million ounces in the measured-and-indicated (M&I — the higher-confidence resource categories) category plus 17 million inferred ounces. Location adds context: La Seguera sits about 20 km from a mining district McDonald described as famous, with almost 500 years of production that now reaches depths of 2,000 m — while his deposit sits right at surface, which he presented as room to grow.
## First test: the gap program
The PEA assigns zero silver value to rock inside a gap in the resource shell, and McDonald believes that gap could hold another 10 to 20 million ounces. A roughly 10,000 m drill program starts in the early fall to test it. Success would trigger a quick resource update by year-end and a refreshed PEA — turning rock the study currently values at nothing into paying material.
## Columba: the growth story behind it
Columba, the company's most recent discovery, carries a maiden resource of 54 million ounces at 284 g/t silver, published a year ago in the inferred category across 17 veins. McDonald calls it the kind of deposit that makes money at any silver price — the reason the company concentrated there while silver traded under $30 and kept its other three deposits on the back burner until the current price environment arrived.
The company is almost halfway through a 60,000 m drill program at Columba. The first phase steps out on 100 m centers to define the edges of the known zones; a resource update is expected around the turn of the year, and McDonald said a PEA could follow — meaning the company could hold two positive PEAs by this time next year.
March results from nine holes on the D-vane, the structure holding about 60% of Columba's ounces, included 34 m at roughly 500 g/t silver, 17 m at nearly 650 g/t, and a 98 m interval averaging over 200 g/t (true width about half). McDonald also pointed to the geology: the vein system sits beneath a volcanic cone with barely any erosion, so he argues most of the original mineralization is still in place.
## Ground position in Mexico
On jurisdiction — a live topic after industry permitting scares and cartel violence touching another silver company — McDonald said both active projects sit in quiet, stable areas. Kootenay has operated in Mexico for more than 20 years, holds long-term access and exploitation agreements at Columba and La Seguera, and owns a 1,100-hectare ranch overlying the La Seguera deposit. Its other two deposits, Promontory and La Negra, are not currently being worked.
## The silver backdrop management is counting on
Much of the interview is macro. McDonald expects silver to return to triple digits, with what he called a reasonable chance of that happening before year-end, after a spike above $120 in January and February and a pullback to just under $60. The host cited the Silver Institute on a sixth consecutive year of supply deficits, and McDonald argued new primary supply takes 10 to 20 years to arrive because most silver is a byproduct of other metals. Both speakers also pointed to government interest: a US critical-minerals stockpiling program of roughly $12 billion that includes silver, Russian central bank silver purchases, a Saudi central bank position in the SLV trust, and Chinese export controls.
## What to watch
McDonald named two catalyst clusters for the rest of 2026. At Columba, drill results arrive in batches, followed by a resource update that decides whether the project advances to a PEA. At La Seguera, the fall gap program could produce a resource update by year-end and a PEA refresh. He added that the company is well financed for all of this work.
Disclosure: the video description states that Commodity Culture was compensated by Kootenay Silver for producing this interview, and that host Jesse Day is not a shareholder of the company.
Generated by Pixys from the source video below. Not investment advice.
