Kuya Silver: high-grade silver cores with lower-grade halos emerge at Umm Hadid JV in Saudi Arabia

Kuya Silver (KUYA) just released its second batch of drill results from the Umm Hadid project in Saudi Arabia, and the standout detail isn't only the headline silver grades. According to CEO David Stein, the company is now seeing a halo of lower-grade mineralization wrapping around the high-grade vein cores at Target 1, a pattern worth watching as drilling moves toward a maiden resource estimate.

## The headline numbers

Two holes are doing the talking in the latest release:

- Hole 4 cut 3,779 g/t silver plus over 6 g/t gold across 0.3 m, sitting inside a broader 26 m intercept averaging roughly 78 g/t silver. - Hole 6 returned over 3,600 g/t silver and almost 2 g/t gold across 0.3 m, within 9 m grading over 137 g/t silver.

Stein noted in his KE Report interview that the wide intercepts in Hole 4 don't have a confirmed true width yet (the orientation is still being worked out), but the consistency of multiple vein systems returning high-grade mineralization at Target 1 is what matters at this stage.

## Why the halo may matter more than the core, for now

These vein systems outcrop at surface and the vast majority of drilling to date sits in the upper 50 m. That shallow setting opens up two very different development paths, and Stein laid them out plainly:

- If the lower-grade halos prove consistent enough, the deposit could be framed as an open-pit target still carried by the higher-grade cores. - If the halos are patchy, the focus shifts to the high-grade cores and an underground mining approach, similar to how Kuya runs Bethania.

The geology will decide which direction the project takes over the next six months, but the takeaway for investors is that Kuya now has optionality on the development model, not just on the resource size.

## Scale of the system

The vein swarm at Hadid has been traced at roughly 4.5 km by 2.5 km on surface, with Targets 1, 2, and 3 all contiguous in the southern portion of the property. Stein said the team may not have enough drilling density to include every vein in the first resource estimate, and the plan is to focus on a subset, then expand outward in future years.

The current 2026 program totals about 10,000 m, with another several thousand meters still to drill over the next couple of months. Kuya expects to have enough data at the end of the program to begin calculating a maiden resource estimate.

## The JV mechanics

Umm Hadid is a joint venture, with Sumo Holding as the senior partner providing most of the capital. Kuya currently holds a 5% carried interest, with the right to lift that to 45% by April of next year by reimbursing Sumo dollar-for-dollar for the 40% gap.

Stein illustrated the math on the call: if the project has spent $5 million by then, Kuya would need to put in $2 million to move from 5% to 45%. The project spent roughly $1.8 million through the end of last year on 5,000 m of drilling plus other work, and Stein estimated all-in drill costs in Saudi Arabia at roughly $200 to $300 per metre, in line with Peru.

## Bethania carries the near-term news flow

The Saudi drilling is the long story. The near-term news flow for Kuya is Bethania, the producing silver mine in Peru. Stein said investors should expect five or six updates before year-end, including:

- A Q3 production update in October once the quarter closes - Closing of the Camilla plant transaction - At least a couple of drill result releases

That cadence lines up with Kuya's transition into Phase 1 production growth at Bethania, which Stein described on the call as "very exciting."

## Investor takeaways

- The halo-and-core combination at Target 1 gives Kuya optionality between an open-pit and underground development model before the maiden resource is even published. - The 5%-to-45% JV back-in right is unusually cheap for a junior, with a dollar-for-dollar reimbursement structure that keeps dilution low if the project keeps delivering. - Bethania's five-to-six updates before year-end give investors a steady near-term catalyst pipeline separate from the Saudi exploration story.