Brian Dalton

Brian Dalton is the co-founder, President, and CEO of Altius Minerals Corporation (TSX: ALS), a St. John's, Newfoundland-based company that owns royalties — contractual shares of a mine's production or revenue that are collected without bearing operating costs — on producing mines and energy projects. He is known for building Altius from a mineral exploration company valued at under $1 million at its 1997 founding into a diversified royalty company with thirteen producing mine royalties and annual revenues the company reports above $65 million. For resource investors, he is one of the longest-tenured chief executives in the mining royalty sector, nearly three decades into running the company he started.

Dalton co-founded Altius in St. John's with St. John's lawyer John A. Baker in June 1997. The company began as a prospecting and project-generation venture in Labrador and became a royalty business through a series of notable deals: a significant equity stake in Labrador Iron Ore Royalty Corporation, which holds a 7% gross overriding royalty on the Iron Ore Company of Canada's Labrador operations; potash mine royalties in Saskatchewan; a copper royalty on Lundin Mining's Chapada mine in Brazil; and a gross metal royalty on New Century Resources' restarted Century zinc mine in Queensland, Australia. The company reports a 36% compound annual revenue growth rate since 2013. In March 2026 it completed its roughly C$520 million acquisition of Lithium Royalty Corp., adding 37 lithium royalties, most of them tied to spodumene (the hard-rock ore mined for lithium) and located in Canada, Australia, and South America.

Dalton's method runs through Altius's project generation business: company geologists originate early-stage mineral projects, then sell or vendor them to partners in exchange for cash, equity, and retained royalties. Royalty income funds the next round of generation — a self-sustaining loop the company describes as converting mineral lands into equities and future royalties. The royalty model gives shareholders exposure to commodity prices and mine expansions without exposure to operating cost overruns, and the portfolio is deliberately diversified across iron ore, potash, base metals, and now battery materials, alongside 38 renewable energy royalty interests.

Today Dalton's focus is energy transition materials and per-share growth through acquisitions — the Lithium Royalty deal and the renewable royalties are the clearest signals of that direction, and Altius reported C$30.0 million in attributable royalty revenue for the second quarter of 2026. Investors who follow him get a working education in how royalty companies are built and valued: deal structure, royalty types, and funding growth from cash flow rather than repeated share issuance.