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#96 Digging for Dollars #24 Raising $100M, Execution is Everything

CEO.CA Apr 17, 2026 44:30

Summary

Amex Exploration's Perron feasibility study shows how grade and low capex create value: $1.13B after-tax NPV at $3,500 gold and about a half-year payback.

AISC (all-in sustaining cost — what an ounce really costs to produce) near $910 and third-party toll milling keep Perron buildable without heavy upfront infrastructure.

Tectonic Metals founder Tony Reda explains raising roughly $100M after one drill year at the Flat project, a camp-scale Alaska gold play beside 40M-ounce Donlin.

Dig This Deal pitches: Kootenay Silver offers 400M silver ounces ahead of its first PEA (preliminary economic assessment); copper picks highlight jurisdiction risk.

Takeaways for any junior: net asset value (NAV) to capex ratios gauge financeability, strip ratios rival grade, and buildable projects make the best takeover candidates.

Key points on G Mining Ventures

  • The hosts discuss G Mining's takeover of G2 Goldfields, saying the premium paid reflected how well the two projects fit together.
  • They praise G Mining for paying with its own shares — even if some viewed the stock as overvalued — calling a strong currency the right time to use paper as consideration.

Key points on Pan American Silver

  • Pan American owns 19.9% of Galleon Gold and provides a $40 million convertible line of credit, which the pitch calls both the rub and the appeal of the deal.
  • Its Timmins mill next door to Galleon's property has spare capacity (about 5,500 tonnes per day, running near 4,000 tonnes per day per the pitch), positioning it to take Galleon's bulk sample and ore as mill feed.

Key points on Borealis Mining Company Ltd

  • The hosts spotlight the Sandman PEA's NAV-to-capex ratio — about $60 million of capex against a roughly $700 million NAV at $4,000 gold — as the kind of durable project math they like.
  • Borealis carries a market cap around $180 million with about $30 million in cash while Kelly pushes ahead with engineering work at Sandman.
  • They argue the sub-1 g/t grade in Nevada still works because of a low strip ratio, saying a 1:1 strip with okay grade often beats a 5:1 strip with good grade in an open pit.
  • The hosts note the project's high IRR and say they look forward to following the coming drill program.

Key points on Denarius Metals

  • The hosts note Denarius is trying to buy Emerita Resources amid the week's controversy, expecting ripples from the drama to keep spreading through the junior space.

Key points on Discovery Silver Corp

  • The Galleon Gold pitch places Discovery Silver's Porcupine operation directly beside Galleon's Timmins land package, in a neighborhood of mills with spare capacity.

Key points on Eldorado Gold

  • The hosts cite Eldorado buying a project at a huge multiple because it was about to enter production, as evidence that junior projects that can be built are the ones that get bought.

Key points on Amex Exploration

  • The hosts call Amex's newly released Perron feasibility study the news of the week: an after-tax NPV of $1.13 billion at $3,500 gold (5% discount rate), rising to about $1.7 billion at $4,700 gold, with a 150% IRR.
  • Per the figures they cite, roughly $194-200 million of capex builds a mine producing about 147,000-150,000 ounces a year over five years at a $910 all-in sustaining cost, with payback in about five to six months.
  • They highlight a NAV-to-capex ratio around 8x at spot (about 5x at $3,500 gold) and a toll milling agreement as making the project financeable — likely with debt — while avoiding costly upfront infrastructure.
  • The main negative they see is scale: a five-year mine life with about a million ounces left over, leaving open whether Amex builds itself into a mid-tier on roughly $500 million of annual cash flow or gets bought.
  • The hosts say they own Amex shares and are hanging on, noting grades nearly twice other projects' and a market cap they put near $700 million against the study's NPV.

Key points on Emerita Resources

  • Emerita is accused of wrongdoing around its spin-out of Lithium Ionic, and the hosts say it is unclear how any investigation would affect the company's assets in Spain.
  • Denarius Metals is trying to buy Emerita in the middle of the controversy.
  • The hosts note Emerita is one of the most followed companies on CEO.ca, and that a retail base that large brings volatility; they debate whether the sell-off is a contrarian entry but say they hold no position.
  • They expect ripples across the junior space — overlapping boards and deals — with possible opportunity when names sell off too fast.

Key points on New Found Gold

  • The hosts say New Found Gold is the first name that comes to mind when asking what Amex's buildable, high-grade feasibility means for other Canadian juniors.

Key points on Novagold Resources

  • The guest identifies Novagold as co-owner, alongside John Paulson, of the Donlin deposit in Alaska sitting just under 40 million ounces.

Key points on Radisson Mining

  • The hosts name Radisson among stories that could follow the playbook Amex's feasibility demonstrates — mining just the high grade in Canada.
  • They note Radisson operates in the Abitibi, can use area infrastructure and toll milling agreements to mitigate initial capex, and fits the NAV-to-capex filter they emphasize.

Key points on Kootenay Silver Inc

  • Guest Tony Rita pitches Kootenay as a Mexico silver company with a market cap around $159 million, four assets, three with resource estimates, totaling over 400 million ounces of silver — a sum he admits is not 43-101 compliant.
  • The company holds over $25 million in cash and will publish a maiden PEA, which he expects will reframe the La Sagara project and act as a share price catalyst.
  • Kootenay plans about 40,000 metres of drilling in 2026, expanding known high-grade zones and testing never-drilled targets for discovery potential.
  • The judges dig or re-dig the story, arguing the stock was beaten down with Mexico broadly even though Kootenay sits in a safer part of the country.

Key points on Snowline Gold Corp

  • The guest says Tectonic's Flat project is regularly called the next Snowline, with both belonging to the reduced intrusion-related gold system family whose granddaddy is the Fort Knox mine.
  • Based on his reading of public data, Snowline's system is not heap-leachable, a differentiator he claims for Tectonic's heap-leachable project.
  • He notes these systems hold a sea of low grade (0.2-0.3 g/t), Snowline included — material that was uneconomic at $2,000 gold but can work as a heap leach near $4,000 gold.

Key points on Tectonic Metals Inc

  • Guest CEO Tony Rita says the Flat gold project sits next to Donlin — just under 40 million ounces and among the largest undeveloped gold deposits in the world — in Alaska's third-richest placer mining jurisdiction with 1.4 million ounces of recorded placer production.
  • He reports a 100% drill success rate: all 191 holes at the Chicken Mountain target hit gold across 3.3 kilometres of drilled strike, about 700 metres wide and drilled to 400 metres depth, with the system still unconstrained.
  • The company has raised about $100 million after its first year of drilling; he calls a multi-million-ounce resource within reach, points to Black Creek's 4.5 g/t over 40-plus metres open in every direction, and says third-party analysts have modeled an initial gold resource estimate.
  • He describes Flat as a heap-leachable reduced intrusion-related system kin to the Fort Knox mine (close to 10 million ounces produced), with an Alaska native corporation — the state's largest private landowner — as its second-largest shareholder under five mineral agreements.
  • Drilling with five rigs is targeted to start around May 1, 2026; he warns openly of plot twists, from metallurgy to a sea of 0.2-0.3 g/t low grade, with the job being to find the high grade.

Robert Friedland's takeaways

  • Top takeaway The guest says the last operator on Tectonic's Flat ground was Fairbanks Gold, a company started and financed by Robert Friedland, which signed the native corporation agreement in 1985, made the first discovery, and worked the property from 1985 to 1989.
  • He notes Fairbanks Gold also advanced Fort Knox toward production before being acquired, and that anything Robert Friedland touches is worth a look.