MinCore Inc. ("MinCore" or the "Company"), is pleased to announce the receipt of
a positive Preliminary Economic Assessment ("PEA") for the development of its
Tameapa copper-molybdenum project in Sinaloa, Mexico (the "Project").
The independent NI 43-101 compliant PEA prepared by AGP Mining Consultants Inc.
of Toronto Ontario ("AGP") confirms the economic potential of the Project with a
life of mine production of 3.6 billion pounds of copper equivalent metal
("CuEq") and envisions a conventional open-pit mine at the Pico Prieto deposit
and an underground sub-level caving mine at the Venado deposit. Capital payback
is estimated at 3.5 years with annual production over the first five years of
215 million pounds of CuEq and averaging 185 million pounds of CuEq produced
annually life of mine ("LOM").
The PEA is based on discounted cash flow analysis of a project designed to
process 100,000 tonnes per day with ore initially from the Pico Prieto deposit
and supplemented from year 12 onwards with mill feed from the molybdenum-rich
Venado deposit. Based on the favourable economics seen in the PEA AGP recommends
that the Tameapa project advance to the next levels of study to support the
necessary level of engineering for a feasibility study.
About MinCore
MinCore is a mineral exploration company based in Toronto, ON whose primary
focus is on the exploration and development of its Tameapa Copper Molybdenum
Project located in the front range of the Sierra Madre mountains in Sinaloa
State, North-Western Mexico.
Results of the PEA
The Financial Base Case discounted cashflows in the PEA are denominated in US$
and were based on the following assumptions:
-- long term commodity prices of $2.75 copper, $16.5 Molybdenum, $1,000/oz
gold and $16/oz silver;
-- 642 million tonnes LOM mill feed;
-- Milling rate of 100,000 t per day (36 million t per year);
-- Mine life 19 years;
-- Initial capital costs of $1,026 million;
-- Capital payback 3.5 years;
-- On site operating costs $6.65/t mill feed (including mining, processing,
G&A);
-- Pre-tax Net Present Value ("NPV") of US$1,031 million at an 8% discount
rate;
-- Internal Rate of Return ("IRR") of 22.9%;
-- 3.6 million pounds of CuEq metal produced over the LOM.
Project Metrics
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Years 1-5 Life of Mine
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CuEq Production 215 m lb 185 m lb
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Strip Ratio 0.38:1 0.52:1
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Copper (M's lb) 163 127
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Molybdenum (M's lb) 6.4 8.0
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Silver (M's oz) 1,405 1,092
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Gold (M's oz) 12.1 9.4
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Average NSR Value ($/t) 16.18 14.11
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Total Op Costs ($/t) (inc all off site
costs) 6.82 7.11
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Margin ($/t) 9.36 7.00
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Annual Revenue (M's $) 554 477
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Annual Net Cashflow(i) (M's $) 271 213
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Copper Costs/lb pre-credits $ 1.43 $ 1.90
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Copper Costs/lb post-credits $ 0.64 $ 0.74
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(i)Net Cashflow = (Revenue - Operating Costs (including all off site costs)
- Sustaining Capital)
Copper is attributable for 70% of life of mine revenue
The Tameapa Project
The Tameapa Project comprises two large copper-molybdenum porphyry/breccia
deposits, Pico Prieto and Venado, about 800 m apart. They are within a belt of
Laramide-aged (53 to 59 ma) intrusive rocks extending from the United States to
west-central Mexico and host numerous world-class porphyry deposits. Several
northwest and northeast trending faults and lineaments cross the Tameapa
property and the deposits. These faults and lineaments likely played a role in
focussing the mineralization within this porphyry belt.
The potential economics set out in the PEA indicate that for the Financial Base
Case, (highlighted below) the Project has a NPV at 8% of $1,031 million with an
IRR of 22.9%. The payback period is 3.5 years with the payback occurring in the
fourth year of production.
PEA Discounted Cash Flow Results (Pre-Tax)
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Engineering Financial Financial Financial
Cost Category Units Base Base Case #1 Case #2
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Metal Prices
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Molybdenum $/lb 15.00 16.50 17.58 15.00
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Copper $/lb 2.50 2.75 3.04 3.25
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Silver $/oz 15.00 16.00 17.80 16.00
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Gold $/oz 950.00 1,000.00 1,061.00 1,100.00
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Revenue (after
smelting,
refining,
roasting,
payables) ($M) 8,201.0 9,058.0 9,964.0 10,0047.0
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Net Present Value
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NPV @ 5% ($M) 1,050 1,559 2,102 2,178
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NPV @ 8% ($M) 642 1,031 1,447 1,515
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NPV @ 10% ($M) 446 775 1,129 1,192
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IRR ($M) 17.8 22.9 28.1 29.4
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Years
(Year
Payback Period paid) 4.3 (Yr 5) 3.5 (Yr 4) 2.9 (Yr 3) 2.7 (Yr 3)
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(i)The mine designs were completed with metal prices of $2.50/lb of copper
and $15.00/lb of molybdenum, but the PEA Financial Base Case used a copper
price of $2.75/lb of copper and $16.50/lb of molybdenum. Two other financial
cases were compared.
The PEA is preliminary in nature as it includes Inferred Mineral Resources that
are presently considered too speculative geologically to have economic
considerations applied to them that would enable them to be categorized as
reserves. There is no certainty that the results shown in the PEA will be
realized. Mineral resources that are not mineral reserves do not have
demonstrated economic viability.
Included in the PEA revenue are gold and silver values. The drill hole database
incorporates historical holes from the previous operators, which did not include
assays for silver and gold. All of MinCore's drilling did include assays for
gold and silver. Consistent gold and silver values were noted in the concentrate
testing and have been incorporated in the revenue stream. Assuming the PEA
Financial Base Case prices, silver revenue accounted for 3.3% of the revenue and
gold accounted for 1.7%. Both metals have been included in the PEA and will be
included in future studies. AGP considered that their inclusion in the PEA was
warranted.
"The completion of a positive PEA for the Tameapa Project is an
important milestone for MinCore," said David Jones, CEO of MinCore.
"The study further confirms both the economic and technical viability
of the Tameapa Project, and provides a strong foundation for moving
the project forward in the near term. This is a copper-molybdenum
project that represents a tremendous opportunity to bring to market a
large, low cost copper project into an anticipated strong world copper
market."
Near Term Exploration and Development Plan
With an economically PEA study complete, MinCore will move towards taking the
project to Feasibility level. MinCore plans to initiate a two-phase drill
program, totalling about 40,000 m, focussed on exploration and in-fill drilling
at Pico Prieto, however also including some exploration drilling to the south
and west of Venado. The PEA puts forth an exploration budget of US$8.3 million
to collect drill data for grade estimation at a confidence level high enough to
support a feasibility level study.
A recent reconnaissance study by MinCore covering the exploration potential of
the entire 66,000 ha property has identified 24 new mineralized exploration
targets outside of the area of the Pico Prieto and Venado deposits. All these
targets remain at early stages of exploration and include various mineralization
types, including copper-molybdenum porphyry, Mo-breccia, polymetallic skarn,
IOCG, and precious and/or base metal veins and breccias.
Gord Zurowski P.Eng., Mike Waldegger, P.Geo., Andy Holloway, P.Eng., Geoffrey
Challiner, CEng., Roland Tosney, P.Eng. and Dave Rennie, P.Eng. are the
Qualified Persons, as defined under National Instrument 43-101, who supervised
and are responsible for the Preliminary Economic Assessment for the Tameapa
Project and have reviewed the content of this release.
All exploration at the Tameapa Project is done under the supervision of
MinCore's Chief Geologist, Sr.Ramon Solis, and Dr.George Cargill Ph.D. P.Eng.,
who fulfills the requirements of a Qualified Person as defined in National
Instrument (NI) 43-101. Dr Cargill has verified the data disclosed in this
update, on the Tameapa Property including sampling, analytical and test data
underlying the information.
Cautionary Note Regarding Forward-Looking Information
Information set forth in this news release may involve forward-looking
statements under applicable securities laws. Forward-looking statements are
statements that relate to future, not past, events. In this context, forward
-looking statements often address expected future business and financial
performance, and often contain words such as "anticipate", "plan", "estimate"
and "expect", statements that an action or event "may", "might", "could",
"should", or "will" be taken or occur, or other similar expressions. All
statements, other than statements of historical fact, included herein including,
without limitation; statements about the timing and amount of future production,
the mineral resource estimate, the results of the PEA, the future exploration on
and the development of the Tameapa Project are forward- looking statements. By
their nature, forward-looking statements involve known and unknown risks,
uncertainties and other factors which may cause our actual results, performance
or achievements, or other future events, to be materially different from any
future results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by such
forward-looking statements. Such factors include, among others, the following
risks: the need for additional financing; the possibility of failure to convert
estimated mineral resources to reserves; future metallurgical test work; changes
in commodity prices; risks arising from operating in Mexico (including political
developments in Mexico, changes to regulations affecting the Company's
activities, surface rights, foreign currency fluctuations and delays in
obtaining or failures to obtain required regulatory approvals); the
uncertainties involved in interpreting exploration results and other geological
data; volatility of and sensitivity to market prices for metals (market or
otherwise); inability or delays in procuring the required capital equipment
and/or operating parts and supplies; equipment failure; unexpected geological
conditions; environmental and safety risks; seismic activity; weather and other
natural phenomena; risks relating to labour and other exploration, development
and operating risks involved in the mineral exploration and development
industry. Forward-looking statements are made based on management's beliefs,
estimates and opinions on the date that statements are made and the company
undertakes no obligation to update forward-looking statements if these beliefs,
estimates and opinions or other circumstances should change, except as required
by applicable securities laws. Investors are cautioned against attributing undue
certainty to forward-looking statements.
APPENDIX A: Preliminary Economic Study Details
Mining
The Pico Prieto open pit has been designed as a series of six pushback's or
phases and will be developed using conventional rotary drilling, blasting and
loading with hydraulic shovels and 218-tonne trucks. The open pit mine was
estimated to have a LOM strip ratio of 0.52:1. A total of 624.4 Mt of Inferred
resource material, with a LOM mill feed grade of 0.22% Cu and 0.013% Mo will be
supplied to the mill from the open pit, while 325.0 Mt of waste will be moved.
Supplementing the mill feed will be a sublevel caving underground operation at
the molybdenum-rich Venado deposit. The operation will supply 14.2 Mt of
Indicated Mineral Resources and 3.5 Mt of Inferred Mineral Resources as feed
material to the mill. Underground mine life is expected to be eight years from
commencement of mining in Year 12 of the overall production schedule. The
nominal production rate selected for the Venado underground is 2.75 Mt/a (7,640
t/d). LOM feed grade for the underground 0.08% Cu and 0.084% Mo.
Metallurgy and Processing
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
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Mineralization Type % Cu to Copper Conc. % Mo to Moly Conc.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
100% Primary 86.8 70.2
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50/50 Primary/Enrichment
Blend 78.2 70.2
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100% Enrichment 69.6 70.2
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No penalty levels of any deleterious elements were measured in any concentrates
produced
In addition significant concentrations of rutile and ilmenite were measured in
the flotation tailings. Opportunity may exist to economically concentrate and
recover these minerals, thereby improving project economics.
Capital Costs
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Sustaining
Pre-production Capital (i)
Total Capital Capital Year 2+
Capital Category ($M) ($M) ($M)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Open Pit Mining 224.1 85.6 138.5
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Underground Mining 108.3 0.0 108.3
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Processing 432.7 428.4 4.3
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Infrastructure 257.6 163.1 94.5
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Environmental 8.5 0.0 8.5
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Indirects 178.7 178.3 0.4
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Contingency 183.3 170.9 12.4
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Total 1,393.2 1,026.3 366.9
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(i)Underground mine to commence production in Year 12
Operating Costs
Mining costs for the open pit are expected to be $1.06/t total material or
$1.66/t of mill feed (includes waste). Mine operating costs for the underground
mine are estimated at $8.65/t. The table below shows a summary of all operating
cost categories on a cost per tonne of mill feed basis over the total tonnage.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
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Cost per DMT
Concentrate
Cost per Tonne ($/t
Cost Category Total ($M) ($/t Mill Feed) Concentrate)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
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Open Pit Mining- mill feed
and waste 1,034.6 1.61 -
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Underground Mining- mill
feed 153.3 0.24 -
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Processing 2,926.4 4.56 -
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G&A 157.9 0.25 -
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Subtotal On-Site Costs 4,272.2 6.66 -
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Concentrate Trucking 82.2 - 16.13
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Port Cost 25.1 - 4.92
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Shipping to Smelter/Roaster 183.7 - 36.04
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Subtotal Off-site Costs 291.0 - 57.09
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Total 4,563.3 - -
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Mineral Resources
Pico Prieto mineral resources was estimated utilizing drill results for 53 core
holes, plus surface channel chip samples in the southeast corner of the deposit.
Assays were composited in 2 metre down-hole intervals. AGP's review determined
that capping of copper grades was not required prior to compositing, however
molybdenum was capped at 0.15% to remove several outlier values.
Wireframe models of all zones and major lithologies were created based on cross
sectional interpretation. The density values assigned to the major lithologies
were based on 654 bulk density measurements of drill core. Inverse Distance
weighted to the third power was selected to interpolate copper and molybdenum
grades of all blocks. Block dimensions were 30 metres by 30 metres by 10 metres.
The table below shows the mineral resources for Pico Prieto, at a range of CuEq
cut-off's.
Pico Prieto Deposit Mineral Resource Statement
------------------------------------------------------------
Cutoff Tonnage Cu Mo CuEq
(% CuEq) (Mt) (%) (%) (%)
------------------------------------------------------------
0.10 991.7 0.18 0.012 0.26
------------------------------------------------------------
0.15 846.0 0.20 0.013 0.28
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0.20 656.0 0.22 0.014 0.31
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0.25 443.3 0.25 0.016 0.35
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0.30 271.3 0.29 0.017 0.39
------------------------------------------------------------
0.35 151.5 0.34 0.018 0.44
------------------------------------------------------------
0.40 86.2 0.39 0.018 0.50
------------------------------------------------------------
0.45 51.7 0.45 0.017 0.55
------------------------------------------------------------
0.50 30.4 0.50 0.017 0.61
------------------------------------------------------------
0.55 18.1 0.56 0.017 0.66
------------------------------------------------------------
Notes: The PEA incorporates Pico Prieto inferred mineral
resources that are considered too speculative geologically
to have economic considerations applied to them, and that
would enable them to be categorized as mineral reserves.
Thus inherent in the PEA is the risk that the value of these
inferred mineral resources may not be realized. Mineral
resources that are not mineral reserves do not have a
demonstrated economic viability.
(i)Copper Equivalent (CuEq) = Cu grade + (Mo Price/Cu
Price), where Cu price = $2.50/lb, Mo price = $15/lb, 100%
metallurgical recoveries assumed.
No assaying was carried out for Au or Ag on historical samples at Pico Prieto.
All of the drilling carried out by MinCore was routinely assayed for Au and Ag.
Venado Deposit Mineral Resource Statement
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Cutoff Tonnage Mo Cu MoEq
Category (% MoEq) (Mt) (%) (%) (%)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Indicated 0.07 18.4 0.096 0.10 0.109
------------------------------------------------------------
0.06 23.5 0.086 0.10 0.099
------------------------------------------------------------
0.05 29.7 0.077 0.10 0.090
------------------------------------------------------------
0.04 37.0 0.068 0.10 0.081
------------------------------------------------------------
0.03 55.1 0.052 0.10 0.066
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Inferred 0.07 5.2 0.077 0.12 0.093
------------------------------------------------------------
0.06 7.5 0.069 0.12 0.084
------------------------------------------------------------
0.05 10.6 0.061 0.11 0.075
------------------------------------------------------------
0.04 13.8 0.055 0.10 0.068
------------------------------------------------------------
0.03 26.5 0.039 0.10 0.052
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Notes: 1. CIM definitions were followed for Mineral Resources. 2. Mineral
Resources are estimated at a base case cutoff grade of 0.05% MoEq.
3. Mineral Resources are estimated using average long-term metal
prices of US$2/lb Cu and US$15/lb Mo. 4. A nominal minimum mining
width of 3 m was used. 5. MoEq was calculated as MoEq = Mo + (Cu x
(Cu_price/Mo_price)).
No assaying was carried out for Au or Ag on historical samples at Venado. All of
the drilling carried out by MinCore was routinely assayed for Au and Ag.
Gord Zurowski P.Eng., Mike Waldegger, P.Geo., Andy Holloway, P.Eng., Geoffrey
Challiner, CEng., Roland Tosney, P.Eng. and Dave Rennie, P.Eng. are the
Qualified Persons, as defined under National Instrument 43-101, who supervised
and are responsible for the Preliminary Economic Assessment for the Tameapa
Project and have reviewed the content of this release.
All exploration at the Tameapa Project is done under the supervision of
MinCore's Chief Geologist, Sr.Ramon Solis, and Dr.George Cargill Ph.D. P.Eng.,
who fulfills the requirements of a Qualified Person as defined in National
Instrument (NI) 43-101. Dr Cargill has verified the data disclosed in this
update, on the Tameapa Property including sampling, analytical and test data
underlying the information.
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