The big news out of Callinex Mines TSXV:CNX is its 2023 exploration campaign at its Pine Bay project in Manitoba, some 16km from Flin Flon. The fully-funded campaign will be testing the company’s Rainbow deposit, as well as some follow up work on its Alchemist discovery and Odin target area.
Investor interest is being sparked by the quality of the potential copper deposit here as well as its scale. There is also believed to be high grade zinc as well as gold and silver. Based on the 2022 drill assay results, Callinex is looking at 3.97% copper equivalent including 3.31% copper. This is a potentially very rich deposit indeed.
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These results are enough to sit up and take notice in our view. The new drill program should be able to shed some further light on this.
As CEO Max Porterfield rightly points out, copper deposits of this quality are tough to come by, with most of the top 10 being located in Africa and Russia. From a geopolitical perspective, something like this on the doorstep of US heavy industry starts to look quite exciting.
“The maiden resource is going to be a big catalyst for the company,” Porterfield told us.
Flin Flon: a world leading mining district
The Flin Flon mining district is considered one of the premier districts in the world mining map, with over 130mm tonnes of production and over 30 deposits.
Callinex has completed an upsized CAD 9.4m financing which also saw a number of existing shareholders increasing their share of the action. We are told there is also a new institutional shareholder in the mix, but cannot disclose further details as yet.
The original private placement was quoted at CAD 7m and it has been scaled up due to demand, management said.
Callinex is well positioned to take advantage of the excellent ready made infrastructure on-site. This includes the processing facilities owned by HudBay which has been actively mining in the area and will require additional ore within four years. We also like the fact the company has significant hydroelectric power lines crossing the property and has benefited from provincial government support.
First class geological team
It should also be emphasised that the geological team here is a first class one. Consulting geologist James Pickell was involved in the discovery of the Callinan North, Konuto Lake a 777 ore bodies within Flin Flon. He picked up the PDAC Bill Dennis Prospector of the Year award for hiss role in the discovery of the 777 mine.
Another award-winner on the team is Mike Muzylowski, who has been involved in the discovery of 12 VMS mines in Flin Flon including Trout Lake, which was operational from 1982-2012. He was inducted into the Canadian Mining Hall of Fame in 2011. As Portfield says, he wanted to ensure he had the best geological talent in place to ensure the project lived up to expectations. “I wanted to find the best guys to find and build this mine,” he said.
With copper now increasingly considered a strategic metal, Porterfield has confirmed that he has been lobbying provincial authorities for further support going forward. The big news, however, will be the results from this summer’s drill campaign.
