Republic of Mining

Major gold heist at Pearson, movie plot turns reality in GTA – by Brian Lilley (Toronto Sun – April 20, 2023)

April 20, 2023

At this point, investigators don’t know who stole the gold

It’s the kind of stuff movies are made of — a robbery from a supposedly secure facility, a huge amount of gold now missing and a mystery about who is behind it. Except this isn’t the script of a movie, it’s something that happened at Canada’s biggest airport this week.

Peel Regional Police have enlisted the help of the RCMP following a massive gold heist at Pearson airport. Earlier this week, someone made off with 3,600 pounds of gold being moved through the airport. Pearson is often used to move gold mined in Ontario to customers around the world.

Timmins’ newest gold mine started operations Easter Monday – by Nicole Stoffman (Timmins Daily Press – April 18, 2023)

April 20, 2023

https://www.timminspress.com/

Gowest seeking local diamond drillers for exploration planned for later this spring

Gowest Gold’s Bradshaw Mine, 42 kilometres north of Timmins, began operations on April 10. The company’s president Dan Gagnon shared the news at a luncheon hosted by the Timmins Chamber at the Porcupine Dante Club on Tuesday.

“We are the new mine in Timmins,” said Gagnon, adding that the mine will produce 200 tonnes of gold ore a day (from which gold is extracted) this year at 5.6 grams of gold per tonne of ore, and ramp up to 1,300 tonnes a day by its third year.

Australian junior miner grows its lithium bank in northwestern Ontario – by Staff (Northern Ontario Business – April 19, 2023)

April 20, 2023

https://www.northernontariobusiness.com/

Green Technology Metals boasts two lithium deposits as Sioux Lookout-area project shows growth potential

Green Technology Metals, an Australian exploration upstart, is boosting its storehouse of lithium resources in northwestern Ontario. The company posted a first-time resource estimate for its Root Project, situated northeast of Sioux Lookout, and one of their two leading properties.

The maiden estimate for Root is 4.5 million tonnes at 1.01 per cent lithium oxide, along with 110 parts per million tantalum pentoxide, all in the inferred category. It stems from an almost 15,000-metre drilling program that the company kicked off on the property last August.

No one left behind on the road to net zero – by Terence Corcoran (Financial Post – April 19, 2023)

April 20, 2023

https://financialpost.com/

Except, maybe, coal and China and downtown condo owners

As part of the global policy movement toward net-zero carbon emissions by 2050, as required under the Paris Agreement signed in 2015, Canada’s target is to reduce and/or offset all greenhouse gas emissions through various methods, including “tree planting or employing technologies that can capture carbon before it is released into the air.” China, the world’s largest carbon emitter, is aiming for net zero by 2060.

How’s the global plan going so far? We turn to last weekend’s meeting of G7 ministers of climate, energy and the environment in Sapporo, Japan, which ended with a 20,000-word statement that, if nothing else, serves as an important demonstration of the high level of linguistic advocacy that propels net zero forward.

Mining Lithium in Abandoned Oil Fields for Tomorrow’s EVs – by Jacob Lorinc and Robert Tuttle (Bloomberg News – April 20, 2023)

April 20, 2023

https://www.bnnbloomberg.ca/

(Bloomberg) — Chris Doornbos pulled up to Alberta’s foundational oil field in a baby-blue Tesla Model Y, a not-so-subtle nod to a new world order. It was a crisp January afternoon in Canada’s top-polluting province and a biting -5C (23F), and the 40-year-old mining executive squinted at a patch of dirt that midcentury prospectors had once scoured for oil. It doesn’t look like much now, he admitted, but what counts is the lithium beneath the soil.

The Leduc oil field was discovered in the 1940s, when a group of Imperial Oil Ltd. workers stumbled upon a well so profuse with petroleum that, on first drill, it burped a gaseous fireball almost 15 meters (49 feet) into the air.

The View from England: Famous gems being both flaunted and hidden – by Chris Hinde (Northern Miner – April 20, 2023)

April 20, 2023

https://www.northernminer.com/

By now you should have received your invitation to the coronation of Charles III and his wife, Camilla, as king and queen of the United Kingdom and other Commonwealth realms. If you are at Westminster Abbey on May 6 (or watching, having mislaid your invitation) you will see a sparkling parade, but not the Koh-i-noor diamond.

One of the world’s most famous gems, the 106 carat Koh-i-noor (Persian for ‘Mountain of Light’) will not be used by Camilla. Instead, Queen Mary’s crown will be modified using diamonds from Queen Elizabeth II’s personal collection, including three of the stones cut from the largest gem-quality diamond ever found (South Africa’s 3,106 carat Cullinan).

OPINION: If Teck Resources is sold to Glencore, Canada’s loss will go beyond mining – by Jen Hansen (Globe and Mail – April 20, 2023)

April 20, 2023

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/

Jen Hansen is the co-chair of the mining group at Cassels Brock & Blackwell LLP.

Recent headlines have brought a Canadian company, Teck Resources, into the spotlight as the recipient of multiple offers from a foreign buyer, Swiss mining giant Glencore, with likely more to come. If you aren’t involved in the Canadian mining space or perhaps don’t consider yourself supportive of mining, you may want to start paying attention.

The acquisition of an iconic Canadian company by a foreign buyer can have a far-reaching impact. I hope that does not happen, and my desire to see Teck remain a Canadian company goes well beyond a sentimental feeling about ownership and history.

Sources say Volkswagen’s new Ontario plant will dwarf previous automaker investments – by Tonda MacCharles and Robert Benzie (Toronto Star – April 20, 2023)

April 20, 2023

https://www.thestar.com/

Ottawa and Queen’s Park hope the auto giant’s new manufacturing complex will be the lynchpin of a new “green” supply chain in Canada.

OTTAWA – Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Premier Doug Ford hit the road Friday to finally unveil plans for the new multi-billion dollar Volkswagen electric vehicle “gigafactory” in St. Thomas. Ottawa and Queen’s Park hope the German auto giant’s massive new manufacturing complex will be the lynchpin of a new “green” supply chain in Canada.

Volkswagen announced last month it chose southwestern Ontario over U.S states like Oklahoma that were vying for the global automakers’ first battery plant outside Europe. The “gigafactory” will sprawl over hundreds of acres near London, Ont., and produce hundreds of thousands of electric car batteries a year to generate “gigawatts” of battery power for the burgeoning EV market in North America.

Canadian dealmakers expect low-carbon shift will drive mining M&A – by Maiya Keidan (Reuters – April 20,2023)

April 20, 2023

https://www.reuters.com/

TORONTO, April 20 (Reuters) – Canadian advisors to mergers and acquisitions (M&A) expect a shift toward low-carbon technologies and government subsidies for them will spur dealmaking in mining for years to come and some are already gearing up for it.

Critical minerals including copper, nickel, lithium, and cobalt – all abundant in Canada – have a big role in the manufacturing of renewable energy systems, especially electric vehicles (EVs), making those miners prime candidates for dealmaking. “We’re very bullish on the next couple of years in mining,” said Bill Vlaad, a Toronto-based recruiter who specializes in the financial services sector.

Teck takeover bid prompts debate over government’s role in future of Canadian mining – by Holly McKenzie-Sutter (Bloomberg News – April 19, 2023)

April 20, 2023

https://www.bnnbloomberg.ca/

As the battle for the future of Teck Resources heats up, so has debate over whether the mining company should remain in Canadian hands, and whether the federal government should ultimately get involved to keep it there.

Glencore Plc told shareholders in Canada’s largest diversified miner that it would sweeten its US$23 billion takeover bid – but only if they vote to reject Teck’s plans to split its base metals and coal businesses at an upcoming April 26 meeting.

The cost of salt – by Sam Blakely (Canadian Mining Journal – April 18, 2023)

April 20, 2023

https://www.canadianminingjournal.com/

Salt (NaCl), a nutrient vital to all animal life, is an important natural resource especially in southwestern Ontario. Canada is one of the world’s largest salt consumers thanks to its harsh winters, and Ontario provides substantially more of this salt than all other provinces combined. Most Canadian salt is commonly mined via underground room-and-pillar methods and is used to de-ice roadways.

Table salt, chemical raw materials, and other end uses also represent major portions of overall consumption. The later products are most often produced via solution mining, where fresh water is injected via wells into buried salt deposits to recover a salt-saturated brine. Solution mining also yields valuable underground caverns, often used to store hydrocarbons after salt production ends.

Glencore mulls tender offer for Teck but chances of success appear low – by Eric Reguly and Niall McGee (Globe and Mail – April 20, 2023)

April 20, 2023

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/

Glencore PLC is dangling the prospect of a higher takeover offer for Teck Resources Ltd., and possibly even a tender offer, as it urges the company’s class B shareholders to reject the Canadian miner’s proposal to split itself in two when they vote next week.

Glencore of Switzerland earlier this month offered to buy Vancouver-based Teck at a 22-per-cent premium to its market value in a stock-and-cash deal worth roughly US$22.5-billion. The board of Vancouver-based Teck, its management and its controlling class A shareholders have repeatedly rejected Glencore’s advances, saying a takeover would be ruinous to shareholder value.

Train 185: TVO documentary missed some important points – by R.I. Macdonald (Sudbury Star – April 19, 2023)

April 19, 2023

https://www.thesudburystar.com/

R.I. Macdonald is professor Emeritus, University of Manitoba and co-author of The Heart of New Ontario.

‘You will notice that several of the above points relate to the important role played by Indigenous individuals in the development of this part of Northern Ontario’

I watched the TVO documentary on Train 185 last evening and congratulate the production team for an interesting documentary. I offer the following points that would have been useful and interesting to have included.

The photography was excellent. The aerial photography in particular provided a dramatic, unique visual description of the Height of Land region of Northern Ontario. The fact that the two-car train photographed from the air was not the three-car train on the ground level shots was obvious and a bit disconcerting.

OPINION: How the hedge funds could feast on any Teck deal – and possibly influence its outcome – by Eric Reguly (Globe and Mail – April 19, 2023)

April 19, 2023

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/

Shares of Teck Resources are on fire, and that is a sure sign that hedge funds and other arbitrageurs are building stakes in what could be an epic battle for control of the last Canadian diversified mining company of any size. If their stakes are big enough, they could influence – even determine – Teck’s future ownership.

Teck shares have rallied about $10 since the start of April, taking them to $65 and giving the company a heady market value of almost $34-billion. While no hedgie has declared it is playing the Teck game, the steady price increases and trading volumes of as much as seven million shares a day suggest they are.

Billionaire Robert Friedland comes out in defence of Teck – by Cecilia Jamasmie (Mining.com – April 18, 2023)

April 18, 2023

https://www.mining.com/

Billionaire Robert Friedland has become the latest prominent figure in the Canadian mining industry to come out in defence of Teck Resources (TSX: TECK.A, TECK.B) (NYSE: TECK), which is facing a hostile $23.1bn takeover bid from Swiss commodities giant Glencore (LON: GEN).

The mining veteran, who has a stake in Teck through his company Ivanhoe Mines (TSX: IVN), warned late on Monday through a series of tweets that investors should not take lightly the attempted takeover of a Canadian “champion.”