Arc Minerals signs exclusive agreement with Anglo American
Arc Minerals Chief Executive Officer and CEO Nick von Schirnding announced that copper explorer Arc Minerals, who carried out extensive exploration drilling in Zambia in its study of the near-term copper opportunities, has signed an exclusive agreement with Anglo American.
Arc Minerals, listed on UK Aim, hold former Anglo-American copper deposits in northwestern Zambia that remain largely unexplored, and Von Schirnding is himself a former Anglo-American plc and managing director of De Beers.
“Of course we cannot or do not want to have further discussions with any other group due to the exclusivity with Anglo, but I can say that we have had further follow-up approaches from two main groups of miners that we cannot currently develop further. We’ll have to see what Anglo will do at the beginning of next year, but we are in a very good place, we are in a very good place, with great interest, ”said Von Schirnding to Junior Indaba last week, chaired by Bernard Swanepoel.
“We have drilled a lot with phenomenal results,” said Van Schirnding. More than 17,000 million holes priced at $ 3.5 million have identified 14 copper targets and Arc’s market cap has increased from around £ 2 million three years ago to nearly $ 50 million today
“We really do believe we’re sitting here on very valuable exploration assets, and that says everything in terms of our valuation today,” said Von Schirnding, whose father, Kurt von Schirnding, was South Africa’s former Ambassador to the United Nations.
“Our game plan is to exploit as many of these targets that we’ve identified to make it as attractive to a potential suitor. Now that suitor could be a major like obviously we’ve just signed up with Anglo American; it could be a mid-cap; or it could be any other potential funder, including private equity, who have also reached out to us.
“We’re not here to simply keep drilling for the sake of drilling, as I think many junior companies do without really an end game in sight. We’re equally not here as a lifestyle company. We know exploration is a very tough game. You’ve seen the lack of really any major success with the majors over the last 25 to 30 years and that, I think, in many respects is because they are not focused enough and they don’t incentivise enough, and I’m a huge believer in incentivisation. So, we incentivise our people based on success,” Von Schirnding emphasised.
“We’re really going for ideally some sort of commercial relationship with a much larger company that can drill this out as it should be because, truth be told, on any of these 14 targets, we really should be spending $4-million to $5-million per target. It is what I call the butterfly approach; we identify, on an opportunistic basis, as many key targets for a partner to come and develop them, either exclusively or jointly with us,” he added.
Arc has two major licences with 66% interest in Zamsort and a 72.5% interest in Zaco, which collectively cover 872 km2, which are close to First Quantum’s Sentinel and Kansanshi, and Barrick’s Lumwana mines.
The licenses were previously explored by Equinox Minerals and Anglo American Prospecting Services by way of the Zambezi Joint Venture through Anglo’s affiliate Zamanglo Prospecting during the late 1990s as part of the Kabompo project.
source: zambian mining magazine
