Cartier Resources Unveils C$1 Billion NPV at Cadillac

Trevor Hall (0:17)

Welcome back in to Mining Stock Daily, everybody. Busy couple days here as we try to wrap up the week, heading into Beaver Creek for next week. And it has been a news full week. And so we're going to pick up one of those news items with our friends from Cartier Resources. They do trade on the TSX Venture with ECR and on the OTCQB with ECRFF. This morning, the company published an updated preliminary economic assessment for the Cadillac Project up in the Val d'Or area of the Abitibi.

Now, this replaces the 2023 PEA. And for many of you who have been following the story, we know this is a much different project than it was three years ago. Happy to welcome in CEO, Mr. Philippe Cloutier once again. So Philippe, three years, different project, different economics. Why publish an updated PEA at this time?

Philippe Cloutier (1:15)

That's a very good point. Indeed, when we published the one in 2023, we had a resource of 2.3 million ounces. We were using a price of gold of 1,750 US dollars.

We went full out Cadillac, you know, top, build your own mill right from the start. And so we had a hefty capex for a project which wasn't fully evaluated yet. And we were using the historical metallurgical recoveries of, you know, like 93 percent. And as you know, for most of the former mine life of the Chimo Mine Project, because it is a past producer, they never had a mill on site. So they were using somebody else's mill, and it wasn't really... This is 1997, so it wasn't like calibrated. Fast forward to today, well, 2026 PA has an added 1.1 million ounces. So we're using a base of 3.2 million ounces.

We are using a price of gold in an upward market. Gold is now trading at $4,400 US., but we're using $3,600 US.

And then we're using metallurgical results from a recent study that we did on recent drilling, which is much better recoveries and 95% or 96% recoveries.

And then finally, there are mills along the highway. Notably, Agnico has two or three mills, Gold X, La Ron, Canadian, Malartic.

El Dorado has the Lamoc mill. West Dome has their mill. The Nyan Gold has a mill. And then there's two newcomers. One, it's a junior mining company that bought a smallish mill. And then there's Fresnillo who bought Probe. So, and this time around, we said, listen, it makes a lot of sense from an environmental point of view, from a trying to reduce the upfront capex point of view. So this time around, we came around with a hybrid approach of starting out with a toll milling, you know, getting warmed up. And then building your mill as you're paying yourself back. So it's a much different product. And yet the thing that hasn't changed is there's tremendous upside. You know, we have not included the new discoveries that we made with the recent drilling that we've done. So we already know that the resource can grow. We already know that we have new zones that can contribute to this, to a next study. The contact discovery was like really high-grade multi-ounce veins, although they're thin. And then the hope discovery was a Canadian malartic lookalike. And then finally, one thing to be noted is that the local communities, be it First Nations or the city, they tend to ask more questions if it's an open pit approach. So for this version of the scoping or economic assessment, we've evacuated that. We're saying, look, we're going to go with an environmentally friendly full underground approach. And so there's so much upside if working forward from this. But today's numbers are striking. They're very, very good, as you mentioned.

Trevor Hall (4:53)

Yeah. You did use a $3,600 per ounce base case. That brings the Cadillac up to an after-tax NPV of about $1 billion Canadian, and after-tax IRR of 26.6%.

Obviously, those numbers are greatly improved at current spot prices. So I'll let people go back and dig into that news release to get those numbers. But I'm glad you mentioned the toll milling idea here, here, Philippe, because that really stuck out with me. And I know the PEA, it's preliminary in nature, right? Like this is a snapshot of what a potential mine situation could look like at Cadillac. By no means are we hanging the hat on this being the final idea. But the toll milling, even though it's preliminary, does that require having some sort of understanding if you're toll milling where it's going to be told to? Have you had those conversations with your neighbors and peers?

Philippe Cloutier (5:50)

It generally does. Some companies go as far as signing agreements, MOUs, and I'm not saying that's out of the picture. Anybody that's high level thinking will understand which mills we've actually simulated the toll milling agreement on. And although this is preliminary, I think you're probably right in pointing it out. When you're in mine country, this is only a 30-minute drive from these mills, right? So this PEA is not fluffy. It's being monitored by senior producers, so...