Radisson Mining (TSXV:RDS) - Agnico Eagle C$57 Funding Backs O'Brien as Drilling Continues

Matthew Manson (0:00)

My name is Matthew Manson. I'm the president and CEO of Radisson Mining Resources. We are exploring and developing the O'Brien Gold Project in the Abitibi of Quebec.

Crux Investor (0:10)

Matt, good to have you here.

Matthew Manson (0:11)

Thanks for having me.

Crux Investor (0:12)

You've been since when you just got into this conference.

What do you expect the takeaway to be from this? What's it gonna do for you?

Matthew Manson (0:21)

Well, full agenda, as usual. We're going heavily now all the way through to Friday lunchtime, and then we're back at it again at the Denver Gold Show in Colorado Springs next week. A bunch more meetings there.

You know, we're generating a lot of news. So we're generating a lot of exploration news, a lot of drill results, projects obviously getting bigger. And we've just recently, literally a few weeks ago now, September 2nd, first we closed the deal, a large investment from Agnico Eagle, $57 million Canadian.

Crux Investor (0:50)

$57 million, 10%?

Matthew Manson (0:51)

10%, more or less. And that's, of course, Agnico is not just one of the world's biggest coal mining companies, they are the owners of the project, the mine, LaRonde, their flagship, it's a mothership, you know, mine, that's immediately adjacent to our project, 3km away. So a lot of validation for the project and for everything we're trying to achieve at home.

Crux Investor (1:16)

Well, let's talk about, I think that should probably be the focus, because we now got 2.3Moz, you're drilling, you're finding more ounces, but now it's going to be about the type of answers, the location of those answers, in the context of a strategic partner like Agnico coming in. I don't expect you to speak for them, but what was the nature of the call? Who approached who and how did you agree some kind of the formula for what they would come in for?

Matthew Manson (1:45)

Well, I think we've been saying for some time now, certainly for the last two years since I've got involved myself personally as a CEO is that the best way to develop Radisson and the O'Brien project is in the context of the existing mining infrastructure that's all around us. There's multiple mines and multiple mills and tailings facilities, and there's two projects immediately adjacent to us. There's one over the back fence, literally that's LaRonde with Agnico Eagle. So we have been exploring paths and avenues consistent with that strategy.

The time was right for us and for Agnico for that investment to happen. I think how you should see that investment is it's at Agnico taking a 14.9% ownership because there's a 10.5% ownership of common shares through the $57 million investment. And then there's also a half-warned there, which Agnico very much see as facilitating getting out to about 15%. So essentially we've sold 10% of the company essentially for one price, another 5% for another price, you know, future consideration. So, yeah, so look, it's a natural way forward for us. The use of proceeds of the investment is to go underground. So all of our drilling right now is from surface. That's going to continue, fully funded. It was $100 million in the bank at the end of August.

So fully funded, $140,000 meter, eight-rig surface drill program to grow the resource. But at the same time now, we're funded with this investment to put a ramp in, an exploration ramp, which is going to answer some important questions about the ore body, continuity, mineralization, growing conditions. But it's also going to establish a development timeline for the project, which is what we said in the press release. Because once the underground access is in, you're a long way down the path of achieving the mining infrastructure you need to develop the project.

So how this goes from here on in, it's a step-by-step process. The investment is being made to support the ramp, get that in, get to grips with the ore body underground. And we're not really calling this a bulk sample program. We're being quite specific not to call it a bulk sample. It's an underground exploration program because we're not doing it, we don't really feel we need a big bulk sample, but we need to understand the ore body. And so we're going to be doing ore drives through the ore body, exploring it that way, understanding it technically, setting up underground drill platforms, getting to grips with our drilling from underground as well, a bunch of different things. But that's what the investment is supporting. And at the same time, very importantly, yeah, the drilling is continuing from surface. And that's all step out resource growth type drilling, which is paying off handsomely so far.