Soaring demand for copper will help drive mergers, BHP CEO says
Demand for copper, a key element in the energy transition, is set to rise by 70% to 100% by 2050, Mike Henry said
Transition Metals (TSX-V: XTM) announced on Monday it hat signed a definitive agreement to acquire fellow project generator, HTX Minerals, a private firm.
According to the press release Transition and HTX are both based in Sudbury, Ontario and hold a combined 30 exploration assets across Canada and into the United States.
These include prospective gold properties in Ontario’s Abitibi Greenstone Belt and in British Colombia; nickel-copper-platinum properties in Northern Ontario and Minnesota; sedimentary-hosted copper in Northern Saskatchewan; and gold and diamond properties in Nunavut.
HTX also owns the Aer-Kidd project, located ~20 km southwest of Sudbury, along the Worthington Offset Dyke, an area with a rich mining history, dating back to the 1800s. Mineralization was first discovered on the Aer-Kidd property in the late 1880’s and near-surface mining occurred periodically from 1916 to 1968, from three zones. Other, similar near-surface mines were developed to the west and east of Aer-Kidd by Vale/Inco (Totten mine) and KGHM/Quadra-FNX (Victoria mine).
According to the statement, the project generator business model employed by Transition Metals and HTX Minerals maximizes shareholder exposure to discovery, while minimizing shareholder equity dilution by relying on partners to fund more expensive drilling and exploration.
The acquisition brings together an experienced management and exploration team led by Transition CEO Scott McLean, who previously worked as a senior member of the exploration team at Falconbridge Limited.
In 2004, Scott was named co-recipient of the PDAC Prospector of the Year Award for the discovery of Falconbridge’s Nickel Rim South mine, in Sudbury. (Nickel Rim is now the flagship mine of Xstrata Copper, Sudbury.)
HTX Minerals currently enjoys a strategic alliance with Impala Platinum Holdings Ltd. (Implats), the world’s second-largest producer of platinum, to explore the Mid Continent Rift region in Ontario for platinum group element deposits. HTX also enjoys a strategic alliance with the Nunavut Resources Corp. for mineral project generation and exploration, including precious, base and strategic metals, and diamonds in the Kitikmeot Region of the Territory of Nunavut.
