Latest / SILVER / GOLD / $UFD: Surviving Global Economic Shifts | RONS BASEMENT / 🍁GOLD is Red HOT in THIS Area of CANADA🍁 - First Mining Gold Webinar

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🍁GOLD is Red HOT in THIS Area of CANADA🍁 - First Mining Gold Webinar · SILVER / GOLD / $UFD: Surviving Global Economic Shifts | RONS BASEMENT

0:00
Welcome to the First Mining Gold webinar.
0:03
First Mining is a Canadian gold development company.
0:06
They have two multi million ounce projects in Canada.
0:10
Today we're going to focus in on one of those projects.
0:13
They're du Parquet project in Quebec.
0:15
There's a lot of activity going on in the gold mining sector in
0:19
Quebec right now, and 1st Mining is right in the thick of thick
0:24
of it. We're joined by Dan Wilton, he's
0:26
the CEO of First Mining Gold, James Maxwell, he's the VP of
0:31
Exploration, and Carolyn Pinard, the manager of exploration.
0:37
Everyone, welcome to the webinar.
0:39
Thank you. Thanks for having us, Ron.
0:41
Thank you, Ron. Yeah, there's a lot of exciting
0:43
things to talk about at the company as a whole.
0:46
Again, we're going to focus in on Quebec and Duparquet today,
0:49
but maybe you'll be helpful to our viewers if James and
0:53
Caroline just give us a little, tell us a little bit about their
0:56
background and how that might apply to what's going on at
1:00
Quebec and within the company right now.
1:02
Caroline, would you like to go first?
1:04
Yeah, sure. I'm Caroline Pinard.
1:06
I'm the exploration manager. As Ron said, I joined the
1:09
company in 2021 soon after emigrating from South Africa and
1:14
I've been here since happily to be part of the team.
1:17
I'm a geologist by trade. I spend most of my career
1:20
working in the gold sector, underground predominantly, and
1:24
then moved over into from South African to international
1:28
operations over time. Most of my career is sort of
1:33
building and trying to integrate myself into the full mining
1:35
value chain. I've also pursued academic
1:38
programs to give me that explosion to help to fully
1:41
immerse myself into mineral exploration and development
1:45
opportunities. Thank you.
1:48
James, could you tell us a little bit about yourself?
1:51
Yeah. So I'm a geologist as well and
1:53
you know, have a great deal of exploration history operating in
1:57
what would be the northern components of the continent here
2:00
in North America. So that includes largely what we
2:02
consider our key and aged rocks. And certainly there are a series
2:07
of rocks that are very, very known for their their gold
2:11
endowment. So I've spent about over 20
2:15
years now working in our key and greenstone belts in Canada, in
2:19
the jurisdictions of Ontario, Quebec, Manitoba and Nunavut.
2:23
Spent a lot of time looking at these deposits, evaluating them
2:27
as well as the opportunity to look at some of them around the
2:29
world, including Australia. And certainly really appreciate
2:32
my time and expertise and focusing on 2 great ones that we
2:35
have at First Mining in Spring Pool and Du Parque.
2:39
Thank you, James and Dan Wilton, CEO of First Mining Gold.
2:43
Could you maybe give us a, a brief synopsis overall the
2:46
company kind of where we are now and and where where you see it
2:49
heading here in the in the future?
2:51
Sure. So an exciting time for first
2:54
mining. So you know, we have two of the
2:57
10 largest undeveloped gold projects in Canada and advancing
3:03
those projects down different paths right now with our Spring
3:08
Pull project targeting submitting our final
3:12
environmental assessment on Spring Pull at the end of this
3:16
month, which has been a process we've been in for you know, 6
3:21
1/2 going on 7 years. So very exciting time moving
3:25
forward there. And then at Dupart K, this is a
3:29
project that we consolidated our ownership in a couple of years
3:35
ago. So we own it 100%.
3:38
It's located in the middle of the Abitibi gold belt, which
3:43
stretches really from called Valdor Quebec to Timmins ON and
3:50
a little bit further South to Kirkland Lake would be kind of
3:52
the three main, call it main corners of the Abitibi, but this
3:56
is one of the most prolific gold belts in the world.
3:59
I heard a statistic today that something like 90% of the gold
4:03
that's ever been produced in Canada has come out of the
4:06
evativity, so remarkable mineral endowment and more discoveries
4:10
happening all the time. So that's why it's really
4:14
exciting that you know what we're starting to uncover there.
4:19
And really on the back of what has been very systematic focused
4:27
first principles geology work that James and Caroline and the
4:31
team have done to A, really understand what we have at Dupar
4:36
K, which is one of the largest undeveloped gold projects in
4:40
Quebec. And B, then from understanding
4:43
it better understand where we can see it continue to grow.
4:46
And that's where it gets really exciting and I think what the
4:48
team will talk about today. Sounds great, sounds great.
4:51
So, so James and Caroline, as you as you look at this project,
4:55
obviously there's already millions of Oz of gold that's
4:58
been defined in the ground. Is the push as we move forward
5:04
to further define the existing deposit and or to to do more
5:09
exploration to find more gold. How would you describe the, I
5:12
guess the strategy to the to the to the viewer?
5:16
So it becomes a bit of both. I mean, obviously we want to
5:19
understand and extrapolate the full endowment of our project
5:24
and and property at Du Parque. And so with that, you know, we
5:27
will continue to explore, we will continue to build out our
5:31
project to ensure that it has the best, you know, path forward
5:35
for potential development. You know, and that's through a
5:38
number of exploration avenues, not just including, you know,
5:41
working around the foundational resource we have today, but new
5:44
discovery. And I think that's probably one
5:46
of the, the more exciting attributes that we have to offer
5:50
is that, you know, we've got a, a large land position of mineral
5:54
tenure in the ABBA Tibi in Quebec.
5:56
And we have the opportunity to unlock additional new
6:00
discoveries. And that's, that's really what's
6:01
key to having some of these jurisdictions that Dan speaks to
6:05
in the ABBA Tibi is that, you know, that endowment history, I
6:08
mean, it's a known quantity that there is a lot of gold there.
6:10
And there's one thing that makes these jurisdictions great.
6:13
It's it's the fact that they do have new discoveries and ongoing
6:16
and it becomes a factor of inputs.
6:18
The more you put in, you know, typically the more you get out.
6:21
So from that aspect, I think the exploration is quite exciting.
6:25
However, I think, you know, Dan spoke to that sort of friends
6:28
first principles piece, which is that build up to the
6:30
characterization. So yes, we're doing a lot of
6:33
work around the existing resource as well to ensure that
6:36
we well understand it, to ensure that we know you know where the
6:40
the limits and boundaries of that are and bring them down as
6:43
well. So it's it is both we are doing
6:45
a lot of work on advancing the resource as well as growing it
6:49
through exploration. OK, OK, interesting.
6:52
And and as you look back on your career, James, you've worked for
6:55
some other big gold companies you've worked for, you know,
6:58
doing exploration work successfully in the past.
7:01
Can you touch on that and, and, and how you think that
7:04
experience applies to what you're seeing now at at the
7:07
Duparque project in Quebec? Yeah, I think it really comes
7:11
back to some of the characterization and and for
7:13
that reason, whether it's abroad on other projects or whether
7:16
it's in house at a different scale, I think the idea is once
7:21
you understand what makes systems tick or what makes
7:24
systems come together in gold endowment, it allows you to
7:27
unlock them. And so, you know, it's a bit of
7:29
a checkers game to understand all the components that are on
7:33
the board and then make the best move.
7:35
And that's what we're doing at Duparque is we've really
7:38
assessed what what's on the board and what the geoscience is
7:41
telling us through call it historical work, call it
7:43
analogous deposit settings around the world.
7:46
But ultimately what we know was that, you know, there is, you
7:50
know, no finite limit to this currently.
7:52
We know that it's open, you know, in many directions, it's
7:55
open for new discovery. And so from that factor, it's
7:58
really about, you know, leveraging that forward.
8:01
So once we understand the components of the geoscience
8:05
that make the demineralization occur, we can then look for
8:09
similar settings and, and similar details that allow us to
8:12
unravel either new discoveries or extensions.
8:15
And, and once you get onto that trail, it just becomes, you
8:18
know, more momentous in the amount you unlock it.
8:20
And so we've been working on this project through it as an
8:23
expiration group for approximately 24 months.
8:26
And that's about the time it takes to really get the geology
8:29
team understanding the components, understanding the
8:34
opportunities, and then really making business decisions that
8:38
help us unlock additional, you know, value through exploration.
8:42
Yeah, yeah. So you can work to, to to define
8:45
the existing deposit, but also there's exciting opportunity on
8:50
the exploration front as well to find even more, more gold as we
8:54
move forward. 100% and I mean, that's really it.
8:59
James, maybe just spend a minute talking about about your
9:02
experience at Back River, what the deposit looked like when you
9:05
got there and then through your exploration efforts where that
9:08
ended up. I mean the Back River deposit
9:11
which was Sabina Gold and Silver got acquired by B2 Gold a year
9:19
and a bit ago for $1.1 billion. So I think it is.
9:23
It's germane and relevant to the.
9:25
I like it. I, I, I like the sound of that
9:27
$1.1 billion. Go ahead, James.
9:30
Yeah. And so realistically, you got to
9:32
you got to understand, you know, what the path is to, to being
9:36
successful. And, and really it is that
9:38
unlocking, right. I mean, you really want to make
9:40
sure that you get full value for everything you have.
9:43
And it doesn't matter, you know what assets you own, you want to
9:46
make sure you fully appreciate what's there.
9:48
And so you know, it, it comes through doing the the work
9:52
needed to understand, I think the endowment level to begin
9:54
with. And you know, we know from from
9:57
the metrics of the current resource and you know, we can
10:00
talk about so many ounces that occur in a, in a vertical meter,
10:03
in a vertical foot. However, you want to project
10:06
that across the project And you know, it tells us that, you
10:09
know, there's additional ounces to be found.
10:11
And so we can look at the expiration history and usually
10:14
these things go in cycles, right?
10:15
You know, the market cycles take on, you know, there's a bunch of
10:19
work done and realistically, you know, it's it's whether you
10:22
score a goal or not. And so for us, you know, we
10:25
spend a lot of time, you know, setting up, you know, call it
10:28
the playbook to make sure that we're going to have some success
10:31
on the other end, You know, that has an outcome, a favorability
10:34
and and we know that these are there to evolve, but we have to
10:37
use the resources at hand to be successful.
10:39
So similar to back river, there's certain thresholds that
10:42
we needed to to meet in order we felt to be successful.
10:46
And you know, having multi million ounce the potential was
10:49
part of that, but you have to be able to drive the project to
10:53
those milestones as well. You know, making people
10:55
believers as part of it, but showing it and putting the
10:58
resources on the books is a big part.
11:00
So, you know, that's a that's one where we took, you know,
11:03
substantial resources from, you know, single millions to, you
11:07
know, multi millions upwards. I think all told of, you know,
11:11
quite a significant amount, $1.1 billion in take out.
11:14
And I'll just be cautious around the the resource terminology in
11:18
class specification, but you know, we've got a three and a
11:20
half million ounce base at Dupar K and measured and indicated and
11:24
we've got about a two and a half million ounce base in inferred
11:28
resources at Dupar K. So again, significant size and
11:33
it it offers significant optionality.
11:34
But you know, it also projects that you know, with the level of
11:37
work done historically. I mean, if we were to double
11:40
that footprint, if we were to triple that footprint, you know,
11:44
we believe that we could be successful in growing the
11:46
resource, you know, in a similar order of magnitude by doing
11:50
such. And that's kind of what we've
11:52
been doing. We've been putting the pieces
11:53
together, the foundational work over about two years to really
11:57
take this to the next level where we start increasing the
12:00
inputs, we start turning the volume up, which is really the
12:03
the drill meters, which is really the geoscience work,
12:07
which is the characterization. And we should be able to start
12:10
to see this return, you know, through a series of programs
12:13
backgrounds that are phased and include a number of future
12:17
resource updates. Thank you, James.
12:20
Caroline, what about your background and your experiences?
12:24
How are you applying them to what's happening now at
12:27
Duparque? And I guess what are you, what
12:29
are you most excited about when you when you look at that
12:32
project? Well, Sir, I spent most of my
12:35
career working for a company that had multiple million ounce
12:38
deposits and you know, going through that organization
12:41
getting gaining more exposure to each one of those projects in
12:46
different jurisdictions and countries.
12:48
I believe, you know, I had the opportunity to see a lot of of
12:51
that deposits. They were also in various stages
12:54
from like full production or development or at the
12:57
exploration phase. So again, just understanding
13:00
what it takes to drive something along that path was was quite
13:05
important for me. So coming from the other side of
13:08
the value chain into the junior mining space, I think, you know,
13:11
having that experience and exposure and knowing what to
13:14
look for, knowing what makes the economics tech, you know, what
13:18
are the drivers in terms of realizing this project
13:22
potential? And like what when, when is
13:25
something, you know, a push on and when is it like, OK, I need
13:27
to take a step back, understand that, do the gap analysis, get
13:32
the data and then using that to set up our programs.
13:36
We have a strong focus on the strategy, which is something I I
13:40
really enjoy. And I think having that
13:42
strategic outlook with a longer term vision and then building up
13:46
that foundation in support of that strategy is what is
13:49
important. And yeah, what gets me excited
13:51
for defer game? Thank you.
13:53
Thank you. You know, back in June, there
13:56
was a press release, some drill results that came out which
14:00
which to me were in, in, in indicated that that there is
14:06
more gold to be found at this project.
14:10
Dan, could you touch on or, or James or or Caroline, whoever
14:13
would like to kind of what, what what we saw in this press
14:16
release and and what it means for the growth of the project?
14:22
Well, specifically we're talking about the the release that had
14:25
old Dupart K2424IN it. Yes, I mean, I'll give you my
14:32
take and then I'll turn it over to the people who actually it
14:35
all happened. I think one of the really
14:40
important things from that hole was showing a couple of things.
14:45
Number one, there are a number of mineralized zones like the
14:49
you ended up hitting I think 7 different mineralized zones
14:52
inside that one hole, which shows I think the the kind of
14:56
robustness of mineralization through that ore body.
15:00
But the most important thing were some of the widths and
15:02
elevated grades that we were seeing and not just that we
15:06
happened to hit them inside the same old mineralization.
15:09
I think it was a really clear articulation of the fact that
15:14
there is higher grade structurally controlled on the
15:19
contact of what is the style of mineralization in the in the
15:24
cyanide intrusive, which is kind of the only thing that's ever
15:28
been looked for a du parquet. So James and Caroline can talk
15:31
more about it. But that to me was, you know, I
15:35
think showing increasing grades of depth, showing really
15:39
significant widths. Those are the types of
15:42
intercepts around which underground mines are made.
15:46
Yeah. And maybe Carolyn, you want to
15:47
talk a bit about the strategy behind, you know, how we evolve
15:50
a system like that and I can get maybe more into the geoscience
15:53
specifics. Yeah, again, very exciting
15:57
target for us. Quite a bit of work spent by the
16:00
team integrating a lot of the data and digging into that
16:03
geosciences. But the strategy there was to
16:06
understand how we can learn a bit more about the higher grade
16:12
control opportunities at Debarque.
16:13
We started picking up on the cyanide and the D2 structures,
16:17
coming across that contact and the change in the lithology what
16:21
drives it. And of Dan said, you know,
16:23
getting intercepts of almost 6G per ton over 33 meters is quite
16:27
meaningful at those depths because it plays into that
16:30
underground. But yeah, a lot of work went
16:32
down understanding what the main control, the plant of the
16:35
minorization is, what we need to do to step that out.
16:39
And then through the work and integrating again all of this
16:42
data sets, we were able to delineate that there's a
16:45
secondary control in the minorization with even higher
16:48
grade opportunities. So the focus was on building
16:51
that out, tasting that model and theory and and you know, going
16:55
out with the drill book and then actually pursuing it.
16:58
We had the opportunity with three to four holes, stepping
17:02
that out hole 18/22/24 and 19 as well just confirming that
17:08
theory. And now we're doing the work
17:10
further advancing and driving that opportunity down as it goes
17:13
into depth where the minorization is quite open.
17:17
Yeah, thanks, Caroline. I really appreciate, you know,
17:20
the description and it really, you know, discusses a bit of
17:23
what we call vectoring and it's really about the recipe of
17:26
ingredients that come together to make this successful host
17:30
setting. And you know, one of the things
17:31
that we want to do in our work is get to the best, you know,
17:35
and grade and mineralization, we'll call it in terms of, you
17:38
know, breadth and robustness. We want to get to that first.
17:41
You don't want to get to it last.
17:42
You want to be aiming for that stuff and guiding yourself along
17:46
the way towards getting to the best stuff, especially when
17:49
you've got a project that has significant, you know, resource
17:52
foundation already. We've got a lot of Oz, you know,
17:55
we've got a global resource grade that we really appreciate.
17:59
But what we do know is that there's some better zones there
18:01
and we want to find them and expand them first.
18:05
And we want to obviously get them to the front end of our
18:08
potential for developing the project.
18:10
So how to do that is, you know, we characterize where those
18:13
grade settings occur. And between Caroline and Dan,
18:16
they spoke a little bit towards the structural aspects.
18:18
They spoke a little bit to the the host Rock of Infinity, which
18:22
you know, we can almost describe as the vehicle.
18:24
It's the type of car, it's the type of vehicle that's really
18:27
carrying the gold. And as you know, some vehicles
18:29
can carry bigger loads. And that's kind of our grade
18:33
threshold. And what we're focused on here
18:35
is trying to find, you know, that right type of rock setting
18:38
that attributes to better grades, to the right widths and
18:42
has, you know, ultimately what we would hope is the best value.
18:45
So you know, we've done a lot of work in setting that up in this
18:48
case, you know, these are rocks that haven't been as well
18:51
carried characterize on the property.
18:53
And because it's complex, it takes work.
18:55
It's like anything else. Usually if there's some
18:57
unlocking or some discovery, it's because somebody put some
19:00
effort into it. And it's not that our
19:02
predecessors hadn't done good work, they've done a lot of
19:05
work. They did it on a bulk scale.
19:08
It's our ability though. As we go deeper, we need to
19:11
really fine tune the resolution. We really need to have a clear
19:14
picture as we expand additional resources and need to have a a
19:18
recurring or higher priced value prize coming back.
19:22
We really need to fine tune the inputs.
19:24
So we've done a lot of work to understand, you know, what is it
19:27
that makes the better grade systems tick.
19:30
And what we're seeing is that it is in contact with a different
19:33
vehicle. It is something that we would
19:35
call a mafic volcanic sequence. It has the ability to typically
19:40
host higher grade mineralization.
19:42
And that's one of the things about understanding these types
19:45
of systems is understanding, you know, what the components you
19:49
want to see on the highest level of favorability.
19:51
And you know, in the old days, we used to do charts on
19:54
favorability of, of different elements or ingredients.
19:57
You know, how much of this ingredient do you want?
19:59
How much ingredients, you know, how much of this ingredient do
20:02
you want? And so we've kind of tuned our
20:04
scale to understand that, you know, we're looking for a
20:07
specific vehicle type. We're looking for it to be in a
20:10
certain structural regime. We're looking for it to be
20:13
hosting, you know, certain other elements that come with that in
20:17
terms of alteration. And then when we put that
20:19
together, when we put all the different layers together.
20:21
Together, you know, we can start to target this and that's kind
20:24
of what you're seeing in those results from June is that, you
20:27
know, we picked three to four areas that we thought you know
20:30
could have success in sort of the makeup of components that
20:34
we're looking for. And then we've driven the
20:36
drilling towards them and definitely some of them are
20:39
direct hit. You know, we are very happy with
20:41
you know the the ultimate intercepts so that we've put out
20:45
in June, especially in whole 2424.
20:48
I mean, they're absolutely encouraging into the amount of
20:52
opportunity for not only just, you know, growth, but it, it
20:57
also suggests that more of these settings are going to occur.
20:59
And so in some of the other holes, that's what we're seeing.
21:01
We're seeing that, you know, we're starting to get the
21:04
favorability in those other ingredients that we're after.
21:07
And that's what's not only our, our plan is not only unlock what
21:10
we know today, but then vector towards new areas that have that
21:14
exact same recipe. And we're just going to keep
21:16
repeating it. And that's kind of when we
21:18
talked about previous successes and other projects for growth.
21:21
That's kind of the thing was once you understand the recipe
21:24
and once you start really learning how to put these pieces
21:27
together, it just gets easier. It's like anything else you work
21:30
on or fixing something like once you've done it a few times, it
21:33
gets easier. And I'm sure you know, even with
21:35
Ron's basement, every show it's it's almost runs itself.
21:38
I bet today. Oh yeah, yeah.
21:40
Yeah, as you can tell, I'm just always so comfortable when I'm
21:43
down here in the basement. Sure, but but what I'm thinking
21:46
is I is I hear you saying that, James, is that you almost get a
21:50
like 1/6 a sixth sense or a feel after you spend the time 'cause
21:55
there there is a certain degree of art form I would imagine in,
21:58
in in doing exploration work, right.
22:01
It's not all black and white, but the is it, is it, is it an
22:04
accurate statement to say that you developed kind of a feel for
22:08
the land, a feel for the geology and then over?
22:11
Years it's data-driven, Ron, like it's, it's data-driven.
22:14
So you know, it does seem black box, but at the end of the day
22:17
it's data-driven. And today, you know, obviously
22:19
the computing power, the leverage ability of data is, is
22:23
higher than it's ever been. So with with that, I think, you
22:26
know, there is a time where yes, there's a geologic experience in
22:30
education that needs to be with that.
22:32
You know, obviously it takes a little bit of gut feel and
22:35
interpretation, but I think you combine that with, you know, a
22:39
real strong balance of data, you know, and then also in a team
22:43
setting, we're very fortunate to have an internal team.
22:46
And again, that's been working on this for 24 months, seeing
22:49
things together, talking through things together.
22:52
It's it, it really is that team aspect that's going to drive
22:55
you, you know, to the finish line with success.
22:57
So it it is a bit of gut, but it's very data-driven.
23:01
Data-driven right is investors in the market always love to
23:05
hear about drill results. What's the current status right
23:10
now? You've talked about kind of your
23:11
strategy behind how you determine are there drills
23:14
turning? Are there are are we going to
23:15
see some drill results in the near future?
23:18
Yeah. Carolyn, why don't you explain a
23:19
little bit about what we've done, you know, over the last
23:22
two years in this year and just, you know, where we are in the
23:24
program. And yes, we are active today,
23:26
Ron. We're quite active and coming
23:28
through the end of year. But Carolyn, I'll give you an
23:30
update. So first mining, started
23:32
drilling on the project May of last year we had quite a big
23:36
program, roughly 7000 meters that we drilled in 2023.
23:42
Yeah, just need to check the year again, I'm flying.
23:47
And then this year we started the program again, drilling
23:51
continuously advancing on those successes and then coming across
23:54
the property, you know, focusing on resource expansion and growth
23:58
opportunities, extensional opportunities, driving the the
24:02
discovery sort of leveled down and then also focusing on
24:05
regional target development. This year, we are coming up to a
24:10
12,000 meter program. That's more or less where we are
24:12
about now. We have 2 drills turning on the
24:14
project and we're doing quite a bit of work and we're having
24:17
good successes. So we had follow up news
24:19
results. When was that in August, I
24:22
believe on one of our targets, the Valentra one as well and
24:26
definitely more to come on some of the other successes that we
24:30
are seeing and learning on this project.
24:33
With that, we've also spent quite a bit of time working on
24:37
airborne geophysical survey across the full property.
24:41
We did a Lidar survey, which also helps the exploration and
24:45
the vectoring. We integrated that and all of
24:48
this data that we've inherited built on into what you would
24:52
call expanded 3D model that now covers the full property from
24:55
Dupar Gay to Pet and Duquesne where we have these resource
24:58
centers. And that gives us the
25:00
opportunity, as we've said a couple of times to like look at
25:04
this holistically and driving those opportunities.
25:07
So this builds up our target pipeline, it drives up, you
25:12
know, our opportunities to continue drilling and we've
25:15
identified quite a significant, you know, I would say project
25:19
pipeline, target pipeline for development and further
25:23
advancement. Yeah.
25:24
So the news side's going to continue to flow, Ron, just to
25:27
get rate to sort of the update piece.
25:29
I mean, you know we added a drill in September that was in
25:31
our disclosure. So we're at two drills now.
25:34
And again as as Caroline spoke to, I mean we've continued to
25:37
grow our input. So from 7000 meters to 20 to
25:40
12,000 meters, we've now got about 20,000 meters into the
25:43
project. We're hoping to grow that again
25:45
next year. But with that, you know, the
25:48
additional resources coming online, I mean we do see
25:51
additional news flow coming forward and I think there'll be
25:53
a fairly steady cadence as we've been actively drilling the
25:57
majority of this year. If this is a project that you
25:59
can drill 365 days a year at a very attractive cost base, it's
26:04
likely one of the lowest cost centres for expiration in North
26:08
America. And for that reason, you know,
26:10
we're going to continue to leverage that.
26:11
We're going to continue to see active drilling at the project.
26:14
We're going to continue to work towards, you know, increasing
26:18
the the amount of activity at the project.
26:20
And so that's going to return in the in the in the same way in
26:23
news flow, we're going to see more results, we're going to see
26:25
more frequent updates. We're going to see the ability
26:27
to continue to evolve and have milestones attached to the story
26:31
as well. Yeah, yeah.
26:33
And it, and it feels like to me as you've progressed through the
26:36
project and now had several years to work on it, like you
26:40
alluded to earlier, your, your efforts can be more targeted and
26:45
in, in the opportunity is there to have, you know, more
26:49
strategic decisions made, which will likely lead to better
26:53
results. As we, you know, as, as you guys
26:56
progress through your, through your exploration efforts.
26:59
Is that is that an accurate statement?
27:01
It is and you're not always in that level of favorability.
27:04
I mean, we're, we're unfortunate to have come through a tough
27:07
market cycle, but you know, at the same time it's been very
27:11
giving in our, in our ability to properly characterize, properly
27:15
build our team properly, really create an environment that when
27:18
the market turns on which you know, we feel this $2600 gold
27:23
plus market is that time. But you need to be ready, right.
27:26
You need to be ready for these moments where the availability
27:30
of capital or the availability of interest is there to actually
27:34
advance a project with meaningful, you know, output.
27:38
So, so that's kind of where we're at today, you know,
27:41
through a little bit of just attrition, you know, we've
27:43
really worked hard to really crystallize the opportunity and
27:46
make sure that we're ready to turn up the, you know, the
27:49
activity level. And so that's that's where we're
27:51
at today on it. You know, we're very fortunate
27:53
to be there, but we also think this is a very emergent cycle.
27:56
I mean, I've been in this business for quite some time now
27:59
and we know it's cyclic. We know that these times come.
28:02
And I mean, as much as the commodity prices are there, you
28:04
know, I would suggest that there's still a lot of room for
28:07
us to see these inputs flow into, you know, the junior and
28:10
developer sectors, which is what we want to be a part of.
28:13
I mean, we're really building that opportunity to really be
28:16
successful in that method. Yeah, positioning the company to
28:20
to really take advantage of what could be a great market cycle.
28:24
Yes, we we could, we could talk about $2600 gold for the rest of
28:28
the for the rest of the webinar. But I wanted to ask Dan a
28:33
question about Quebec and why location matters.
28:38
I guess specifically on Duparquet, like the advantages
28:42
that it has being in that location.
28:44
And then, Dan, second part of my question would be if you could
28:47
touch on just kind of the, the, the general environment within
28:52
Quebec, within the gold mining sector right now.
28:55
Yeah. I mean, where we are in Quebec,
28:58
Ron, you've been there. This is, you know, really the
29:01
center of the mining industry in Canada.
29:05
We, we didn't have the opportunity, I don't think to do
29:07
the drive from Valdor to ruin Aranda.
29:10
But you pass a mine or a historic head frame like every 5
29:15
minutes on the highway. It is such a a mining culture.
29:20
It's one of the greatest concentrations of mining talent
29:25
in the world. There's a lot of people who go
29:28
to work at other mines really all over the world that start
29:33
their journey from somewhere in the Abitibi because it's just
29:38
again, such a great place with such a concentration of talent
29:43
and resources. You know, you got to remember
29:45
from where we are within 150 kilometres of of Dupart K,
29:52
you've got pretty much every mining supplier and mining
29:57
contractor in the world, right, that is servicing operating
30:01
mines from Timmins to Valdor. So you know just today in that
30:06
region, there's the mines are producing and the quick math
30:10
would be probably somewhere between a million and 1,000,000
30:13
1/2 ounces of gold a year, right?
30:15
These are major mines and a real concentration of them.
30:19
So how does that sort of play through into our opportunity
30:24
here? Number one, And we have
30:26
amazingly talented people who come to work on the project
30:29
every day. And that's our team.
30:31
And it's a lot of the contractors that come in to work
30:33
with us. It it shows up in, you know, the
30:37
quality and the cost of the drilling contractors that we
30:41
get. And that is directly related to
30:44
what we kind of call our bang for the buck in exploration.
30:47
There's not a better place to spend money because your money
30:51
goes further and your productivity is some of the best
30:54
productivity I think any of us have ever seen an exploration,
30:57
particularly drilling anywhere in the world in our careers.
31:02
So it really is a remark place from that perspective and where
31:06
we are at Duparquet, James makes this point all the time.
31:10
Like if you're moving a piece of equipment around the Abitibi,
31:13
the chances are you're probably going over our property like it
31:17
really is smack in the center. And you you spent a bit of time
31:21
in, in Ruinaranda. You've got, you know, the, the,
31:26
the horn smelter that's been operating in rural for more than
31:30
100 years. Like this is just such an
31:33
established part of the community and it, and it goes
31:37
not just in terms of, of the human talent that they're, but
31:41
it goes to the government and regulators and, you know, the
31:47
general populations understanding and appreciation
31:50
for the value of the mining industry and, and the role that
31:54
that can play in bringing economic opportunities to people
31:59
in the region. So, yeah, it's, it's a
32:01
remarkable place. But the other thing just
32:04
strategically to understand is we've all played monopoly.
32:10
Like you can have a house on Baltic Ave. or you can have a
32:15
house at Boardwalk or Park Place, right?
32:17
And it's the same little piece of plastic that you put out
32:21
there, but it's worth a lot more in a better like on a better St.
32:25
on a better property. And I'm playing a lot of
32:28
Monopoly with my kids so that, you know, they usually beat me.
32:32
But that's that's the value of having, you know, three and a
32:36
half million ounces of M and I and I'm two and a half million
32:40
ounces of inferred like one of the largest gold endowments in
32:44
the in the Abitibi geographically located smack in
32:48
the middle of it. This is a really strategic
32:53
resource for the industry and it's been largely ignored by the
32:58
industry because it was held in private hands more or less from
33:04
the mid 1950s. And so it's missed generations
33:09
of work. That's, that's happened on it.
33:10
There's, you know, other than a, a real push of work from call it
33:14
2007 to 2014, where a lot of amazing work was done.
33:18
And we're the beneficiary of that.
33:20
But you know, this, this project in this endowment in anyone
33:25
else's hands would have seen generations and generations of
33:29
work. And so we're, you know, we, we
33:32
take our stewardship of this project very seriously because
33:37
it is a real opportunity that we have to take what was, you know,
33:42
in the 1930's, the largest producing gold mine in Quebec.
33:45
I like to remind people about that.
33:48
But we have the opportunity to really reinvigorate not just
33:52
this project, but kind of the whole district that we're in.
33:55
So it's very exciting times. So, so did I hear you say that
34:00
the within the property that the first mining now owns at the
34:04
Duparque project that existed the biggest gold mine in the
34:09
1930s in Quebec? The original BD mine when it was
34:14
the largest gold mine in Quebec from the mid 1930s in well into
34:18
the 1940s. So producing 100 dish 1000 oz a
34:22
year. And remember it produced
34:24
overall, you know, more than a million and a half oz over a 20
34:29
year time frame. So and and James or Caroline can
34:33
jump in or or Dan and answer this question.
34:36
And I've heard this said many different ways, but that that
34:39
the best place to find gold is buy an old gold mine.
34:43
Is that is that a common sane within the gold exploration
34:48
build? You know, that actually, as it
34:50
turns out, used to be the tag phrase for a company called
34:53
Orzon Mines, which had the Casa Berardi mine, which is about 100
34:57
kilometers north of Duparte, maybe 140.
35:01
Yeah. And and particularly at Duparte,
35:05
you know, James and Caroline can talk about it too, but there's
35:10
in, in the generation of work that was done from 2007 to 2014,
35:16
2015, it almost exclusively focused on an open pit
35:20
opportunity which we still have, which we think is large and very
35:24
robust. But they looked at that and
35:27
basically ignored the depth potential in a geologic
35:32
environment in the Abitibi where, you know, the
35:35
conventional wisdom is that the real minds don't start until the
35:39
kilometer down. This is the reason that that
35:42
this is such a great gold endowed region.
35:46
The reason that it is so well known and that so many ounces
35:49
have been produced in the Epitibi is because it is
35:52
renowned for its vertical continuity.
35:55
It's renowned for these deposits not only to to have to have
36:00
continuous gold mineralization as you go deeper, but often it
36:04
gets wider and higher grade to depth.
36:07
And that's exactly what we're starting to see at Dupart K.
36:11
You know, when we show the, the, the picture, it's there's hardly
36:14
a drill hole deeper than 500 meters.
36:17
And they mined it down 500 meters and they never ran out of
36:20
war in this in this project. So that's where the real
36:24
opportunity to open it up at depth comes in.
36:26
And James and Caroline could talk a bit more about that.
36:30
Yeah, I can talk a little bit about the the shadow of the head
36:32
frame is, you know, kind of the other way of looking at it.
36:35
But yeah, it really is about that favorable horizon.
36:38
And the endowment is what we speak to is like, you know,
36:40
these areas have, there's a specific reason and it's about
36:44
getting those ingredients right at the bigger scales.
36:46
You know, there's a lot of things happening and, you know,
36:49
large crustal levels of geology and this goes back, you know,
36:52
2.7 billion years ago. It's a long time ago, but
36:55
there's favorable conditions that created the right
36:58
environment. And for that reason, you know,
37:01
they're a great place to look for these deposits and we just
37:03
happen to be in a in a very prolific belt for it.
37:06
And staying close to these these historic minds is certainly, you
37:10
know, a recipe for success as well.
37:12
There is something about close ology and being in the right
37:15
real estate. Dan talked about a little bit,
37:17
you know, putting yourself in the right position to have
37:19
success. And you know, similarly, it's
37:22
the same thing in any other sport.
37:23
If you want to score a goal, you've kind of got to be in the
37:25
right place, which is usually in front of the net and somewhere
37:28
where you get a couple of good shots at.
37:30
And so, you know, here we are in Duparque and you know, we feel
37:33
that there's a number of opportunities that lead to our
37:36
success. And we spoke to the fact that,
37:37
you know, there is deep rooted systems in these are key
37:40
environments. We know that these deposits go
37:43
down many kilometers, probably beyond the levels at which we'll
37:46
ever be able to extract them. So for us, you know, there's
37:49
still a lot of open space to accommodate, you know, discovery
37:54
and extensional potential within the belt.
37:57
And, and also the other side about these areas is there's a
38:00
lot of diversity in the deposit styles.
38:02
It's not like it's just one make or one model of deposit.
38:05
And so Dan spoke to how, you know, previous screening kind of
38:09
had a bit of a bias towards one style of deposit, one level of
38:13
opportunity of mineralization. And it really has, you know,
38:16
allowed us to take an open look at the canvas and there's a lot
38:20
of blank canvas where we can apply our screening, our
38:24
filtering, our inputs and exploration approach that can
38:27
evolve new discoveries and new ideas and concepts.
38:30
But that's what's important about, you know, some of these
38:33
historic gold camps, if you will, is that's what really
38:36
makes them special is that they continue to give, they continue
38:39
to surprise, they continue to get better.
38:42
And, you know, it's like other things that are the best in
38:45
class in in their category. They always have these abilities
38:49
to impress. And that's what we feel about Du
38:51
Parquet. And you know, going back to our
38:53
results, I think you can look at them and see as well that, you
38:56
know, even ourselves, you know, in our in our greatest, you
38:58
know, kind of achievements, you know, we're really encouraged by
39:01
what we're getting for feedback from the drill results.
39:04
You know, we're looking for this stuff and it's speaking to us on
39:07
kind of levels that even, you know, we're you have have
39:09
expectations that we're over exceeding.
39:12
I mean we have kind of a threshold now where we're really
39:14
focusing on three to 4G kind of opportunity and discovery and we
39:19
have results that are coming back, you know from 6789 and 10
39:21
grams, you know, over significant composites.
39:24
Interesting, interesting. You know, Dan, you, you
39:27
mentioned Monopoly earlier and you also mentioned how these
39:32
properties were, were kind of independently owned for decades
39:36
and decades. And we're somewhat, I guess you
39:38
could say ignored to a certain extent.
39:41
And I know about two years ago, it was a big, big
39:43
accomplishment. I know Keith, I've heard Keith
39:45
Neumeyer and you correct me if I'm wrong, but that from the
39:48
founding of the company, he was very interested in getting these
39:52
properties together. And and when that happened, that
39:56
was a big deal, which now allows for for them to be.
40:00
Explored and developed kind of together in aggregate.
40:03
It feels like to me if we were playing Monopoly right, like you
40:06
had Park Place, you Boardwalk like you, you put together three
40:09
of the best properties all in one.
40:12
And now as we move forward, whether you want to look at it
40:16
from a jurisdictional perspective, a geological
40:19
perspective that there's a lot of a lot of opportunity.
40:22
I guess my my my next question would be how do you see Duparque
40:26
progressing over the next, let's say one to three to five year
40:30
time frame? Any any thoughts on that?
40:33
Yeah. I mean, I think we're, we're we
40:37
put out the, the preliminary economic analysis last year that
40:40
showed, you know, a big and robust project at Duparque.
40:45
You know, keep in mind we put that out with a gold price of
40:49
$1800 an ounce. If you look at that project
40:53
today as it was scoped as it was scoped a year ago and only a
40:57
year ago, but you run at anything like a 25 twenty
41:01
$600.00 gold price, you know every $100 in the gold price is
41:07
about 100 million US of after tax NPV on on that larger
41:12
project to Dupar K, we know a couple of things about this
41:15
deposit. Number one, we know that there
41:18
are a couple of pretty interesting higher grade areas
41:22
that potentially you could start with a smaller mine and that's
41:28
something that we're looking at now is just scoping that higher
41:33
margin, higher grade opportunity.
41:37
And I think that's it's very important just to demonstrate
41:40
the flexibility that is inside this deposit that a lot of
41:43
people don't appreciate. So we're looking at that, but I
41:47
think it's you know germane to the to the conversation today.
41:52
The strategic interest of this deposit I think can change
41:56
dramatically with a the handful of more drill results kind of
42:05
like we had in the whole 2424. You know, the more that we are
42:09
able to demonstrate and James had made a quick allusion to it.
42:14
But if you take out the oz that were that were mined out of this
42:19
deposit in the top 500 meters, you know, the overall endowment
42:24
and all all do my best to well, count the the mind oz as, you
42:32
know, not inferred. The most true kind of Oz are the
42:36
ones that are out of the ground and sold.
42:39
But you know, in total, it's, you know, call it 5 million
42:46
ounces of of you know, M and I plus what's been what's been
42:53
mined and then another million oz, million and a half oz have
42:56
been furred. That's there just in the in the
42:58
core Dupart K deposit, that's in the in the top 500 meters.
43:03
And so the real trick is within an area of structural
43:06
continuity, what is it to say that you're not going to have
43:09
similar kind of million oz per 100 meters vertical that you
43:14
could extend these things as you go deeper now you need to find
43:17
the higher grade. But that's the real significance
43:20
of what the exploration program is achieving right now is it is
43:25
demonstrating that there are significant widths of
43:28
significantly higher grade which have an opportunity to add a lot
43:33
of value to a development scenario.
43:36
So I I really see it evolving down up to parallel paths.
43:40
What would be 3 one is, you know, us continuing to scope and
43:46
actually conduct a bunch of environmental baseline data
43:50
collection and move forward a project at du Parquet because it
43:54
is really important that we actually move forward toward I
43:58
think call it a production scenario.
44:01
And we think there's actually an interesting way that we can do
44:04
that more quickly by focusing on smaller, higher margin tons in
44:10
the, you know, in, in the mine plant.
44:12
So we're working on that and we're optimistic what what the
44:17
initial work is telling us on that.
44:20
At the same time, you know, we're looking at at aggressively
44:24
growing the deposit at depth along strike regionally and
44:29
having success literally at all three of those different avenues
44:33
for continuing to grow it. And then the third part is, you
44:37
know, there is the important part of managing the legacy,
44:42
that's environmental legacy that's left from the old
44:45
producing project. And that's something that we're
44:47
making very good strides on. And then it's important, a very
44:51
important part of, of our commitment to the project and to
44:55
the community is advancing that work as well.
44:57
So, you know, our, our goal is, you know, particularly on the
45:03
exploration side, it's, you know, we're not, we're not
45:08
looking at marginal Oz additions here.
45:11
James and Caroline can talk a little bit more about what the
45:14
targets are. Caroline, you want to jump in?
45:18
Yeah. Again, I'm just alluding to a
45:20
lot of what we have spoken about is bringing all of this data
45:24
together, consolidating it and then developing these targets,
45:28
finding those higher grade opportunities that we are seeing
45:31
in strategic places outside that main resource and then also
45:36
extending that, you know, across the property.
45:39
We've got some very exciting field work targets that we're
45:42
also developing and advancing through.
45:44
We're doing the last bit of data collection before the snow
45:46
chases us out and then we are going to push on that and we
45:52
have classified and prioritized them.
45:54
We've got our, you know, target ranking matrix to make sure that
45:58
we know the opportunities that will align with our strategic
46:02
and corporate objectives. Thank you, James.
46:05
Any anything you'd like to add? Yeah.
46:08
I think it's just important to understand that, you know, we're
46:10
really looking at big centers of gravity here.
46:12
I mean, our exploration approach, you know, given the
46:15
scale of the, you know, regional endowment and current resource
46:19
configuration, you know, we're really looking to make
46:21
meaningful efforts towards growth.
46:23
So if you think about the millions of Oz that we have at
46:26
Dupar Ki mean ultimately, you know, to have meaningful growth,
46:30
we're looking at, you know, certainly, you know, 1020 thirty
46:33
percent growth is what we're looking for.
46:35
And if you start running those numbers, you know, on the
46:37
resource benchmark, I mean they're significant.
46:39
You know, we're looking at targets typically, you know, if
46:41
we can't get into something and that doesn't have, you know, a
46:44
potential to have a scale of 250,000 oz minimum, I mean, you
46:48
know, we're passing that on because we have, you know, a
46:51
real opportunity to shift things here in big meaningful ways.
46:55
And so that's what we're working towards.
46:56
We really want to grow this deposit meaningfully.
47:00
And so that's kind of the objective of our team.
47:02
We have objectives that we deliver internally to our team.
47:05
We have corporate objectives we're trying to meet.
47:07
But you know, ultimately, you know, I'd really like to, as Dan
47:10
said, take this and look to either double or triple the
47:12
current endowment that we have in resource.
47:14
And I think it's, you know, given what we see, you know,
47:17
again, it's very data-driven. We can look at the data, we can
47:20
look at how many ounces are hosted in a certain amount of
47:24
area that's been explored and we can look at how much area hasn't
47:26
been explored. And we definitely can take that
47:28
footprint and we can move it around the property and we can
47:32
see the ability to double and triple the potential of the
47:35
opportunity here at Dupar K. Thank you, James, Caroline,
47:40
James, Dan, this has been great. I need to ask you, is there
47:44
anything I forgot to ask you today or anything that any of
47:46
you want to mention before we we sign off today from our webinar?
47:52
No, I'm good, only that if people want more information,
47:54
they know where to track down Paul the famous Paul Morris.
48:01
And the website is obviously a great source of information as
48:05
well, www.firstmininggold.com. Yes, and I and I always have
48:09
Paul Morris's e-mail address in the description of every one of
48:13
the video. So he loves to talk to
48:15
investors. He does a great job for the
48:17
company. This has been a great webinar.
48:20
I feel like, you know, I am an investor in the company, company
48:23
I've followed for years and I feel like I've gained a deeper
48:27
appreciation, but also excitement level about what's
48:30
going on at Du Parquet. You know, Caroline, James and
48:34
and Dan, you all offered your own kind of individual angles
48:39
and and input into what's going on there.
48:42
But you know, when I look at as an investor, when I look at
48:45
Duparque and, and that's just one of the big projects that the
48:49
company has, when I consider, you know, the jurisdiction,
48:54
right, that there are roads and there's power and everything
48:57
right there. It's a mining friendly area with
49:00
a deep history. And I think one of the, one of
49:02
the things that I, that I get really excited about is this
49:05
idea that for really the first time in decades, this property
49:08
has all been brought together and now kind of offering a big
49:11
canvas that, that James and Caroline is, is the exploration
49:16
team explained a big campus to go out and, and look at
49:20
different opportunities within that.
49:22
And that there's been several years spent on that.
49:24
And, and then decades prior, right.
49:26
If we didn't even mention the fact that I forget what the
49:29
number was $100 million, where the drilling had been done by,
49:32
by previous operators. It's very exciting, very
49:36
exciting. And, and again, like Dan said,
49:39
people want to learn more. They can go to
49:41
firstmininggold.com. The stock is traded in the US
49:45
with the stock symbol F FM GF and in Canada, Toronto with the
49:50
stock symbol FF. And, and we will reiterate one
49:53
more time if you want to get more information, want to talk
49:55
to a real live human at the company, you can reach out to
49:59
Mr. Paul Morris. Thank you guys.
50:02
This has been great and I'll look forward to seeing you all
50:05
again another time here in the basement.
50:08
That's awesome. Thanks for having us, Ron.
50:10
Thank you, Ron. All the best.
50:11
Bye.