Brent Cook and Joe Mazumdar on BNN Market Call.

Brent Cook and Joe Mazumdar

The two geologists who pen the junior mining newsletter Exploration Insights were on Market Call Tonight on BNN. Brent Cook and Joe Mazumdar write what I believe to be is the most expensive mining newsletter (price wise).

Is it worth it? MAYBE

• You do get two experienced geologists (as the saying goes two heads are better than one)
• They do invest in their own money (or so they say). Most other mining stock newsletters are not independent. This is important as it makes the other letters biased. It looks like the only $$$ Joe/Brent receive from companies is from sponsorship a few conferences they speak at.
• Track record was decent last year (but every junior mining stock that didn’t have moose pasture was up significantly). They did have 4 or 5 takeovers in the past 12 months and do a great job finding a fatal flaw in mining projects.

Brent Cook and Joe Mazumdar are currently focused on development stage companies who can be taken over (M&A). The game plan is to own companies majors want to buy since their reserves and resources are depleting.

Here are my quick notes from Brent Cook and Joe Mazumdar commenting on viewer questions on mining stocks.

Northern Dynasty Minerals –  Brent Cook – Northern Dynasty has the Pebble deposit which has in the order of 90 million ounces of gold/copper. It has been heavily promoted as a Trump play with the idea with him in the regulations will be easier and will get permitted. This is a mega project in the middle of nowhere in Alaska at the headwaters of one of the largest salmon fisheries in North America. It is a difficult place to build a tailings facility and is expensive ($8 billion – $12 billion) to build. The best grade is also at depth. Not enough detailed enough work to know if this is economic or not in Brent’s opinion. The bottom line is not something they are buying.

Dalradian Resources –  Joe Mazumdar – We owned it last year liked the resource,jurisdiction, and team. Have since sold as they didn’t think the resource would match the grade. Right now Joe and Brent are not looking at development plays so they have not gone back to DNA have moved upstream to exploration plays.

Semafo – Joe Mazumdar – They are in Burkina Faso not a horrible jurisdiction by any stretch. They are not really looking at producers at the moment. Looking for development plays to feed the next cycle. Brent Cook – They don’t often look at companies with multiple mines as they are already well covered by the brokerage community. The portfolio currently owns one company that is in production.

Aurion Resources –  Brent Cook – I know it well bought it 5 years ago in a private placement. Stock went from 25 cents to 5 cents. Company is cleaned up and moved to Finland. They have found boulders with visible gold in it recently. It is intriguing. If drilling can confirm continuity it will be interesting. This is the sort of thing that could really do well.

Fission Uranium – Joe Mazumdar – We owned a uranium stock last year that we sold as we were looking for a rebound in the uranium market. As of now we don’t own any uranium stocks. Market is over supplied. Fission a good team and a good asset. Brent Cook – We do not see majors buying any projects at the moment. A dead market to us something we don’t want to play.

Silver Standard – Joe Mazumdar  – Silver Standard is not really a silver company anymore. They have converted the company in the last 18 months to a gold company by buying gold assets in good political jurisdictions.

Western Copper and Gold – Joe Mazumdar – I visited it last summer. I did a tour of the Yukon. A very large but low grade deposit if you want to play the leverage game. It will take awhile to permit. Right now for me it does not make a lot of economic sense they would need higher copper and gold prices.  Brent Cook – Majors are not going to buy a marginal asset like Western Copper.

Brent Cook and Joe Mazumdar Past Picks

• Mirasol Resources
• Kaminak Gold – taken over by Goldcorp +270%
• Ivanhoe Mines

Cornerstone Capital Resources –  Brent Cook – Years ago I spent a lot of time with them. They have been in Ecuador quite a while a formed a JV with Solgold. Have made a very impressive copper-gold discovery in Ecuador. It is deep. It is looking pretty good but we missed it. Right now it is more expensive then we want to pay for it but it is certainly a nice discovery.

Wellgreen Platinum – Joe Mazumdar – It has good investors (Electrum and RCF) a good long term shareholder base. New CEO Diane Garrett formerly of  Romarco is now running a company which is a positive. It is set up very well and is a big project. The big thing for them is drilling out the resource and the metallurgy is very important. Metallurgical test work is worth watching.

Premier Gold – Brent Cook – I know Ewan Downie really well I have all the respect in the world for him. They bought in December and have since sold for a short term trade. The grade at Arturo looks to be higher than expected. The Cove deposit that they are drilling out seems to be hanging together. The bottom line is I see no fatal flaws in Premier now. I think you wait till it gets whacked as gold drifts lower into the summer. Wait for your price.

Tinka Resources – Joe Mazumdar. I was just at site a week ago. The management team is fantastic with lots of experience. Have a zinc project that has decent grade. Have a resource and are trying to drill out the same on a significant land package. We bought it because we think it can get bigger basically.

Moneta Porcupine – Brent Cook – That is a very large low grade deposit. 1 million ounces of M/I and probably a couple million more ounces in inferred. A very sketchy deposit mineralization is spoty. Would be very hard to mine. May work as a leverage to the gold price. Not something I own or every will own since I don’t think it’s an economic deposit.

Oceana Gold – Joe Mazumdar -We don’t own producers. Oceana is a multi asset producer. For some investors they might be over exposed to the Philippines right now. They are taking more of a focus on the Americas. They have been more active in placements in junior mining companies.

Newcastle Gold –  Joe Mazumdar -New management team the ex ceo of Detour Gold is now running it. An open pit heap leach deposit in California that was a former mine. Grade going forward is lower than previously mined. As far as land package they are in the middle of a national (desert) reserve so that is something you have to watch. Investors need to look for head grade, recovery, and water consumption. We don’t own it.

Pretium Resources – Joe Mazumdar – Long term is really based on the volatility of the underlying resource. A lot of people don’t know if the head grade will be what the feasibility project suggests. Other companies are still uncertain if that grade is going to be real. If other companies are not interested we are not interested.

K92 Mining –  Brent Cook – K92 is a high grade deposit in Papa New Guinea. Land package is great and exploration potential is good. Trying to mine high grade veins which the previous company could not do. Until they can prove they can make money mining these high grade veins it is a show me story.

Brent Cook and Joe Mazumdar Top Picks

• Mirasol Resources
• Cordoba Minerals
• Nighthawk Gold