Investor Insight
Doré Copper Mining is advancing high-grade projects in the Chibougamau region through a hub-and-spoke strategy centered around its flagship high-grade copper Corner Bay deposit, leveraging its unique advantage of owning the only mill in the area, while benefiting from supportive communities and existing infrastructures.
Overview
Doré Copper Mining (TSXV:DCMC,OTCQB:DRCMF,FRA:DCM) is a copper-gold exploration and development company, positioning itself as a near-term producer in the prolific Chibougamau region of Québec, Canada. With a clear strategic focus, Doré Copper Mining is actively advancing its assets toward production, taking advantage of its brownfields high-grade copper and gold projects, existing infrastructure, and supportive jurisdiction. The company’s overarching goal is to establish itself as Quebec’s next copper producer, with a hub-and-spoke mining strategy centered around its Copper Rand mill.
Doré Copper Mining’s operations are located in the Chibougamau mining camp, an area known for its historical copper and gold production, within the world-renowned Abitibi Greenstone Belt. The company’s flagship asset, Corner Bay, is complemented by several other projects, including Devlin, Joe Mann, Cedar Bay, and Copper Rand. These properties form the foundation of Doré Copper Mining’s near-term and future production plans.
The company is unique because it owns the only mill in the area. The Copper Rand mill is designed to process an average of 1,350 tonnes-per-day and will need to be refurbished. This infrastructure gives Doré Copper Mining a significant competitive advantage, both in terms of reducing capital expenditure requirements and potentially generating additional revenue streams by processing ore from third-party operations.
Québec, as a mining jurisdiction, provides strong support for mineral exploration and development. It ranks highly in the Fraser Institute’s rankings of mining-friendly jurisdictions, offering political stability, favorable tax incentives, and access to well-established infrastructure, including roads, rail, and power.
Doré Copper Mining is led by an experienced and highly skilled management team. Ernie Mast, the company’s president and CEO, has over three decades of experience in the mining industry, including leadership roles at companies such as Primero Mining and Minera Panama (Inmet Mining). Mast’s background in managing junior and small-cap mining companies is well-suited to Doré Copper Mining’s current development phase. The broader management and technical teams bring a wealth of operational expertise, with several individuals having extensive experience in exploration, project development, and mining operations in Canada and internationally.
Company Highlights
- Doré Copper Mining’s hub-and-spoke mining model—using the Copper Rand mill as the central processing facility for its satellite deposits—would support an initial production target of more than 50 million pounds of copper equivalent annually, with a mine life exceeding 10 years.
- The 100 percent owned Copper Rand mill will be refurbished for future production and will be the only operating mill in the Chibougamau region. The mill will have extra capacity and provides the ability to process its own ore while potentially offering toll milling services to other nearby mining projects.
- Doré Copper Mining is led by an experienced and highly skilled management team.
Key Projects
Doré Copper Mining’s assets are located within a well-known copper and gold mining region, with a long history of production. The company’s current strategy revolves around a hub-and-spoke model, with the Copper Rand mill serving as the processing hub, fed by multiple satellite deposits. The key projects in the PEA include Corner Bay, Devlin, and Joe Mann. Other past producing mines, like Cedar Bay and Copper Rand, have further exploration potential.
Corner Bay (Main Asset):
Corner Bay is the cornerstone of Doré Copper Mining’s portfolio. This copper-gold deposit has demonstrated exceptional grades and exploration potential, positioning it as one of the highest-grade copper projects in North America. The latest resource estimate, as of 2022, includes 2.7 million tonnes of indicated resources at a grade of 2.66 percent copper and 5.8 million tonnes of inferred resources at a grade of 3.44 percent copper. The deposit remains open in several directions and at depth, suggesting that further drilling could potentially expand the resource base and extend the mine life.
Corner Bay is expected to be mined by longhole open stoping with pillars and Avoca underground mining methods. The project will utilize existing infrastructure, including a portal and decline to a depth of 115 meters. The ore will be processed at the Copper Rand mill, with pre-concentration of the material through ore sorting technology at the Corner Bay site.
The PEA for the project anticipates a mine life of over 10 years, with the potential to produce 53 million pounds of copper equivalent annually. Metallurgical testing at Corner Bay has yielded positive results, with copper recoveries ranging from 96.8 percent to 98.2 percent, and the concentrate is of high commercial quality, making it highly attractive to smelters.
Devlin (Secondary Asset):
Devlin is a smaller satellite deposit located approximately 10 kilometers west of Corner Bay. The project has a measured and indicated resource of 775,000 tonnes at a grade of 2.17 percent copper, along with an inferred resource of 484,000 tonnes at a grade of 1.79 percent copper. While Devlin’s size is modest compared to Corner Bay, it plays a crucial role in Doré Copper Mining’s hub-and-spoke mining strategy. Ore from Devlin will be transported to Corner Bay for pre-concentration, before being trucked to the Copper Rand mill for final processing. The company is planning to employ room-and-pillar and drift-and-fill mining methods at Devlin, with operations expected to commence shortly after Corner Bay comes online.
Cedar Bay:
Cedar Bay is a past-producing mine located near the Copper Rand mill. It produced 3.9 million tonnes of ore at an average grade of 1.63 percent copper and 3.21 grams per tonne gold during its operating life. Doré Copper Mining drilling programs have defined in the southwest zone 130,000 tonnes of indicated resources at a grade of 9.44 grams per tonne gold and 1.55 percent copper, and 230,000 tonnes of inferred resources at a grade of 8.32 grams per tonne gold and 2,13 percent copper .
Joe Mann:
The Joe Mann gold-copper deposit is another component of Doré Copper Mining’s hub-and-spoke strategy. Located 60 km south of the Copper Rand mill, Joe Mann produced 1.2 million ounces of gold and 28 million pounds of copper over its mine life, at an average grade of 8.26 grams per tonne gold and 0.25 percent copper. The current resource estimate includes 608,000 tonnes of inferred resources, with an average grade of 6.78 grams per tonne gold and 0.24 percent copper. The PEA plan is to have Joe Mann operational once Devlin is depleted, and its ore will also be processed at the Copper Rand mill.
Copper Rand:
Copper Rand was historically the largest copper mine in the Chibougamau camp, producing over 16 million tonnes of ore during its operational life, which spanned from 1959 to 2008. The mine has excellent exploration potential, particularly at depth, where limited drilling was conducted before the mine’s closure. Copper Rand has historical reserves and resources, and excellent potential below previously mined areas.
Board and Management
Mario Stifano – Executive Chairman and Director
Mario Stifano is a seasoned mining executive and chartered professional accountant with over 16 years of experience working with exploration, development and producing mining companies. Stifano is currently the chief executive officer of Galantas Gold. Stifano has held a number of senior executive positions including chief executive officer of Cordoba Minerals, executive chairman with Mega Precious Metals, vice president and chief financial officer with Lake Shore Gold, and vice president and chief financial officer of Ivernia. Stifano has been instrumental in raising over $700 million to explore and fund mining projects, including raising over $500 million at Lake Shore Gold, to develop three gold mines which are currently producing over 180,000 ounces of gold annually, and are now part of the Canadian assets within Pan American Silver.
Ernest Mast – President, CEO, and Director
Ernest Mast has 30 years of experience in various technical and executive roles in the mining industry, across a wide range of commodities, geographies and development stages. Mast is on the board of Scottie Resources. Mast previously held the positions of president and chief executive officer at Primero Mining, vice president of corporate development at Copper Mountain Mining, vice president of operations at New Gold and president and CEO of Minera Panama S.A., Inmet Mining Corporation’s subsidiary, developing the $6 billion Cobre Panama project. Mast began his career with Noranda and its affiliates, where he took on roles of increasing responsibility over a 20-year timeframe. Mast is a member of l’Ordre des ingénieurs du Québec and has a bachelors’ and masters’ degree in metallurgical engineering from McGill University. Mast also received post-secondary business training at Henley College in the UK and at the Universidad Catolica in Chile.
Gavin Nelson – CFO
Gavin Nelson has over 15 years of finance experience in public practice and corporate accounting and reporting, including being responsible for all levels of financial reporting and day-to-day accounting oversight for several public mining exploration companies. Nelson has held a number of financial oversight positions in mineral exploration companies, including chief financial officer of Mexican Gold. Nelson is a member in good standing of the chartered professional accountants of Ontario. Nelson holds a Bachelor of Administrative and Commercial Studies (Finance), with a minor in Political Science, from the University of Western Ontario.
Nicholas Kwong – COO
Nicholas Kwong, P.Eng., MBA, has more than 15 years of corporate, technical, operations experience in the mining industry, predominantly in gold and base metals in North American, Australia, Latin American and Saudi Arabia. Most recently, Kwong was general manager at Ma’aden Gold’s’ Sukhaybarat & Bulghah gold mines in Saudi Arabia. There he completed the mine and mill expansion and modernization which resulted in a significant increase in production and decrease in unit costs, all while controlling capital costs during the COVID-19 pandemic. Prior, he worked at New Gold from 2005 to 2019 in progressively responsible leadership and management roles, starting as a project engineer for the design and construction of the New Afton underground mine and gradually progressing to manager of mining engineering and director of technical services.
Kwong holds a Bachelor of Applied Sciences in Mining Engineering and a Master of Business Administration from the University of British Columbia.