Goal is to find ways to generate $900M for mine

By Tony Davis

Tucson, Arizona | Published: 10.17.2009

"It's a fantastic project, one of the pre-eminent copper projects in North America, based on the quality of the asset," said Sally Eyre, director of marketing and business development for Endeavour Financial Corp. "We're delighted to be involved."

Endeavour is headquartered in George Town, capital of the Cayman Islands in the Caribbean. It's a publicly traded, merchant-banking company focusing on mining and other natural-resource-based industries. It has offices in Vancouver, British Columbia; London; and Monaco.

In a news release, the company said the majority of the $900 million Rosemont Copper Co. needs can be raised from a range of sources. These include conventional bank financing, and equipment financing in which a company that sells equipment to the mining firm helps with financing the copper project.

Rosemont, a subsidiary of Vancouver-based Augusta Resource Corp., has also said it plans to make use of "offtake financing," a practice in which a buyer agrees in advance to buy copper at a future date — in amounts and at prices that are subject to future fluctuations.

Endeavour's most recent activity was to buy $43 million worth of stock in Etruscan Resources, a Nova Scotia-based mining company that has explored for gold and diamonds for more than 14 years in Africa, including gold-mining areas of Mali, Ghana, Burkina Faso and Cote d'Ivoire (formerly Ivory Coast) and diamond mining in South Africa.

It also has recently advised other companies on the financing, acquisition or sale of various other projects: an oil pipeline in Colombia, a gold-copper mine in the Republic of Kazakhstan and gold mining projects in Venezuela.

None of these projects is as expensive as the Rosemont mine, proposed to be built in the Santa Rita Mountains southeast of Tucson.

Endeavour lost $207.4 million through the 2008-09 fiscal year ending in June 2009, according to its financial report. It blamed the losses on the global financial crisis and investor fears of a global recession.

Its performance rebounded in the final quarter of fiscal 2008-09, during which it earned $27.7 million in net income, still down from $53.1 million a year earlier.

Rosemont proposes to mine 220 million pounds of copper annually from private land and to store waste rock and tailings on federal land.

The company says it will create 400 permanent jobs and has financed a study saying it will generate $15 billion in sales and other direct and indirect economic impacts during its life: $745 million in economic benefits annually.

Local governments and state legislators from the area are on record opposing the mine, as are many residents. Opponents are concerned the mine will damage the surrounding mountains, draw down the aquifer and pollute storm water running off into neighboring washes and canyons.

In a brief interview, Eyre said she couldn't comment on whether the company has any trepidation about injecting itself into the controversy surrounding the Rosemont mine in the Tucson area because "I haven't been close enough to those discussions to date."