Re: Investor Q&A
in response to
by
posted on
Nov 16, 2013 10:38AM
Windfall Lake Property, located near Val d'Or, Quebec: Indicated 538,000 oz. (10.05 gpt) / Inferred 822,000 oz. (8.76 gpt) (July 2012)
Investor Q&A
Eagle Hill offers this online Q&A to allow for an interactive discussion regarding Eagle Hill's business plan and activities at its Windfall Lake Gold Project. Of course you can still reach us by phone (604-697-5791) and email (info@eaglehillexploration.com), but this Q&A allows for a more public discussion, since many shareholders have the same questions. I won't always have answers right away, but I'll find the information as quickly as I can. Please check back frequently, and don't be shy about posting your questions! If you prefer to remain anonymous you can post your question using the name Shareholder. |
The recent drill results extended the main zone by 500m. What now is the lateral length of proven deposits? The mineralization included in the gold resource extends for 1.4 kms to include the F51 and F17 zones on the Murgor-Cliffs property. But the majority of the deposit, what we call the Main Zone, is well defined for a length of 800 metres, a width of 600 metres and a depth of 500 metres. The drill that we've just completed to the southwest confirms that mineralization extends at least 500 metres to the southwest, but we will need to complete additional infill drilling to determine whether mineralization is continuous enough to be included in a resource estimate. |
How does Eagle Hill get the 35% exploration tax credit back from the Quebec government? We fill out the necessary forms and provide evidence of our activities and then they cut us a cheque, but it takes about a year to get the rebate. |
Are you going to release drill results as they become available, or will you present an aggregate report with the new resource estimate in 2014? We'll probably batch the drills together based on the area / intention of the drilling. We've already released the drill results from the holes focused on testing the western extension of the deposit. The other objectives of this program are to test lateral extensions of the Zone 27, Mallard, Mink and Caribou zones, so that would logically result in four press releases, and then to test the extension of mineralization at depth, for a fifth press release. Of course sometimes it makes sense to release results more frequently if we're putting out other news, or if we've got an MDA coming out in association with our quarterly financials and want to ensure that we're providing a complete update on the Company's activities. It's a fairly flexible process. We don't want to be releasing results hole by hole, but we don't want to wait too long either. |
Is there a formula that would express the value of your mineral resource? I know that g/t, depth, jurisdiction, management, etc. all play a role in evaluation. But is there a formula that says, for example, "after you spend $5 million and prove 2 million ounces, which at today's prices would be worth $2.6 billion, at a 4% discount the mine should be worth $100 million, divided by 400 million shares outstanding each share should have a value of approximately $0.25." Until we've done a feasibility study and have reserves at the project, it's really hard to calculate the value of the gold in the ground. You can have the biggest gold deposit in the world, but if you can't get it out economically, it's not worth anything. The entire point of a feasibility study is to determine the engeering, environmental and economic parameters surrounding the project to determine how to build the project, how to mine the resource, and whether it can all be done economically. I'm sure if you go onto a mining chat room and ask people how they value pre-production deposits you'll get lots of suggestions, but there really isn't a one-formula-fits-all approach. What I can tell you is that Eagle Hill has done some preliminary metallurgical work on the deposit whichshowed that the mineralization can be extracted using a very simple crushing, flotation, cyanide flow sheet, and we get about 91.7% recovery that way. We'll continue to work on the metallurgy as exploration proceeds. I can also tell you that the deposit is easily accessible by road and the terrain is very flat, which of course significantly reduces both exploration and mining costs since we don't need helicopter support, we don't need to build any tunnels or major roads to access the site, etc. There are no significant environmental or water issues, and we already have an agreement in place with our First Nations partners. So we know that there aren't any significant hindrances to developing this project. We just need to keep drilling, do the necessary environmental, engineering and economic analyses and then, if everything is pointing toward production, get the green light from the Board! And of course with grades averaging 10 g/t gold in the indicated category, Windfall Lake can withstand lower gold prices, whereas the economics of projects with lower grade will be vulnerable if the gold price weakens. |
Around 2005, Noront had a BIG gold find and I understand they even built a ramp to access it. Where is that in your development plans? The ramp is still there. At the moment it's flooded, but the ground quality is good and we'd just need to dewater the ramp to be able to use it again. The ramp is about 1,400 metres long with a vertical depth of about 100 metres. It's not of much use to us for underground drilling, since the angles aren't quite right and when it only gives us a 100-metre advantage, we're best to just drill the holes from the best location. The ramp will be a great asset to us in the future, however, when we're ready to take a bulk sample and potentially advance the deposit toward production. |
Are there any flow-through shares available? At the moment, no. If the Company decides to offer additional flow-through shares, we will press release our intentions and provide information on how investors can participate. |
How much of the deposit can be mined by open pit method. How easy is it to mine the lenses if and when this goes to production. Studies to date indicate that this deposit will be an underground mine, should the Board decide to advance the project to production. While mineralization is very consistent within each gold lense, between lenses the grade drops significantly, which would result in significant dilution using open-pit mining methods. It does appear that parts of the deposit would be amenable to longhole mining, which is cheaper than a shaft. The mineralization is very visual - when we see 3% pyrite and higher we know we've got the gold grades that we're looking for. The drillers know that if they see pyrite they should keep going, and if they don't see pyrite they're through the mineralized zone. The same logic would apply with underground mining. |
Do you intend to follow this project all the way to production or are you anticipating selling the site to another company once the resource estimate has been proven? At this time we are keeping both options open. Our focus for the near term is to determine just how big this deposit could be. Just the first eleven holes in this drill program have discovered that mineralization extends 500 metres beyond the western limits of the Main Zone. If we keep drilling to the southwest, will mineralization continue to extend? What will we find at depth? Right now we're focused on expanding the mineralization, and ultimately the mineral resource. Once we've got the results from this drill program we'll determine next steps for the project, which will most likely include additional drilling to upgrade the resource (and perhaps additional expansion drilling), and potentially wrapping some preliminary economics around the project. The best path to building shareholder value for the near term is to continue drilling and proving the potential of this project. |
How much new finance will have to be raised in order to take this project to BFS stage? How do you intend to raise it? We have not set next year's budget yet. At the moment we are focused on the current drill program and the resource update. Once we've got those results, we'll be able to determine next steps and the amount of funding that will be required to advance the project. With regard to how we will raise additional funds, when the time comes that we need to do that, flow-through funding is logical for exploration. For the hard dollars required for G&A and other corporate activities, we could fund that internally through the exercise of warrants. There are nearly 90 million warrants outstanding at $0.10, which would bring in close to $9 million if exercised. Knowing that we could exercise the warrants gives us the flexibility of funding internally or through the market or a private placement, and we can choose the pathway that will bring the best value to shareholders and the project. |
How much more of the site is there left to explore once this phase of drilling is complete? LOTS. We have tested only a small portion of the property. The top map on this PDF shows you where the Main Zone is located in the 12,400 hectare property. Eagle Hill owns 100% of everything in green and has the option to earn up to 100% of everything in grey. We will certainly focus our near-term exploration in the green areas. The bottom map shows you the Main Zone, and where we've drilled around the Main Zone. You can see that there is still a great deal of 100%-owned ground to the west, east and south of the Main Zone that has not been drilled at all. The most recent drill results came from the area marked "Open" on this map. We drilled eleven holes to the southwest of the Main Zone, stepping out 150, 300 and 500 metres, and every single stepout discovered mineralization. How much farther to the west does mineralization extend? To the east? To the south? At depth? |
How is the drilling progressing at Windfall Lake? When will the flow of results commence? We released first results on November 5. We are currently drilling extensions of the gold lenses in the Main Zone. I expect that we will batch those results, for example releasing all holes related to Lense 27, then all holes related to the Caribou Lense, etc. Hopefully we'll have results coming every few weeks now, until the program is finished. |
What is the plan for 2014? Where do you guys see the share price in 6 months? How are you guys going to add value to shareholders by issuing more shares? Unfortunately we cannot predict future share price. Our value in the market is influenced by many things that are beyond our control, including global economics, general market sentiment, and the gold price. What we can control is how we manage the company and how we advance the project. Our focus for the near term is on expansion drilling to determine just how big this mineral deposit could be. We had good success with drilling to the southwest of the Main Zone. We are also going to drill at depth, and at the lateral ends of each of main gold lenses to see if we can extend mineralization further. This will give us the information we need to decide whether we should do more expansion drilling, or focus on infill drilling to upgrade the resource. We should be in a position to decide next steps fairly early in 2014. The way we will add value in the near term is by continuing to prove the potential size of this deposit. The grades are already outstanding. With an average grade of 10.1 g/t gold in the indicated category, Windfall Lake is in the top 7% of resource stage projects worldwide. What we need to prove now is just how big this deposit could be. That's how we'll add value. |