Regards,

Michael

Here is an article from MineWeb summarizing the conference:

Mines & Money Hong Kong – Overview of a very positive event

A retrospective overview of Mines & Money Hong Kong which took place last week and encompassed some very interesting presentations and panel discussions.

Author: Lawrence Williams
Posted: Monday , 25 Mar 2013

LONDON (MINEWEB) -

What a difference 12,000 km and a couple of weeks makes in the junior mining sector. Mines & Money Hong Kong (MMHK) proved to be a much more upbeat event than this year’s PDAC was in Toronto. The doom and gloom which pervaded the latter just didn’t seem to be so prevalent in Hong Kong. Maybe this was a function of the companies attending – the PDAC attracts juniors in all states of financial strength from the haves to the have-nots attending almost as a last desperate throw of the dice in hope of raising just a little money. Those having to cover the expense of exhibiting in Hong Kong probably have a little more financial strength in any case – and the show was dominated by Australian juniors rather than Canadian ones and the ASX has perhaps not suffered quite the meltdown experienced on the TSX-V, although juniors have indeed having to nurse their wounds there too.

What is also pleasant after the horrendous crowds at the PDAC is that MMHK was a far more relaxed event – and that there was a broader range of keynote and featured speakers definitely draws an appreciative audience in, although the auditorium definitely thins out for the 10 minute long presentations allowed for the junior companies trying to present their wares to hoped for investors. But talking to the organisers it does seem that enough of the juniors are sufficiently impressed to get them to sign up already for next year’s event.

Timing is also good. It may have been too close to the PDAC for some, but it finished just ahead of the Hong Kong rugby sevens which has a strong appeal for many of the Australians attending in particular, as well as the expatriate Brits who are well represented on the junior scene.

Of course the gold price had made a move upwards breaking back through the $1600 mark as Cyprus hit the newswires, and with many of the exhibitors involved in gold mining and exploration , that did add a welcome bit of cheer to the proceedings. However it remains to be seen whether gold’s gains can be maintained in the face of the recent bearish momentum which has afflicted it.

Organisation seemed to be efficient. Indeed the organisers should be congratulated on putting together such an interesting speaker programme which incorporated one or two mavericks amongst the mainstream, not least of whom was Grant Williams who opened the proceedings on the second day with a fascinating, controversial and exceedingly well-presented keynote address. Eric Sprott. speaking on the following day, concurred with many of Williams’ views, although some of the audience, and other speakers were a little sceptical on their very bullish case for gold. Not so a gold panel, also on the second day, although quite what worries about taking U.S. citizens’ guns away had to do with the main topic of financial flows into the gold sector was harder to determine.

There were some excellent overview presentations starting with Dr Allen Trench of CRU Strategies Australia who was the keynote speaker on the opening day looking ahead on commodity prices over the next few years. Others covered various aspects of mining and metals, the impact of China, financing new developments etc. and there were some very positive presentations from major mining and associated companies like Newcrest, Goldcorp, Royal Gold and Fortescue. Robert Friedland gave his usual bullish assessment of his current major projects – Platreef in South Africa and Kamoa and Kipushi in the DRC. He may well have three brilliant prospects here but he is in danger of talking them up so highly (the world’s largest platinum discovery, the world’s biggest and richest copper discovery and the world’s richest mine of any kind) that many will underrate a plethora of projects which appears almost to be too good to be true. More fool they would probably be Friedland’s response – and he does indeed have an impressive track record of coming up with some remarkable projects in Voisey’s Bay nickel in Canada and Oyu Tolgoi copper/gold in Mongolia, although the former is not necessarily proving to be quite as profitable as the early hype had suggested and the latter is experiencing political difficulties and there are stories going around that there could be technical problems there too. Caveat emptor! We shall see. Friedland certainly has a great track record in selling off his projects for huge sums of money. Summitville gold in the U.S. is conveniently forgotten.

The juniors presenting were limited to 10 minute overviews, which some handled a lot better than others – this was necessary to get through the 140 or so companies which took up this opportunity. Indeed the short presentations were welcomed by much of the audience who, if the presenter whetted their interest, could follow up at the presenting companies’ exhibit booths.

There were some 270 exhibitors – mostly junior miners and explorers, but interspersed with engineering companies, analysts, financial institutions, accountants, software companies, manufacturers and lawyers. Australian juniors dominated – indeed one Australian financial exhibitor we talked to reckoned he could see senior executives of as many companies there in a couple of days as it would take him at least a couple of months to see back home. That’s what an exhibition of this type is all about.

There were some interesting, and valuable, workshops running alongside the main event and overall Mines & Money Hong Kong has taken its place in the mining event calendar as perhaps the best event so far in Southeast Asia. Leo Stemp, the Conference Director for the Mines & Money events, took on the job of introducing and chairing many of the sessions and did an excellent job. Altogether a valuable and enlightening five days.