Fortune Minerals Limited announced that it has engaged Deloitte & Touche Corporate Finance Canada Inc to act as Fortune's financial advisor in pursuing strategic alternatives for the advancement of both the Company's flagship projects, the Mount Klappan Metallurgical Coal project in northwest British Columbia and the NICO gold cobalt bismuth copper project in the Northwest Territories in Canada. Deloitte will assist Fortune in identifying potential financing partners and evaluating potential transactions that would provide funding for the development, construction and successful commercial production of both assets.
Mr Robin Goad president of Fortune said that "We are very pleased to be working with Deloitte again on this important corporate finance advisory mandate. Deloitte's work as our financial advisor in securing POSCO as a partner for the Mount Klappan Project demonstrated they have a leading global M&A capability focused on the mining sector. Their strong presence in critical Asian markets is especially important as Fortune looks to further advance its projects."
Mr Jeremy South, Deloitte's Global Mining M&A Leader, commented that "Our team of Mining M&A professionals in Canada and Asia will work closely with Fortune's management team to deliver its goal of securing the funding required to advance the NICO and Mount Klappan projects to production. We look forward to leveraging our global reach and expertise to assist Fortune."
Mount Klappan Metallurgical Coal Project
Mount Klappan is one of the world's premier metallurgical coal deposits, consisting of 15,866 hectares of coal exploration licenses in northwest BC and is located 330 kilometers northeast of the port of Prince Rupert. The licenses straddle the BC Railway right of way and its partially constructed roadbed, 150 kilometers north of the current terminus of track at Minaret where CN is operating under a long term lease. Mount Klappan is in the environmental assessment process for the upgrade and expansion of the railway infrastructure and for the development of an open pit mine and wash plant that is expected to produce an initial 3 million tonnes per annum of premium ultra low volatile pulverized coal injection products for the overseas steel industry. Fortune (80%) and POSCO Canada Ltd (20%) are the current joint venture partners of the project. POSCAN is the Canadian subsidiary of South Korea's POSCO, one of the largest steel producers in the world, and has investments in other North American coal companies and mineral development projects.
NICO Cobalt Gold Bismuth Project
The NICO Project is located 160 kilometers northwest of the City of Yellowknife, NT and 50 kilometers north of the Tlicho community of Whati. The 31 million tonne deposit will be developed using a combination of open pit and underground mining methods with ores projected to be processed at the rate of 4,650 tonnes per day in a mill at the site over an 18 year mine life. Other facilities that are planned at the site include a camp to accommodate employees working on a rotation basis, ancillary buildings and a 27 kilometer all season access road that will join the site to the proposed Tlicho Road connecting nearby communities with the highway to Yellowknife. The mill is expected to produce approximately 180 tonnes of bulk concentrate per day for shipment south to the Company's proposed hydrometallurgical refinery near Saskatoon and further processing. Fortune plans to be a significant, reliable North American based supplier of high purity cobalt cathode, bismuth ingot, gold doré and by product copper cathode and nickel precipitates.
