Libero Copper and Gold Corp. (LBC:TSX.V; LBCMF:OTCQB) announced it has extended the Terry porphyry copper-gold discovery at its Big Red property in British Columbia’s Golden Triangle.
The company drilled four holes for a total of 2,790 meters. Three of them tested syenite porphyry intrusion targets to the east of the discovery but found no significant copper-gold mineralization.
The final hole, hole BR-22-043, intersected 0.24% copper (Cu) and 0.03 grams per tonne gold (g/t Au) over 100.5 meters, successfully testing the down-dip extension of the porphyry copper-gold mineralization found in an earlier hole, BR-21-028. That hole returned 0.26% Cu and 0.06 g/t Au over 118.7 meters.
“Despite drilling not returning significant results to the east of Terry, we continue to believe that Libero has the potential to make an economic discovery at Big Red with a follow up drilling program to vector towards the center of the porphyry system, where higher grades would be expected,” Red Cloud Securities wrote Jan. 17 in its Rocks Daily newsletter.
Red Cloud analyst Taylor Combaluzier has rated the stock Buy with a target of CA$1.40.
The company plans to follow up this year with fieldwork at the Poker, Windy, TGR North, Ridge, and West deposits.
“We will be analyzing all the field data in preparation for the 2023 field season,” Libero Chief Executive Officer Ian Harris said.
The Catalyst: The ‘Metal of Electrification’
To meet the demands of the new green economy, huge amounts of copper will be required.
Electric vehicles (EVs) would not exist in their current form without copper; they use three times as much as cars with internal combustion engines because of its electrical conductivity. The infrastructure for charging them also will require plenty of the red metal for solar cells and batteries.
“While a variety of metals and rare earth elements have received a great deal of attention by governments, media, think tanks, and universities, one of the most underappreciated critical minerals is also one of the most familiar and most fundamental — copper,” S&P Global wrote in a recent report, The Future of Copper. “Deeper electrification requires wires, and wires are primarily made from copper.”
According to the report, copper, “the metal of electrification,” is essential to all energy plans. Demand is expected to double from about 25 million metric tons (Mmt) today to about 50 Mmt by 2035. The amount of copper that will be required by 2050 will be more than all the copper consumed by the world between 1900 and 2021, it said.
The challenges this poses are reminiscent of the 20th-century scramble for oil but may be accentuated by an even higher geographic concentration of copper resources and the downstream industry to refine it into products, S&P wrote.
Red Cloud analyst Taylor Combaluzier has rated the stock Buy with a target of CA$1.40.
“The chronic gap between worldwide copper supply and demand projected to begin in the middle of this decade will have serious consequences across the global economy,” the report said. “In the 21st century, copper scarcity may emerge as a key destabilizing threat to international security. Projected annual shortfalls will place unprecedented strain on supply chains.”
No Turning Back
At Big Red, a total of 614 surface rocks were collected and assayed as part of last year’s fieldwork. Assays confirm the previous historical sampling results from these areas with mineralized samples containing up to 10 g/t Au, Libero said.
In addition to the Big Red property, the company also has projects in Colombia and Argentina. The Mocoa project, discovered in 1973, is the largest copper resource in Colombia, according to the company. Libero said it’s working with authorities to start drilling at its Esperanza project in Argentina.
One out of five vehicles sold worldwide could be an EV in less than two years, and Ford and General Motors have set a goal of achieving 40–50% of their sales from EVs in the U.S. by 2030.
The transition to clean energy is expected to bring 10.3 million new jobs globally by 2030, the World Economic Forum noted in March. That increase will offset the 2.7 million jobs expected to be cut in fossil fuels.
There is no possibility of turning back now, Harris said about the switch. “It’s a done deal.”
Ownership and Share Structure
Streetwise Ownership Overview*
Libero Copper and Gold Corp. (LBC:TSX.V; LBCMF:OTCQB)
According to the company, 28.5% of Libero is owned by institutional investors, Anglo Asian Mining Plc. owns 19.6%, high net worth investors own 6.5%, management and insiders own 5.2%, B2Gold Corp. owns 3.2%, and 37% is retail.
The company is covered by Taylor Combaluzier of Red Cloud Securities and newsletter writers Clive Maund of Clivemaund.com, Bob Moriarty of 321gold.com, David Forest of International Speculator, Brien Lundin of the Gold Newsletter (Jefferson Financial), and Gwen Preston of Resource Maven. Click "See More Live Data" in the data box above to view more of what they are saying.
Its market cap is CA$14.61 million, and it has 90.6 million shares outstanding, 70.3 million of them floating. It trades in a 52-week range of CA$1.05 and CA$0.115.
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