Amur Minerals outlines plan for Kun-Manie feasibility study

Nickel-copper sulphide exploration and development company Amur Minerals Corporation updated shareholders on its strategy for the compilation of the bankable feasibility study on its Kun-Manie nickel-copper sulphide project in Russia’s far east, which it noted was adjacent to the largest nickel consuming nations of China, Korea and Japan.

The AIM-traded firm said that, as it made “good progress” on its permanent conditions TEO and received key resource, mining and processing information from the work programme, it was looking beyond the completion of the TEO - Russia’s mandatory feasibility study - to the compilation of the bankable feasibility study.

It said the purpose of a bankable feasibility study was to provide the technical, environmental and economic detail of the project to give institutional investors the confidence to proceed with the project financing, necessary to advance Kun-Manie through construction and into production.

The study strategy covered three areas, being finalising the detailed plan, costing and technical parameters for the bankable feasibility study, attaining binding offtake agreements, initiating the funding for the study.

It released its pre-feasibility Study in February 2019, ahead of the start of the TEO, with the board saying on Wednesday that the bankable feasibility study objectives were “broadly the same” as the pre-feasibility study, but had a “far greater level of detail and accuracy”.

In addition to the data being provided by the TEO on the Kun-Manie mine site, the bankable feasibility study would also cover the detailed engineering and costing for the access road, the proposed rail siding and logistics.

The company said it was currently in the process of finalising the detailed plan and costing of the study, and would begin engaging with potential partners who will assist in the compilation of it.

Amur announced on 11 June that it had received non-binding indicative offtake terms for both the nickel and copper concentrates, which was a TEO requirement for establishing that a marketable product could be generated.

The firm said it would continue to engage with the wider metals commodities market, with the objective of obtaining binding offtake agreements.

It said the attainment of binding agreements would be an important step in attracting the funding for the bankable feasibility study.

Amur said its primary funding objective was to position the company so that it can finance the bankable feasibility study.

It was envisaged that the funding would be primarily through debt, with a further component funded through equity, or a supporting investment from an offtake partner.

In addition, the firm said it was actively seeking to invest in mining opportunities in the near future that were either near cash flow, or were already in production in established mining jurisdictions.

The objective for the strategy was to provide revenue streams to fund the company's corporate activities through the bankable feasibility study and beyond.

“Significant progress has been achieved on the TEO, and we are on track to complete this for December,” said chief executive officer Robin Young.

“Beyond this, our next major milestone is the bankable feasibility study, which is a substantive body of work.”

Young said that as the Company started planning for the study, it was equally important that it planned for the future funding requirements.

“The addition of Adam Habib to the team has added to our capability to market the Kun-Manie project to a wider pool of financing sources, which have an interest funding projects through to completion of a bankable feasibility study."

At 1109 BST, shares in Amur Minerals were down 12.73% at 1.2p.