Categories: Base Metals
Topics: General Base Metals

Alaska Energy Metals (TSX-V: AEMC)(OTC: AKEMF) CEO Greg Beischer on Scale, Continuity and Exploration Upside at Nikolai

 

Gerardo Del Real: This is Gerardo Del Real with Resource Stock Digest. Joining me today is the president and CEO of Alaska Energy Metals, Mr. Greg Beischer. Greg overdue update. It's good to have you back on. How are you today, sir?

Greg Beischer: Yeah, I'm glad to be talking with you again, Gerardo. We've had a bit of a lull in the action, but we're back on track now.

Gerardo Del Real: Well, let's get right into it. I believe that we are in the midst of a commodity super cycle that has many, many years to go. You have the Nikolai project, which it's a large accumulation of nickel with copper, with cobalt, chrome, iron, platinum, palladium and gold. And so the issue with the project as far as the devil's advocate point of view has always been, will the grade hold up or the continuity hold up? Is there enough of it to make it economic?

And of course, in a commodity super cycle, that question starts answering itself in a more favorable fashion as the market moves higher. You just announced the drilling program to target some pretty compelling geological, geophysical, geochemical targets, and so I wanted to touch base on that because I think it's an important program that can really help provide a path forward on the project. As far as the potential economics go, I'll let you provide the context. I know that was a heck of an intro there as far as a lot all in one, but I haven't had you on for a while and I want to make sure we give a thorough update there.

Greg Beischer: Sure thing. Well, you're right. I mean, as of a few months ago, we announced that we have a bonafide 43-101 deposit of nickel along with the other metals you mentioned, most of which fall on the United States critical and strategic list. It is a very substantial resource. It is continuous, it's homogeneous, and it's probably a lot bigger than we've so far outlined. The deposit appears to continue in both directions, southeast and northwest and even to depth. And the concentration of mineralization is not that high, but it is very continuous and homogeneous, which is important. Big companies love these large scale projects, but having said that, it would always help to have higher grade.

And even if we can find some higher grade pods, that will really help with the economics because it helps with rapid payback of the capital. These large scale projects typically have very high capital costs, and the sooner that capital cost can be paid back, the better the project economics will be. And then once it's paid back, I mean these big mines just keep churning out metal and profits for the mining company in the future. So finding high grade pods or even standalone very high grade deposits is high on our list of things to do. We spent a lot of time last year doing the groundwork for that, geophysical surveys, so that we were ready to test for those higher grade zones. We've recently raised cash, and that's how we're deploying it, is drilling some very compelling geologic geophysical targets to find higher grade mineralization.

Gerardo Del Real: You recently put together, look, the deposit, the 43-101, the exploration upside is all great, and it's pretty clear what you're targeting there. But along with that, you mentioned raising capital and having capital markets experience and people that know how to advance a project of this scale is going to be important if the project succeeds and you're able to monetize the asset. Can you speak to the group that you're involved with that now is helping provide a lot of the guidance here for the company moving forward?

Greg Beischer: Yes, for sure. Yeah, we had some turnover in our board of directors and some quite strong people with admirable track records come on and invest in the company in a pretty big way. And these people have created and sold monetized companies in the past very successfully, making great profits for the shareholders of the company. They've lived through it, some of them multiple times, and so I'll be really happy to have that guidance and direction from the new board members. So very pleased with this development. This project's getting really serious now. I can see that in two to three years from now, we'd be at the point where we could be applying for mine permits and go into that permitting process to get there is going to take a lot of money.

And that is probably going to mean alliances with larger companies, whether they're mining companies, refining companies, or end consumers. For example, we noticed with great interest that Samsung invested in a company that would be a peer to us, Canada Nickel Company. So they're an end user that uses nickel right now primarily for the manufacturer of batteries for electric vehicles, laptops, phones, what have you. That's a whole new demand for nickel on top of the base demand of stainless steel. So a strategic partner is likely to be in our future and the board members that have come in will be able to help a lot with that, I think.

Gerardo Del Real: What comes next, Greg?

Greg Beischer: Well, we're drilling right now, now that we've raised at least the first tranche of the financing that we announced a few weeks ago, suddenly everything changed.

Gerardo Del Real: Funny how that works, huh?

Greg Beischer: Yeah, I think our share price had been artificially depressed. The investing public and financiers realized that the company was really low on cash, and frankly, even a little desperate. But once we raised a few million dollars, all of a sudden that selling pressure came off and the share price started to rise. And if there was any short sellers, they've been chased away. And that may have contributed into the large volume and the big trading days we've experienced over the last couple of days. But I think more of that volume is a recognition that we do have a great big deposit going into a metal super cycle.

If you compare our deposit to the pure companies like Canada Nickel, we really should be valued higher. And I think some of that value is being recognized, but we're also drilling, and you know when you're drilling holes into brand new prospects, there's the potential for that brand new discovery. And these are really compelling targets where we could hit really high grade. We've got high grade surface samples that tell us there's a high grade nickel sulfides in the area. So yeah, I think people are excited about what we're doing, and now that the fear that the company could run out of money has evaporated, then our share price is moving up nicely.

Gerardo Del Real: Greg, it's great to have you on. I mentioned it was an overdue update. Good luck with all of it. Let's definitely keep in touch and anything else that we can do, always happy to have you on. Can't wait for the assays. Looking forward to seeing how the new group and yourself advanced the project here over the next several months and years.

Greg Beischer: Thanks very much, Gerardo. Talk to you again.

Gerardo Del Real: All right, Greg. Cheers.