Categories: Energy
Topics: General Energy

Blue Sky Uranium (TSX-V: BSK) CEO Niko Cacos on Drilling at the District Scale Amarillo Grande Uranium Project

Gerardo Del Real: This is Gerardo Del Real with Resource Stock Digest. Joining me today is the President and CEO of Blue Sky Uranium, Mr. Niko Cacos. Nico, long time, no hear. How have you been?

Niko Cacos: I've been doing very well. And right now that I'm on your program, Gerardo, I'm a very happy person.

Gerardo Del Real: I am excited.

Niko Cacos: Glad to be here.

Gerardo Del Real: I'm excited to have you back on. It's been a bit, as I mentioned. You had some really important news today in regards to your Amarillo Grande uranium project in Argentina. This is one of the most consequential I believe, and important projects, uranium projects, in Argentina, in South America frankly. And I would love for you to provide a brief overview of the project for those that might not be familiar with it.

Niko Cacos: Absolutely. And I think you hit it right on the button when you said it's a very important project. There's not many new uranium discoveries around the world, let alone a new uranium district. This is an enormous district that spans over 145 kilometers, about 50 kilometers wide. Blue Sky owns all the land package in between. And there are uranium occurrences throughout this entire region. You know, our management team, the Grosso Group has been pivotal, has been the team behind Blue Sky that's been able to identify this and manage it and bring it to its head. We have an initial discovery there of just under 23 million pounds of uranium and 11 million pounds of vanadium. And I think there are two takeaways to this. Our prime objective is to make this amongst the largest and amongst the lowest cost uranium productions in the world.

And we're on route to that path because our preliminary economic study that we did just about a year and a half ago, demonstrates that if this were in production today, they would rank amongst the lowest producers in the world, simply because the uranium occurs close to surface. And the second takeaway is we plan... you know 23 million pounds is not shabby, but we think that the district contains an enormous potential. Just like the districts in Kazakhstan, in Australia that grow up to be a hundred to 200 million pounds of uranium. And I think with the drill program that we announced today, this is what we're going to demonstrate over the next couple of months, how quickly and easily we can expand this uranium discovery.

Gerardo Del Real: You mentioned the group and the team, the Grosso Group obviously. Can you explain how the group, frankly, pioneered exploration and resource development in Argentina. The group has been there for decades and is largely responsible for re-inventing exploration and development in that part of the world.

Niko Cacos: Absolutely. Prior to 1993, exploration and mining industry as a whole in Argentina was essentially non-existent. It wasn't until '92, '93, the Grosso Group went there, one of the pioneers of opening up mining and mining exploration in Argentina. Since that time, the Grosso Group has been responsible for uncovering four major discoveries. The Gualcamayo gold mine, which is still in production today, the Navidad silver deposit, which is one of the largest silver deposits in the world, the Chinchillas silver-lead deposit, which is currently in production and we were in partnership with SSR Mining until we sold our stake recently, and the last and most current discovery that we have that we're working on is the Amarillo Grande uranium vanadium discovery in southern Argentina. Argentina is a vast country, the eighth largest country in the world that's seen very little exploration. So the discovery potential there is huge. Joe Grosso actually identified that back in 1993. And I think his record has proven correct.

Gerardo Del Real: Agreed. You recently raised an up-sized financing of $5.46 million. I say up size because that wasn't the original amount, but the interest was so high that you had to increase it. Can you speak to that a bit? And then let's get right into today's news, which obviously is where a lot of that money is going to go. You announced a pretty comprehensive drilling program and engineering studies to advance the Amarillo Grande Project.

Niko Cacos: That's right. Well, we embarked on raising some money between Christmas and New Year's, which is typically the slowest and quietest time of the year. And we initially wanted to raise to three, three and a half million dollars, and we received such an overwhelming interest that we expanded that to up to five and a half million dollars, and we still turned away millions of dollars. It was absolutely incredible. And the quality of the investors that were requesting, I'm talking about smart money, institutional investors, funds, very sophisticated family money. So this wasn't just our buddies down the street here. This was global money and smart money, so it was very, very encouraging to see.

We're well cashed up now. And I think like we announced in today's program, we have a big drill program. We've got 4,500 meters of drilling that we're about to start. It's going to take course over the next three months and we're going to test four different targets. And the idea is to take, like I said at the outset, the 23 million pounds of deposits that we currently have, and our internal objective is to double it or do better than that. And that will definitely put Amarillo Grande on a world scale that will be too big for anybody to ignore.

Gerardo Del Real: A lot of people smarter than I have been calling for a bull market for years on end. I called for it last year and I'd love to get your take, Nico, it appears that we finally have price action, volume, timing and fundamentals on our side for 2021 to really be a breakout year. It's being led by the equities not so much the spot price yet. I'd love your take on the uranium market.

Niko Cacos: Oh, absolutely. We've been hearing that for a long time, but being on the corporate side, we know that we have a good project. We have always focused on having a project that could be economic in the current times. Not if the price of uranium takes off like the experts say, that would just make our company that much more profitable. So yes, I agree. You know, timing is key. I think we're at an excellent time right now to embark on this drill program. And I think as we've seen some of the the larger equities, even today, I watched Cameco and they're up like $3, $4 a share, and they're starting to create a multi-year high. This is very exciting. I think Blue Sky and its shareholders, their time has come and we're going to see some great returns, hopefully.

Gerardo Del Real: Don't let the Redditors get ahold of uranium. That could be a very, very fun ride to take.

Niko Cacos: Absolutely. I mean uranium is... I think we've seen a wholesale change in society the way uranium is viewed. I mean, uranium is a new clean type of energy. We know that it's safe. We know that it's cheap to produce and it's sustainable. And especially these small modular reactors are proving to be a real game changer globally right now. So yes, the uranium demand is definitely here. We're seeing a gap in demand over what is supply. And I think we're seeing that initial rise here with the equities and the spot price is also beginning to make a move in the right direction.

Gerardo Del Real: Niko, thanks for your time. I can't wait to have you back on and talk results from this program here.

Niko Cacos: Be happy to. Thank you for having me.

Gerardo Del Real: Stay safe out there.

Niko Cacos: You too.

Gerardo Del Real: Thanks.

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