Categories: Base Metals / Precious Metals
Topics: General Base Metals / General Precious Metals

Orestone Mining (TSX-V: ORS)CEO David Hottman on Hunting for a Deposit at the Gold-Copper Captain Project in British Columbia

Gerardo Del Real: This is Gerardo Del Real with Resource Stock Digest. Joining me today is the CEO of Orestone Mining (TSX-V: ORS)(OTC: ORESF), Mr. David Hottman. David, how are you?

David Hottman: Very good, Gerardo. How are you?

Gerardo Del Real: I am well, thank you for asking. Let's get right to it. We have gold flirting with $2,000 again. We have copper above $3 a pound. You took a big swing at the Resguardo Project. I know the drill results were not what anyone hoped for. But exploration – we talked a bit off-air – exploration is what it is, and if it was easy metal prices would not be where they are today.

Can we talk a little bit about Resguardo? Then let's get on and talk about the Captain Project, which again, it's another big swing, right?

David Hottman: Yes, that's correct. Resguardo, we had a project where you had copper and gold mineralization exposed at surface. There was previous mining of some really good grades. We put together a small exploration program after acquiring the option on the property to test for what we thought might be the source of that mineralization. It was a really big geophysical anomaly just offset from previous mineralization that was mined, as I mentioned. We drilled it and it wasn't there.

Like we discussed, that's exploration. The next drill hole can be a big win. I'll use as an example Kodiak Copper, which is probably known to you and other people. They hit a nice drill hole in a big porphyry and the stock went up $36 million in market cap. I think you had mentioned previous to starting recording, we've got a $4 million market cap. That's the business we're in, if you can make your stock go up by 10 times, that's the business we're in.

Gerardo Del Real: Absolutely. The market cap that you currently have obviously supports a ton of upside. I always say, you should look at companies that allow for multiple misses, as long as the testing can be done efficiently and quickly. Again, to the credit of the team, it wasn't an expensive program. It was a big swing. Had you hit, we'd be having a different conversation, but that's that. Here we are, you're in good shape for the next program.

You're pivoting now to the Captain Project, which has seen exploration in the past. It's a project the team understands very well. Can you provide a brief overview? Then let's talk about the fact that it sounds like by month end, you'll have a rig turning.

David Hottman: That's right. This is a project that is a number of years in the making in that it is just south of a known producing mine, the Mount Milligan Mine. Exploration started south of the mine quite some time ago. Just in the last three, four years, we're really starting to understand the project. We believe we've found the key to unlock the value now. That is that we have a cluster of mag anomalies that have coincident, moderate IP signatures. The drilling that we did over the last number of years has identified the deposit model and allowed us to be able to target more efficiently. We believe now that we can – it's not necessarily as easy as shooting fish in a barrel – but we can isolate these targets and drill with a lot higher probability of success.

Gerardo Del Real: You've drilled on two of the eastern anomalies, correct? If I'm not mistaken, you had some pretty impressive intercepts. I think you had intervals of 6.1 and 9.1 meters of, I think, it was 4.45 grams per tonne gold and almost 6.5 grams per tonne gold with copper credits that were pretty impressive as well. Is all that accurate there? I'm working off of memory.

David Hottman: Yeah, that's very accurate. Don't lie to everybody, you read that.

Gerardo Del Real: I read it earlier, but right now I was working off of memory.

David Hottman: Yes, it's a system that actually every place that we have drilled and gotten a mineralized intercept on the property, there's a very high ratio of gold to copper. They're more gold-rich poryphyries than your classic copper porphyry. That's exciting in and of itself in that we're more gold bugs than copper bulls, just as a history in the business. The targets that we're going to be drilling each have the capability of being a deposit. We'll drill another two or three of the targets, maybe as many as four of the targets. They're relatively close to surface in that there's only maybe 20 to 40 meters of overburden on the particular targets we're going to be drilling.

There'll be, call it, 200-meter holes. As I say, we've got the deposit model down. We'll test two to four of these targets. It only takes one. That's the key to the methodology we're using is, it's kind of hit and run. We're not going to drill 10 holes in one target and do the definition of insanity, which is you continue to do the things that don't work. That's the definition of insanity. We're going to be putting a hole in each of these targets. If it's mineralized, great, then we know that we can come back with a 10-hole program.

Gerardo Del Real: Again, to be clear, you're looking for a legitimate discovery. You don't have any interest in just getting some numbers that read well on a headline to get the stock price up. I know the team, the history of success. You obviously are hot for the next deposit, pun intended

David Hottman: We're in the business to create wealth or create value, not just flog stock. We've been involved in numerous big porphyries in the past, all of them are gold porphyries in Chile. Two of them down there have a combined 35 million ounces of gold. Then one in Turkey, which turned out to be 12, 13 million ounces of gold. So that's what we're looking for at Captain. We're not looking for something that's small and mediocre. We're looking to find a big deposit, something that's meaningful that will create a billion dollars worth of value.

Gerardo Del Real: How's the infrastructure?

David Hottman: Infrastructure is fantastic. It's been previously logged because of a pine beetle infestation that killed the forest. Basically it's been clearcut. There's some re-forestation that's been done, but basically it's a network of good logging roads on a relatively flat plateau and very easy to get around. In fact, our permitting for the entire 26 square kilometer project is only $14,000 Canadian because we're drilling on the roads. That's how many roads there are. Almost every single target has a road over the top of it. So we're able to access them with virtually no permitting, virtually no infrastructure build out. You drive up, you drill the hole and kick dirt into the hole.

Gerardo Del Real: Fully-funded drill program?

David Hottman: Fully funded. We're only going to be spending, say, a quarter of a million dollars Canadian on the project. We've got over a half million in the bank. Just getting a good drill hole opens up the marketplace to raise as much money as you want. We're not needing any funding at the moment. Sometime in the next year, we'll need to put together some funding.

Gerardo Del Real: Sounds good. David, anything else that you'd like to add?

David Hottman: No. I think that pretty much covers it. Everybody, good hunting. It's a bull market, let's make some money.

Gerardo Del Real: Absolutely. Thank you so much for the update. I appreciate it.

David Hottman: Thanks, Gerardo.