Categories: Energy / Mining Stocks
Topics: General Energy / Uranium Stocks

Standard Uranium (TSX-V: STND)(OTC: STTDF) CEO Jon Bey on Multiple Fully-Funded Uranium Exploration/Drilling Projects Kicking-Off in Canada’s Prolific Athabasca

 

Gerardo Del Real: This is Gerardo Del Real with Resource Stock Digest. Joining me today is the CEO of Standard Uranium — Mr. Jon Bey. Jon, it's great to have you on. How are you today, sir?

Jon Bey: I am doing well. Great to be talking to you as well, Gerardo.

Gerardo Del Real: Well, let's get right into it. I'm always pretty straightforward, and, obviously, I wrote a check for Standard and will be happy to write future checks and add to my position, especially at current levels given the pullback in the stock.

The last week has been really interesting for me as a shareholder and exciting as well because you now have multiple projects in regions that are seeing takeout offers and discoveries being made. 

And I think that's likely an indicator of a resurgence of M&A activity in the second half of the year along with discovery drilling that actually starts leading to new discoveries in new areas. And areas that have been very overlooked, which, of course, is kind of like the Standard Uranium MO, right; take belts and take regions with structures that are favorable and haven't seen a lot of modern exploration, consolidate them, joint venture some out, keep some, and go make a discovery.

So with that being said, I want to get into all of that. I want to start with getting your take on the macro. You have your finger on the pulse, and I want to hear what you're hearing in regards to the Fission Uranium offer and what that means for Standard Uranium. And then, definitely, we’ve got to talk about the discovery near Sun Dog.

Jon Bey: Yes, lots to unpack there. We'll talk about Fission, we'll talk about Sun Dog, and we’ll talk about the macro story. The uranium space right now is in a little bit of a downturn, and, obviously, there's been a pullback. 

If you go back 12 months, the uranium spot price was less than US$50 per pound. And then, over that late summer into the fall and into the early winter, we went from US$50 to US$106/lb. And then, from January to now, it has dropped from US$106 down to US$83 a pound.

The last several months have been kind of depressing for a lot of uranium shareholders watching the majority of their positions really trickle down on almost, if not a daily, at least a weekly basis. Just slowly pulling back and pulling back except for the major players, the major producers, who are holding and doing alright.

We’re a junior exploration firm, as you know, as a shareholder. And like many of our peers, we've sort of seen this trickle down, and it's frustrating. But as we shifted about a year ago to this project generator model, it has put us in a unique position where we don't have to go out and raise capital as prices are declining.

We've got cash flow coming in from our JV partners, and we've got two drill programs already completed. We're about to start our third drill program, all of which are fully funded. And we had a financing offering out there about two months ago, and we pulled it because we just didn't want to dilute at these share prices.

So we've got cash coming in, we're in a good position, and we'll look to go back to the market probably not until the market really gets going again in the mid-fall, which we anticipate it will once again.

So that's a lot of info at first… and right back to you again… let's get into what's going on with the Fission-Paladin offer this week. First of all, let me ask you, what'd you think of it when you first saw that? Then, I'll give you my thoughts.

Gerardo Del Real: Fission Uranium is a core position in the paid services portfolio; it’s a long-time position. It's one of those positions where when you get an asset that has that kind of scale and that kind of grade, you ride out the volatility and you let the market take its course. And that means you withstand a lot of volatility. We've seen the share price be very, very low at one point and finally pick up some steam.

Now, as it relates to this specific offer, I can tell you as a long-time follower of Fission, I think there is more to unpack. I think there is a very decent chance of a competing offer; an offer that maybe is more competitive.

Overall, I think it's great for the sector. I think it's great to see a major like Paladin come in and give the project that type of endorsement and really start looking towards the future. I think we're going to see a lot of that in the uranium space; I think we're going to see a lot of that in the copper space as well.

And frankly, it's a market that we've all been waiting years for. I think it's finally here, and I couldn't be more excited about the second half of the year.

Jon Bey: Yeah, exactly. So let me give your listeners a bit of insight here. If you look at a map and you see where that Fission Triple-R project is, our project, our Davidson River project, is basically right beside it. We basically butt up against it.

And we know that project about as good as anyone because we've been there for seven years. We work side by side with the Fission team in the Big Bear camp, which is the exploration camp where we all stay; we share the dining hall and the cabins and all of the exploration area around there. So we've gotten to know Ross and his team at Fission extremely well. We know the project, we know the rocks, we know the potential of what's there.

And for us, it's really exciting to see another company come in and put a valuation, which is 25% or 30% higher, on it to sort of make a first push and see if they're willing to make that move.

Now, it's been really interesting for us to see what's transpired over the last week. The amount of commentary happening on the billboards, the amount of people talking about it, investors and corporate executives who are talking behind the scenes about this as well.

Like you said, I think it's an exciting opportunity. So does this current offer go through? It might. Will there be competing offers? There might be. Will there be some players that come into this space that have never been in this space before? I saw rumors about that. That would be pretty interesting to see some major energy companies come into the space, which would really shake things up.

But not only have we got the Fission offer, we've got NexGen right next door who's getting more agreements from the Canadian government, giving them, hopefully, their final permits to begin construction this summer. So all of that stuff taking place is super exciting in the southwest corner.

And like you said, we're in the doldrums of the summer, end of June going into July, August; it's usually a really slow time until things really take off again in the fall. And I think this is a perfect time to have these M&A discussions happening to give people the opportunity to really digest what's going on here and for more offers to come in before things really kick off in the fall.

So it's exciting. I'm really happy to see this happening and to see that offer come across the table because there are also people talking to us now behind the scenes about our Davidson River project and how we fit into this whole equation. Would somebody be coming at us and making an offer on us? So watch as that plays out over the next few months as well.

Gerardo Del Real: Let's talk about the second half of this year. It is a catalyst-rich one. It's the one that I wrote a check for. And the reason why I haven't sold a share and I've encouraged those that didn't have a position, I've had several subscribers and colleagues reach out asking me about Standard. And I think with the current market cap, it's a gimme, right, if you're liquid enough to be patient and just wait for the market to catch up and re-rate.

If we're lucky enough to have a discovery, then the market takes care of itself. But with that being said, the exploration work that's being done, and the quality with which it's being done, and the team that you've amassed should be enough to take the market cap at several multiples of where it is today. So tell me about the second half of the year and kind of set the table for us.

Jon Bey: Yes, I fully agree with the statement you just made about where our market cap is today and where we believe we should be and where we're headed based on potential future discovery and M&A opportunities.

If you look at some of the SEDI filings, you'll see I bought shares yesterday. We've got our CFO and some of our other team members buying shares at these valuations because we believe this is an incredible time to be doubling down and getting positioned better in this company.

Where are we headed? We've got our exploration drilling program at our Sun Dog project near Uranium City kicking off in a few weeks. Myself, Sean Hillacre, and some of our exploration project geologists are all heading up there on about July 8th or 9th to get things going.

Our partners, Aero Energy and Fortune Bay, are currently in the middle of a drill program in the middle of their second hole. And they put out news on that yesterday announcing a nice discovery. They had 33,000 CPS over a very short period. Those are exciting numbers in an early exploration hole. So watch for those guys to continue to follow up on that drill program by putting multiple holes in that same structure.

The three of us, the three companies, spent the last few months doing geophysics and really helping to identify our drill targets. And it's exciting for us to be getting our first real summer drill program started in mid-July. So we're going to be following up on what they've done.

Look, it's all the same geologists, the same drillers; we're all up there and ready to go. So our exploration program is going to run from probably mid-July until probably mid to end of August. And there's going to be a lot of exciting news coming for Standard. So that’s something to really keep an eye on.

Gerardo Del Real: Looking forward to the news flow and looking forward to seeing the tiny sub-C$5 million market cap re-rate. And looking forward to having you back on hopefully soon, Jon. Thanks so much for your time. Anything to add to that?

Jon Bey: Always great talking to you, Gerardo. We love working with you and your shareholders and your followers.

For us, just keep following the news flow, watch what our insiders are doing, keep an eye on our exploration work, and follow us. We’d love to see you get some more shareholders to come along our way as well.

Gerardo Del Real: I appreciate it.

Jon Bey: Always happy to talk to you, anytime.

Gerardo Del Real: Thank you, sir. Looking forward to the next one. Cheers.

Jon Bey: Alright, take care.