I am not questioning whether the porphyry is there. Auryn says it is “highly prospective” of a copper/moly porphyry. That is a pretty strong statement. I have no reason to disagree with it.
Your original question was about grades. The safest bet, until there is more data, is to look at the Singer report and take the average grades of a copper / moly porphyry. But they need drilling to determine the size, the proximity to surface, grades at depth, etc. But the data so far is not enough to push a “dream grade” exceptional porphyry narrative.
IMO the aspect that could end up being ‘most exceptional’ about it is that it may be easily accessible from the side of the mountain, i.e. it is potentially close to surface, rather than having to remove 1/3 of the plateau. So this could lead to a cheaper-to-mine deposit. But to bring money to the table that idea would have to be proven. And that requires a lot of work be done with the drills and the modeling and formal reports. And that’s why we are looking at several years of exploration and why Auryn is bothering to start up short term mining to fund that anticipated exploration period.
If it was obvious to the professionals that there was an at surface 1.2% Cu / 860 ppm of the average 500MT, we would not be here any more. Therefore, it is not obvious.
In addition, the LDM is being “reinterpreted” according to Auryn’s presentation, in a potentially very positive way. But work remains.
Finally they have high grade gold @ 5000 tpm to mine in order to fund say $10M, $15M or more per year in exploration for a few years.
It was clear, imo, that by Aug 2017, not enough would be done to justify the $100M cash payment, so the deal had to be restructured because Auryn was not going to pay. And nobody wanted them to walk. The new deal gives Auryn more time. In compensation, the new deal keeps Auryn working on the mountain and gives MDMN a larger part of the action. Obviously the risk for MDMN is higher than if Auryn had just written a $100M check. Now it’s a waiting game for us and a lots-of-work-to-be-done game for Auryn.
And once that porphyry becomes obvious to the professionals, or the LDM reinterpretation becomes settled in the very positive direction, or a great magnitude of the high grade gold becomes ‘formal reserves’ and easy to mine, then the next stage will come when offers come our way to exit stage left (i.e. a TO), imo. That’s how it works in this industry.
