Niko Cacos from Blue Sky. You're in
Argentina but before we get started,
tell me your symbol and what exchange are you on?
We are on Toronto Venture
Exchange under the symbol BSK.
Okay. Argentina though.
Argentina.
You have a property in Argentina. What is it about Argentina that made you say 'okay this is
where we want to be'? Because you're not
new to it either.
No, we're not new. We
have a 26-year history in Argentina
through our management group, this is the
Grosso group, and we have quite an
impeccable track record in that country.
You know we've made four - this is our
fourth major world class discovery. Two
previous that we've got here - first discovery was the Guacamaya Gold Mine.
That was put into production and
run by Yamana.
That's a pretty good partner.
We discovered the Navidad
Silver Deposit, which is the world's
largest undeveloped silver deposit and
that right now is held by Pan American
Silver - Ross Beaty.
Ross Beaty, yeah.
And we discovered the Chinchilla Silver
Mine, which we, together with SSR
Mining, now have put into commercial
production since the last couple of
months.
Mmm-hmm.
And here, we're here to talk about
uranium.
Yes.
Blue sky, we have, in southern Argentina, uncovered not just a deposit or a piece of property, an entire
district, that - we own it all. 145 kilometre strike went like 50 kilometers wide.
This is -
It's the mother lode!
I like to call it the Saudi Arabia of
uranium. Like this is big - this is very, very significant.
Okay, but it is uranium - uranium is still a little soft.
Yeah uranium it's coming out of a bear
market. I mean, you got to remember
in the last year, uranium price of, spot
price of uranium has come up 50
percent.
Right, but is that not also with
some producers holding on and not
producing that they're that they're now
creating that mark?
That's right, they're creating that but we're also seeing
organic growth within the industry because nuclear reactors are now becoming
very popular again to generate electricity. A lot of emerging market
countries are now, you know, they don't
like - they don't like having to import oil
and all the politics that goes with that.
And coal of course.
And coal you know, in the last decade or two we've seen the price of building these
reactors come down, the time frame to
build them become cheaper and you
know quite frankly, uranium has no carbon footprint, it's reliable, it's the most
efficient form of electricity generation.
Mm-hmm.
And it's being recognized today around
the world.
Ok but where specifically is
that market? We know there's
market in the United States and it
appears there is an emerging market in China, and in
India. Where is the future as far as
uranium consumption is concerned?
Well yes, China is definitely a big
driver. I think there's 71 nuclear
reactors in construction globally right
now and about half of those are in China
and in India but we're seeing them even
in places like the Emirates.
In Emirates, of all places, of all places, right? Building them, because it is effective,
its efficient and a lot of others in Africa.
They're becoming more popular and
Argentina. Argentina has three nuclear
reactors producing right now. They have
another one that they're building and
two more that are being commissioned. And
they're doing this, again, to get away
from the politics that having to import
oil and having to you know use dollars
to acquire it and they're doing it to
also abide to reduce their own pollution
in carbon footprint in that country.
So what else has happened though in the
uranium market? Because there was a
tremendous fear about it at one point.
Nuclear energy eh, I'm not so sure, you
know, the downside of an incident. But
that concern seems to literally be
melting away in light of a desire to
create a greener series or a greener
sources of energy production.
Correct and no you're correct but I think what's
happening is we're not - they're not doing
that just to find an alternative
source of energy. I think the safety
record for uranium is the most dangerous
thing about it is just the fear itself. I think if they didn't - if they used electricity first,
when they first
discovered it, to electrocute people, I
think people be terrified by electricity.
And they used uranium to
build nuclear bombs and I think there's
been a big fear that's generated
into the population and it's not
unfounded. But when you look at the real
track record, take Fukushima.
People call it a nuclear disaster. Well no
one was killed by nuclear radiation
fallout. People were killed by the
earthquake, people were killed by the
tsunami, and that reactor, by the
way, should never have been in production. Generally working order right now, but it
was old it should have been
decommissioned a long time ago. Another
reactor further back nothing happened there.
Right, so you're saying the
technology is creating this sense that
this is a reliable source of energy
production. Look, and I know that Dr.
Patrick Moore, who was one of the
founders of Greenpeace, that's actually
saying if you have the concern about
carbon which he dismisses that a little
bit too - different topic different day -
but he says the the answer lies in
nuclear and so when you have somebody of
that stature getting behind this, it says
so much about where we're gonna go with
the green economy.
Bill Gates.
Mm-hmm.
Just check out his website.
You'll see he talks about nuclear energy is the way for poorer countries, emerging
countries, to get out of poverty. And it's saying it has a major role to play there.
So let's go back to this
massive - the Saudi Arabia of uranium - a
project where are we at right now in its
lifecycle
moving towards developing the property?
Right now we just a few days ago
published the first PEA, or preliminary
economic assessment, so well you know we -
because the area of the property is so
huge, we've done work throughout this
entire project. We've decided in the last
year-and-a-half to focus on the southern
portion of the property first. Okay. And
last year, just around this time, we
established our first resource there - 43-101 resource - and then we spent the
next year basically saying, okay we have
this resource, which is now stands at
about 23 million pounds and 11 million
pounds of vanadium - there's a significant
vanadium content there and we can get to
that. Yeah. So now we put out an economic
study that says this thing,
if it was in production today, would make
money today.
Today?
Today. At current prices. At current prices.
Our costs all in
sustaining cost is just over $18 a pound.
Mm-hmm. The contract price average out
there in the markets between 50 and 60
dollars. There's a lot of margin there. Yeah.
But that's what - the exciting thing about
it is that this 23 million pounds, over
this entire district, has the potential
to become a hundred million pounds.
It'd be no different than what they have
in Kazakhstan, at Inkai Deposit, 100
million pound deposit, again producing it
around but a little bit higher cost than
where we are at. There are other examples around the world. It's this - the setting
is it's right at surface. The first 25
meters in the surface and the ground
there's no blasting. Excavator and then
you leach it like it doesn't get simpler
in terms of cost. So this has
truly got the potential to be one of the
largest and lowest cost uranium deposits
in the world and that's what really
excites me. And that's why we've been putting our own money, management has,
you try finding somebody in the last few years to put money in a uranium company
exploration - it's rare to find!
Talk to the hand!
Yeah so we've been finding
it ourselves.
So management right now, I mean our
friends and family, they all own about over
60 percent of the company. Mm-hmm
so the money we put in, we spend
it and make sure we spend it on the right
things down there, and now our goal is to
grow this deposit over the next six
months because we'd like to become
Argentina's first domestic source of
uranium supply.
So would you develop it on your own or
you're gonna be looking
partner?
Well, we can expand it on our own.
Mm-hmm.
We can take - we have a track
record and the team and expertise to do
all the way up the feasibility study.
Yeah. To go into production, if we had to,
we'd do it on our own, but, we also
recognize the production is a different
business and exploration. So by all means
we would look to see if we could import
some external expertise there and, you
know, maybe partner up with somebody or whatever would be best return for shareholders.
So let's talk a little bit
about Argentina as a mining
jurisdiction. Sure. How stable is it?
Argentina is - we've been there for 26 years. Classic
case if you listen to everything the
politicians say, you know, is like
driving - not always signalling, they're
gonna turn left, turn right, but they turn
the other way right? Argentina is a great
place for many reasons: geologically,
Mm-hmm. There's so much potential in that country. Eighth largest country in the
world and, until 25 years ago, never been
explored. So there's a lot of low-lying
fruit to harvest there and that's what
we've been doing. Politically,
the country right now is run like a
company. President Macri is a businessman,
and he's got a mandate to eliminate red
tape, eliminate regulations and he's
also recognizing to promote mining
to become and grow and become a more
important part of their economy. And in
the 26 years that we've been there we've
never had a permit denied, never had a community say don't do it,
we've never had anything, any problems in
Argentina. Love working in that country.
Last question here, so what would access
to market be? What's the infrastructure
like that allows you to get product out
of the ground and to the market that wants it?
Well, we can get it out of the ground. There's a - twenty kilometers away there's a town
of Valcheta, there's a pool of people you
know we can draw in for workers, there's
a high power line there, there's a
railway line there for about 50, 55
kilometers from a deep seaport
Mm-hmm. All the infrastructure is perfect
and it's a flat lying area, very flat, Patagonia. Less populated, less densely
populated than Siberia.
So when you come out of there by ship, it's not too much
around them and India and China are just
across the Atlantic.
That's right, I mean
we're getting a lot of major companies
knocking on our door there's not been a
lot of exploration in uranium space, but
this is something we know that's been
truly spectacular and I think you
know the larger producing companies are
looking at us, but not yet, it's too early.
I think this has a long way to go.
Well, it sounds like a pretty exciting
opportunity and I have to admit I would
not think of Argentina uranium, especially this time but yeah, this is, you know, fascinating to
learn. I wish you all the best of luck
with this
thanks for coming in and sharing all of this.
Oh great, thank you.
Thank you
