Overview
If you love gold and you love the USA, then you need to be in Nevada, the world’s fifth largest producer of gold, totaling almost 170 million ounces from 1850 to 2018. Nevada is known for its large clusters of deposits known as “Trends”, and a majority of Nevada’s gold production comes from the Carlin Trend, the Cortez Trend and, of course, the Walker Lane Trend where Lahontan Gold is operating.
Lahontan Gold may be a new player in Walker Lane but the company is one investors should pay close attention to. Lahontan Gold was formed by combining three high-quality projects held by Victoria Gold and KA Gold LLC in September 2020. Lahontan is in the process of going public on the TSX Venture Exchange and expects to complete its listing in Q4 2021.
KA Gold is a private company with a strong successful background in the capital markets. Headed by two Managing Partners, Kimberly Ann and Brian Maher, KA Gold has partnered with several mid-tier precious metal producers on precious metals projects in the Great Basin of the western United States.
Kimberly Ann is Lahontan Gold’s Founder, President, CEO and Board Chair and has served in various senior executive functions for multiple TSX-listed junior mining companies. She has raised over $210M in project financing and directed three major junior mining rebranding projects.
This time, she is focused on bringing Lahontan Gold to a similar success and is ready to dig into the work. In an interview with INN, she said, “I’ve sold three companies and made money for my people and I want to continue down that path of success because I believe in the mining space. We need CEOs that want to work for the shareholders more than their salary. I don’t care about that. I care about building things and making money for my shareholders.”
Brian Maher is Lahontan Gold’s Director of Exploration, and brings over 40 years of experience in international mining and exploration. Maher’s long list of accomplishments include being part of Argonaut Gold’s $340M acquisition of Prodigy Gold, leading exploration and mine operations for Metallic Ventures Gold and Hochschild Mining. Maher is also the President and CEO of PPX Mining (TSXV:PPX), an exploration and development company already operating a high-grade underground gold and silver mine in northern Peru.
Lahontan Gold Corp is named for prehistoric Lake Lahontan which covered over 22,000 square kilometres of westerrn Nevada and eastern California during the last Ice Age.
Lahontan Gold has a district-scale land package of 32 square kilometers in the heart of Nevada’s Walker Lane. The company’s properties include three high-potential multimillion ounce projects, two of them are past producers. The company’s properties are all accessible year-round and have excellent infrastructure.
Lahontan Gold’s fully-owned flagship Santa Fe project produced approximately 400,000 ounces of gold between 1988 and 1992 and is contiguous with the Isabella Pearl mine operated by Fortitude Gold. The Isabella Pearl mine is a high-grade open-pit heap leach operation currently in production.
Kimberly Ann shared how she got involved with the project and said to INN, “Our flagship asset Santa Fe was in the hands of Victoria Gold for a very long time and the CEO came to me and said he wanted me to run the project. I had just sold my last company for a seven-fold profit for my shareholders in less than 24 months, so I had a lot of people with their eyes on me wanting to know what I was going to do next.”
She is dedicated to Lahontan Gold’s success and said “We’re going to build this up as far as we can take it, whether we build it to production or sell it off, it doesn’t really matter. Whatever makes our shareholders money.”
On the other hand, the company’s Moho project hosts a group of past-producing, high-grade gold and silver veins and structures. The company strongly believes that the Moho project has the potential to reach one million ounces at grades as high as 9 to 15 gpt of gold equivalent.
Lahontan Gold’s Redlich project has the potential to be a major discovery with a historic resource estimate of 16.5 million ounces of silver equivalent. The Redlich project is also on strike with the Candelaria open pit silver mine.
The company is well-funded with a strong financial position. In August 2021, the company announced the closing of an oversubscribed private placement with gross proceeds of C$5,100,714 which greatly exceeded the company’s goal of C$3,500,000. In total, the company has raised C$8.5 million and is completely debt-free.
Lahontan Gold plans to continue its drilling program on its Santa Fe asset with an aggressive 25,000 meters in 2021 and 2022. The company has a goal of providing its shareholders with an NI 43-101 resource estimate in 2022
Lahontan Gold’s management team has a proven track record of significant discovery including the Jasperoide project operated by C3 Metals, the Eagle Gold mine operated by Victoria Gold, the Magino mine operated by Argonaut Gold, the Sierra Aspera mine previously operated by Southern Copper and the Silver Bell mine operated by Asarco. The company’s management team also has a vested interest in delivering shareholder value with almost 15 percent of pro forma ownership in the company.
Company Highlights
- Lahontan Gold is headed by Kimberly Ann who brings over 20 years of business and capital markets experience, and Brian J. Maher, an economic geologist with over 40 years of experience in international mining and exploration.
- Lahontan Gold has a district-scale land package of 32 square kilometers in the heart of Nevada’s Walker Lane Gold Trend including three projects with multimillion ounce potential.
- The flagship Santa Fe project is a high-grade gold and silver asset with past production of 345,000 ounces of gold and 710,000 ounces of silver.
- The Moho project is a high-grade gold and silver asset with the potential to reach a plus one million ounces at high grades.
- The Redlich project has the potential to be a major discovery with a historic resource estimate of 16.5 million ounces of silver equivalent.
- The company is well-funded with a strong financial position. The company has raised C$8.5 million and is completely debt-free.
- In August 2021, the company exceeded the company’s goal of raising C$3,500,000 and closed an oversubscribed private placement with gross proceeds of C$5,100,714
- The company is led by an experienced management team with decades of experience in Nevada and a proven track record of significant discovery including the Jasperoide, Eagle, Magino, Sierra Aspera and Silver Bell mines.
Key Projects
Santa Fe Project
The flagship Santa Fe project is located in Nevada’s Walker Lane The project is 15 kilometers southwest of Paradise Peak which has produced more than 1.5 million ounces of gold. The Santa Fe project is also contiguous with the Isabella Pearl mine operated by Fortitude Gold. The Isabella Pearl mine has proven reserves of 2.3 million tonnes grading 3.05 gpt of gold and 18 gpt of silver and probable reserves of 220,100 ounces of gold and 1.2 million ounces of silver, respectively. Santa Fe is fully owned by Lahontan Gold.
Exploration on the property dates back to the 1970s when gold was discovered. From 1988 to 1992, the property produced 345,000 ounces of gold and 710,000 ounces of silver from a series of four open-pit mines utilizing heap-leach processing. From 2009 to 2010, diamond drilling was conducted on the property and confirmed the presence of a thick, high-grade, shear/breccia zone beneath the Santa Fe open pit.
Lahontan Gold’s phase one drilling program on the property is currently underway. There is currently one drill rig running on the property and the Company expects to add two additional drill rigs shortly. Early drill results include 188.9 meters grading 1.75 gpt of gold and 9.9 gpt of silver including 56.4 meters grading 2.78 gpt of silver and 17.6 gpt of silver. The results also included 6.1 meters grading 4.29 gpt Au and 31 gpt Ag. Going forward, the company plans to pursue multiple high-potential targets including unmined mineralization at depth and along strike with a 25,000-meter drilling program for 2021 and 2022. The company has a goal to obtain a NI 43-101 resource estimate in early 2022
Moho Project
The Moho project is located in Nevada’s Walker Lane, 35 kilometers southwest of the Santa Fe project. The Moho project is underlain by high-grade, oxidized, Tertiary gold-silver-lead-zinc epithermal veins and in multiple sub-parallel structures.
In the 1930s, mining on the property revealed grades from 20 to 25 gpt of gold and 300 gpt of silver. In 2018, detailed mapping and channel sampling found high grades of up to 26 gpt of gold and 456 gpt of silver in historic underground workings. The company also completed a ground magnetic survey and drilled six core holes totaling almost 2,000 meters. The drill holes intercepted high grade gold and silver mineralization below the underground workings with grades up to 26.8 gpt Au Eq (21.8 gpt Au and 376 gpt Ag) accompanied by 14.1% Pb, confirming the tremendous resource potential of the Moho Project.
Lahontan Gold has obtained permits to conduct follow-up drilling on the Moho property and the company strongly believes that the Moho project has the potential to reach one million ounces at grades as high as 9 to 15 gpt of gold equivalent.
Redlich Project
The Redlich project is located in Nevada’s prolific Walker Lane trend. The project is about 45 kilometers south of the Santa Fe project. The Redlich project features Tertiary epithermal veins and the exciting DBK discovery.
Previous exploration on the property defined a historic resource of 16.5 million ounces of silver equivalent. In 2018, drilling on the property identified a new style of mineralization called the DBK discovery: thick zones of disseminated gold and silver mineralization hosted by hydrothermal breccia.
Core drilling in the DBK zone cut a more than 100-meter interval of intensely silicified and mineralized breccia. The DBK zone is hosted by a westerly-trending structure that is partially exposed on the surface and is seen in gravity and ground magnetic surveys. Lahontan Gold strongly believes that the DBK zone has the potential to be a major discovery as it is on strike with the Candelaria open pit mine. The area is drill-ready with permits already in place to test a strike length of over 2,000 meters.
Management Team
Kimberly Ann, Chairman – CEO and President
Kimberly Ann is a mining executive who has founded multiple Junior Mining companies and served in a variety of senior executive positions including Founder, CEO, President, CFO and Board Member. In the past twelve years, Kimberly Ann has raised over $210M in project financing and collaborated on three Junior Mining M&A projects. While at Prodigy Gold, Kimberly Ann was responsible for all aspects of the company’s corporate communication program, facilitating equity financings, generating analyst coverage, participating in key aspects of corporate M&A leading to the $340M buyout of Prodigy by Argonaut Gold. Kimberly was CFO and VP Corporate Development at PPX Mining Corp, successfully bringing the high-grade Callanquitas gold-silver underground mine into production in Northern Peru. In 2012 and 2013 Kimberly was a senior executive with Waterton Global Resource Management, a multi-billion dollar private equity firm focused on the mining industry. In 2017, Kimberly founded Latin America Resource Group (“LARG”), building Jasperoide from two small concessions into a 57 square kilometer strategic project in the heart of Peru’s most prolific copper-gold mineralized belt. In 2020, LARG merged with Carube Copper Corp. to create C3 Metals Inc., setting the stage for value creation throughout C3’s project portfolio. Kimberly is also the Managing Partner of KA Gold LLC, a private company with a portfolio of advanced gold-silver exploration projects in Nevada.
Brian J. Maher – Director
Brian J. Maher is an economic geologist with over 34 years of experience in the international mining and exploration industry. Currently, Maher is the president and CEO of PPX Mining where he helps operate a high-grade underground gold and silver mine in northern Peru. Before PPX Mining, Maher was the president, CEO and director of Prodigy Gold Inc. where he guided the company through a period of expansive growth including raising $140 million in project financing. This culminated in the $340 million acquisition of Prodigy by Argonaut Gold in 2012. In 1982, Maher began a 16-year career with ASARCO Inc. in which he explored gold and copper deposits in a variety of geologic environments throughout North and South America. From 1998 and 2004, Maher was project manager for Metallic Ventures Gold Inc. where he supervised underground and surface exploration, mine development and operations at an underground gold mine in Nevada.
In 2005, Maher joined Hochschild Mining PLC and was involved in all aspects of the company’s North American exploration program. At Hochschild Mining PLC, Maher served as the exploration manager for the US, Canada and Mexico. Maher is also the Managing Partner of KA Gold LLC, a private company with a portfolio of advanced gold-silver exploration projects in Nevada. Maher received his BA degree in Geology from the California State University, Chico in 1980 and his MSc. degree in Economic Geology from Colorado State University in 1983.
John McConnell – Director
John McConnell has more than 35 years of mining experience, mostly spent in Canada’s northern territories. McConnell is the current CEO, president and director of Victoria Gold Corp where he guided the construction of the more than 200,000 ounces per year Eagle Gold Mine in the Yukon. Previously, he was president and CEO of Western Keltic Mines until it was acquired by Sherwood Copper. During his career, he was the vice president of Northwest Territories projects for De Beers Canada where he was primarily responsible for the permitting and development of the Snap Lake Diamond Mine. His experience also includes 12 years with Breakwater Resources Ltd / Nanisivik Mines Ltd in operations at the Nanisivik Zinc and Lead Mine on the northern tip of Baffin Island.
He also spent six years with Strathcona Mineral Services Ltd. where his work included engineering, feasibility studies and project development. McConnell is a graduate of the Colorado School of Mines with a B.Sc. in Mining Engineering. He is also a director of two public companies –– Hudson Resources Inc. and Abacus Mining & Exploration Corp. McConnell is a strong advocate for the mining industry. He is also a director of two industry organizations –– Klondike Placer Miners’ Association (KPMA) and the Mining Association of Canada (MAC).
Bob McKnight – Independent Director
McKnight is a mining executive with over 40 years of experience in copper, gold, base metals, coal and potash. McKnight has been directly involved in over $1.5B in project debt, equity, stream financings and M&A transactions. McKnight was the executive VP and CFO at Nevada Copper where he arranged over $500M in debt, equity and metal stream financings to develop the Pumpkin Hollow copper mine. McKnight was also the CFO and VP at Yukon Zinc Corp. and Selwyn Resources where he secured $150M in financing and the takeover of Griffin Mining.
Chris Donaldson – Independent Director
Chris Donaldson is an experienced executive with a 25-year track record of raising funds and building out new investment channels for both public and private companies. Donaldson is the CEO and director of Outback Goldfields. Donaldson is also the director of corporate development with Western Copper and Gold (NYSE American and TSX-listed) as well as director of corporate development and community with Casino Mining Corporation. Donaldson has a Bachelor of Arts in Economics from the University of Western Ontario.
Josh Serfass – Independent Director
Josh Serfass is the Executive Vice President of Corporate Development and Investor Relations at Integra Resources Corp. Previously, Josh was the Manager of Corporate Communications at Integra Gold Corp. He was a key member of the team at Integra Gold that grew, developed, and sold the past producing Lamaque Mine in Val-dOr, Québec to Eldorado Gold for C$590 million in 2017.