Talisker Accelerates Growth with 100,000-Metre Drill Plan

[MUSIC] Welcome back to Miningstock Daily, Ian Wagner here on Thursday, April 9th, with a corporate update from our friends at Talisker Resources. Talisker is a gold producer in Braylorne, British Columbia. It's rated on the TSX under the symbol TSK and on the OTCCUB at TSKFF. It hosts a market cap of about $310 million Canadian depending on the day. For those new to the Talisker story, I would recommend listening to past interviews we've done with the team. Earlier this year in January and also in the fall of 2025. With us today is the CEO of Talisker, Mr. Terry Harbert. Terry, good to see you. Welcome back to the podcast. Hi, Ian. Yeah, it's been a while. So I'm very glad to be back on. Yeah, absolutely. I think today what I'd like to do is start with some of the recent news flow and then use that to work into the larger corporate story because I think it'll take us there organically. With that, let's talk about some drill results. Everybody's favorite topic. You guys released some drill results just this week. Your first 25 holes from this year's exploration program. I believe I think eight surface, 17 underground. A lot of high grade intercepts there across multiple veins. Numbers like 10 grams per ton, 13 grams per ton, 121 grams per ton, right? Big numbers and I know you have a 30,000 meter campaign. Walk us through these returns and I think to clarify are these resource conversion or these exploration is this Mustang just kind of like give us the context around those and kind of what they tell you. Yeah, sure thing. All of the results that have come out now that they're part of our 2026 program, our 2026 program started the year at 30,000 meters, predominantly all reverse, all resource conversion drilling. We've just finalising the planning on increasing that program now up to 100,000 meters. So, extension amount of drilling and we can talk into more detail if you like about where we're going to allocate those. The majority of this drilling to come out here was surface drilling, targeting resource conversion in the Braille on West area. So your list is might recall in our Mustang mine, there's a couple of different areas, the Mustang proper itself where we started production and then the Braille on West area, which is about 600 meters or so away from where the Mustang one is. Well underway on development of a straight shot, a decline to make it over to that Braille on West area. We've got I think a bit less than 200 meters left to go on that development. So all of this drilling, all the majority of this drilling that's coming out and certainly some of the stellar hits are on a series of five veins that sit in this new area, this Braille on West area that we have it mined at before. So really great to see those results coming out as we infill that material. So really good results, particularly on the 55th vein and the 55th hanging wall vein, very consistent width, very consistent grade. So it's great to see that that was really what we're expecting over there at Braille on West, this consistency. Also a few holes there that had come in early at the Mustang area on the BK. These are where we're mining now. So it's just extending that down plunge. So no surprises there. It all came back pretty good. Yeah, okay. So a lot of that in that Braille on West and I think it's important to clarify, you guys are, so you're mining in Mustang and then there is that you said about 600 meters away as that Braille on West. And I guess in terms of just before we leave the drill results, these big numbers but smaller widths, these what you expected, are they tracking what the model predicted? Are there any veins positive or negative that are behaving differently or change your material understanding or still right on track or early to say, I guess? Well, everything's really on track and there's no real material changes. Generally, you win some and you lose some when you're doing resource conversion drilling. So when you're infilling between your inferred spacings, summer, what you expect, summer below, what you expect, summer more than what you expect. So in average, it generally comes out even Steve and particularly with a project like Braille on that's very well known. In our results, you'll note that we put the centre of the vein first, which is generally a very high grade and then we dilute that out to what we consider to be, you know, round-minable widths on either side of the vein. So a mining widths are generally have true widths of 0.5 to 0.8 sometimes two meters depending on the vein. So really, we're showing those results with these diluted amounts. So on average, it's been what we're expecting or at times a bit better than we expect. Usually when we drill more at Braille on the grade 10s, we increase a bit. But sometimes you lose them, you know, sometimes the veins become narrower. It's generally very characteristic of these style of originate buying deposits. Yeah, imagine anytime you see triple digit grams per ton that's positive to the upside. You mentioned you're expanding that campaign from 30,000 meters to 100,000 meters and you know, one could ask where where that money's going to come from, but I think that's segues into to the next news, which is, you know, in March, you announced a bot deal financing, a pretty substantial one, 52 upsized to $52 million Canadian through Red Cloud. So I'll just read the numbers and then I want you to talk about, you know, why now and what for and all the color and context on that 26 million units each unit consisting of a warrant and one half excuse me, the warrant and one share the warrant is for a half share purchased up to two years down the road from now. Yeah, you guys, because you guys did a funding last fall, but also what I think's interesting is you guys have a debt facility, right? That was untouched through ocean partners, right? That $25 million credit facility. So just just kind of give everybody a landscape of, you know, why and what for and how you kind of see this where that money is going to go for this year. Yeah, and look, it's all about building the platform for growth and accelerating our growth over the next few years. Really pride of this. We've been built on a bootstrap or a cash flow based model. So we can only go as fast as the goal we produce. So this was a very strong indication a bought deal. So very strong support coming in. I saw it as a very opportunistic time to take capital at a very good price. We were certainly indications of there was going to be some geopolitical turmoil. We didn't know how long that was going to last. And often when you knock back capital because you don't think you need it when you do need it, it isn't available or it isn't available at very good prices. And that's certainly how things turn out. We have no trouble with increasing our growth profile or accelerating our project. And that's certainly what this capital is going to be useful. We'll be putting additional drilling about 20,000 meters additional drilling extending the Mustang area following the all shoots down, particularly on the on the BK BK-9087 in the Mustang. We're currently mining. So we bring that forward into the mind plan. But really the big things that we're looking at here is planning out to do a significant amount of drilling at Olympus. So we're looking at bringing that forward from our plan and we plan to drill that in 27 now we're bringing that forward to this year. And also doing about 10,000 meters at the Congress deposit, which is about 10 kilometers to the north. So we had that planned in in in in 2029. So we're bringing that forward of four three years. So really we're just capitalizing on growth and development and looking at how fast can we bring these other projects into decision point and then into production. Olympus is something we haven't really talked about because it was so far out on the calendar rate. We've talked about Mustang and Relaar and and and maybe before we get there, you know, because I'm looking at your your deck and your PEA mineral source update or just the the Braylon area. The Braylon Braylon is so big, right? And it's so deep, right? I'm looking up to two kilometers deep and you guys, you still need to get that ramp done correct and like, where are you at with that and what will that give you and sort of how will that allow you to kind of then change the way you access some of those other veins or levels or stoops in in Vraylorn? So we're playing here for for this year, which is well underway is to finish that development across the Braylon West. We've probably got about another 40 or 50 days worth of four by four ways development until we arrive over there. Then we'll start on a spiral access decline and start on the lateral development. So the spiral access it'll basically give us this year access to four levels and we'll be developing on between three and five veins per level. So that'll add up to sort of between six and ten working faces on each level across four levels and really what this is to do is to remove the bottlenecks there, four ramped up production in 27, 28 and onwards. So really this year what we're tackling are the four main things that make an early mining project fail. Not enough drilling, we're doing 100,000 metres and not enough development where we're looking at nearly 8,000 metres worth of development. Too much debt, we've only got $1.6 million of debt on the books and we're looking at moving that totally and then of course insufficient capital and we'll have 75 million in cash and another 35 Canadian in that revolving credit facility so about 110 million. So really we're set up at a very strong low risk position as we as we start to grow this mine and bring it into what we believe is going to be a world class producer. Okay, looking at your calendar you've got a mineral resource update and a PDA on deck for I think Q2 right so we're in Q2 so net just talk through what that will cover and will that be any of the resource or the infill drilling you guys have done earlier or will that be all cut off from 2025's campaign and then just going to how do you expect that to materially show a difference in the way people maybe understand or think about Braylorne right now. So there will be a whole lot of additional data that'll be coming into that about 28,000 underground risk samples becoming into that about 30,000 meters of drilling that was completed up until 2025. I think now the counts up to another 20 new wireframes that will be coming into that resource that weren't previously in there. We're expecting from our work that'll be somewhere between 800,000 to a million ounces so we won't quite be doubling the resource but it'll be like a 60 to 70% increase from our current resource giving us a you know somewhere between two and a half to three million ounces global resource. So a really significant change and all that's well on track we're expecting here between the mid and end of May to have that out this year that'll be the resource update and we're taking a step back on the PAA. So in general PAAs use comparable economics use comparable mill design and process flow. So we're actually going to take a more technical approach to it and do proper engineering design for the mill and process plant tailings waste dump that we actually want to implement. So theoretically it's it's going to be at a feasibility level but classified as a PAA because of the inferred level of the resource but we'll be using all of our mine economics that we're currently doing drill blast, my call, all our transport economics, our payables so it'll actually be like a feasibility all beyond and then we'll use all those engineering studies to submit our major permit amendment which will be bringing that mill and processing plant online in in 2028-29. 2028-29 so we'll then until then you will still be trucking or to to ocean partners and they'll still be handling and that kind of leads I guess another question like because you guys are already mining at at Mustang like maybe just give everybody like and even myself right absolutely sort of like clarity on like so what you're doing in MRE about something you're already mining or a PAA about a deposit you're already mining like help us maybe understand what this will cover and what it won't if that makes sense. Yeah so really what we're targeting is is two 10 to 15 year mine plans sorry with 10 to 15 year mine life for both Mustang and Braille on oh sorry Mustang and Olympus we won't have any of Congress in there it's a bit early yet we'll be drilling at Congress this year but we won't have any of the resource base in this current plan so it'll be those those development of those two mines it'll include a component of trucking and milling similar to what we're doing and then a transition likely in 29 to our own mill and our own own processing plant. The engineers our guys are still working on the mine plan on the mine schedule but at this stage I expect both of the mines will be somewhere in the 750 to a thousand tons per day capacity on average at each mine so that'll be sort of an average of 1500 to 2000. We are looking right now at where we are implementing our all sort of it's well underway we receive the permit for that back in in in March the equipment's been ordered it's it's under manufacture now we expect that to be completed here coming into May and and shipping that out we expect that to be installed built in fully operational September October this year so it's a fully fledged primary crash seconded crash a screening plant wash plant dual all sorters and a tertiary crash coming out the other end so you know it's a significant amount of mineral processing not having a mill but almost doing everything else prior to the mill on side okay and so if I'm looking at your if you're kind of deposit area right so Mustang and Olympus will be the mines brailor and Mustang will and potentially parts of king will feed the Mustang mine and then parts of like brailor and east and pioneer will be mine via Olympus is is that correct I just want to make sure I'm sort of viewing this you know properly yes yes so in general most of the operation we do sits sits in between where the old mines were we tend to keep away from remnant mining from the old workings challenging from a health and safety perspective and also challenging from a scheduling perspective so you've got to do a lot of development and often you know you don't you don't get great material out of there whereas what we're generally mining in the Mustang area which includes parts of brailor and west parts of of king east and the Olympus area which really includes parts of brailor and east and parts of pioneer that weren't historically mined and and they're the two draw points so we'll be drawing out of the portals that sit in between the old mines at that Mustang and Olympus we're putting in a port about 10,000 meters into drilling at king from underground this year in historically you know it wasn't extensively mined that was generally considered to be under capitalized throughout the the golden era if you like of production at the brailor and camp from the the thirties through to the end of the sixties so we'd like to be able to bring some of that in that that sits within our current mine permit so there's no no amendments that we need to do to be out of stock to get in there and extract material out switching gears a little bit I'm looking at that sort of so brailor and right has you know can go pretty deep right and you you've got some drift asses that sort of show some pretty high grade material down there like what do you what do you think could be down there have you guys done drilling down there or what is that sort of look like or what is that how does that fit into you guys as overall plans I guess is that some potential you know just another just another additive to the resource or how are you thinking about that because that's going to be your deepest part of any of these pioneer king Mustang right like some of that stuff goes pretty far down yeah so good at this day Jen it probably won't that that deepest stuff probably won't make an into a current mine plan but of course as as we deplete the resource through mining will be will be starting to extend down in dip and along strike to be able to replenish and increase the size of our resource base but that this size at at this stage really, we have so much material from a company. a kilometer deep up to surface that we know we aren't really considering planning for that down there it's probably going to be after I'm long gone that things are mining down there but really you know we think there's potential with modern mining technologies, modern ventilation that that braid on it likely be mine to two and a half kilometers depth or even beyond. The veins are certainly very strong in the corporate presentation you can see those drift assays in areas of work mind, extensive areas a couple of hundred meters along strike of of plus 20 gram per ton material. So there's certainly some very good material down there and certainly be very valuable to get down there and extract it just with current gold prices you know gold continues to increase over time then it's certainly certainly going to have a lot of economic material down there. Shooting gears um well let's just let's just talk about valuation right because you guys did take a little bit of a hit in February like everybody else and then gold prices certainly seeing a lot of volatility but after the financing you guys have really kind of seen your stock you know take take a significant hit like what's your message to either current shareholders or future investors you know what's what's what's the market missing here um that you think that that everybody should keep in mind. Oh look it's all really an execution story now in um and you know it was a tough pill for me to swallow with geopolitical um things going on and beyond our control and and to see a hundred million wiped off your market cap um so really there's not much we can do about that what we need to focus on as a company is is building value building revenue building cash flow um de-risking the project and we've taken massive strides in that de-risking here uh we're on a well-developed mind plan um we'll have a significant significant update to the um to to the resource coming out um all sort of coming in uh we've got a great agreement now that gives us substantial cash flow and consistent cash flow through what's generally the dip in the lason curve so we we're we're going to be in production and building a cash pool as we're building our mill and there's very few other operations that can actually say that that can can can step that up and and increase their production rates so we think we've got a lot of re-rating uh to come um as we as we transition if you like from an EV per ounce valuation uh to a multiple of cash flow value valuation so if you like from a explorer developer into a real producer um so we're in that pathway now the team's doing all the work that needs to be done to de-risks to increase and amend the permits to plan out the engineering of how we're going to build this into a district sky scale plus 200,000 ounce producer we've talked so much about future plans and present work i don't want to yeah i don't want to skip over what you guys have been doing what what did you because we're now in april do you know what you mind and produced in for for Q1 of this year or do you know kind of what uh you know how much ore you sent out and things like that uh yes i do we we're looking to release it to market next week so i probably can't talk about it now i'll be happy back on the absolutely absolutely uh and then the really the really important message here is that we executed the transition from nickel across the ocean partners almost seamlessly uh and and a lot of support there coming from our first nation partners bridge river management who have put together the the crushing facility and and and transfer station uh sign off our own our holding certificates for us to get paid so that you know done that in very quick time um so i think so far and i'm happy to give you the tons so i think we've got about uh two thousand two hundred tons of material uh already to go that we've invoiced for we're just waiting for payment on that uh we've got about another three and a half thousand uh that's already been delivered to site and we've probably got about another thousand that that stockpiled at braille on so we've we've we've filled that that process train uh and now we'd be very consistent with trucking and and shipping that ore um one thing to note last year if anybody delved into our our financials um was we actually finished the year our first five months of production in a cash flow positive uh have position i think we're we're ahead of the curve by about half a million dollars which is something almost unheard of in in in new mine startups particularly small scale startups so really congratulations to our team in in in managing the finances um managing everything related to early stage production you know usually it's a year to two years before people start to see that so very proud very happy of course we had some tailwind with uh with the gold price uh being beyond what we expected it to be um but it really shows that that uh the fiscal control is very strong within our company and we're building that stage to deliver on the promises and null stains that we put out to the market excellent well i think that's a good stopping point for today taren maybe we can have you back on as soon as you have those those financials out and we'll certainly look to um catch up when you have increased drill results and a lot of catalysts on the on the calendar had with the resource update and additional plans so thank you for stopping by i appreciate the time thanks very much Ian absolutely that is Terry harburt CEO of taluska resource sources they trade on the tsx under the symbol tsk and on the otcqb at tskf the information presented should not be considered investment advice mining stock daily and its affiliates are not responsible for any loss arising from any investment decision and connection with the material presented herein please do your own research or speak with a licensed financial representative before making any investment decisions