Hot Chili: Three’s a crowd – Hot Chili onto a 3rd huge copper-gold discovery
Hot Chili Managing Director Christian Easterday on 3AW, 2GB, 4BC & 6PR Bulls N' Bears Report
Listen to ASX-listed Hot Chili Managing Director Christian Easterday talk to Matt Birney on the Bulls N’ Bears Report about Hot Chili’s brand new copper-gold discovery right on the door step of its existing tier 1 porphyry discovery that looks set to turbo-charge the numbers of the broader project.
TO LISTEN TO THE HOT CHILI AUDIO INTERVIEW - CLICK BELOW
Hot Chili is developing its massive Costa Fuego porphyry project in Chile where it already has 3 serious copper-gold deposits that combined, are likely in the top ten copper deposits globally. Last year the company took an option over an additional piece of ground just south of Costa Fuego called La Verde and recently hit copper-gold pay dirt at that project too with the drill bit.
RADIO INTERVIEW - TRANSCRIPT
Matt Birney - Welcome to Bulls N' Bears brought to you today by copper-gold developer Hot Chili
Matt Birney - ASX code: HCH
Matt Birney - I'm Matt Birney and I'm joined now by the Managing Director of Hot Chili, Christian Easterday.
Matt Birney - Hi Christian.
Christian Easterday - Hi Matt.
Matt Birney - Okay so Hot Chili is developing its massive Costa Fuego porphyry project in Chile where it already has 2 serious copper-gold deposits that combined, are likely in the top ten copper deposits globally. Last year the company took an option over an additional piece of ground just to the south of Costa Fuego called La Verde and recently hit copper-gold pay dirt at that project too with the drill bit.
Matt Birney - Okay Christian we'll get to those drill results in a moment at La Verde but firstly just remind me of the size of the resource at your existing Costa Fuego project, because it's pretty damn big isn't it?
Christian Easterday - Yes it is, it's a monster, around 1 billion tonnes of resources defined for about 3 and a half million tonnes of copper and 3 million ounces of gold with 85% of that in the indicated basket.
Matt Birney - Okay well let's get into these recent drill results just to the south of that mega project you're calling La Verde, you just picked it up last year, what are the best two or three results from the latest drill campaign there?
Christian Easterday - Very very exciting to be on the cusp of a third major discovery. Intercepts like 308 meters at 0.5% copper, 0.3 grams per tonne gold supported by high grade intervals of 100 meters running 0.7% copper and 0.3 gold, from all from shallow depths and most of our holes are all finishing in mineralisation.
Matt Birney - I know Hot Chili's also run a preliminary economic study on the existing Costa Fuego project to the north of this new discovery and I'm keen just to run through them even though I'm sure they're a bit out of date now because it was done some time ago but just for fun let's run through the numbers on that study because it doesn't include this new discovery and I'd be curious to see how the new discovery and the updated numbers impact it but let's just go back and have a look at that study on Costa Fuego.
Matt Birney - What copper price did you use for it?
Christian Easterday - 385 per pound copper
Matt Birney - And what will it cost you under that PEA to produce a pound of copper and how much is it selling for today?
Christian Easterday - Look our all- in costs were around about $2.48 per pound copper and we have a current price of about $4.60 per pound copper in the market today.
Matt Birney - And what sort of mine life are you predicting and what's the annual profit? Let's go with EBITDA.
Christian Easterday - Yeah 16 years mine life and a post tax NPV of around US$1.1 billion.
Matt Birney - And what about annual EBITDA?
Christian Easterday - Our annual EBITDA is around US$445 million per year
Matt Birney - Okay and what will it cost you to build and how long will it take you to pay that capital back?
Christian Easterday - Very very low capital intensity, a billion dollars to build putting out around 100,000 tonnes of copper and 50,000 ounces of gold which makes it one of the lowest capital intensity major copper projects in the world.
Matt Birney - And I'm guessing that this new discovery to the south will likely have a pretty serious impact on those numbers at some stage, is that what you're thinking?
Christian Easterday - Yes it certainly will. It won't slow us down from the prefeasibility we're due to release at the end of this quarter but what it does do is speak to the scale up opportunity to lift the production scale and the mine life on Costa Fuego.
Matt Birney - Christian Easterday from Hot Chili
Matt Birney - Thanks for joining me on Bulls N' Bears and remember we're only here to give you information, not advice, which you should of course seek independently.
Matt Birney - I'm Matt Birney and this is Bulls N' Bears.
Outro - For more public company interviews go to the money page on the 6PR, 2GB, 3AW and 4BC websites and click the public companies tab.