Philippines miner Marcventures Mining and Development Corp. is to take over the Manila-listed property company AJO.net Holdings, Inc. during the first half of the year in a reverse takeover deal worth P1.3 billion (US$281 million). Marcventures shareholders will eventually control 97% of the combined company according to Augusto Serafica, Jr., executive director of Asian Alliance Investment Corp. who are advising the transaction.
Marcventures will then assume AJO’s stock market listing.
Marcventures Mining is a Butuan City-based nickel miner owned by local businessman Mario G. Vijungco, and has an estimated value of P1.49 billion (US$322 million).
AJO.net Holdings was founded in 1957 as an oil exploration and drilling firm, but became a holding company in 1996.
Mr. Serafica said Marcventures Mining and AJO.net Holdings would spend P200 million ($43 million) on commercial mining operations this year and will stockpile between 30,000 and 50,000 metric tons of nickel ore before releasing its first shipment. In its first year the enterprise is expected to produce 600,000 MT of nickel ore. This will rise to 800,000 MT in the second year and 1.2 million MT in year three. The company claims to have signed a contract with a Japanese firm for annual shipments of 1.2 million MT of nickel ore.
Marcventures has spent P300 million exploring and developing a 4,799-hectare nickel mine in Surigao in the Mindanao islands. One 120-hectare area in the property has an estimated resource of 19.08 million MT of high-iron limonite and 4.47 million MT of high-nickel saprolite ores that can be extracted within 20 years.
No comments:
Post a Comment