Titanium mining coming to North America?

EPISODE 8. Anthony Milewski and Christian Purefoy are joined by special guests Mike Stier, CEO of Saga Metals and Michael Garagan, Geologist of Saga Metals, to talk about the importance of titanium, especially in national security, and their titanium-vanadium project in Canada.

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Transcript

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All right, great, everyone. Welcome to Boom, Bust and BS with Anthony Milewski and me, Christian Purefoy. And today, we’ve got two special guests to talk about titanium. Not just titanium, we're going to talk about exploration in Canada and and national security, right. It's always interesting. Hey, guys. I appreciate you guys coming on. Why don't you just talk in real quick who you are and who you guys are with? Yeah, sounds good. I'll start. So my name is Mike Stier. I'm the CEO and Director of Saga Metals Corp. And Michael Garagan, the geologist for Saga. And yeah, I see. I've kind of had a look at your website. Yeah, Saga has a few different projects, but my understanding is you guys are focused on the titanium part of the exploration portfolio. But what exactly is titanium? I mean, when I think about titanium, it's like, you know, like someone broke their arm or something. They've got like a titanium bone in there. But what actually is titanium for? Yeah, I think that's a good point, is that it's you're right it's used implants. If you need, so I've got an implant my old hockey injury I have an implant for my front tooth. Right. And it's titanium based and so it's really used in so many facets of our everyday lives that I don't think we've fully grasped it right. At the end of the day, it's in your iPhone. It's, it's on your walls, right? It's a pigment in paint. Where does it come from? Right now if I go in and I get something done or whatever, where is titanium produced today? So the majority is it comes out of China. Right. And so, you know, when you mentioned at the beginning of this the whole national security side of things, over 60% of the world's titanium comes out of China. And so that's that's kind of the hot topic. And big issue right now is that... Is it mined in China? So the deposits - is a lot in Africa, too? Or is that something different? Minerals, you know, titanium. Yeah. There's something that comes out of Africa as well. Russia, some comes out of Canada right now from Rio Tinto. Right? So it does come from all over the world, but it just it's dominated by China. And so America is it's safe to say that most of America's titanium is coming from China. Is that fair? I think that's a fair statement. And again, to come back to the national security side of things, United States is one of the largest manufacturers of titanium metal. So like your end use products that, you know, companies like Boeing or Airbus or Lockheed Martin would use, but they don't mine really any titanium like they import the majority of their full consumption. Is titanium on any of the - I know in recent months there's been these sanction lists and critical minerals lists and all that sort of stuff. Do you know, in terms of America, is it on any of those lists? Absolutely. 100%. So has China put tariffs on titanium? Not at this point in time, but it has come up recently as a threat of one potential metal that they would not even just tariff but potentially cut off the exportation of it to other countries. And I mean, it's being used on fighter jets in America, right? This is this is literally national defense fighter jets are made out of this stuff. All the drones do. They use titanium in drones? Yeah, it's used in aerospace applications. So it certainly can be a I haven't specifically looked up drones, but it's in airplanes, satellites, spaceships, fighter jets. Lockheed Martin's F-35 Raptor uses 40% structural titanium and there's no replacement for titanium. You said Raptor. I was thinking about the Ford Raptor. I wonder. I wonder if there's titanium in cars. Do they put, there must be titanium in automobiles as well, right? Automotive. Yep. There are. There are applications as well. Chemical processing. Do either of you guys golf? Right. It's in your it's in your time. Well, it's yeah, well, it's in your it's in your golf clubs. It's also in tennis rackets. So titanium is kind of like a lot of these, you know, Christian, we're always talking about minor metals and critical minerals, and it kind of it's in the same category. So it's sort of the same setup. You know, it's critical to all these military applications, uses a bunch of stuff we don't even know. It's being used in our golf clubs. And there’s always one problem. China controls it, it's back to China. So, you guys, I guess what's interesting, Mike, you guys have a company, it's listed on the TSX, right? The TSX Venture,. And that and you've got an asset in Canada and you guys tell me a little bit where are you are. You guys have drilled, I know, quite a bit. And what's the size of your titanium deposit today? And like how does that fit in around like other global deposits and that sort of thing. Yeah. Like if you want to jump in. Yeah, you bet. So yeah, we have done are maiden drill program. I'll probably like correct you a little bit, is we haven't done a ton of drilling but we, we are pretty advanced within the project. It's and this kind of comes back to a big discussion within the junior mining industry in Canada and the critical minerals and everything that we're looking for. Canada, North America has a ton of these, but for a long time Canadian companies have looked elsewhere around the world. So there is you know, this is kind of a perfect example is this titanium vanadium deposit that we're looking at... Sorry to interrupt you, we literally just published on vanadium. You did, yeah, absolutely. And I read that article and it was I honestly thought it was a brilliant article. And titanium vanadium, in my opinion, go hand in hand. They are quite often found in not only the same deposits, but often the same minerals as is the case with our project is we are getting titanium and vanadium locked up in titanium magnetite. So when I hear magnetite and I'm not a geologist, I just play one TV, I think about iron ore. It is there is, there is a relationship between your deposit and iron ore. Absolutely. You're absolutely right there. Yeah. Okay. So you're saying that Canada and North America have got a lot of these minerals, but there's been this problem they have in mind, is that correct? So yeah, and it's kind of an interesting discussion. And you know what Russia and China has done really good at is going at these really large tonnage, layered mafic intrusions, big, big deposits of titanium. I got to hold you right there. You lost me at layered Well, what what is the. I don't even know you're talking about. You got to help us out. It's a layered, mafic intrusion, intrusion, layered mafic intrusion. And that didn't mean to get too technical, but point is, they're very big, very large deposits. And what you're saying is your style of deposit sitting in North America and Canada potentially the 51st state we've heard, although it's not been confirmed, has this big ore body or this big anomaly, is it an anomaly right now? And you guys are basically going out and you have a drilling program lined up. What do you guys have going on? Yeah, absolutely. So we've started to find the shape of of the anomalies in the ore body. And we're continuing to do the drilling to essentially try and prove how big this thing actually is. And it very well could be massive. And that's what we're hoping to prove to the markets. How much are you guys drilling, how many meters do you guys have scheduled? So the next drill program we're looking at doing about 10,000 meters. That's going to hit our main targets that will allow us to infer the 20 kilometer trend that we believe is mineralized. So right now, there's not an inferred resource on the property. It's just you guys are kind of kicking off the drilling program to create one, is that right? Absolutely. That's correct. Yep. And remind us what who else produces titanium in Canada? Does anyone Rio? Maybe Rio Tinto at the mine Lac Tio in southeastern Quebec. They, as far as I know, are the only big time producers of titanium coming really out of North America outside of your ilmenite sands. There's this this one in America, right in Utah or something, I thought. But they're very well like there's I know if you follow the Appalachians down there like I think Tennessee has one there's ilmenite sand deposits and they're pretty rich in titanium. The problem with those deposits is because they're like a sedimentary sand, essentially a plaster deposit. Quite often they're not that big. And, you know, that's the that's been the big difference between, say, China and Russia. And what the Western nations have done is we've looked at these plaster deposits, If you will, as as being easy and cheap to mine, where Russia and China has looked at these great big deposits that, yes, might take more capital to get it going, but they might have 75, 150 year mine life. And a deposit like you guys And I know it's early, but what order of magnitude of CapEx is something like this going to require? Is it is that in the low hundreds of millions or I mean, I don't like it, who knows? But it seems like it's hard to raise$1,000,000,000 today. Right? I mean, it's challenging. Yeah. I mean, I think for us and again, like we brought on Paul McGuigan, he's an expert, geologist and metallurgist, and he's confirmed in the zone that we've drilled that we do have simplified metallurgy, right. So because we only have the one mineral magnetite that we can essentially do a crush and magnetic separation of the mineral, pulling out the combination of iron, titanium and vanadium ore body essentially, and then ship that off for processing. So our we would endeavor to keep, you know, any kind of plant or CapEx to a minimum at our actual site because there's already other facilities around the world like in Quebec that already processes titanium, iron, vanadium, those kinds of things. Would you guys, would you also be producing vanadium and iron ore? Correct? Yes. Yeah, it's it's all it's all byproducts from the same processing methodology. Interesting. Yeah. Okay. So what's the next steps? The next step is you guys, over the summer, you're going to be drilling. You're probably already out there. Are you going to be out there? And. Yeah, I'll be out there in the next week actually. Cool, and then help us out. So how long from when you start drilling until you can start typically announcing how those drillers thoughts are going as is it take a few months, a few weeks, six months. So I mean, yeah, go for it. So really what you're waiting for is your assays from the laboratory, right? So you're pulling the drill core up, you're doing your descriptions, you're taking your samples. Those samples have to go to the laboratory and you need that. That kind of verified laboratory confirmation of what is in that rock to be able to actually release that to the public. We can we can talk about things and update the public in the markets and the investors on how the progress is going. But not until you have those concrete laboratory results, can we speak to that. And is it getting busy with gold being where it's at? Is there a lot? I mean, is that are you feeling like more pressure at the labs just because of all the activity that's going on up there? Not not really a factor, I think here. I mean, we we've got a good relationship with the lab and they've I would actually say the last drills results we got on our first maiden program like they were we didn't have to overpay for rushed assays and they came back in a respectable time period consistent with a lot of our other programs that were just grab sample programs like it all came back fairly in good order. So I'm not expecting any unknown delays or unforeseen delays with other commodities. Interesting. So what's changed then in North America to make this viable from what's gone through the last couple of decades to what's happening now. Geopolitics, for one, the geopolitical atmosphere, but also the research that has gone into the metallurgy and the recovery of titanium and vanadium from things like magnetite. That's again, one of the reasons that North America has looked at these small ilmenite sand projects as being so viable. There is less complications now. But we've actually, you know, and in China's led some of the headway with the research on the recovery, it's potentially a massive turning point where these big deposits are potentially even more viable, more economically viable than they've ever been before. I've had people reference that it's kind of on and again, not to get technical but on the verge of when we worked out the models and the research for copper porphyry deposits that changed the copper industry for forever like globally and it kind of feels like we're on the verge of that. But so what's next steps here? I mean, it seems like for the market just updating on this joint program is going to be really, really key to kind of just everything it sounds like from my perspective. I mean, in addition to the geopolitical environment which you don't control, I mean, that's just as what it is. But it seems like there's drilling programs pretty critical. Yeah, for sure. And just the back up, you know, one second. I think one important factor here is that our the maiden drone program that we did sort of confirmed the thesis that not only does this magnetite sit below the surface, but it is quite extensive, extensive, and has the ability to be quite, you know, large across the entire property. And so this is utilizing a combination of grab samples, geophysics, which is essentially utilizing a magnetometer which detects the magnetic levels coming from underneath the surface, and then using that to to drill essentially. So all of that combined is what got us to where we are right now. That has confirmed this 500 meter zone that is quite extensive. Just within this small zone, we have 19 and a half more kilometers at minimum to go drill with about four immediate priority targets that this summer we're going to be doing that same geophysics on to get that same below the surface 3D, you know, image, an anomaly that you can see so that Mike can take that to delineate, you know, exactly where do we want to put the drills and then we're going to move that along the property along the remaining 19 and a half kilometers. So again, this is where when you compare it to other projects, this 20 kilometer inferred zone is unbelievable. That's pretty cool. So just for the people who are not mining engineers or even you know, that close to the industry. I mean, 20 kilometers. I'm just thinking about how long that is. You know, I can't go jog 20 kilometers, let's put it that way. I mean, probably more like 5, but do you have to put the roads in that get a drilling spot or is it kind of open, is it forested? How hard is it to actually get out there and drill this thing? So that's a great, great point. Mike, if you don't mind, I kind of step in. There is one of the amazing things about this property is we are ten kilometers from the coastal town of Cartwright, Cartwright, Labrador, so we have unbelievable infrastructure. Like we have a road that literally takes us about 100 meters from our main mineralized zone. So in other projects where you're expecting heavily forested areas and you're punching big roads and yes, we are putting roads in to get the drill exactly to where we want it, but that's a matter of a kilometer or two or a mile or two or a couple hundred meters rather than ten, 15, 20 kilometers. So that is a huge difference and an advantage that we have. Well, and to kind of help people with that, when we say we're going to put a road in from, say, one of the already existing access roads that would come into the property where you would actually drill, we're not we're not talking about your typical road, you know, in your neighborhood, Like we're not paving this thing or it doesn't require a whole, you know, extensive amount of work to do it. We're talking about using an excavator to just create a proper, nice smooth surface so that we can move a drill along. Right. So it's a very simplistic process, doesn't, you know, cost a whole lot to do it, but it's going to be game changing in terms of being able to move that drill along and just keep going along the whole 10,000 meters that we want to do right. It's exciting. Well, look, I am really glad you guys have come on the show and talked to us a little bit about titanium. I'd love to have you guys back when some of your results start coming in. Help us understand what the meaning of it is and maybe come back on and give us an update on the market as things continue to develop inside of the U.S. And Elon and Trump work out their their the bromance. Yeah. So like really appreciate it and thanks a lot for coming in. Yeah thank for having us on today. I really appreciate it. Thanks guys.