USC Orford Map-minAlamos Gold entered an agreement to acquire all of the shares of Orford Mining Corp. in a transcation valued at $11.8 million. The acquisition will add the highly prospective Qiqavik Gold project, in Quebec, Canada, to the Alamos portfolio, along with interests in several exploration-stage critical mineral and gold projects in Quebec, including West Raglan, the Joutel Properties, and Nunavik Lithium.

“Our acquisition of Orford is consistent with our strategy of building out a pipeline of high-quality, long-term projects, in good jurisdictions, to complement our near-term organic growth projects in Canada. Qiqavik fits that strategy perfectly as an attractive early stage gold project, located in one of top mining jurisdictions in the world. We see excellent long-term potential within the underexplored Qiqavik district and look forward to building off Orford’s success with a larger and sustained exploration program,” said John McCluskey, president and CEO for Alamos.

The Qiqavik gold project is a camp-scale property covering 438 km2 in the Cape Smith Belt in Nunavik, Quebec. The Qiqavik Property covers the 40-km long Qiqavik Break, a major crustal-scale structure controlling gold mineralization on the belt. Early stage exploration completed to date indicates that high-grade gold occurrences are controlled by structural splays off the Qiqavik Break, which extends along strike over the 40 km length of the project.

The West Raglan Property is currently under an option agreement with Wyloo Metals Pty. Ltd., whereby Wyloo can earn up to up to 80% of the West Raglan Project for total expenditures of C$25 million over seven years. In 2023, Wyloo satisfied the first earn-in milestone and acquired 51% ownership interest in the West Raglan Project and has provided notification that it intends on earning-in an additional 19% to take its interest to 70%.

West Raglan is a large 646-km2 property situated in the Cape Smith Belt in the Nunavik Region of Northern Quebec. West Raglan Ni, Cu, PGE, Co mineralization is hosted in the ultramafic units of the Lac Esker Suite (1.89-1.87 Ga). These ultramafic units host all known nickel sulphide mineralization in the Cape Smith Belt, including Glencore’s Raglan mine (North Trend) and Canadian Royalties’ Nunavik Nickel mine (South Trend). The West Raglan property covers a 50-km strike of both the “North” trend that hosts Raglan-style deposits and the “South” Trend that hosts Canadian Royalties-style deposits.

Joutel Eagle is located along the historical Eagle-Telbel Mine Trend in the Abitibi Greenstone belt. Orford can earn 100% interest in the 50-km2 Joutel Eagle Property through an option agreement from Globex Mining Enterprises Inc. The Joutel Eagle Property is an advanced exploration-stage gold property with approximately 20,000 metres (m) of historic drilling and 3,253 m of current drilling completed by Orford in 2022 and 2023 that has identified multiple gold zones. The property is adjacent to Agnico Eagle’s past-producing Eagle-Telbel operation, which produced in excess of 1.1 million oz of gold. The Joutel Eagle Property covers 11 km of strike length of the Casa Berardi structural zone south splay, which is associated with several gold deposits.

The Nunavik Lithium properties are comprised of 598 km2 of claims in the Cape Smith area of the Nunavik Region in northern Quebec. Following the acquisition of the claims in 2023, lithium-cesium-tantalum (LCT) bearing pegmatites were discovered on three projects through the initial exploration program. An additional 12 new exploration targets for LCT pegmatites were subsequently identified during the 2023 field program based on till geochemical results. These results also generated two potential exploration targets for gold within the properties.

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