Raiden Resources pens US$31.5M deal with Rio Tinto

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2018 has been a busy year for Raiden Resources Limited (ASX:RDN). The company completed a successful capital raising if $5 million under a public offer before being re-instated on the ASX in February.

The relisting came after the company’s acquisition of a number of highly prospective copper-gold licences located in the world class Tethyan Belt in Serbia, via the acquisition of Timok Resources Pty Ltd. RDN has since established an in-country Serbian operational team and support infrastructure in preparation for exploration activities.

Here is its newly-acquired portfolio of Serbian projects:

To support its exploration in Serbia, $1.2 million-capped RDN has entered into an JV agreement with Rio Tinto (ASX:RIO), one of the world’s largest and most respected exploration and mining companies, regarding three of RDN’s Serbian copper-gold exploration licences.

Of course, as with all minerals exploration, success is not guaranteed — consider your own personal circumstances before investing, and seek professional financial advice.

The licences are located within the prolific Western Tethyan metallogenic belt and the exploration targets are for copper-gold porphyry and related mineralisation. The Majdanpek West and Majdanpek Pojas licenses are located within the northern section of the Timok Magmatic Complex, in the Serbian section of the East European Carpathian-Balkan Arc. The Timok Magmatic Complex is one of the most copper endowed districts in the entire belt.

The mineralisation is hosted within a porphyry and epithermal geological setting, which intruded into Cretaceous volcanic and volcanoclastic units.

Historical exploration at the site was promising. Geological mapping and exploration by the Serbian Geologial Survey in the 1960’s confirmed the compatibility of the stratigraphy and lithologies, primarily andesite volcanics and pyroclastics of Upper Cretaceous age, with those of the Timok Magmatic Complex.

The permit includes copper mineralisation and hydrothermal rock alteration that could be related to a porphyry copper system. Previous explorers have defined geochemical and geophysical anomalies which to date remain untested.

Rio Tinto Earn-In and JV

On March 13, RDN, together with its wholly owned subsidiaries (Kingstown Resources D.O.O. Beograd and Skarnore Resources D.O.O. Beograd), entered into an Earn-in and Joint Venture Agreement with the RIO’s Rio Tinto Mining and Exploration Limited.

The Agreement covers the RDN’s Zapadni Majdanpek, Majdanpek Pojas and Donje Nevlje exploration licences in Serbia. The JV Licenses are located within the Western Tethyan Metallogenic Belt in Eastern Europe, which hosts numerous tier-one copper-gold porphyry and associated mineral deposits, including recent discoveries.

Here are RDN’s JV projects with Rio Tinto mapped out, along with its other Serbian projects and applications:

Dusko Ljubojevic, RDN Executive Director said, “We welcome Rio Tinto as a partner through this Earn-in and Joint Venture agreement on our selected licences. Rio Tinto delivers a tremendous depth of experience in these styles of mineralisation and a commitment to the Western Tethyan belt, together with funding capacity to unlock the potential of world class projects.

“In our opinion, this validates the prospectivity of our licences and we look forward to working closely with the Rio team and realising the potential of the JV properties. It also enables us to focus on exploration in our retained licences to rapidly deploy our planned exploration program.”

The Agreement is conditional on Rio Tinto being satisfied with its due diligence investigations within 60 days of the execution of the Agreement. If satisfied, the JV will then be formed.

Rio Tinto has the option to sole fund a three stage earn-in totalling US$31.5 million (~A$40M) in three stages, as follows:

• Stage 1: US$2.5 million (~A$3.1M) within three years of the Effective Date to earn a 51% participating interest, with a minimum of US$500,000 (~A$635,000), committed in the first 12 months.
  
• Stage 2: US$9 million (~A$11.4M) in the three year period after Stage 1 to earn an additional 14% interest (for a total participating interest of 65%).
  
• Stage 3: US$20 million (~A$25.4M) in the three year period after Stage 2 to earn an additional 10% interest (for a total participating interest of 75%).
  

This JV will provide RDN with a significant source of funding for exploration of the JV Licences and will enable it to devote further resources to exploration and development of its other assets, as well as evaluating new opportunities in line with its growth strategy.