CAY reaches “FID” with first bauxite shipment due early next year

FID or Final Investment Decision, is the last hurdle before a mine moves from the development stage to the construction stage…

And then eventually production.

After all of the exploration work, millions of dollars spent on drilling, time to lobby the government into securing permits and everything in between, the production phase is where the mines ACTUALLY return money to shareholders.

(As long as the price for the commodity is strong and the mine operates efficiently).

Thousands of assets go through the exploration stage, but only a handful make it to production.

And in the first half of 2026, our 2025 Wise-Owl Pick of the Year Canyon Resources (ASX:CAY) might just get there.

This is the exact point on the Lassonde curve that things start to ramp up:

CAY owns one of the world’s biggest undeveloped bauxite deposits, not (yet) owned by one of the multi-billion dollar majors.

This week, the company announced that it had ordered the long lead items in anticipation for production in the first half of 2026.

The project is financed with a US$140M loan from a major bank in Cameroon AGF Bank and an exercise of options by the major shareholder Eagle Eye Asset Management of A$16M (plus another A$8.7M coming soon).

This is enough to fund Stage 1 of its operations.

CAY’s bauxite project is incredibly easy to mine (effectively a free dig), but with all bulk commodities “transport and logistics” is make or break for the project.

On that note, CAY has:

• Ordered 22 locomotives with CRRC Ziyang
• Secured an inland rail facility scheduled to commence in July 2025
• Road construction engineer secured
• Mining contractor and ore haulage contractor secured (set to start at the end of the year)
• 9.1% stake in CAMRAIL (Cameroon’s major rail network), which includes a board seat

What’s next for CAY?

CAY’s team has delivered their progress on schedule.

🔲 Publish an upgraded JORC resource

CAY already has the 8th largest bauxite resource in the world, CAY expects to upgrade its mineral resource estimate next month.

🔲 Finalise offtake discussions

🔲 Finalise DFS

The bauxite price has significantly increased since the company completed its DFS in 2022. We are hoping to see some new project economics with an updated bauxite price and upgraded JORC resource.

🔲 Construction begins

🔲 First shipment of bauxite

CAY expects first shipment of bauxite by early 2026.