Happy Creek Minerals Ltd. (TSX-V: HPY): Exploring Copper, Copper-Gold and Tungsten Deposits, near Mines and Infrastructure in South Central B.C., Canada; Mike Cathro, P. Geo, Interim President and CEO Interviewed
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By Dr. Allen Alper, PhD Economic Geology and Petrology, Columbia University, NYC, USA
on 6/30/2021
We spoke with Mike Cathro, P. Geo, who is a Director and the Interim President and CEO of Happy Creek Minerals Ltd. (TSX-V: HPY). Happy Creek Minerals is advancing two new exploration discoveries, in proximity to mines and infrastructure, in south central B.C., Canada. The 100% owned, 130 square kilometer, Fox tungsten property is among the highest-grade tungsten resources in the western world. The 100% owned, 240 square kilometer Rateria and West Valley copper property adjoin the operating Highland Valley Copper mine property, Canada’s largest copper producer, and the past producing Craigmont mine property, to the north and south respectively. Near-term plans include a summer exploration program in the Highland Valley and at the Cariboo copper-gold projects. A small drill program in planned for late summer or early fall. According to Mike Cathro, Happy Creek has a strong Technical Team, and they expect lots of good news coming out this summer.
Happy Creek Minerals Ltd.
Dr. Allen Alper: This is Dr. Allen Alper, Editor-in-Chief of Metals News, interviewing Michael Cathro, who's a professional geologist, Director and interim President and CEO of Happy Creek Minerals. Mike, could you give our readers/investors an overview of your Company and what differentiates your Company from others?
Michael Cathro: You bet. Thanks for inviting me to speak, with you and your readers/investors today. Our Company has been in existence for about 15 years and our focus is on metal deposits in Southern British Columbia, Canada. All our projects are 100% owned and they're road accessible in some of the important metal mining districts of southern British Columbia. We're primarily exploring for copper, copper-gold and tungsten deposits. Our flagship project is at the Highland Valley district, which is host to the Highland Valley Copper Mine of Teck, which is the biggest metal mine in Canada. We have over 240 square kilometers, in the Highland Valley district, and we've made two discoveries of copper porphyry mineralization at Zones 1 and 2, located 6.5 kilometres south of the mine. All told, we have over 25 copper prospects on our property, and we have the right rocks, the right alterations and we have a crew in the field right now, collecting information that we believe will lead us to a new discovery, in the District.
We also have a large property package, in the Cariboo region of Southern British Columbia, near the town of 100 Mile House. Our key projects there is the Fox Tungsten deposit. It's a skarn and it has a 43-101 resource on it, with 582,200 tonnes of indicated resources and a similar tonnage in the inferred category. Fox is one of the highest-grade tungsten deposits in the world and we think that there's great room to grow the resource. We have a target of about three and a half million tonnes that we'd like to get to before we take it to the next stage.
Finally, we have a large project adjacent to the Fox, which includes our Silverboss and Hen-Art-DL and Hawk blocks of claims. The Silverboss property is surrounding the old Boss Mountain molybdenum mine, which is now closed and it's owned by Glencore. On those series of properties, we have a number of copper, copper molybdenum, and copper-gold targets that we think are very prospective for the discovery of a large porphyry as well. Our crew has recently returned from soil and rock sampling various gold prospects on the Hen-Art-DL.
Dr. Allen Alper: Well, that sounds excellent. Could you tell our readers/investors your plans for 2021 going into 2022?
Michael Cathro: At the moment we are in the field, in the Highland valley and we're going to be doing some geological, geochemical and geophysical surveys, with the intention of moving some of our prospects to a drill stage. We hope to be drilling later this summer. We have roughly $1.3 million Canadian in the bank, and we expect to spend about $900,000 this year on exploration. So, we're going to be selective on which targets we drill this year, with a focus on copper and gold.
Dr. Allen Alper: That sounds very good. Could you tell our readers/investors a little bit about your background, the Management Team and the Board?
Michael Cathro: I'd be happy to! Our Company has been in existence for about 15 years, and it has a very experienced Management group, led by Mr. Walter Segsworth, who's the Chair of our Board. He has a long history of mining in Canada. He was President of Westmin and then later President of Homestake. He's on the Board of several other companies, including Pan American Silver. The founder of our Company is David Blann, a Director and our Chief Geologist. He founded the Company 15 years ago. He's a professional engineer and he's the one that's been responsible for pulling the property package together over that time, and making the discoveries, both on the Fox Tungsten project and on the Highland Valley Copper project.
My background is, I'm a geologist and I live in Kamloops BC, so very close to all of our projects. I've had two stints in exploration, sandwiched around about 17 years in the British Columbia government and doing geological research, economic development, permitting, and that sort of thing. I worked throughout BC, the Yukon, Western U.S., Australia, looking mostly for precious and base metals. And then about 12 years ago I retired from the government to return to industry. Over that time, I have been leading exploration for uranium in Canada and also copper and gold in Western Canada. My last job was VP of operations for Skeena Resources here in BC.
We also are lucky to have Sarah Weber and Rodger Gray on our Board. Sarah is also a geologist, and she brings a lot of experience in community relations, permitting, and government relations. Rodger is a financial and capital markets specialist, based in Toronto. So, we have a pretty diverse and well-rounded Board. One other thing that we've done recently is enhanced our technical team by hiring C.J. Greig & Associates as technical consultants. They are led by Charlie Greig, a well-known geologist in Western Canada. He recently won the Spud Huestis Award for the discovery of the Saddle copper-gold and gold silver deposits for GT Gold. He's a real expert on porphyry deposits and brings a top-notch team of young geologists. So, they're pouring over our data and working through the projects. We expect them to come up with some new targets to help us find the next big one.
Dr. Allen Alper: Well, that sounds excellent. Sounds like a very experienced, diversified, strong Management Team and advisors. So that sounds excellent. Mike, could you tell our readers/investors a little about your share and capital structure?
Michael Cathro: The Company has 122.7 million shares outstanding. We're trading at about seven and a half, to eight cents Canadian. It's listed on the TSX Venture Exchange, under the ticker symbol HPY. So, the market cap is about nine million dollars. The Company has been listed for 15 years now and has never had a rollback in that period of time, thanks to prudent cash management. We believe the Company is undervalued, especially considering all our properties are one hundred percent owned and we have discoveries and resources in the ground. We have a strong Technical Team, but are currently looking for a new, young and dynamic, permanent CEO. We think that will help to bring more attention to the Company. We're looking for somebody with capital markets experience.
Dr. Allen Alper: Oh, that sounds very good. Could you tell our readers/investors the primary reasons they should consider investing in Happy Creek Minerals?
Michael Cathro: I'd love to do that. The key reasons to invest in the Company are; we are actively exploring an excellent package of 100% percent-owned, road-accessible copper, and copper-gold properties in a couple of Canada's great mining districts, the Highland Valley and the Cariboo regions in southern British Columbia. We have excellent infrastructure, with operating and closed mines right next to our properties. As a bonus, we also have a very high-grade, tungsten project, with 43-101 resources, open for expansion. We have a really strong Technical Team, and we think there's going to be lots of good news coming out this summer, from our field work and the drilling planned for later in the year. We believe there is excellent potential for discovery of more copper, gold and tungsten on our properties.
Dr. Allen Alper: Sounds like very good reasons to consider investing in Happy Creek Minerals. Mike, is there anything else you'd like to add?
Michael Cathro: No. That's everything I have. I really appreciate the opportunity to speak with you Allen, and your readers/investors. Thank you.
Dr. Allen Alper: Well, that sounds great! We’ll publish your press releases as they come out, so our readers/investors can follow your progress.
https://www.happycreekminerals.com/
Mike Cathro, P.Geo,
Interim President and Chief Executive Officer
Office Phone: (604) 662-8310
Email: mcathro@happycreekminerals.com
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