Metals Exploration Plc to acquire controlling interest in YMC Group

LONDON, UK: Metals Exploration Plc, a gold producer in the Philippines, has entered into a conditional share purchase agreement to acquire a controlling interest in the YMC Group, which holds an extensive exploration tenement in the prospective Abra area of the Philippines.

The acquisition consideration comprises US$1.6 million cash and the issue of options to subscribe for up to 41 million new ordinary shares of £0.0001 each in the capital of the Company.

The YMC Group holds a highly prospective exploration license covering 16,200 hectares on Luzon, Philippines, approximately 200km north of the Company’s Runruno mine, in the Cordillera region, which is a prolific gold belt in the Philippines, with proven mineral endowment, having produced over 40Moz of gold historically.

Steven Smith, Interim Chairman of Metals Exploration, commented: “Our strategy is to grow MTL within the Philippines and ultimately the broader region, leveraging our established in-country knowledge, experience, and strong technical team.

Our team at Runruno has set the bar for high performance, locally-run and managed operations, and this gives us a significant competitive advantage as we focus on the development of new projects in the country.

The acquisition of the YMC Group is the first step in our progress to a new future for the Company.  The Abra Tenement has the potential to provide an extensive project growth pipeline for MTL, with multiple prospective targets in both gold and copper over a significant area, in a geological region of scale and with historical production.  If we have the exploration success we are targeting, we aim to focus on developing a high-grade, smaller-scale gold production-ready project as soon as possible, in addition to advancing our other targets.

YMC is the first of a number of targets within our purview and we look forward to providing further updates on both our exploration progress and project expansion efforts, as results are obtained.”

First Class Metals signs agreement with NNFN for mineral exploration in Canada