Driven By Geology, Prospectivity and Opportunity

0:08 Well, hello, everyone, and welcome to the B-Metals Live Investment Seminar today, hosted by 6. I'm pleased to introduce our speakers for today. We have John Wilton, President and CEO, and Derek Iwanaka, Vice President, Investor Relations and Corporate Development. John and Derek will walk us through a company presentation and then we will be accepting questions live. So please remember, you can submit your questions at any time on the Q&A panel on the right hand side of the screen and we'll get to them after the presentation.

0:37 And as always, this event is being recorded and will be available to watch afterwards on SIX.com. So without further ado, I'll hand it over to you, John. Thanks very much, Tasha, and welcome to everyone to this update on B Metals. And what this webinar is really about today is really to give you an update on really material developments on all of our projects in the last 3 months since our last webinar which was earlier in the year.

1:10 So just a little background about why metals really for those who may be considering a first investment into a company like ours. Really we're covering a broad spectrum of metals at this point. As some of you may well know that B Metals, we started with really a more of a focus on base metals initially. But then from the middle of last year, we looked to expand our portfolio of projects to include gold into that range of metals. And we've now successfully accomplished that through the acquisition of the Kazan Gold Project in Japan, something that we're really, really excited about. Gold is a real store of value and in the incurrent sort of uncertain times coming out of the, to a degree, coming out of the global COVID pandemic will always remain an important part of the global economy.

2:10 And increasingly, the importance of green metals, such as copper and zinc, which are related to the sort of whole green initiatives that are being implemented pretty much every country in the world at this time.

2:29 So as a short summary of the value proposition, and we'll come back to this at the end. We'll show you through this webinar that B Metals is really guided and led by some of the top mine finders, builders and operators in the resource sector who have returned value to investors over a number of decades. Access to capital and we'll show you how that's now been increased on the back of a recent investment from B2 Gold Corp. The increasing deal flow that we get exposed to at B Metals, especially now opening our portfolio to include gold and being now well financed. Really for the first time in the 3 years that B Metals has been building our portfolio.

3:19 We really are in a good position now with a strong treasury to deliver on the near-term catalysts for future growth and development and increased value in the company. Very briefly, and many of you will have seen this slide before, this is our board of directors. The company was founded by Clive Johnson, Tom Garrigan, Roger Reeshair and myself about 3 years ago. You will know many of those names, I think, very well, Clive, Tom and Roger specifically, who have founded 2 companies, Bima Gold Corp and B2 Gold, which have delivered exceptional value in the mining sector. Mark Connolly joined us about a year ago now as a non-executive chairman.

4:08 Mark was responsible for bringing the Focola project to B2 Gold in Mali, which B2 has subsequently evolved and developed into a world-class gold mine. My introduction to the team here came through my relationship with Tom Garrigan on the back of my work in the late 90s with a good friend and colleague of mine who was when we were involved leading the discovery team and the resource development team for the Ochicotto Gold Project in Namibia, another highly successful operation that V2 has put into production. We have Kristen Reinertsen, a very efficient CFO and corporate secretary based in Vancouver with Derek, who you'll hear from later.

4:58 And again, that fits with our company culture in using efficient people, keeping the overheads low, and focusing money on the ground, money into the project investments. On our more advanced project evaluations, and specifically our South Mountain project in Idaho. I spend a lot of time interacting with Dennis Sandsbury. Dennis has really been a core part of the B2 team, responsible for designing and building and implementing their mining operations across the world. And during my time before B Metals, when I was with Antofagasta PLC, our go-to external consultant was Dr. Richard Salitto, based in London, here in the UK, and he kindly agreed to join us as an advisor when we started B Metals.

5:52 And his insights and experience, truly are world-class, added a huge amount of value already to our South Mountain understanding on the geology and the mineral exploration side there. And as you'll hear about later, also fundamentally added value from his experience to our start of our gold exploration in Japan. So if we were to use 1 slide to capture the sort of value that we see in the team and the company here, we would probably use this one slide. It shows the value creation through discovery and building of mining operations across the world through both BIMA Gold and B2 Gold and we see B Metals as being the third company coming out of that sort of stable of Cornerstone directors and investors.

6:48 Important to say at this time as well is that that very strong team of directors and advisors are very much engaged with B Metals. We have very regular update calls. Everyone is part of the guidance on the decision making and that's a very important value for the company.

7:11 So on the back of our gold acquisition which is now closed for the high quality gold projects in Japan that culminated in a private placement of 7.5 million Canadian dollars from B2 Gold and for the first time that puts B2 in the registry of the company at approximately the 19% level. That sort of was seen as a very good validation and we were very proud of that in B Metals validation of the management team of the company and the value that we already created in this business through careful deployment of exploration funding and advancing the portfolio of existing projects.

8:00 It also provides B2 with exposure to projects which maybe initially look a little bit on the more modest scale side, but have the potential to expand with good exploration and project development.

8:18 Really, this is an important slide for us and sort of links to the tagline of this webinar and it shows that we're really driven by geology, prospectivity and opportunity. To grow a company such as ours in a relatively short period of time, we have to be open to working in a number of regions across the world, and that we are now doing. With our initial project, as some of you may remember, starts with the tier 1 focus copper exploration that we're doing in the northwestern extensions of the Zambian Copper Belt, one of my former Antofagasta exploration properties. We then brought in the, under an option agreement, the more advanced South Mountain project, where we built a very good relationship with the optionees of that property, put in some of our own staff and that's really done well and we'll show you the value creation there with the updated mineral resource estimate that we put out just this morning.

9:20 And thirdly, now the exciting gold exploration potential of our Kazan acquisition in Japan. So as the entry into gold is new for us, we'll start with that project. And really what we've done here is we've been able to acquire a very highly perspective portfolio of gold properties in Japan. And a number of those properties were selected by part of the B2 team when Japan was opening its doors for the first time to direct foreign investment in gold exploration. Those properties have been selected both through their prospectivity but also projects that the team felt at that time could have the potential to be quickly put into a high-grade, probably underground, mining-type scenarios.

10:13 2 other main competitors in the Japan gold exploration sector at this time. Basically, a company called Japan Gold and Irving Resources that have Barrick and Newmont as backers in those businesses. Obviously, as you're hearing about now, really, we have B2Gold as a backer in our gold exploration business there also. So that gives you an indication of the pedigree of the terrain in Japan with those sort of major gold producers all being interested in getting exposure to exploration in that arena. So one of the main drivers for that and really the indication, another indication of the pedigree of the Japan gold scene is the Hishikari gold mine, which has been a long-standing large gold producer from inception, probably in excess of 8 million ounces of gold, and very importantly, a very high grade producer, one of the world's most highest grade producers in the range of 30 to 40 grams per ton.

11:30 That's obviously a big driver for the large corporations, B2Gold and ourselves to be exposed to these young gold deposits in Japan.

11:47 So this is a little bit of a zoom in on our 3 projects that we have on Akaidu. And one of the main focuses for us in the early stages of rolling out now our exploration campaign will be the Kato project. That was explored in the 1990s by one of the Japanese agencies. And coincidentally, during that time in the 1990s, one of our advisors, Richard Salitto, was involved in that exploration and in fact was literally at the drill rig while that early first drilling of the Cato project was evolving. And at that time, he already liked the geology that he was seeing. There's certain geological characteristics there that show us that the full column of potential mineralized stratigraphy is preserved.

12:40 Often a problem with exploration for this style of gold mineralization. And obviously the fact that we were returning high-grade gold intercepts. The project has been tested by further drilling in more recent years by B2Gold, working through the local company that we have now acquired called Kazan Resources. Also encouraging results coming out of that project, showing a broader, lower-grade envelope, but importantly with higher-grade zones of mineralization within that overall drill intercepts. So one thing we'll be looking to do now is to fully assimilate that data, build a three-dimensional model, and that will naturally deliver targets for further drill testing.

13:34 We're currently in negotiations with a major international drilling company which will allow us to secure good right suited equipment for the exploration of this project, and also a company that's had exposure with inter-drilling in this part of Japan. There are some relatively difficult ground conditions related to the alteration around the mineralization, which in itself is an encouraging sign in a way. So really the most important news that we've had to come out just this morning is really an update on our exploration and development project in Idaho.

14:24 This is a project some of you will remember. We really like the address of this project. We're down in the southwestern corner there of Idaho. Idaho is a mining friendly state. We like the relatively modest but high-grade nature of this mineralization. The fact that the project is located on private land, which means that we won't experience too many hurdles in terms of permitting for a potential mining operation.

14:57 And what we can now demonstrate as per our news release this morning is we've had great success in expanding the resource space, which is one of our key objectives when we first got involved on this project about 2 years ago. Bearing in mind we've had some relatively confined periods of drilling where we've been underground drilling very, very accurately through 2 phases in 2019 and 2020 and that leads now to the upgraded mineral resource that we put out today where we've achieved a 21% increase in the measured and integrated resource category and a 130% increase in the inferred.

15:43 That was critical to us because that builds now a sort of all-in potential resource base that's very close to 1 million tons of material. And this we will now plug into our ongoing PEA study that started last month. Really encouraging results as well in the fact is that while we've also increased the scale and the footprint of the deposit through that focused underground drilling, we've been able to maintain the high grade nature of this mineralization. So we're looking here at material that's between 20% to 18% zinc-equivalent grades, so very, very good polymetallic mineralization.

16:32 High-grade nature of the zinc mineralization itself, but also a large component of value coming in from the significant silver and gold credit, specifically in the DMEA type mineralization, where we've extended the largest part of the resource through deeper drilling down plunge on the DMEA zone. We've also identified what we call the Texas West Zone, which is a more scarn-hosted type of mineralization as opposed to the DMEA, which is predominantly massive sulfide. In Texas West, what we deal with there is generally higher copper grades with a significant silver credit.

17:18 And then further east of the Texas zone, the Texas East Zone, that mineralization is more typical of the metal content of the DMEA zone. So what we typically see there is high grade copper, silver and again a gold credit coming into that mineralization with generally lower copper values. So really pleased with these results, we're looking forward now to integrating these into the ongoing PEA study and an important thing that we've learned through this drilling was that we are getting a good degree of predictability from 1 phase to the other. So we managed to intersect the mineralization that we saw in the 2019, predict where we could do infill holes, and that sort of results hung together.

18:10 As we've now identified this mineralization style is really a carbonate replacement style of mineralization, not predominantly the scarn that we thought it was when we first got involved here, that gives us the sense that there's a lot more ultimate upside on the scale of this deposit. And in fact, in that red ellipse on what we call the northern limb of the deposit there.

18:33 That was identified by prospectors back in 1904 because of high-grade silver mineralization at surface and has not yet been tested by drilling for the polymetallic mineralization underneath that high-grade silver. Nonetheless, our main target at this point is to build our mineral resource in that underground situation, which can allow us to get ourselves into a development situation for a modest scale initially, but high-grade mining operation. As I mentioned, we're currently got a PEA study that's ongoing, you know, bi-weekly project meetings with a very experienced team that we've put together with input from our own consultants and advisors.

19:24 And we're currently completing also metallurgical test work that will build upon the existing test work on the project that was completed in 2014 and

19:39 2015. So now to give you an update on the Pangeni project, our copper exploration in Zambia. We're out here in the Northwest part of the extension of the Zambian Copper Belt, exploring underneath the Kalahari Sand Cover. As many of you will have heard me say before, a similar general idea to how we discovered that Ocho Calo Gold Project in Namibia, where we were exploring there again in a covered terrain, looking at geophysical targets, drilling through that cover, getting bedrock geology and geochemistry, and then following up on those positive results.

20:25 The Zambian Copper Belt has got a great pedigree of tier 1 scale and grade deposits. We're about 130 kilometers to the southwest of the Sentinel mine or 1st quantum

20:40 and another development here has been in the last month you will have seen the news releases we have bought Jogmech, the large Japanese government agency in as a partner on this project and they are currently in the process of investing $1.5 million into the exploration of this project. Thereafter, we will proceed with the exploration on a pro rata funding basis. Good to have a real first quality group such as Jogbek to come in, see the value of this project and share with us in some of the early stage exploration risk on this project.

21:24 Our recent news release here was related to the field season in 2020. We drilled some important holes as large step outs, both air core and then follow up core drilling, from positive results on the deep prospect specifically that we achieved in 2019. What that does is it now creates a large footprint of this mineralization underneath the thin Kalahari cover. That green ellipsoid really outlines an area that's probably less than 24 meters average sand cover thickness. And now what we're seeing is there's an 850 meter separation between where we're getting meaningful widths. These are basically true width type intersections in the 0.45% to 0.5% copper range.

22:19 So really quite exciting results, bearing in mind here that there's no outcrop. There's no way to do easy soil sampling. So we have to rely on geophysical interpretation, first doing shallow, air core drilling, punch holes through that sand cover to get the bedrock geochemistry.

22:40 And quite obviously, based on these results, one of the new, one of the first things we will be doing in the upcoming field exploration to be rolled out at the end of this, starting the end of this month, will be to do infill and further step out drilling through the sand cover in this area to try and scope the potential of this really encouraging results that we're seeing to date. There's a timeline for the project where we are now bringing in the JOGMEC investment. And we will be starting that field exploration, as I mentioned, by the end of May. That'll include drilling at the Southwest target and the D prospect, and also testing a number of other prospects on the targets on the property yet to be tested.

23:33 But really encouraging an overall sense of the value we're seeing. We're seeing the right geological relationships known to host mines in the nearby with the alteration mineral kyanite associated with the copper mineral chalcopyrite.

23:53 So obviously the recent investment from B2Gold and the acquisition of the Kazan gold properties in Japan has been really topical, something investors were really looking for us to do. And we've delivered on that now. And I'll hand over to Derek to give you a bit of an update on where we are in terms of our corporate structure and the current investor base of the company. Thanks, Sean. Actually, in case anybody's looking at their ticker screen, I see that We've traded about 2.7 million shares as we speak. And I can tell you right now that the institutional chart needs to be updated a little bit. So we just brought in a new large institution.

24:43 Can't say any names, but that same institution is involved with B2 Gold as well. So that's the type of relationship we have. And I think that we're starting to see some of the shareholders from B2 see the value and see that This is an early stage company that they can hop on board with and help us grow. And so we're starting to see some of those new larger institutions get into the stock. And insiders, of course, own a very large portion. And that continues to grow, in fact, because everybody, including John, has just bought more stock. So we have great ownership and continue to see that on the share structure side, we're now up to 175 million shares outstanding and our market cap has increased about 67 million.

25:34 What's important here is we now have $11 million in the bank. So that's the most cash we've ever had, which means that we're fully funded to do all

25:42 the exploration programs and the PEA for our South Mountain project this year. So we've never really been in a better situation financially. Of course, with B2Gold as our largest shareholder now, we have that support to go forward as well. Back to you, John. Thanks, Derek. So really to summarize where we are to come back to the value proposition here for any new potential investors and current investors, you know, what you're getting with your investment or pending investments in B Metals is you're getting a company that's being guided and led by some of the top mine finders, builders and operators. So that experience is key.

26:27 I guess another point to address here may be that you know we're currently now exposed in the company to gold exploration,

26:36 delivering on that promise of last year to our investors to get ourselves involved with a high quality gold project at sensible valuations. That's the important thing. And we have our base metal portfolio. Some people might wonder why we're prepared to keep those in the same company. I think that's an important differentiator here, in that collectively the team has a huge amount of depth and experience both in gold obviously from the B2 connection but also in in base metals so you know that's why we feel very comfortable being able to advance these exploration and development projects within within B metals certainly as they grow at the opportune time, there might be potential for for separation of certain assets at the right time, which could in itself create another value accretive event for investors.

27:30 Access to capital has always been possible, importantly at sensible valuations. I think that's partly testament as well to our sensible deployment of those funds, even when the markets are running hot as to agree, they are at the very moment. Extensive international network, which brings in a huge amount of deal flow on projects and potential new opportunities for the company which is only going to expand now with the closer relationship to B2 Gold. We are now, as Derek mentioned, well-financed to deliver on our near-term catalysts and growth, which include rolling out of the gold exploration in Japan, results coming through from that exploration.

28:20 The B2, sorry, the South Mountain Project in Idaho, where we're working now hard on completing a PEA study by September this year. And also now, while we've shared some risk bringing in that Jogmek investment, still exposing our investors to that tier 1 targeted copper exploration in the Zambian copper belt. And as we all know at this time, copper is a real good commodity to be exposed in at this moment. So that I think really sums up where we are and actually a lot of updates there since our last webinar 3 months ago, but really very positive steps on all 2 of our existing projects, now bringing in the third gold acquisition,

29:14 bringing with that an excellent cornerstone investment from B2Gold. So we're really excited about the way that we're starting to get traction as Derek mentioned with some of the large funds coming out of the US and elsewhere and I think this is a really great time for people to start getting involved, more engaged with B-Medals as we take the company forward in the coming months.

29:42 Great, well, thank you so much, John and Derek, for the presentation. Now we're going to open the floor to Q&A. So if you do have a question, please submit it now. The first question we got emailed in is, what is the significance of today's update resource estimate with respect to your plant at South Mountain? Yeah, good question. Thanks, Dasha. I think really, as we touched upon, one of the important things there is the way that we've shown through 2 rather limited metre campaigns of drilling, but we've had a significant expansion to the resource. We've obviously learned a lot about the geology, how to explore it from underground. That all bodes well for the future, that we can further expand the resource in the future.

30:28 And importantly, while we've expanded the resource, we've also maintained the hydrate nature of the mineralisation. In the massive sulfide alone category, what we're seeing in the DMEA zone is like a 2.5 gram gold credit now, which is an uplift from the historical resource estimate. So we are really understanding the geology, We're really building that resource base. And we're showing that we can do that. And I expect that to continue into the future. Great, thank you. Tom has a question. He's asking, so CRDs are seen in Arizona to great value with zinc, silver and lead. Are there any carbonate replacement deposits in Idaho near your property? This is the one that, You know, it's a good question. This is the one that's known in that area.

31:19 There's obviously a lot of potential to expand on a sort of a semi-regional scale. And as Tom rightly says, these deposits can be of significant value. There's a lot of work we need to do on the, the age of the mineralization. We've got ideas on that. But the, the important thing is that style of mineralization is likely to grow on us. And these systems generally have, extensive routes. So once you get onto one of these things, it generally will get bigger on you. But still, we have to keep to the objective. The important thing is to get this one into production at the appropriate early time and then sequentially expand from that point.

32:05 Got it. Thank you. He's also asking, in regards to Japan, what is the synergy here in terms of the 3 properties? Yeah, I think basically in Japan, we're looking at the same style of mineralization from a geological point of view, generally low-sulfidation, epithermal deposits, those similar style of deposits well-known in Nevada in the US, for example. Similar style of mineralization, most likely closely age related also. And the important thing is, you know, the potential for high grade underground mining with a relatively small scale environmental footprint. Thank you. Martin is asking why aren't you mining South Mountain, especially with the high price of copper?

32:53 He's saying it's the time to mine, not to do more studies. That's always a good question. You know, obviously that is sort of our objective to fast-track this project as much as possible, but some of the key parameters, there's not really, there's not too many shortcuts in our business and people who do take shortcuts generally come on stuck very quickly as well, you know. So we need to complete the right amount of metallurgical test work, really understand that metallurgy before we start designing and building a plant. Very expensive things to design incorrectly and then have to refit thereafter. So it's a question of getting the right balance between aggressively pushing this project forward, which we are, and demonstrating we can do, but also ticking the boxes on some of the technical questions.

33:45 Of course. So Patrick is asking if you can summarize once more how your cash will be spent on the geographically far apart assets and how far that cash will take you. He's asking are the 11 million including the current WTS exercise? Warrants. Warrants. WTS exercise. Warrants. Warrants. Yeah. In terms of deployment of the funding, we've got an approximately a $2 million, a US dollar program planned for the next 12 months in Japan, following up on these exciting gold projects. We're in the process of rolling out a 1.5 million dollar copper exploration program in Zambia.

34:32 As the way that funding comes in from JOGMEC, that will be an approximate 50-50 split between JOGMEC and ourselves for this year. And then we're busy investing about 1.5 million dollars into the current PEA study at South Mountain. With the current cash situation that we're in, we're certainly well covered for the next year and likely further than that, but you know, depending on the results of the PEA study from South Mountain, we will look at the next sensible steps there in terms of a potential feasibility study, a very focused feasibility study, for example, you know, with a short time path then into potentially construction given continued positive technical results.

35:30 Great, So with B2 Gold as a new cornerstone investor, will they also be investing to advance your base metal projects? Yeah, obviously B2 has come in at the equity level. So by default, they are investing across the portfolio of projects. And obviously, depending how we take some of those projects forward, there might be an element of debt and equity funding on the more advanced projects, for example. But at this time, they certainly appear very comfortable to invest in the portfolio or projects, obviously being very close to them, seeing how they've evolved and being comfortable that they're really valuable things to continue to explore and develop.

36:19 All right, thank you. Diego is asking, what vision does B Metals have in areas of South American Andes where B2Gold has worked, for example, Colombia? Yeah, we look at opportunities, as they come up across the world. We went 2 years ago, we were down in Chile, for example, looking at potential opportunities there. We'll continue to look at opportunities, but the focus for the next while is to bed down the new acquisitions in Japan and get our current portfolio advanced. But we're certainly open to looking at the right fit of projects for us. They have to be projects that fit with the company where we are at the moment in terms of our growth profile and you know, make sure we make sure we're getting them at a good valuation for the current investors.

37:14 Thank you. Patrick is asking, will drilling in Japan have less COVID-related capacity constraints in regards to turnover time, essays, and does the core go out of country? Well, the samples historically have gone out. They get the sort of first phase of obviously cutting the samples and then they get shipped generally to Vancouver. You know, there has been some constraints on the current COVID situation in Japan. Importantly, through the acquisition, we are very pleased to inherit the current staffing in Japan itself, so we have a functional team on site. We've managed to do some reconnaissance work in the last month on some of the properties that haven't had so much attention in the past already and we're in the process now of rolling out some early stage outcrop and potentially stream sediment sampling on a number of the properties ahead of the real focus which will be probably drilling at the Cato project.

38:23 Great. So what is your monthly burn rate when you are not drilling? Well the corporate overhead is, you know, we've got that really nicely under control by design. Most of our project teams are based in the regions. A project like our Pengeni projects, for example, in Zambia, our burn rate on that project when we're not active in the field is $5,000 a month. So it doesn't come much cheaper than that just to keep that project ticking over. Our corporate overhead is in the order of 80 to 100,000 US per annum, which are pretty modest considering the spread of projects we have and the value that we've achieved and invested in the last 3 years.

39:12 All right, and last question here. How would you rank your current assets in order of priority? Yeah, that's a good question and a difficult one to answer at this point in time. I mean, you know, there was a strong sense from Investorbase and from ourselves that we wanted to get exposure to gold exploration And, you know, we've done that through now the Japan, Japan acquisition. So, you know, we're really excited to get going with that project. Nonetheless, you know, we've also got the high grade South, South mountain property, which is really advancing nicely. The more more sort of advanced project that could get into production, probably the quickest or definitely the quickest of all our properties at this point in time.

39:59 And we can't forget the tier 1 focused copper exploration in Zambia, you know, a part of the world that's really also attracted, you know, the majors are in there, companies like Rio Tinto, 1st Quantum, Anglo American. Interestingly enough, we've acquired, you know, our whole portfolio of projects, Japan now and Zambia, in areas where the majors are really interested, which shows you that they see the real big upside in those regions for the gold in Japan and the copper in Zambia. That's great, thank you so much. So thank you so much to both of you, John and Derek, for taking us through your presentation and the Q&A session. And thank you for everyone who joined us today and submitted questions.

40:46 If you think of another question after the summit, we will be sending out a short survey where you have the opportunity to leave your contact details and the B-Metals team will be happy to follow up with you directly. And you can also find more information on their website at bmetalscorp.com. So I'll pass it back to you, John and Derek, for the final word. Thanks very much, Dasha. Very good for you to host another presentation. And, you know, we look forward to keeping More of these going forward as we ratchet up our marketing on the base of these, you know, real positive results that we're seeing coming out of B Metals at this time.