Hycroft Expands Vortex, Encounters Significant Silver & Gold

0:07 Good afternoon, good evening or good morning, depending on where in the world you're tuning in from today. It did look like quite an international audience, so especially appreciate people coming in very early in the morning in Australia. Thanks for joining us today. Where I'm joined by Diane R. Garrett, President and CEO of Highcroft Mining and Alex Davidson, the company's Vice President of Exploration. Diane and Alex, great to see you both today. Great, thanks for having us, Romeo. And welcome, everybody. Awesome. Now the way today's going to work, just so everybody's got expectations in the room, Diane and Alex are going to have a quick update related to this morning's press release, then I'm going to pop back up on screen to ask some of the really great questions that came in over e-mail, and then a couple of my own. Then we're going to get into questions live today from the webinar audience. So for those in the room, this is an interactive event. There's a chat button in the bottom right of your screen. Feel free to ask a question at any time during today's event. We're gonna get to as many as we can today, but if we don't get to your question, I wanna make sure the Hycroft team has access to it and gets back to you as soon as possible.

1:02 So hopefully you won't have to wait long. We will try to get to as many as we can today. The event is also being recorded and will be available on 6.com and YouTube probably by early tomorrow morning. So you get it right in your inbox. At that point, you can feel free to share it around. But you didn't come here to hear from me. So I'll throw it first to Diane and Alex, just to give a quick update before we get into questions. Okay. Great. Alex, you wanna kick us off and give us the geology view of what we announced this morning. Very exciting stuff for us. Yeah, it's this has been a really stellar year for us It's been a small program we started off with but We had a lot of Objectives to achieve with this one. I think the biggest thing if you guys remember we started off Understanding that the 2 new trends that we were following up, 2 high-grade silver trends.

1:56 So the first part of our year focused on Vortex, which is what our press release was about. So there were a couple of key objectives that we really needed to understand with these 2 new trends. First, Vortex did not match at all what we had previously modeled. It's almost 90 degrees to what we had previously modeled. And it's also low angle, which is also very different. So the work that we did this year, a lot of mapping outside the resource area, coupled with the drilling, was really trying to understand what was driving that low angle feature. And we've learned that it's a low angle detachment structure that had pre mineral movement on it. And then mineralization came through and mineralized what we know as vortex.

2:50 So we really tried to focus to define how that low angle feature sat in there, and it's opened up a lot of new things for us. It's opened up targets to the east of our current resource, And we're also trying to establish how things are looking to expand to the north, to the south, as well as to the west. We know fluids are coming up from the west. So it's been a long journey to get where we know I have to take a stop and give a big shout out to my team. I got a team of very bright geologists, block modelers and geologists who know geochemistry and understand structure extremely well. So they've put a lot of effort into bringing a whole new structural paradigm to high crops.

3:43 It's been a great journey in the last several months. Yeah, and I just add to that. I mean, this is all real exciting for us because we are advancing the technical studies as everybody in the audience is aware. And This was a surprise and a gift for us to get this high grade. It's something that the team has long recognized as the potential of Highcroft. It's kind of the untold story and the real jewel, if you will, to the entire resource and the deposit that we have, this world-class asset. And the team has been successful in identifying it. And that is, I can't stress enough when you're in this side of the business how difficult that can be. And company after company after company have come through projects for decades and not been able to ultimately discover what what we are discovering here so we're real excited about it.

4:39 The drilling also allowed us to connect some high-grade areas together and extend that whole vortex system you know laterally as well as at depth So that's really exciting stuff for us. And then that's just Vortex. And we also have the Brimstone high-grade discovery with those results coming out soon. Awesome. So appreciate that update. Now, we did get a lot of really great questions that came in over email, so I'm going to go to a bunch of those. DGP and others in the chat. I see your questions. We're going to get to those too, but I just want to run through the ones that came in in advance first. I think the first one that I've got probably will go to Alex, And that's somebody wrote in asking if you can provide more details on the cutoff grade

5:20 used for these results. They note that with the impressive high grade intercepts over narrow intervals, they're curious what the strategy is for balancing with the longer lower grade intercepts. Yeah, that's a good question. I think it's important to remember that with our drilling program we're trying to achieve a couple of different goals. So first we're trying to understand what a potential high-grade underground scenario would look like. And the other objective is remembering that we have an open pit scenario that also has a lot of economic value to it. So I've had to kind of organize the intercepts to accommodate for both sets of things, sets of objectives.

6:08 So when we look at these high-grade intercepts, I look at this in a three-dimensional sense. You know, there's what opportunities set above as well as below and how they interact laterally to 1 another as well. That helps me establish that continuity between

6:27 drilling. And So I look at this, you know, we started off with like a 4 gram sort of a cutoff grade from the open pit and then we try to adjust for what an underground scenario would look like. So there's 2 different ways to look at that. And then a third thing that we do in the cross section that was in the press release today was we have, we built a 1 gram wireframe. So that 1 gram wireframe was designed as an exploration tool to help us better understand the continuity across the breadth of both of these new trends. So we are able to better target going forward.

7:17 Awesome. Appreciate that. Another question also for you, I believe, Alex, and they note the drill hole H24D6006

7:25 is mentioned in the Vortex highlights but listed as assays pending. They're curious when investors can expect those results to be released and if they'll be published alongside the pending Brimstone trend results? Yeah, that's actually a good question. 6006 was a challenging hole. It ended up, we lost the hole in some really challenging grounds, some areas that were structurally complex. So we delayed sending assays out on that because we needed to try to get an understanding of what our next hole would be. So we had some options with 6. We could reenter the hole And how would that hole go? And our concern was, would we just reenter the same challenging ground?

8:13 So we've spent a lot of time talking back and forth with our drilling experts, Timberline and my own drill services manager on how we can deal with this hole. And ultimately, what we came down to is we plan on drilling an offset to 6. So we're going to step away and try to find a better scenario. And with that we decided to go ahead and ship the

8:43 samples off. And The reason why we delayed is we wanted to make sure if we reentered that hole, what part of the, of the assays, we don't want to just duplicate assays. So we want to make sure which part of the hole would be a valid thing to send. So now we're going to go ahead and just send all the samples off since we're stepping away. They'll add value all the way to where the hole TD. So we can expect to see reasonable open pit things. Geologically, when we're mapping that, logging the hole, we could see some vein density in there that looked promising. So there's good things will come out of those samples. We can look a couple of months out before we actually see those assays, a little further towards the end of the year.

9:30 Awesome. Next question somebody wrote in with actually a question I had too, which is always good when that happens. That's what the identification of the potential feeder zone at Vortex. How does this new understanding influence your exploration strategy moving forward? Does it open up new target areas beyond what's currently known of the resource? Yeah, absolutely. That also is a really good question. The concept of the new feeder zone is something that we've really been working on throughout the year. We had a couple of experts come to site, Dave Reese and Rick Strife.

10:04 Rick was a former boss of mine and a good friend. And one of the things that we talked a lot about was the presence of native sulfur. And when we go into Vortex, there is an area that we're able to map out. We can see in the drilling, we can see exposures of it in the high walls of native sulfur

10:25 being right over our target area. And from our conversations with Rick and Dave, we learned that native sulfur is one of those things. That's part of the upflow. It's one of the last things to be mineralized on the surface. And So with that kind of concept, we really set back, we looked at what we could see with that sulfur and organized, you know, the down dip of that. And so that's what our targeting has been. 6007 was a really exciting hole. Fortunately, it, we lost that hole right in the top of the mineralized target with some really high grades, at 960 grams of silver and a little over 4 grams of gold.

11:19 So that's a good sign for us. So now what we need to do, we got to recalibrate, try to step out a little bit farther, and reach slightly down dip of that and find out what it is. So there's a couple of things that we need to understand here too. We think the the Western extent this this whole 6007 is going to push mineralization to the West, down dip of the low angle thing. This feeder zone is something that's coming up sub vertical to that. So hot fluids have come up, we found that nice breccia zone, vortex, minerals,

11:59 that mineralization has gone down there. So now we've got to find that feeder zone. So that's a big target for us. So it's helping us with our western extent. And this whole process, the whole part of the drilling has really opened up

12:17 exploration farther outside the pit all the way to the east. It's got us to looking a full kilometer to the east of our current resource. It's a big win for us. You're on mute, Romeo. Thank you so much. Geez, I never noticed that. I got one last question for you, Alex, before I shoot it to Diane for a couple. And that's, press release mentions is something that's always exciting to me. The vortex remains open in all directions and at depth. Given this potential for expansion, I know you've already touched on this, but I'd love a just straight to an answer. What is Highcraft's plan for follow-up drilling and how could this impact your resource estimate? Yeah, we're gonna continue to do step outs

13:04 from our known ore body that we've got. Some of this is going to be targeting specific structure at depth. Some of this is going to be trying to expand to the north. Some it's going to be trying to expand to the north. Some of it's going to be trying to expand to the south as well. So when I write in there, it's open in all directions. I mean very much it is literally open in all directions. I think another key thing about this program is we're able to connect vertically

13:39 these ore zones. So before we kind of just saw discrete high grade zones, somewhat stacked, But now we're seeing that these things are, there's really good grade in between extremely high-grade zones. So it's trying to pin that vertical continuity together as well. Awesome. Appreciate you going through the gauntlet there, Alex. I do have some questions for Diana as well. So this one is it's a compilation of a lot of questions. These came in on email and there's 1 for Mike in the chat that I think goes in the same direction. So if anybody feels like this doesn't cover your question, but it's in the same vein, get at me in the comments. I will be sure to ask a slightly different version of it. Basically what people want to know is when does production for mining start? What does that timeline look like? And for folks that, you know, might be their first miner or only mining investment, What does that timeline typically look like in a jurisdiction like Nevada?

14:35 Sure, it's a great question. And we get asked this a lot. I know it's something that everybody wants to know, right? But I also want to make a point up front that share price performance is not necessarily tied to production. And I know many of you have heard me say it before when our last company went from 20 million to 1.3 billion and we were 5 years away from production still. So Your share price can be driven off new discoveries like we have, high-grade discoveries like we have, market conditions, generalists coming into the space and looking for opportunities, growth opportunities, which is where the stage that High Cross fits in right now, development and growth. But we are also working very diligently to complete the technical studies. They do take a long time. We have seen recently, if you follow Mining News, a couple of projects that have started up and shut down very quickly after startup. Why?

15:34 Because these technical studies were not completed satisfactorily with dotting the i's and crossing the t's. That will never happen with this company. It will never happen on our watch. We make sure we de-risk the project up front. But in a general timeline, I mean, the beauty of Highcroft is we are permitted for heap leach and milling operations. Permitting in the United States can take years. I mean, there's been some mines that have been taking a decade or more. It's a lot of regulation and a lot of work that goes into the permitting application. So we are way ahead of the development curve, having had, because we have been a grass producing site and we still have those permits for the next phase of operations. So that is good.

16:20 Ordering equipment comes once we finish these technical studies and we understand if we're going pressure oxidation or if we're gonna go roasting to process our sulfide ore. Once we confirm which one generates the best cash flow and the best economics for our shareholders, and we lock in on that one, and you don't just go buy a roaster off the shelf or a piece of equipment off the shelf. Every piece of equipment

16:46 is designed specific for the mineralogy of your ore body. So while all rosers are generally the same, they will be retrofitted and adjusted for our throughput size, for our mineralogy, for the hardness of our rocks, same with our trucks, our tires, everything. So once we complete the technical studies, and we are as anxious as everybody, I've responded to several emails today explaining that the industry is being affected by a backlog with independent engineering firms timeline, laboratory timelines, we're feeling it, everybody's feeling it. So we don't have a firm date for that technical study, but the work is ongoing right now and we hope to have a date for you very soon as to when you can expect that.

17:33 Then when you get your equipment in, then you start to order your equipment. Right now, lead times for some of the equipment that we'll be ordering is 12 to 18 months. Can get a little shorter, can get a little longer supply demand. And then we will need about 18 months for construction of the of the mills it will take about that long. This will be a massive new plant at Highcroft. It will be processing somewhere between 55 and 60,000 tons a day, So this will be a very big operation. And so that kind of gives you the general buckets of, you know, from technical study to production of the big bucket timelines that we have to look at. But all 3 of those stages, You're de-risking a project, you're adding value, you're creating value.

18:19 And frankly, I'm just glad that we didn't start mining, you know, 2 years ago. We couldn't anyway because of the technical studies, but

18:26 we would have been selling an awful lot of gold and silver at much, much lower prices. So I think timing is working well for us right now but we're as anxious for production. As everyone is so. When the technical report does come out you will see the economics you will then know what is it going to cost to build the project, and you'll see what the cash flows are from the mine every year, and you will see what the total value

18:53 of the operation is for our shareholders. And so that's going to be another big value driver for our share performance. The market in general is waiting to see those economic numbers and they do need to be completed and done before you can flip the switch and go into operations. Awesome, appreciate that answer, very thorough. If anybody has any question in that vein you don't think we've tackled, let me know in the comments, but I think that should answer a lot of the questions that came in over email. A couple more. 1 investor asked just a really clear question, at what price point would Highcroft consider a buyout? Not the easiest answer, but a clear question. I'll throw it to you for that.

19:34 I hope not at these prices, but here's what I will say. Our fiduciary duty as a management team is to always entertain every single option available and look at all options available. Okay, so that means that we stay in contact with other companies. We invite them to the site there. Under confidentiality, they're looking at what we are doing.

19:57 There can be opportunities for strategic investments by other companies. There can be opportunities for mergers or for acquisitions. If somebody were to come in and make a bid for the company, then if it's a bid at a premium, and we like to take it to the shareholders for the shareholders to decide if that is something that they would like to see happen. So we're always keeping all options open. That's our duty to you as a shareholder is to to not close the door on anything that could drive a good value for your investment.

20:31 And we're shareholders too. So yeah, it's not a set price. 1 investor wrote in and asked how much equity will be needed to bring the mine to production?

20:43 When we complete the technical studies and we have finalized what size mills, how many, what the configuration is, and then we have to get quotes on that equipment. And once that is done and the economics of the report come out, then we will have the number. We don't know that number today. For a 55, 60,000 ton a day operation. They're high dollar. These are not cheap plants, but we don't have a firm number until we finish the study on roasting and decide which way we're gonna go and then what that equipment looks like. And we've got to get to the manufacturers to get quotes for that equipment. So it will come out in the technical report. And again, we hope to have an update in the fairly near future as to when you can expect that technical report to be published.

21:28 We've been hesitant to put out a new date because we don't want to have to be delayed again until the labs and the engineering firms can give us firm dates, then we'll pass them on to the market. Great, thank you. 2 questions about

21:45 other Highcroft sales on the website. One person asks when will, if Highcroft will be offering silver rounds for sale again? And then somebody was asking about if there's a return to selling merchandise on the website.

21:57 Yes, we intend to do both. The Silver rounds, I think it was recommended we do one with a rocket ship on one side. So we've already had the artistry done on that. So give us a thumbs up on social media if you like that. If you've got some other ideas, let us know. Refineries, there have been a number of refineries. 1 that we used specifically the last few rounds that we did is no longer doing those at the moment. So we do have another refinery we're talking to, but yes, we hope to have something out as a Christmas holiday gift for everybody. And merchandise, yes, we will be going back into the store for the merchandise. We have some that we restocked with, so we'll be getting that out to you, and that'll, we'll blast it on social media and then we'll also post it on our homepage.

22:51 Awesome. Thank you for your interest in our stuff. Yeah, there were quite a number of questions about that actually. Can I give a little plug here? Please. We have some fabulous gold and black rocket ship pins that say HYMC on it, So we'll have those available for you. Awesome. Alex, I got one question for you. There's a number of people, I think it was 3 or 4 actually, emailing and asking if Hitchcock had any drone footage. I know we spoke briefly about it before, but I'll shoot it to you for that.

23:20 Yeah, actually, our surveyor has been doing quite a bit of drone work lately. She's done a fabulous job pulling some neat footage together. So we do have some drone footage. We're going to be getting that out. And I think Alex, you were saying earlier, we've got drone footage like coming into the vortex area and then it can morph into our model. So you can see the geology and what that ore body looks like. So we're gonna be uploading that to 6 and we'll be getting that out on social media. Yeah. Awesome. Now there's a number of questions in the chat. I got one more question that came in an email. There's a number of questions in the chat. People want to ask about clearing the debt off the balance sheet. So I just want to tackle that question now. People are looking for the timeline or any information you can give about that.

24:12 Yeah, so sooner rather than later is our goal. We are in dialogue with the debt holders.

24:21 That to me is the single biggest issue of why we have a overhang on our share price. And you'll see today on the great news we put out, we were up like 15 percent and then we gave it all up. Well, my whole screen is red today. So you know, a lot of the there's been a lot of profit taking

24:40 commodities and then the equities themselves. But so it wasn't just high cross specific. But yes, we it is unforgivable for a company to have debt like this at this stage we inherited this debt we came on these it's held by the the the hedge funds that acquired the asset out of receivership. It needs to be cleared. We are in regular dialogue and we are working to try to get that cleared sooner rather than later. We think that's gonna take a big lift off of our stock. And it's a deterrent, because we have new investors and people that want to come in

25:22 in big ways. And they don't want to be behind that much debt. I don't blame them. I'm a former fund manager. And It's not an attractive investment for me until that gets cleared. So we are working very diligently on that and I appreciate your concern. It is the single most

25:41 top of my to-do list every single day. So hopefully we'll have some success here and be able to do it. Awesome. Appreciate that. Another question that's just coming up a bunch of times in the chat, so I want to tackle it before I got into last email question is are you still in a blackout period for marketing? For marketing, Yeah, the specific one that references the blackout period stated by you on 424.

26:08 When did I state it? That I stated a blackout period for 2024?

26:12 Oh, I think it was in response to a question about us buying shares. So we do go into blackouts from time to time and we are restricted from buying or selling shares- right now we are in a blackout because we're a quarter end. So we've got to get our new quarter financials out. And then I'm- unfortunately and fortunately because we have so much trouble news is coming in on a real time basis, we're seeing you know assays coming in and we're restricted from trading as long as we have that information to look at get to the market because keep in mind what we when we send a hole and some of these holes are 1700 feet 2000 feet and there be you know every 5 foot interval is being assayed in these, so we'll get bits and pieces of holes back, but we won't have the entire whole. So we have to wait until the entire whole comes back in before we can then do our QAQC on it with the team and then our independent group and get that out to the market. So at any given time, we've got news And so we're restricted from buying on the back of that news. But when we do free up and we do get freed up, but

27:22 but right now we're currently in a blackout. Yes. Appreciate that. I had one question. This will also tackle one of the questions in Chapman's 1 that came in on email. They mentioned that Eric Sprott is doing investigation or looking into the heavy shorting of the shares of Newfound Gold, one of his big holdings. The question asker is curious if you've talked to him or are doing independently a similar investigation into shares of Highcroft and Predatory Short Selling. Yes. So Eric and I are

27:52 very good colleagues. He was a very large investor in our last company and I'm proud to say did quite well in that one. And we're happy to have a shareholder here. We spent a lot of time talking about this, you know, and what can we do and how do we stop this because it absolutely hurts the retail shareholder. And I do think they're shorting on our stock when you look at, you know, it's it's sort of

28:15 like a kid in a candy shop, they see that we've got good cash in the bank and we're making great progress, but we've got this mountain of debt coming due in 3 and a half years, so it sets itself up well for a short position. But we have got to stop this because there should not be allowed to have this sort of manipulative activity going on at the expense of the retail shareholders. And it's not for a good, healthy market. And unfortunately,

28:43 because of some of the regulations, A lot of those short positions are what we call naked shorts. They're hidden and so you can go look at the public short position, but that's not the real picture. It's usually much larger than that. So we do speak about it. We have done an investigation through it. Eric actually is well connected with 2 groups that he introduced us to and we have used them and they did identify there was suspicious trading. We know the trading houses

29:10 and so then the next level is to send the letters to them and put them on notice that we're aware. But beyond that, it's very hard for a company to actually stop that activity. We've got to figure out a way to band together. And it really needs to come at the regulatory level. And we're very vocal about that. Great, thank you.

29:30 So now, appreciate everybody's patience in the chat. I'm now going to the chat questions starting at the top. So you don't have to ask the same question a bunch of times. I can scroll back. I'll find them all. DGP asks in the chat, what is the status of the roasting process? Want to know if there's any tentative contracts stemming from future deals? Any contracts, is what you're saying? Contracts stemming from future deals.

29:51 So on the roasting process, we're actively engaged with the Hazen Laboratories right now, which is the best, and they do this type of roasting test work. And it's an iterative process, so roasting is usually 2 stages.

30:09 You've gotta get the temperature just right in stage 1, and then you go to stage 2, and that temperature has to be just right. So What you're doing is you're always trying to extract the maximum amount of gold and silver that you can and sometimes those are tweaks and temperatures and different reagents and grinding sizes. And so it's a bit of an iterative process is not just putting it in and having it come out the back end that work is is happening right now. Our team goes down to the lab and spends quite a bit of time there and we have independent metallurgists that are top-notch in our industry

30:44 also involved in that. So it's ongoing real-time and we'll hope that it'll be wound up here in the next couple of months. Great. This question for either of you. A couple of people asked this in chat actually. They're looking if there's been any lithium discovered as part of your exploration of High Crow.

31:03 Lithium as a whole here exists, but it's extremely low grade. We don't have a great deal of lithium on the property. Appreciate that. Nico asks, given that developing underground mine can be a lengthy process, he was wondering if the company plans to mine on the surface in parallel to underground development. Just curious if you have any insights or thoughts on such a strategy. Well,

31:33 I'll kick it to Alex too. Why don't we both take a stab at this one. So from a company perspective,

31:41 it's nice because we have optionality. What you want to do is mine this high grade or early in the mine life. It generates, you know, the shorter payback period, better cash flow, better economics, especially when you're in such high commodity price environment, right? You want to sell that great, great material at the highest prices that you can, which is the environment that we're in. So we will look at it as, you know, open pit and underground, but underground actually is not necessarily longer. It actually can be much quicker to production because instead of building a 55, 60,000 ton a day plant, higher grade underground mines can deliver more cash flow but on a smaller plant size. So we can be looking at 2,500, 3,000 tons a day.

32:34 And by doing that, it's a smaller plant. You have very little surface disturbance, so the permitting for the underground goes much quicker. And, you know, Those are the types of things that we look at as we do these engineering studies. There's a whole long list of things that go into the trade-off studies, and what it comes down to at the end of the day is what makes the most money up front for the shareholders.

33:00 The beauty of the high-prof Mind is whether we start large and open pit or we start open pit on the high grade, which we can do, or we go totally underground, those optionalities don't preclude us from grabbing any of the other resources out there. And we like the idea of starting small because it's more cost effective and much quicker. And then you scale up so you build in the flexibility to increase your throughput. We did it at a former company. We started at 7,000 tons a day And we designed in all

33:32 the flexibility to go from 7 to 10, 7 to 14, all the way up to 24,000 tons a day. And then you're, you're building that larger plant out of the cash flow that you're generating to. And Alex, you want to comment on it from a technical perspective.

33:49 Yeah, Diane hit it square on the head there. Just one more comment, coming back to this year's drill program, we really kept that focus on both aspects because there are really great opportunities, both with open pit and underground. So we're trying to keep our optionality open and our drilling program is dictated by that sort of philosophy.

34:21 And I see things on social media too, where it's like, stop drooling, just focus on production. So Yes, I do read all of your comments on social media, even though I don't always reply, but I do read them. And I thank you for them, and I do thank you for the humor and the fun ones too, and making us laugh. But keep in mind that This drilling is not precluding any advancement on the production scenario.

34:49 We're doing this in parallel, right?

34:52 This is good value and we can easily, we are taking material from this underground and running it in through the labs to do the metallurgy at the same time. So the drilling that we're doing now is not a departure from advancing the project to production. It's we're running it in parallel, and we're doing the same work on that. So I just want to make that clear to our audience.

35:17 One more point to those kinds of comments is you got to really remember that drilling allows us to be good stewards of our ore body. This is how we maximize the value that Highcroft will bring. It's key to keep that drilling going. You know, we need to continue to understand Vortex. We need to continue to understand the Brimstone deposit, but there's a lot of bits that is also coming along with this exploration to the east. There's stuff within the deposit that we need to work on as well. So drilling is key

36:00 to understanding the whole deposit and generally being that good or steward to our ore body. And I'm going to add something else on top of that too. And that's a very good point. Alex is that Most minds, if you're lucky enough to have a resource the size of high crop, you're drilling on this ore body every year while you're in production even. I mean because every year that you produce gold and silver is that much less out of the ground and you want to keep drilling to replace it. So we have an ore body here that is open in all directions and in depth prior management's thought that this ore body ended at the East fault. And now we're seeing this a cop, you know, mineralization extending potentially a kilometer, kilometer and a half to the east. So we're looking at this on a district scale now. So even though we're advancing to production, Alex is absolutely spot on. We are good stewards of the ore body to keep drilling out so that this mine is not just 25 years long, but 35 and 45 and 55 and that continuing to develop and see, you know, to add those years to the mine life.

37:15 Great. DGP asks from the chat, are there any supply agreements in place for future mining? We have, we will be entering into contracts for reagents, for the consumables that we will have, for long term power contracts. We've had them all in the past before because Highcroft has a long history of heat leach operations, but now that we're through the oxides, we've got to put in the new circuit. So we stay in touch with all of those contractors, the engineering firms that are doing the independent firms that are doing our technical studies. We know what our power consumptions are, we know what's required. And so at the right time, we are working with them to lock in contracts.

38:02 Appreciate that. Lock in contracts, yeah. There are 2 questions from the chat that are relatively similar, so I'll bunch them together. 1 from TKEM or V-Chain, I'm not sure which name he goes by. He wants to know if Highcroft has to do another reverse split? I hope not. I mean, we didn't even want to do the last one, but when our stock slid below a dollar for NASDAQ, I think it's 45 days, if you trade 45 consecutive days under a dollar, then you're put on this watch list. And unfortunately, I think even at that time, there was a lot of short position on the stock and it was keeping it down. So we do not intend to. That is the, that would be the triggering point to maintain a NASDAQ listing, you know, if you go below a dollar.

38:53 So we are well above that right now, and we don't foresee that. Great. Jumping back to something I think you tackled already, but there's a couple questions on the chat, so just to jump back on it, a real pivoting topic, but what's the ETA on merch being available before Christmas? ETA on what? Merchandise. Sorry, merchandise. Oh, merchandise. Yeah. Oh, gosh. I'll have to get with our general manager aside, Alex, and see where we are on our inventory. But let's say that, you know, before the end of the year. Perfect. SW from the chat asks, That's an interesting question. I think a lot of neophytes in the industry might have, which is, could the mine be sold to multiple buyers? So rights to silver, gold, sulfur and lithium, or is it typically a single entity?

39:42 Well, you're going to mine when you mine the gold and silver is coming together, So it's going to be very challenging to allow one person to have the gold and one person to have the silver. That becomes a bit of a nightmare. Highcroft is a project that is large enough that can be partnered with another company or joint ventured or you can, you know, sell somebody 30% of the production. But multiple companies likely would not do that. They'll do a joint venture. Nevada Gold Mines is a joint venture between Barrick and Newmont and they have a lot of the mines out there under their control. So that is common, but it's rarely more than 2 companies. Great. This is a question I already think tackled, but good to just have a clean answer when it's a clean question.

40:31 SW asks, when will tech and drill reports be wrapped up? Drilling results, we're drilling through the end of this year. So drill results will be coming out on a fairly regular basis all the way through probably the first quarter. So we're drilling at the end of this year, but drill results will follow. Keep in mind, when we finish a hole, and it'll take a couple of weeks to drill a hole, and then once we finish that, then the geology team has to log it. So that means, you know, they've got their lenses out and they're making notes and they have to log every single piece of that core. What minerals in it, what it looks like, they draw pictures, it has to be photographed. This can take weeks. And then you've got multiple geologists to make sure that you're accurate. Then we split the core, then it has to be packaged and then shipped off to the labs. And then the labs typically run on about a three-week turnaround cycle, but we're finding with so much drilling and so many companies shipping stuff in, we're like, you know, 678 weeks sometimes, right, Alan? Alan Taylor Right, 7 to 8 weeks. Ellen Limerick 7 to 8 weeks, the turnaround time. And that shifts with supply and demand and the activity in the market. We've seen it our entire careers. And so that's why it, you know, it takes time from the time we finish a whole.

41:52 And so that's going to just be ongoing. You know, brimstone results are coming out next and then we'll still have more vortex and more brimstone. So it'll be an ongoing thing. Tech report, after they finish this next round of the roaster testing, we hope that we will have a indication of when the final test work will be completed. And then when that's done, it gives us an indication of when the report can be buttoned up with our engineering firm, with Synco Engineering. And then we will come out to the market. So it won't be like we'll come out today and say, the report will be out in 2 weeks. It'll be a few months down the road, but we'll be able to give you a timeline. At this point, it will be 2025, but is it the first half or mid-year or the second half? We should know in the next month or 2.

42:48 Great, thanks. Rudolph in the chat asks, what's the timeline for the publishing of a feasibility study? So the feasibility study comes after a pre-feasibility study. So the difference there is you've got to get you know very specific on your quotes and estimates so That can take about 6 to 9 months after to get the feasibility completed But first step first is to get the initial one out with the economics. Perfect. And we'll go right into the next stage of. Repeat these things. Makes sense. DG asks from the chat is the goal to mine gold, silver and roast at the same time. So excuse me, roasting is the process by which, so we mine the material, and then it goes through either the pressure oxidation or the autoclave plant, sorry, the pressure oxidation autoclave or the roasting plant. Those processes are what extracts the gold and silver from the ore, the waste ore.

43:57 So you are mining and then you're putting it through the plant to extract the gold and silver. Did I answer the question? I think so. If there are follow-up questions, let us know. We still got a few minutes, so please let us know in the chat. A couple of questions in a similar vein, so I'll kind of lump them together. It's people asking about Highcroft's cash position. Some people want to know how much cash is currently on hand, what the runway for that looks like. And then there's a specific question about the current cash burn rate. I think our cash that we reported today was 56.8 million. I think that was it, the exact number. So that's great. We're in a really solid cash position. But, and then the cash burn, right now we have a drill program going on. So we've got quite a team and the drilling and we're burning close to $2 million a month.

44:59 Those numbers can be pared back based on how much drilling, but as long as we're having success in the drill bit, we're going to keep drilling. So we've got plenty of runway with the cash that we have, and we do have mechanisms by which we can pull that burn rate back. One of the things to keep in mind is our burn rate's a little bit higher than other companies who are just in the development stage. Because we are an active permitted mine site, we have responsibilities and obligations on the environmental side and reclamation side. So we have to do regular water monitoring and sampling. We have to do contouring of historical leach pads. We have to vegetate historical leach pads. There's ongoing work like that. We have to maintain the road that comes out to the mine site. And so there's those kinds of obligations that go on as part of the permits that we have. Great. There's one question from Mike in the chat, who asked a kind of a fun question.

46:00 Is there a chance of Highcroft becoming a major instead of a junior minor? Oh, listen, absolutely. I mean, this particular ore body and asset is a major company asset. I mean, this is the size and scale of something that the big companies would like to have, but also can create Highcroft into a much bigger company. And not just this asset, but once we get this one off the ground, we do have plans to build the company out to a much larger company. So yes. Great. Kikura from the chat asks, could there be investor tours that could take in the distant or near term future of the high crop mine? Yeah, absolutely. We love to have people at the mine and we've had people out there before. We'd like to coordinate it because we've got a lot of big equipment and heavy equipment. We want everybody to be safe and it is a distraction at site, but the guys inside the team, I mean, Alex, you've done a number of tours. What I would ask you is that, unfortunately, I've seen some things sometimes on social media that say, you know, I'm an investor, I'm going to be in the area on holiday, and we want to come by. But It's best if you go through our info at High Croft and put those requests in that way so that we can then Get them to our general manager who will be coordinating site visits and it would be ideal that you know, we're not doing

47:30 site visits for you know one person every single day because it is a massive property and to give you the full effect of High Croft, it's 456 hours, right Alex? Yeah. And it's a big property to get around and a lot to see. So we would like to have groups and maybe we'll put something together for people who are able to come out there and take a tour. In the meantime, that's one of the reasons we were doing this travel work so that we can bring the mind to you in a virtual way. And so we'll be getting those uploaded here in the near future. We were just talking about the timing of that before we all logged into this call. Looking forward to seeing the footage myself. So there you go.

48:16 DGP asks, what are, and this is the best you're able to answer, what are the options for eliminating debt? What are different options or routes, avenues you could take? Well, the debt isn't due for 3 and a half years and We don't make any payments on it right now, but it is increasing every year, so the sooner we can get rid of it, the better. We can offer equity to the subordinated debt holders. Obviously, they would probably love to have cash, but we're not gonna spend our cash. But if we're able to generate cash, then that would be a good opportunity. The goal is to figure out a way to restructure it so that the debt is clean off the balance sheet, it can attract new investment, but also isn't highly diluted to the company.

49:07 So by saying all of that, you realize what a challenge this can be, but we're having good discussions and dialogues and ideas that are coming up on what we can do. So it's probably about all I can say about it right now. Fair enough. Got a couple of questions left. If folks want to get their last minute questions in now would be the time as we're getting towards the end of the hour. SW asks your interview with the Dolly Varden CEO, Sean, he mentioned on the interview that BlackRock has an interest in Highcroft. He's wondering if you are able to expand on that. So BlackRock is probably the, I guess it's the largest investor in our space. They were the largest shareholder of our last company, Remarca Minerals, for about 12 plus years before we were acquired. They own 15% of the company, and every time we raised money, they participated pro rata.

50:07 We are very good friends with them, and they like our management, they know we do good work, and they know their investment is safe behind this management team, because they've seen that before. We introduce the story and keep them up to date with it all the time. I think there would be an interest by a number of institutional investors that have held all of our companies in the past. And the only reason they're not in today is because of the debt, which brings us back to that question, which is, we've got to get rid of it sooner rather than later. And we're hoping that the debt holders will work with us. We have really good dialogue. But it's a debt that they're owed and they want their money too. So how we slice and dice it, so to speak, and maybe it's a staged approach, but we're on it as they say.

51:02 Great. One question from the chat, will Highcraft be raising more funds at the market and or from Sprott slash AMC? If we go out to do a capital raise, we would certainly open it up to Sprott and AMC. We always want to go back and give our existing shareholders an opportunity to come in again and they are very supportive of the company. At the market funds we may. It's an instrument that we keep out there, but But keep in mind when we do, we're very conscientious about that. So we want to make sure that we're not just raising money for the sake of raising money, but that we're doing it at high prices and very, very small percentage of any daily trading volume and really on only on those days where we have big volume and then if we are able to raise you know capture a very high price on a good volume trading day then we can raise money it'd be less dilutive and you know that can also go to helping us pay down the debt.

52:07 Great. Brendan, we have tackled that question already. Stay tuned before Christmas for a merchandise store. But Diane's answer in full will be in the replay, which you can catch in a bit. 1, Andrew, who I think works for Highcroft, just threw in the chat, thank you, Diane and Alex, for being the best management group I've ever worked for. So I wanted to share that with you before we jump in. I'm thinking that's Andy, all right. So that's it for questions today. Really want to thank everybody for joining us. There are tons and tons of very good questions that were in the chat and obviously, Diane and Alex, thank you so much for running through them with us. If anybody has any additional questions, please do shoot them through. I often think of the best possible question moments after the webinar ends. So if you're anything like me, make sure you still write in. I will make sure the HackGraph team gets them as soon as possible. But I'll throw it to Diane and Alex for any last words before we jump off. Yeah, I just want to thank everybody for tuning in on a short notice after our news this morning, this was really exciting stuff for us I got a lot of emails today with just like 1 words that say wow so the kind of grades and the results that we're putting out truly are spectacular in the industry.

53:16 They're really phenomenal so to use to Alex and his team for coming in and doing the hard work and really thinking about where we're going to go to drill, to deliver the goods and well done for doing it guys. But keep it up. We want more of that. Definitely stay tuned. We're doing good things. My team is just, they've been hitting the ground. Lots of great mapping, lots of great things coming out. We've really changed the paradigm of what Highcroft really was. So good things to come. Thank you all for tuning in, really appreciate it.