Andina's Cobrasco: Exploration Update from Colombia

0:16Mining Stock Daily: All right, everybody, welcome back to Mining Stock Daily as we continue our way through here this Wednesday. We're actually going to be talking a lot about the Cabrasco project here with Andina Copper, But we do find the CEO, Mr. Joe Vanden Elsen, down in Argentina, bundled up in a parka. First parka I've seen since winter subsided here in Colorado. So, Joe, good to have you back on. Thanks for taking the time. You must have been dealing with a little cold, a little snow down there. That's right. Thanks for having me back on. It's been a little while. I'm down here in Barrial, which is the pleasant town in San Juan, where we have our core shed and our base camp, if you like, for the Pure Fennis project.

1:06The project season runs from 1st of November till mid-May, indicatively, and we're well advanced now in our preparations for the next field season. So here, spending a bit of time, just trying to lock that in. I think your comments earlier alluded to the fact that all eyes are on Cabrasco and our Colombian project. I think there's a lot of unrecognized value in Argentina within the portfolio. So a big task that I've got ahead of me is to try and unlock that value.

1:43Mining Stock Daily: Very good. So it sounds like early preparation for the upcoming field season down there at Piaquinas. Is that correct? That's right. So, yeah, I mean, if you look at last field season, we had a very, very significant drill hole, the last hole of the season, which was a discovery hole into a previously undrilled blind porphyry target, which intersected near enough 500 metres at 0.5 copper, 0.3 gold, with a high grade zone within that of, it was about 160 odd metres, 0.7 copper, 0.44 gold. So we've clearly been able to demonstrate that the grade profile here at Pure Kennes is incredibly strong. We've now drilled three different porphyry centres.

2:30So this field season, what we need to do is go in and continue the good work that we've done to date. We've drilled about 12 ,500 metres so far, and I would see us doing a similar number over this field season with a couple of rigs. One rig will likely focus on stepping out. that Peel Caness North Discovery and the other rig focus on drilling. We've got a few other untested targets that we'd like to drill this season.

3:00Mining Stock Daily: Okay, very good. Well, let's maybe shelve that conversation for another time because really a lot of the big news, most of the news has really been coming out of the Cabrasco project here in Columbia. And we could go in nitty-gritty with each of your 11 reported holes here, Joe. I don't necessarily want to do that, although each of them seem to be very exciting, continue to tell the story of Cabrasco. But those holes have outlined something like a 1.2 kilometer long by 700 meter wide deposit. It remains open. So what do you think you understand about the scale and geometry of Cabrasco now today that you simply maybe didn't understand six months ago?

3:45So when we came into the project back in, we completed the acquisition of Rugby Resources in July 2025. At that time, there was a historical 43-101 compliant exploration target of one to three billion tonnes. And that was based solely on a bit of soil sampling, a single line of IP and those three holes at Cabrasco. So we've completed now, we're actually on hole 16 at the moment. We've reported yesterday hole 11. And if you look at, as you touched on there, if you look at those 11 holes that we've reported to date, we've very quickly been able to demonstrate 1.2 kilometre strike length, variable widths of sort of 550 to 700 metres.

4:37And to date, we've probably only tested about 40 % of the anomaly. So I think very quickly we've been able to demonstrate that that one to three billion tonne exploration target range is a very realistic barometer for the project size potential. I think we've probably already demonstrated a billion tonnes, give or take, and I think there's potential to step this out further and hopefully reach the upper end of that exploration target range. The other things that we've learnt, I think, would be around grade and the fact that this is a, by modern standards, this is a very, very high grade system.

5:24And just as importantly, it's near surface and indeed comes to surface at various parts of the system. so all our holes or almost all our holes have intercepted very very high grade intervals within broader widths of all grade intervals yesterday's interval for instance that was 200 odd meters at 0.67 copper and notably that's um from 30 30 odd meters from from surface so very quickly North of a billion tons, moving towards that 3 billion ton upper end of the exploration target range, near surface, very, very good grade. It's probably the elevator pitch on what we've seen with the 11 holes reported to date.

6:13Mining Stock Daily: Well, I'm glad you mentioned that, the shallow mineralization that you've been finding. And it wasn't just, you know, this most recent hit. I mean, you've had a number of holes that have found fairly shallow, good-grade mineralization. Is a coherent, shallow, higher-grade domain beginning to emerge here, or is it still too early to connect those intervals into one geological body? So, look, it's still early days in the discovery of Cabrasco. And as you say, there's a number of holes that have intersected high-grade mineralization from near surface. We're drilling at the moment with a single rig and the objective in the strategy has been systematic step outs, trying to test the lateral extent of the system.

7:01We'll get a second rig in shortly and that second rig will allow us to be able to work on the structural controls to the high grade and try and better understand the grade distribution of the deposit. it. So I wouldn't say that we have a coherent high-grade body from near surface established at this stage, but we've certainly got a lot of targets to test when we do get the second rig, which would be going back to some of these previously drilled areas and zones and trying to understand where they come to surface and their lateral extent.

7:40Mining Stock Daily: Yeah. Okay. So watching, I am a shareholder of Andina, so super excited to watch these drill results continue to come in. And listen, I think from the early days before Andina had their hands on it, when it was still under rugby, I think people who were following and never forgot, there was this prospectivity of exactly what Cabrasco potentially could have been. And I would maybe willing to make the argument as a shareholder watching the 11 reported holes. I think you've got an under, it feels like you have a better understanding of exactly what you have, which is a big question. But the next follow-up question is like, okay, how big is Cabrasco?

8:24Mining Stock Daily: Which is what you're trying to really establish right now. So at what point do you feel like you have sufficiently tested the outer limits of Cabrasco, or do you drill enough to maybe put some sort of mineral resource on this thing to show to the market and then maybe provide a carrot of blue sky potential? Like, we don't know the actual limits here, but this is what we know of. So the signal went a little bit bad. So I think I've understood the question. If I haven't, forgive me, and I'll just blame the signal. One thing that we are missing at the moment is research coverage. And the significance of research coverage is that it's a independent objective view on the size already delineated and the upside potential.

9:13So I think that would be a more powerful tool to convey to the market than an initial inferred resource. simply because when you move to conventional resource modelling, you obviously need to comply with the requirements of 43.101 and that may require certain drilling that we wouldn't otherwise do. So I don't see the merit at this point in time in focusing on a formal resource statement. I think we're better off pursuing research coverage that would allow us to talk to these sort of numbers in a different manner. And one of the other reasons I say that is because the logical acquirers of this project are majors.

10:10and if you look at the case of Philo, there was the London BHP tie-up and they did that pre-resource. So they had a resource over the oxides. They'd never actually converted the underground porphyry potential into a resource. And subsequently, post the deal, I think they published a 5 billion ton deposit or thereabouts. So, as I said, I may not have actually heard the entirety of the question, but it is important for us to be able to talk to volume, to be able to talk to scale. I think that's better achieved through research coverage than perhaps it is just by, you know, an early inferred resource.

10:57Okay.

10:57Mining Stock Daily: Well, you basically answered the question despite it breaking up and being a little scattered, not only in the delivery, but also in maybe my questioning. And it really was getting to understand the scale of Cabrasco. But, you know, based on the geology alteration, everything that you know, all those inputs that you know today, obviously this thing remains open in multiple directions. Where, maybe, is there an area of Cabrasco that maybe you're maybe less certain about scalability? You know, it seems it can get larger, but is there an area that maybe you're least certain about? So all I'd, I mean, the reality is it still is early days, right?

11:43So we've had incredible success to date, but we really haven't done that much exploration. If you look at the soil geochemistry, it's been a fantastic guide for mineralization. So we have simply drilled underneath the soil anomalies to date and lo and behold, we've hit good mineralization. So if you were looking at the obvious areas of focus, it would be following the geochem anomaly. And by default, the areas of less interest are therefore the ones that sit outside that. Now, that doesn't mean that those areas are unworthy of exploration, but it'd be a lower priority target for us. and as you know we have that northern block which sits to the north of Rio Tinto's Comita project and we have the southern block which is largely unexplored very little work has been done there so I guess to try and answer the question as best as I can soil geochemistry has been a fantastic guide we haven't really done any down on the southern block so that's that's a critical path and for the time being, we will be following the soil G-comb on the northern part.

12:58Okay.

12:59Mining Stock Daily: You did mention you are bringing in a second rig to Cabrasco. What is kind of the strategy with that second rig? What's the plan there? To try and understand the structural controls on the high grade. So the first rig is trying to systematically step out and understand the size, the scale, the lateral extent of the system. The second rig will be following up on high-grade intervals and trying to understand the structural controls of that to hopefully identify that question that you asked earlier about is there a coherent high-grade near-surface body that may well serve as a logical starter project for the long-term development of Kebraska.

13:49Okay.

13:50Mining Stock Daily: You've drilled enough holes here already, Joe, that investors are probably beginning to start comparing Kebraska with other large Andean copper systems, previous successes, but without getting ahead of the drilling that is yet to be started or completed, You know, what would the next, you know, 10 to 20 holes have to demonstrate before you, as a CEO of the company, become maybe comfortable describing this as a generally world-class copper system? So, I don't know what the trigger is for when you can say that it definitively is, you know, a world-class system. But if you look at it and say, we are 100-odd Ks from the coast.

14:36we are at sea level or near enough to sea level as distinct from projects in the high andes such as where i am at the moment you say that this is a near surface project of significant size high grade from near surface a lot of ball night in the system which potentially augurs well for producing a clean concentrate. And it's probably about 15 Ks from the provincial road. Those things collectively mean you can say that it's potentially a world-class deposit and we need to continue to de-risk the project, which is multifaceted. I would suggest that the geological risk here is relatively low. We're in the middle of the Colombian jungle.

15:31As we all know, Colombia is an emerging jurisdiction, probably the salesman way of selling it, but Colombia is certainly a much more challenging jurisdiction than San Juan, where I am at the moment in Argentina. So in order to really unlock the value of the project, we would obviously need strong tailwinds to remain for copper, for Colombia as a jurisdiction more broadly. And that would help us move to a point where we could say definitively that this is, you know, a world-class project.

16:05Mining Stock Daily: I think there's a little bit more favorable thoughts on Colombia here recently, as it's gone through a major political change with new president Abelardo coming in and taking office. We've had a couple of discussions regarding this administration with other Columbia-focused companies as well here, Joe, but maybe let's turn that question over to you. You know, from Andina's perspective on the ground, what could this new administration actually change for an early-stage exploration project like Cabrasco, and what project risks remain regardless of who is sitting in office in Bogota? One thing that I'm very proud of is that we've achieved a very strong local social license very quickly.

16:53So we acquired the project in July of last year. We were drilling, I should remember this, but if I'm not mistaken, it was October of last year when we started drilling. And since that time, we've executed near on flawlessly and at the same time managed fantastic relationships with the local stakeholders and authorities. And it's only for that reason that we were able to operate under a less than favourable federal regime. And I'm referring to the outgoing president who finished his term earlier this month. The reality of Colombia, however, unlike Argentina where I am at the moment, is that it's a federal system.

17:41And so the long-term permitting required to support a porphyry copper development in Choco is going to be federally driven. And that's something that is unlikely to have been, it's certainly going to have been more challenging under the old administration. So if you look at the old administration, one of the interesting things is that they were, however, supportive of copper as a future source of economic growth and development for the country, and as a means of reducing their reliance upon fossil fuels, so namely coal and oil. The Cordoba Minerals, the Alaclan project, formerly owned by Cordoba Minerals, the TSXV issuer, Friedland-backed company, which was taken over by a Chinese group, they actually had their open-pit environmental licence for a large-scale copper project approved earlier this year under the old administration.

18:47So this is my long-winded way of saying we did a fantastic job under the old administration. The old administration was supportive of large-scale copper development. Under the new administration, however, I think the real value is going to be in expediting some of these long-lead items and providing a more attractive framework for foreign investors, which can only be a good thing for companies such as ourselves. I think what you see is that Columbia has been a jurisdiction where majors have gone in and out of it. Rio Tintaro, Immediate Neighbour being a case in point, I think they've gone in and out a couple of times over the last 20 years.

19:30So with a new favourable or pro-mining, pro-foreign investment administration, I'd expect to see more exploration in Colombia. I'd expect to see more majors. I'd expect to see a more supportive regulatory framework, all of which will hopefully make our life a bit easier.

19:47Mining Stock Daily: And investors' life a lot happier here. Although they haven't had much to complain about. Your market's been trading absolutely solidly, not only with execution with the drill bit, but a supportive copper market, copper price as well. So really nothing to complain about there. Joe, thanks so much for your time. I appreciate you taking some time out of this busy travel schedule of yours and sharing your insights. We look forward to touching base with you in the next couple of months. Thanks again. Yep. And Dina Copper trading on the venture with ANDC and on the OTCQB with PMMCF. The information presented should not be considered investment advice.

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