Fox Tungsten's 20,000 Metre Drill Program Is Underway, PEA Due in '27

0:15Stephen Gray: In a good year for metals, tungsten has been a standout. Tungsten prices have soared as much as sixfold since early 2025. That, according to the International Energy Agency, Chinese export restrictions and increased industrial demand for specialized components are creating the price spike. Fox Tungsten is advancing a tungsten project in central BC, what it says is one of the highest grade tungsten resources in the Western world. The current NI43101 mineral resource estimate includes 582 ,400 tons, grading at 0.826 tungsten dioxide and 565 ,000 tons, grading at 1.231 tungsten dioxide inferred. The company is working towards a preliminary economic assessment in the first half of 2027.

1:02Stephen Gray: Steve Gray is CEO and president. Steve, welcome to Mining Stock Daily. Hi, Michael. Thanks so much for having me. Now, the company and the project are both named Fox Tungsten. Can you tell us, how did you come across the project? The project was found a number of years ago by a prospector, actually. It was a pure greenfields discovery. One of the interesting things about tungsten, or sheelite rather, the tungsten-bearing mineral, is it glows under UV light. So this was a prospector, a guy by the name of David Bland, who was wandering around the woods at night with a black light and found some cool glowing rocks.

1:41And, you know, that was about 20 years ago. And, you know, it's just continued to grow from there. So this was a greenfield discovery in the most classic sense. But we're working hard to advance the project.

1:55Stephen Gray: Let's bring it up to today. So you announced a drill program back in June. You have two rigs on site through the summer program right now. You have both exploration and resource targets, resource expansion targets rather. Talk about the drill program. The drill program is going very well. So as you said, we have two drills turning as we speak. We've been operating for about a month. We're targeting to drill 20 ,000 meters this summer, which to put that into context that will roughly double the amount of drilling that's ever happened on this property historically so this is a very large drill program it's the biggest drill program we've ever done and we're extremely optimistic the program has two main goals one is to maximize the size of the resource that will feed into a resource update and a PEA that will come out next year and that and that's going very well secondly though we're also thinking a bit more broadly we're exploring because we do have a massive property we're about at about 400 square kilometers and it's very underexplored so what on one hand we're trying to dial in and advance the project forward to that PEA but at the same time we really don't know how big this thing potentially can be So we're trying to walk and chew gum at the same time.

3:16Stephen Gray: Now, you did announce in late July that you had a good hit rate for Fox North. Now, I'll just qualify that. That's no assays back from that yet. But you did announce the invisible she light that you were talking about at the start. Those markers of the glowing rock, that indicates, you know, it can be a good indication for tungsten. Can you talk a little bit about that more, what you can infer from that? Yes, so Sheelite, the tungsten-bearing mineral, does glow under UV light. It allows you to identify its presence, although not necessarily its grade. And we've seen Sheelite in the resource expansion drilling south of the RC zone, which we expected.

4:03It's encouraging, but we expected that. What we did not expect or what we didn't know was there was at our Fox North Greenfield target, we intersected several parallel zones of tungsten that are vertically higher than our existing zones. And so this is potentially game changing for us because it allows us to expand the deposit, not just laterally, but also vertically in these different parallel zones and potentially allow us exponential growth. So, again, very early days, no assays yet, but it's very encouraging to see these multiple parallel zones because it gives us a different direction to grow the deposit.

4:49Stephen Gray: When do you think you might be getting assays back? Uh, we're still probably a month away from releasing assays. Also, the Fox North that you had, was that one of the exploration targets that you were growing? That's right, yes. So we had some surface samples there that indicated there was something in the area. And we can see the surface expression of the SCARN, of the mineralized system on surface. So we knew there was something going on over there, but we didn't quite know what. And so the three drill holes we put into Fox North, again, they all hit multiple layers of sheelite mineralization, which was very encouraging to see.

5:36It's still wide spaced. It's still early stage drilling. So there's work left to be done, but it's a very encouraging sign.

5:43Stephen Gray: Now you announced the drill program back in June. It's about mid-August at this point right now. Are you going to have all of the drill results for doing that PA in the first half of 2027? That's right. So we'll drill through to approximately late October, which will mean we'll get our final assays around Christmas. And that's when the PA and resource update will start in earnest. And so the resource update and PA will be likely Q2 of 27. then. Stepping back, what is it like up there? How are the roads, the electricity, other infrastructure? Yeah, we're very lucky to be in a great location. So we're about 100 kilometers to the northeast of 100 Mile House.

6:30We have road access right into camp. There's a power line crossing the property. You can drive from our camp to the grocery store in about an hour. So fantastic location, close to infrastructure, close to civilization. It makes our lives a lot easier. So we're very lucky that way.

6:50Stephen Gray: Is there any community around you at all? So the town of 100 Mile is the nearest, I would say, major settlement. It's the nearest kind of McDonald's and grocery store. Closer to us, though, is the Canham Lake or Tuscan First Nation. They're kind of pathway in between. They've been a strong and friendly partner of us for many years, and we have a great relationship with them. Now, in April, you closed$12.7 million Canadian bot deal financing. How far do you think the funds will be taking you? That will take us through to the next major milestone, which will be the PEA. So we're fully funded through this summer's drill program and then the technical work that will follow.

7:38with, you know, a bit of buffer left in the bank after that. But we will need to raise money again in sort of, you know, late spring, early summer of 27 to fund the next year's drill program, right, the 2027 drill program. And so if all goes according to plan, this will be this year the last purely exploration program that we run. And then next year the focus will shift a little bit to, you know, Let's getting ready for the PFS. Let's get ready for, you know, more met drilling, geotech, infill, that kind of thing. So we'll probably be doing a similar level of work next year, but the focus will shift.

8:22We'll be doing less exploration and more engineering.

8:25Stephen Gray: Any permitting work or is that still too far? Is that still in the future? So we're fully permitted to do what we're doing. But in terms of permitting for construction of a mine, it's a bit early for that. And so I think once we have the PEA in hand, then we'll have a better idea of, okay, what's the footprint? What does the infrastructure look like? and then we'll be able to kick off the baseline studies and archaeological surveys and all that kind of stuff that we'll need to do. But again, that stuff will start next year. Steve Gray, thanks for speaking with Mining Stock Daily. Thanks, Michael.

9:07It's my pleasure. Thanks so much for having me. The information presented should not be considered investment advice. Mining Stock Daily and its affiliates are not responsible for any loss arising from any investment decision in connection with the material presented herein. Please do your own research. or speak with a licensed financial representative before making any investment decisions.