Pecoy Copper Expands South Breccia and Targets Major Resource Growth

0:15Vincent Metcalfe: Welcome back to Mining Stock Daily. Ian Wagner here with a catch-up interview with our friends at Pecoy Copper, an emerging copper developer in South America, in Peru. They have a flagship project, the Picoi, which hosts more than six billion pounds of copper. They trade on the TSX venture under the symbol PCU, host a market cap of roughly$340 million Canadian. And I'd note we spoke with Picoi back in April. And so if anyone is new or new to this story, go back and check out that episode. A lot has happened since April. and to talk about all that we have Mr. Vincent Metcalf, CEO of Picoi Copper.

1:01Vincent Metcalfe: Vincent, good to see you. Welcome back to the podcast. Yes, well, thank you very much for having us again. It's a pretty exciting and exciting time to give you guys an update, especially given the current copper market and then also given that we're just on the back of Labor Day and the conference season is starting. So I think we've got an exciting fall ahead of us. Yeah, yesterday, Anna, I know we're recording this on Thursday, September 10th. Yesterday, copper hit an all-time high again, about 680. So maybe we'll talk about that in a minute. But yeah, I really want to dive into what you guys have been doing this summer.

1:36Vincent Metcalfe: And when we spoke in April, I think you had just drilled two, you know, 1 ,000-meter holes in the south breccia. You said the porphyry center still hadn't been found. And since then, you guys have four rigs turning instead of two. You've done a metallurgical review. near surface copper, kind of set the, maybe just recap where you guys are at and kind of how busy this summer's been and what, what maybe important news has, has come out. Yeah, no, for sure. Thank you very much. So I think the most important thing is, as you pointed out, so the main thing with is that we're already starting with a significant asset, which has significant scales, or as you mentioned 865 million tons at 0.34 copper or 0.43 and a half copper equivalent.

2:26The important point here is that this was all done on a historical drilling and historical resource. So that just basically represents the starting point. And I think the main thing with what we're doing and what we've been doing for the last 12 months, we just, it's our first year anniversary this year of trading on the TSX Ventures. We're pretty happy on that. But the main thing that we decided to do last year is to undertake a big 35 ,000 meter drilling program at Picoi versus the historical 49. So that's what's significant here is that we're starting with a very large resource, but we expect that to grow significantly.

3:07And as you mentioned, we started with one rig, two rigs, and then four rigs as of today. And really the clear focus of the initial resource was the South Breccia. And, you know, as you mentioned, last time we spoke, we had just released hole 65 and hole 66, which were within that South Breccia. Since then, we've now released hole 72, which is another 804 meters of 0.34 copper, 0.08 molly, 0.08 gold, sorry. But from 24 meters deep, and then within that, you have a pretty big core of, you know, 485 meters of 0.4 copper and 0.01 gold so the south breccia keeps on growing and that's what's really interesting here so we've got a third broad interval we've now drilled 78 as well that's going to come in here shortly with regards to results uh we're drilling 82 as well all those holes within the south breccia so i think what's really interesting here is that the south breccia is increasingly, you know, it looks like a very substantial mineralized ore body.

4:13We knew that, but I think with today's, you know, and this year's work that's going into, you know, it's definitely becoming more and more important and importantly, it remains open. So.

4:28Vincent Metcalfe: Yeah. And I remember too, with 65 and 66, one thing notable, both those holes ended in um, mineralization, right. And are, are you seeing that at, uh, you know, you said 60, 67 to 60, 72 just came back. Right. And are you seeing that again or is how, how. Yeah. So it's a common theme, right. So it's, uh, for sure when we say, you know, we want to test, I think last time we were on one of the questions we keep on, uh, uh, you know, telling people that we want to answer this year is how big is picoy so how we're going to answer that question is we're going to be testing at depth and then we're going to test be testing to the north northwest the south east and west so and we'll talk about the northwest in a minute but for now if you look at and i'm happy to point people to our website if you go on our website our latest releases there's a few embedded verify presentations in there and i think it's very easy for investors and shareholders to look at, but basically all our, so there's one slide there, which is the historical drilling and another slide, which is our current drilling from 2026.

5:42I would say all of those holes, I think except one, has gone through the historical pit shell. So that's, again... Because that was only like 400, 500 meters, right? Correct. I would say on average, when you took it, if you look at all the historical drilling, everything that was north of the border, so everything that was in the Pembroke, uh claim the average depth was around 600. If you look at everything that was south of the border those holes are even shallower 120 meters in average depth so now most of our holes are over a thousand meters and you know some of them are reaching 1.2 kilometers so adding a lot of a lot of additional uh mineralization below the existing pit and that's what we also showed last week with hole 67, but that one not in the South Breccia, but more to the Northwest.

6:31Vincent Metcalfe: Yeah. And that's going to have that near, the strongest near surface copper results right outside of the South Breccia. On top of it. Correct. Exactly. So that's, you know, as we said, so South Breccia always going to be the center of gravity of our exploration focus because it's by far the richest component of our current deposit. Who knows if we find more discoveries. But then the second theme is let's prove out those near surface zones. And that's where the 67 comes in, uh, 69, 71. And, and to your point, that's where you go into those 200 meters of 0.4, but starting, you know, at 15 meters below surface.

7:10Correct.

7:10Vincent Metcalfe: Yeah. Easy, shallow right there. Um, switch gears a little bit to, to the MT survey that I think we just touched on maybe in April, either you had just finished or you were just still expecting results. And that, that came back recently. Right. And I helped you guys identify, um, a, a untested opportunity, right. MTP zero one. And again, I'll just go back to that comment that you, you said to me in April, which is that you guys haven't found the, the, the center of this porphyry, um, is MTP one, you know, that, that, that center, is that the newest big target? Are you putting a drill rig dedicated to there?

7:49Vincent Metcalfe: Like give us some context around what that is. Yes. So, um, for sure. I think I'm going to answer that, that question in various steps here. The most important thing here is as you, as you point out, there's a big geophysic anomaly. I think what's even more interesting is, is that it lines up with a lot more than just geophysics. So what I mean by that, it's just, it's not just an empty anomaly. It also lines up very well with our IP chargeability. It lines up very well with the magnetics. It lines up with, you know, geocam on surface. And it lines up almost, you know, to a certain point with historical drilling.

8:30Because when you look at the current MTP-01, basically you have drilling just on the side of the initiation of that anomaly. So N67, which was released last week, is also just on the edge of that. So that's what's interesting is when you look at our anomaly slide is you have these four big anomalies. So MTP1, 2, and 3, and 4. The interesting thing with those four anomalies is that if you take three, that one essentially is directly within the south breccia, which is already known. So that's the interesting thing there is that, and that's what gives us confidence in those anomalies, is that we have one historical ore body, the South Breccia, which we know is there, which is basically calibrating our data for us, right?

9:23So we know, okay, we've got 65, 66, all the South Breccia holes that are right on the MTP3. And then we have a similar one called MTP01 to the edge, to the Northwest, which is the same type of anomaly, but that is currently completely untested so obviously from that point of view it's it's quite quite uh exciting because could it be the center of the porphyry or could it be just a different porphyry right um so it could be another ore body that we haven't you know we don't just don't know about uh but you know obviously that's what's uh interesting is that we have known copper mineralization stepping towards a very large, you know, multi-layered geophysical target, which has yet to be tested.

10:11Vincent Metcalfe: So, yeah, I'm looking at that and it's like 67 shoots right down next to it, right? But just maybe misses it by just a hair, right? So, and it's big, right? MTP1, I would note at least from this, is bigger than MTP03, right? So where that south pressure is. So, okay. So this is going to be a follow up to that and a follow up to, again, something you said where a lot of these big copper porphyries do eventually get to 150 ,000 meters of drilling, 200 ,000 meters. You guys are drilling 35 ,000 this year. Where are you at in that? And then how do you then go and attack this MTP 01? Is that, you know, are you guys able to, you know, put together a, are you going to drill it this year?

10:59Vincent Metcalfe: And then is that, or is that a next year thing? Like, how do you, how are you thinking about that? Yeah, no, the current plan right now is, as we mentioned, we're up to four rigs. So one rig is going directly in that Northwest area. So it's going to keep testing kind of around the 67 near surface ore, but also towards that MTP01 anomaly. So for sure, we're going down that road and, you know, it's definitely something that we want to test, you know, in the weeks and months to come here. So this is a priority one type target. With regards to where we're at with our 35 ,000 meter program, we've now completed 17 ,000 meters of drilling of the 35.

11:41So pretty much halfway. But one thing to remember is that we completed most of that with only two rigs. So now that we're up to four rigs, we expect to get to the 35 ,000 meter mark by the end of the year. And, you know, we've got the, and that's one thing also is a year ago, you may recall, but, you know, in our first conversation is we had one geo on the payroll. So we've built out the team significantly. And, you know, from a point of, again, there was no drilling at Picoi since 2016 prior to us starting the drills up again. So it's been a very, very active year. We're very happy with the team.

12:20We're very happy with the speed at which we've, you know, brought the team up to speed. It's not easy to put these teams together and make sure we have the right people, but it's been a big effort and we're very, very happy about that.

12:36Vincent Metcalfe: Yeah, no, for sure. I'll note you, Javier Del Rio was appointed to the board in May. Also, since we spoke last, the political situation kind of resolved itself when Fujimori won the election. Seems like pro-mining. I know that was, you know, maybe not a concern, but certainly an undefined result for a little while. So that's good news for developers. and then you guys had some rain to deal with. So, okay, so you're going to be drilling, a lot of drilling. Maybe now is the point to talk about the copper story, right? And because you noted Picoi hadn't had a lot of drilling since 2016, well, now yesterday copper is at 670, and maybe today I think it's come down to 6.5, right?

13:25Vincent Metcalfe: But your guys' initial resource was at three and a quarter, right? Yeah. So obviously things have changed. So, you know, I guess one is just, does that mean you guys get more phone calls? Does that just validate your belief? Does it change anything from a modeling perspective? Like how does this copper environment affect you guys? yeah well I think it all falls into the category of the reasoning why we want to move this project as quickly as we we can because as we pointed out in the intro we already started with a good base now frankly you know I'm I'm not that I'm not interested in in the copper price today because it's 658 687 bucks where wherever it ends up I think what's even more interesting is is what's happening on the supply side.

14:21So, you know, you see global mine supply, uh, decline, you know, pretty much month over month, especially in the last like six months, uh, you've seen Chile, the world's largest producer just reported July production. I think it's like 10 % down. So year over year. Um, so I think that the industry is struggling to, to add that growing supply and what the big operators are going to be looking for, are going to be looking for easy operations, which means big open pits, low elevation, close to infrastructure, close to local expertise in a country where you don't have to explain what mining is or an existing mining culture.

15:02And I think that's what's super interesting with, with Pico is that we have a large, very scalable type operation. It's a, it's, it's likely going to be a very low strip operation. So from that point of view, these are the projects that matter. And I think that's where you take Picoi and if we're able to advance it as fast as we can, I think we're going to catch up to what are already seen as, you know, buildable projects. So that's where we want to get to, is to a point where is Picoi buildable and how fast can we get to? So I think that's what we're, Or, you know, as I said, we're pretty fortunate that we're starting with a big base of resource.

15:46But now what's great is that with the additional drilling, with the metallurgy work that we're doing with, you know, all the new people we've added to the team, advancing the engineering. I think we have all the pieces in place. Now it's just really executing.

16:03Vincent Metcalfe: Yeah. So on that, I mean, because you guys, you got no shortage of things to drill, right? And we haven't even touched on Tororume, which I think you said last time was potentially bigger, but essentially untested. How do you guys scale up to the speed or the size that you want to? And are you funded for that? How do you get there? Like when we're talking in a year, we should be seeing a lot more tens of thousands of more meters in here, right? And a lot of results. How do you get there? Yeah. Yeah, no. So one of the things we've talked also in the past is what do you do? You know, what are your next steps to financing and how do you, who are you bringing as partners?

16:43Because at the end of the day, these projects are big projects. Mining is a capital intensive business, but copper is even, you know, bigger. So from that point of view, we have to make sure we have the right partners. So I would say since the beginning of the summer, we've been incredibly busy on that front. We've been conducting site visits, whether it's with strategics or local experts or porphyry experts to really give us that expertise. but also to, so, you know, we're able to share knowledge, we're able to share expertise and also, you know, identify who could potentially be the one or two very good partners to help us advance PICOY.

17:28So that's been a big focus, I would say, this summer. And I think as we get closer to the end of the year, we'll get closer to a place where we could execute maybe on one of those transactions or deals to bring in someone to support us in the future. And I think that will fall into the plan of saying, okay, what's 2027 for us? Where do we see things, you know, unfolding? So obviously there's going to be a lot more drilling, but importantly, it's also executing on studies. So whether it's the, you know, what brings us to a PEA slash PFS stage.

18:04Vincent Metcalfe: Yeah. Vincent, on that note a little bit, are you frustrated with your valuation? You know, copper has gone up. I think your story has gotten better. Your valuation since we talked in April really hasn't moved and has maybe come off a little bit, you know. So, yeah, I guess I'd say, are you frustrated? And what is the market missing, maybe? Yeah, no, for sure. I mean, you know, ultimately, I think we should be at a much higher valuation. I think there's a few different components here. I think the Peruvian elections didn't help. it took a while for that situation to get resolved and there was a lot of back and forth whether or not the current party that went through was going to go through and I think that added a lot of volatility around our stock I think second is not that we're I think the fact that we moved so fast from zero to four rigs you know the expectation also moves very fast so i think people are looking for more results we've been a bit quiet on the result front but i would say the fall we've now had three press releases in the last couple of weeks and i expect that momentum to keep building as well um we've uh and again now that we're up to four rigs i think more results at the end of the day that the drill big uh speaks by you know by itself right so the more results we put out the more we're going to be able to really show the scale of Picoy.

19:37So I think there's been a bit of that. But I think in general also, we need to hit the milestones that investors want. So that new resource in Q1 next year is going to be a big one, because that's where we strongly believe that we'll go from 865 million tons or six and a half billion pounds of copper to a much higher level. And that's when you know everything we believe Bitcoin is will ultimately materialize into something real so from that point of view I think it's just that's what what the investors want to see and in the interim then we're executing on you know a lot more drill results a lot more discoveries potentially you know empties getting drilled and hopefully see some of that materialize as well and but yeah So I think, you know, just going through and making sure also that we hit the right areas, whether it's the right institutional groups, the right retail investors.

20:42We're now up to four research analysts. That's steadily growing as well. Again, you know, I went to London this summer. It was the first time in London. There's a lot of investors that hadn't heard the PCORI story. So really getting out there and making sure that we're in front of people and people know what is PCORI. But as I said, a year ago, we had no drills. Now we're up to four. Like this program has gone, you know, very quickly. So there's a bit of catch up to do on the investor front. But I think that's going to take care of itself.

21:19Vincent Metcalfe: Last question then, and obviously not, I know the drill will inform this and not asking you to make any forward looking statements. Do you have, when that resource update comes out, what do you want that to communicate to the market? Yeah, well, look, I think, you know, all things being equal, we always said we saw before even putting one drill on the ground, we always saw, you know, 865 potentially growing to 1.2 billion tons. I strongly believe that with the current drilling, with what we're seeing, that is definitely achievable. Now, given the current commodity price environment, the cutoff will likely be a bit lower.

21:58So right now we're at 0.23. if we say lowered it to 0.2. And in our release last week, we also included all the intervals over 0.2 to show that we have certain intervals and what we will call like the normal holes that we don't necessarily highlight in the titles. Even those normal holes have broad intervals of over 500, 600 meters above 0.2. What that means is from an economic point of view or from an operator's point of view, Those are tons that are making money. So that's what's interesting here is that even if we get the cutoff down to 0.2, I think with the drilling that we're seeing with the current program, aiming for that 2 billion mark is something that we'll work very hard towards maybe achieving.

22:51but making sure that we keep a very high grade core or started pit core within the South Brecha and the near surface tons on surface to make sure that those tons feed your economics and we make sure that we have a quick payback. So it's a bit of a, you know, halturistic way of seeing it, but you have to like, it's not just, you know, data. You have to kind of, there's a bit of a ballet here to be doing

23:22Vincent Metcalfe: yeah and yeah and that affects your sequencing right which affects your capital raise which affects your mine plan and your your irr and all those things so well listen vincent this is a i think it's a great update for today i think we'll call it for now and then we'll maybe uh you know look to catch up with you as some of these these four drag four drill rigs return results throughout the fall well thank you very much and uh we're looking forward to keeping you guys updated Yeah, absolutely. Appreciate it. That is Mr. Vincent Metcalf, CEO and president of Picoy Copper. They trade on the TSX Venture as of celebrating their one year anniversary on the TSX Venture under the symbol PCU.

24:07Vincent Metcalfe: 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