Medallion – Focused on Rare Earth Exploration
Overview
Medallion Resources Ltd. (TSXV:MDL, OTCQX:MLLOF) is rethinking rare earths. Their team of undisputed leaders in the rare-earth exploration industry has been examining the potential of large, low-cost sources that can provide significant near-term production and long-term supplies of rare-earths. The Company is now convinced that rare-earth sources almost totally ignored by others, mineral sand-based monazite deposits, are the only practical near-term solution to critical rare-earth supply issues.
New rare-earth production from monazite can be developed relatively quickly and inexpensively since it is accessible in large quantities as a waste by-product of heavy mineral sand mining operations. Medallion has a market capitalization of$12 million and has $2.7 million cash on hand.
Investment Highlights
- Medallion is a tightly-capitalized company offering a REE investment opportunity with substantial upside
- Medallion challenges conventional rare-earth-exploration practices, which focus on hard-rock occurrences, to address the critical rare-earth supply issues
- A world-class technical team with extensive REE knowledge and expertise to execute its heavy-mineral sands monazite strategy
- The multi-billion dollar global market for REEs is projected to grow at an annual rate of 8% to 10%
- Medallion’s proposed large-scale monazite rare-earth extraction facility complies with national and international mining and environmental safety standards (SENES Consultants Limited, 2012)
- Medallion has a $12 million market capitalization and $2.7 million in its treasury
Medallion Investor Presentation: Critical Metals Symposium from Medallion Resources on Vimeo.
Key Property
Red Wine HREE Project – Labrador, Canada
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Medallion’s Red Wine HREE Project is located within the Red Wine intrusions rare metal belt in southern Labrador. The Project hosts many areas containing peralkaline intrusions, which are a known host to HREE-bearing minerals such as eudialyte. Many experts believe that eudialyte will prove to be the world’s main source of HREEs. Red Wine is a major new HREE area play with numerous participants, including nine publicly traded companies.
HREEs are the most rare and valuable of the REEs. There has never been an HREE mine, per se, and very few HREE prospects are known. In the past, HREEs have always been by-products of LREE mines, uranium mines or niobium mines. China, which produces 97% of the world’s REEs, has declared that its HREEs resources are finite, with only 15-20 mining years left.
Medallion has negotiated an option, subject to certain terms and conditions, to acquire 100% of four property blocks (six licences), covering an area of over 42 km2. The largest and key licence is located in the southern part of the belt, approximately 90 km northeast of Churchill Falls and 16 km east of Provincial Route 389, covering an area of 2,225 hectares. An exploration program was carried out in 2010 involving mapping, sampling, and airborne studies and the results are being compiled as an NI 43-101 style Technical Report. Large areas of eudialyte-bearing rocks were located and assays and mineralogical studies are pending for these targets.
Medallion is projecting that its Red Wine HREE Project will bear HREE occurrences similar to other peralkaline deposits in Quebec, New Mexico, and Russia. With the licences covering large areas and the peralkaline intrusions being right at surface, this Project has the potential to be an extremely economic operation.
Summary
Medallion Resources Ltd. (TSXV:MDL, OTCQX:MLLOF) is rethinking rare earths. Their team of undisputed leaders in the rare-earth exploration industry has been examining the potential of large, low-cost sources that can provide significant near-term production and long-term supplies of rare-earths.
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Management
William H Bird, PhD, PGeo – CEO and Chairman
Dr. William H. Bird holds a PhD in Geology from the Colorado School of Mines, is a registered professional geologist, and has over 40 years of mining and corporate experience. He possesses a strong combination of business credentials and mineral-industry expertise. His practical and theoretical understanding of geology (most notably rare-earth elements), mineralogy, and metallurgy is recognized as exceptional.
Since his early career as a mineralogy professor, Dr. Bird has pursued his long-standing interest in rare-earth elements and their mineral occurrences around the world. In 2005, he became CEO of Rare Element Resources, which owns the prominent Bear Lodge REE and gold property, where he was given the mandate of to reorganize and refocus the company. Dr. Bird left Rare Element Resources at the end of 2007 to devote his energy and expertise to Medallion Resources.
Donald M Lay – President and Director
Don Lay has over 25 years of experience in venture capital, public-market communications and technology start ups. He has also served as a director for a number of public companies including several mineral-exploration companies such as International Taurus Resources Inc, American Bonanza Gold Corp Inc and Medallion Resources Ltd. Don was a principal at China Mobile Soft, a seed-funded, embedded-software supplier that delivered solutions to Chinese telephone handset makers.
China Mobile Soft was ultimately sold to ACCESS of Japan. Before entering the venture-capital world in 1994, Mr. Lay invested 13 years in enterprise-applications development and software sales and support. Don holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Computer Science from the University of British Columbia.
Thomas Arnould, CA – CFO and Corporate Secretary
Mr. Arnould is a graduate from Queen’s University in Kingston Ontario, receiving his Chartered Accountant’s designation after articling with Coopers & Lybrand (now part of PricewaterhouseCoopers) in 1982. Since then, he has worked with various private companies in the food processing and distribution and group-benefits areas where he assisted with the sale of these companies to public entities.
More recently, he has worked as a CFO of a private strategic-marketing firm, as a principal with Adler Business Solutions Inc and as the CFO of Securefact Inc. In addition, he consults with other companies on finance and accounting matters.
David Haber – Director
Mr. Haber serves in Vancouver as the Honorary Consul General, Republic of Austria. He was educated in Austria and graduated from the Vienna Business School. In 1981, David founded what later became Heath Benefits Consulting Inc., a major National Pension and Benefits consultancy with offices in six major Canadian centres. In 2006, he sold Heath Benefits Consulting to Morneau Sobeco, the largest Canadian employee benefits consultancy, where he served on its Senior Executive Committee until early 2009.
As a past President and Founding Member of the BC Chapter of the Certified Employee Benefits Specialists (CEBS), Mr. Haber has played a key role in the development of the benefits industry in British Columbia. He is a member of the International Foundation of Employee Benefit Plans (IFEBP), the Canadian Pension and Benefits Institute (CPBI), and BC HRMA.
Rod C McKeen, LLb – Director
Mr. McKeen is a lawyer, and a founder and principal of Axium Law Corporation in Vancouver, Canada, since January 2004. He has more than 25 years’ experience in all facets of securities and corporate law pertaining to the mining and mineral-exploration industry. Prior to forming Axium Law Corporation, Rod was a partner in the law firm of Gowling Lafleur Henderson LLP and a partner with the law firm Montpellier McKeen Varabioff Talbot and Giuffre.
Mr. McKeen’s practice encompasses emerging to mid-size mineral-resource companies with projects and operations around the world and involves dealing with stock exchanges and mergers, acquisitions and financing transactions on a similarly global basis. Rod earned a Bachelor of Laws degree from the University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada, and a Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of Alberta, Edmonton, Canada.
Andrew Morden, CA – Director, Audit Committee Chair
With over 20 years of operations and finance experience, specializing in taking small companies to the next level of growth, Mr. Morden is a seasoned executive and leader. Andrew joined Webtech Wireless in 2010, getting back to a focus on the mobility sector. Prior to Webtech, he spent eight years working at the C-Level in e-Commerce and mobility software companies, managing operations and raising venture and public market financing.
As Vice President, Financial Planning and Systems, Andrew spent four years at Intrawest Corporation and was also Senior Manager in the Assurance and Corporate Finances practices at KPMG. Mr. Morden is a Chartered Accountant and holds a Bachelor of Commerce (Honours) from the University of British Columbia.
Sothi Thillairajah, MBA – General Manager – Middle East
Sothi Thillairajah has two decades of experience in international finance, advising North American corporations on Middle East joint ventures and early-stage, mineral projects in Africa and Latin America. Most recently, he was Managing Director at Revere Capital Advisors, a hedge-fund seeding group, working with investment professionals at Middle Eastern financial institutions, sovereign-wealth funds, and investment offices evaluating and recommending hedge funds and private equity investments. Mr Thillairajah earned a BA cum laude in Economics at the University of Rochester and holds an MBA in Finance and Statistics from the University of Chicago.
Warwick Bartle – Director, Feedstock Acquisition
Warwick Bartle’s commercial experience with titanium and related minerals spans almost 50 years. He started as an industrial chemist, working in pigment production for Laporte Titanium (now Cristal Pigments). He soon found his way into international mineral sales and marketing, and over the years has held those responsibilities for titanium minerals, zircon and monazite for leading companies that include Western Titanium (now Iluka Resources), QIT (now Rio Tinto Iron & Titanium Inc), Cable Sands/RZM (now Bemax), and others. Mr Bartle, who is based in Australia, is a graduate of the Royal Institute of Chemistry, London.
