Noble Mineral Exploration Inc. (TSX-V:NOB, FRANKFURT: NB7, OTCQB:NLPXF) announced today that it has entered into a binding Letter of Intent to acquire the Lucas Gold Project from Canada Nickel Company Inc. (CNC). The transaction, structured as a unit issuance and back-in right, marks a strategic move for Noble to repurchase a gold prospect with known mineralization and untested parallel zones.
Under the terms of the agreement, Noble will issue 5,000,000 units at a deemed price of $0.06 per unit. Each unit consists of one common share and one-half of a non-transferable common share purchase warrant, with each whole warrant exercisable at $0.15 per share for two years. Additionally, CNC will retain a Back-in Right to acquire a 25% interest in the property after a Trigger Date, defined as the earlier of 36 months from closing, when $5 million in exploration expenditures have been incurred, or upon a sale or change of control of Noble. The back-in payment would be four times the exploration expenditures incurred by Noble.
The Lucas Gold Project is located approximately 30 km north of Timmins, Ontario, a region renowned for over 75 million ounces of gold production. It is also 20 km northeast of the world-class Kidd Creek Mine, which has produced over 150 million tonnes of ore in its 58-year history, and about 20 km east of the Crawford Nickel Resource being developed by CNC. The project benefits from full infrastructure, including paved Highway 655, access to power and water, and a Memorandum of Understanding with local First Nations.
Previous exploration by Noble in 2018 included 15 diamond drill holes totaling 3,184 meters, covering approximately 650 meters of a 1,700-meter gold mineralized trend identified from airborne surveys. The company located 37 historical drill-hole collars and twinned three of them. Notably, the project has six discrete induced polarization (IP) anomalous trends requiring follow-up, with only one trend tested by drilling to date. Gold mineralization is interpreted as structurally controlled lenses within a pyrite-plus-gold mineralized tuffaceous unit.
Vance White, President and CEO of Noble, stated, "We are very pleased to be proceeding with the repurchase of an excellent gold prospect on which we know from past work carried out by Noble of an existing gold zone but also a number of untested parallel zones." The company plans to conduct further drilling on the initial IP anomaly to define the gold mineralization and test the other five undrilled IP anomalies.
Qualified persons Stephen J. Balch, P.Geo. (ON), VP Exploration of CNC, and Wayne Holmstead, P.Geo. (ON), have reviewed and approved the technical information in this release. The transaction remains subject to negotiation of a definitive agreement and approval from the TSX Venture Exchange.
The Lucas Gold Project represents a drill-ready opportunity with significant exploration upside. For more information, visit Noble's website at https://www.noblemineralexploration.com.
