…you gotta kiss a lot of frogs (or “trying to find a junior miner bargain”)
Every so often, friends, clients, IR people and even complete strangers will tip me a junior mining stock, usually cos they operate somewhere inside LatAm. So over time I’ve developed a scanning system that lets me check out the company quickly…if it passes these tests then I’ll look at it more deeply. Today someone gave me a name to look at, and after running down the system I’ll try and sum up how it worked today
So in rough chronological order, here’s the scanning system. Practical comes after.
Who gave the stocktip?
I tend to trust some people more than others…normal, no? If one of the wiser stockpals passes me a name to look at with a bare minimum of info, I’ll look it over no doubts. If it’s the “psst, wanna buy a goldmine” variety, goodbye. Between those two poles there are a lot of colour shades, and it often depends if I’m busy
Where does the stock trade?
If it’s one of the established markets like the NYSE, Nasdaq, Amex, LondonSE,
Website time
If I’m still interested, I’ll go to the company website. I first look for transparency. Go to the financials page and see if the share count is up to date and the latest quarterly report is available on a link. Once that’s done, there are three important things to look at, firstly….
Management team
This is the most important, and particularly true in the case of a small junior miner. I want to see DECADES of experience in the top jobs, and also the top guys must have experience in first-rate companies. If the management and directors also sit on the boards of other companies, that’s not necessarily good or bad, but the active head of the company (be it the CEO, the Chair, the Prez or the COO) should be dedicated to the business your looking at right now and not one of his or her other seats.
Financials
This is the second most important. Get the latest quarterly financial and the management’s discussion (at the SEC they come as one, at SEDAR for example they’ll often get presented as separate documents). Once in the financials, I’m looking for “a lack of red flags”, rather than actively good things. Do the assets add up? Are they hiding a bootload of warrants and options behind that small ‘shares outstanding’ number? Does the debt look correct and serviceable? If it’s already producing, how are gross revenues/costs/stuff like that progressing (by then, I’ll have a second, earlier financial open to compare number evolution etc). If I still like what I see I’ll then go to..
Projects
What are these guys doing right now? If it’s a junior miner, do they have the cash to do what they want to do or will they need to raise cash via dilution or debt? How far along the development timeline is the project? Things of that style, but this part of the DD process isn’t as empirical as the previous parts, and ‘getting the feel’ is important.
So after all that (which shouldn’t take more than 15 minutes), if I’m still interested in the stock I’ll sit down and do a SWAG (stupid wild-ass guess, if you didn’t know already) on how much money I’d expect them to make and when they should start making it. Another 10 minutes, perhaps
And if I still like the stock after all that, it’ll be worth my time dedicating a few hours to learning about the stock more seriously.
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
So now to the practical: Today, I was told about a company called ‘Nilam Resources’, so here’s how it fared down the filtering system.
Who gave the stocktip
A friend who knows what a mine needs to look like. Smart guy, successful investor and a junior aficionado. If he says it’s worth a look, it’s worth a look. Respect given automatically
Where does the stock trade?
Ticker is NILR.OB, and OTC stock. Ugh! Not a case of outright rejection, but red flags.
Website time
Not a bad site. User-friendly, and well laid out.
Management
Very good-looking management team, and this scores big points. My pal had told me in his original mail that someone called Len de Melt was on the board, and that had already caught my eye. Mr. de Melt has a top CV and has a good reputation in
Financials
No red flags. Short on ready cash, and their main project is in the acquisition process right now, so they’re going to have to raise money to pay the bills.
Projects
Not bad. The flagship property already has a small 50 tonnes per day (tpd) processing plant on site, and Nilam plans to put a 500tpd facility on site. Good reported gold grades of 1/2oz per tonne of rock, and apparently plenty of reserves left to be proved up on the site.
So all in all, it was worth spending a few more minutes on the numbers. So the quarterly report gets pored over more carefully and the SWAG calculation comes out. In a SWAG, I always try to be conservative but realistic. Rather than step-by-step the SWAG, here’s what I wrote back to my pal (edited slightly to protect the innocent)
They have a 50tpd operation there. That may be true, but betcha the cash costs are way high too (i know these piddly
So let’s assume there’s a placement at discount to market PPS…say 10m shares at $1.50 with half a warrant attached. That would add about 15m to the full dilution. That’s not bad. What they aren’t telling you is that it’ll take 12 to 18 months to ramp the 500tpd operation up. Meanwhile they will be nickel’n’diming the 50tpd operation for sure. They will need more cash to get through that period…i’m going to play safe
Let’s fast forward and get to them running a 500tpd gold operation at a little under 1/2oz per tonne (they say they’re running 1/2 oz per tonne right now, but it’s easier to pick and choose the ore
gross sales at POG $950 = U$55.7m
They have to pay 4% in royalties on this number: 3% to the mine vendors as part of the sales agreement, and 1% to the govt (that’s the rule down here)
minus $2m = $16.3m
minus 8% workers = $15.8m
after tax earnings = $11.06m