Fireweed Metals Corp., [FWZ-TSXV, FWEDF-OTCQB, 20F-FSE] has announced management changes, including the appointment of director Peter Hemstead as interim President and CEO. He is replacing Brandon Macdonald, effectively immediately, the company said in a press release.
The company has also hired Adam Lundin, Chairman of Lundin Mining Corp. [LUN-TSX; LUMI-Sweden], as a strategic a strategic advisor, while appointing Paul Harbidge as independent director. Fireweed said it intends to nominate Jamie Beck for election to the board of directors at the company’s upcoming annual general shareholders’ meeting.
The Lundin family has previously in previous financings making them collectively the company’s biggest shareholder. The Lundins are a well-known group of Swedish-Canadian mining financiers with interests in companies like Lundin Mining, NGEx Minerals Ltd. [NGEX-TSXV], and Lucara Diamond Corp. [LUC-TSX, LUCRF-OTC].
Fireweed shares advanced on the news, rising 2.8% or $0.03 to $1.08. The shares trade in a 52-week range of $1.77 and 80 cents.
Fireweed’s flagship asset is the Macmillan Pass zinc-lead-silver project, which is located in the eastern edge of the Yukon, 350 kilometres northeast of Whitehorse. Macmillan Pass is thought to be one of the world’s leading undeveloped zinc projects.
According to a NI 43-101 technical report, the Macmillan Pass project hosts an indicated resource in the Tom and Jason zones of 11.21 million tonnes of 9.61% zinc equivalent or 6.59% zinc, 2.48 g/t silver, including 1.63 billion pounds of zinc, 610 million pounds of lead and 7.69 million ounces of silver.
On top of that is an inferred resource of 39.47 million tonnes of 10% of zinc equivalent, including 5.845 zinc, 3.14% lead, 38.15 g/t silver or 5.08 billion pounds of zinc, 2.73 billion pounds of lead and 48.41 million ounces of silver.
A preliminary economic assessment announced in May, 2018, says that material can sustain a mining operation for 18 years, one where average yearly contained metal production would be 85,000 tonnes of zinc, 48,000 tonnes of lead and 2 million ounces of silver.
“We believe that Macpass is a district-scale opportunity that we have only scratched the surface of,’’ said Lundin. “We look forward to supporting Fireweed’s exploration team as they continue to uncover the full potential of the district, define its true scale and take the company to the next stage of growth that we envision.’’
Lundin welcomed Hemstead who spent 10 years in a senior financial executive role at Capstone Mining Corp. (now Capstone Copper Corp. [CS-TSX]), leading the finance team through the successful expansion from an exploration and development stage mining company to an intermediate copper producer with multiple operations.
Harbidge is a geologist and former President and CEO of GT Gold, where he led the company to a $456 million takeover by Newmont Corp. [NGT-TSX, NEM-NYSE]. He was previously Vice-President, Exploration at Goldcorp when the company was acquired by Newmont in April 2019.
Beck has more than 15 years of international project management and corporate development.
