Insightful Call w/Dan from another board
Someone from stockhouse had a private call with Dan and posted what they talked about. Thought you’d find it illuminating and positive
So the call went well and here are the list of things I think people should take note of:
Lets start with Cat Lake. We talked quite a lot about all of the issues that have been plaguing Cat Lake, like the substance abuse, lack of good healthcare, and just a lot of poverty and social problems. The community has sort of been so overwhelmed with problems in recent years so this is one of the major reasons why the Chief has been quite upset with the government. Dan stated many times that First Mining is actually on very good terms with Cat Lake itself, he knows Chief Russel Wesley very well and the two seem to have a good understanding with each other and they keep good open dialogue. Dan also repeated many times that Cat Lake and Chief Wesley is not at all against development on their land, this seems to have been completely missed by a majority of investors according to Dan. Cat Lake has been wishing for a winter road for many years and when First Mining was issued the permit for a winter road of their own this seems to have been too much for Chief Wesley to digest, so he took the issue to court. Not because he has anything against First Mining, but because he has felt the government does not care about Cat Lake. My sense here is that this winter road issue is really what it all boils down to in the end, and Dan was quite vocal about this and stated the biggest focus right now for the company is to negotiate a community agreement with Chief Wesley. The agreement should basically cover development of the winter road to Cat Lake with the condition that they also allow First Mining the rights to continue the progress on the project development. Dan stated First Mining has done and funded lots of engineering and environmental work already on how this potential road would be constructed to Cat Lake, so basically it’s all there ready to be developed as soon as the parties can come to an agreement about it.
I really got the feeling and noted that Dan actually cares a lot about this community and he really seemed to show a lot of sympathy for the Chief. This is very important to keep in mind for investors because this community agreement requires the Chief especially to feel his community is being included in the whole process. If he would not trust Dan at all then this would be a real issue for me. They really seem to be on good terms and that made me feel very good about this issue getting resolved in the end, especially when Steve Lines (head of EA) is also involved in the negotiations. Other than that, Dan said basically the government is on board here completely because the leverage with them is very simple: The project will generate an enormous amount of wealth and jobs to this region, which for the government means lots of taxes and infrastructure being developed. He said many times this would probably be the major factor in the end to also get Cat Lake on board because they would benefit immensely from the project being developed, the road would just be the start. They are still working together on the Indigenous Environmental Assessment (done by Cat Lake) and First Mining is funding this as well. First Mining has received lots of feedback from Cat Lake about fishing, caribou movement and other Indigenous concerns which they will address in the final EA. I asked many times if there are any major disagreements that have come up from the Cat Lake led EA which would collide with First Mining's EA and Dan said basically those issues are already known and relate to the previously mentioned impacts on the wildlife there. They have included all kinds of mitigation measures for this in the final EA, so I'm not concerned about this at all.
All in all, my biggest take away from this whole issue with Cat Lake was that reading the news about this really gives you a completely different picture than knowing what is going on behind the scenes. I had previously written about my own "analysis" of this whole situation and basically it was correct, except that I know got to know Dan better and was able to read between the lines that the man really cares about this community and is deeply committed to resolving this and any other issues with them. We really could not be asking for a better CEO here guys.
Regarding Duparquet: We spent almost all of the call time discussing the Cat Lake issue so I really had to squeeze in all of the rest of the questions, but I would like investor to really focus on what Dan said about Duparquet. He was pretty surprised about the fact that most investors (in his view) have completely missed what is happening at the project and the potential they have there for getting a starter pit operation going. They are doing major drilling work this year and are in the process of trying to grow the resources and if they succeed in what Dan thinks is possible, the deposit could grow to potentially 8-10m ounces. Dan also reminded me many times that this starter pit operation would basically be easy to get going and required very little capital because most of the infrastructure is already in place. You just need the permits and make some agreements with a few contractors and basically the operation would be cash flow positive from day one.
Other than this Dan stated many times the company has a committed shareholder base (including Keith) which will fund this company to the finish line and stated with a very serious tone that his own personal/networth is pretty much tied up to the success of his company. I think we can all rest assured this man works day and night to make this company's vision happen.
I bought some more shares yesterday after the call simply because I really felt good about it. Will keep adding to my position as long as we stay in this 10-20 cent range.
I have full faith in these people getting us to the finish line.
