Cloncurry Potential Draws Canadian Precious Metals Magnate

The Age

Friday May 11, 2007

Barry FitzGerald, Resources Editor

THE big-time copper/gold/uranium potential of north-west Queensland's Cloncurry region is emerging as the next big play for billionaire mining entrepreneur Robert Friedland after he cemented his $US1.5 billion ($A1.8 billion) Mongolian copper play with Rio Tinto.

Fresh from revealing plans in BusinessDay in March that it was planning to float its Cloncurry interests, Mr Friedland's Canadian-listed Ivanhoe Mines has emerged as a major backer of ASX-listed and Cloncurry-focused Exco.

Exco is raising $12.27 million to step up its exploration and development hunt, with Ivanhoe the main subscriber. It will emerge with 26.4 million shares, or 12.2 per cent of Exco, at a cost of 30? a share. Other participants include Melbourne-based resource investment group Lion Selection, which will maintain a 10.7 per cent interest.

Exco's exploration portfolio in the region includes a known resource that contains 350,000 tonnes of copper and 350,000 ounces of gold.

On completion of the capital raising Exco will hold $18 million cash to pursue a stepped-up annual exploration program of about $5 million.

Exco shares closed 3? higher yesterday at 34?.

Mr Friedland is best known in this market for the discovery by his Diamond Fields Resources of the Voisey's Bay nickel deposit in Newfoundland and its later sale to Inco for $C4.6 billion ($5 billion).

More recently he enticed Rio Tinto to throw its weight behind Ivanhoe's Oyu Tolgoi copper-gold project in Mongolia.

Rio has taken a 9.9 per cent stake in Ivanhoe as part of a broader plan to invest $US1.5 billion to take its eventual stake to 40 per cent, subject to reaching an investment agreement covering Oyu Tolgoi's development with the Mongolian Government.

Ivanhoe's entry into Exco raises the prospect that Exco could become Ivanhoe's preferred route into the Australian market, rather than the float option.

LINK

? www.ivanhoe-mines.com

© 2007 The Age

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