TORONTO (miningweekly.com) – Africa-focused project developer Ivanhoe Mines on Monday said it had appointed BMO Capital Markets and Morgan Stanley & Co International as financial advisers to conduct a strategic review of its Kamoa and Kipushi base metals projects, in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).

The TSX-listed firm, led by billionaire executive chairperson Robert Friedland, in May said it was examining both corporate- and project-level options to help realise the potential value of the company's world-scale mineral projects.

The strategic review would at first focus on potentially introducing third-party strategic investors and/or joint venture (JV) parties for the Kamoa and Kipushi projects.

Ivanhoe would also continue to examine other corporate- and project-level options such as corporate reorganisation, project spin-offs (including potentially separating its South African platinum assets and its DRC copper and zinc assets into separately listed public companies), sales or JVs, project- or corporate-level debt and/or equity investments, and additional and/or alternative stock-exchange listings for certain of the company's projects.

Ivanhoe in May raised $150-million through public and private offerings to fund its DRC projects, which would fund exploration and development work until next year.

Ivanhoe’s TSX-listed stock on Monday traded 1.36% lower at C$1.45 apiece, having shed 22.63% in value since the start of the year.

Last month, Ivanhoe started building the box cut for the initial portal to planned decline ramps that will provide underground access to the proposed Kamoa copper mine.

At Kipushi, Ivanhoe last month reported "exceptional" results from the first batch of assay results from the company’s underground diamond-drilling programme at the Kipushi copper/zinc/germanium/lead and precious-metals mine, which had confirmed initial visual estimates of high-grade zinc and copper mineralisation in both the Big Zinc and copper-rich Serie Recurrente zones.