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TORONTO (miningweekly.com) – Korea's LS-Nikko has opted to take a 20% stake in Inmet Mining's Cobre Panama copper project, leaving the Canadian firm with the other 80%, Inmet said on Monday.
LS-Nikko and Inmet signed an agreement in October that gave the Korean company an option to buy 20% of the Cobre Panama project, and until January 31, to decide to increase the option stake to 30%.
The deadline was since extended until March 15, at LS-Nikko's request, while the company examined options to bring on another Korean investor into its Korea Panama Mining Corporation (KPMC), which will hold the Cobre Panama stake.
“While the results of the technical and business due diligence were positive, KPMC was not able to settle on a satisfactory governance structure within the election deadline to accommodate an additional investor within KPMC,” Inmet said on Monday.
“In light of other financing alternatives available, Inmet decided not to provide a further extension to the option timeline.”
Inmet CEO Jochen Tilk said last month that the company was holding talks with parties interested in helping it fund its share of the project development.
He said at the time that Inmet needed to have the LS-Nikko stake finalised before it could make firm plans regarding project finance.
Inmet took sole control of the Cobre Panama (formerly Petaquilla) project in 2008 by acquiring Petaquilla Copper and buying Teck Resources' 30% stake in the asset.
