TORONTO (miningweekly.com) – Canada’s largest uranium producer Cameco has signed an agreement with explorer ALX Uranium to acquire 27 mineral claims within the Patterson Lake South (PLS) uranium camp, located in the south-western Athabasca basin, in Saskatchewan.
Under terms of the deal, Cameco will pay ALX C$170 000 in cash. ALX will retain a net refining returns (NRR) royalty on certain of the claims, subject to Cameco buying out 0.25% at any time for C$750 000, and a 2% NRR subject to a reduction of 1% at any time for C$500 000.
ALX on Thursday advised that the mineral claims were located next to its Hook-Carter property, comprising mainly claims isolated from the main contiguous block of ALX’s Hook-Carter property. It also included a small, north-eastern portion of the main block, covering ground with depths to the unconformity much deeper than the main parts of the property, where ALX intended to focus its exploration.
The isolated claims were within and next to Cameco’s existing claims neighbouring ALX’s property. The purchased claims covered a total of 7 064 ha.
ALX’s Hook-Carter property was located within the PLS camp, covering parts of the north-eastern end of the Derksen, Carter and Patterson Lake conductor trends, which hosted several uranium showings, deposits and recent discoveries, including Fission Uranium’s Triple R deposit, NexGen Energy’s Arrow deposit and Purepoint Uranium Group’s Spitfire discoveries.
In recent years, Fission had reignited interest in the PLS camp, after it discovered the world-class Triple R uranium deposit on its PLS property – the largest and highest-grade undeveloped uranium deposit in Canada’s Athabasca basin district.
Analysts were bullish on uranium, as a 15% supply gap was emerging that could signal a prolonged upturn in the uranium price through to 2024.