I'm Georgia Williams. This is the Investing News Network and we're here at the Vancouver Resource Investment Conference and joining me today is Bruce Reed, CEO of 55 North Mining, which trades on the CSSE at ticker symbol FFF. Thank you for being here today, Bruce. >> Thank you very much for inviting me. I really appreciate an opportunity to tell this story. >> No problem. It's our pleasure to have you. How has the conference been for you so far? >> Busy. We were laughing um with a couple


of friends of what the difference is in one year uh between last year or the last five years where you know I mean it was it was dead you know I mean it was just a few of us going to other booths and talking to friends of ours uh whereas there is real investors this year. And having said that, it's still early days. So, we'll see. Let's see what it looks like next year or, you know, we've got the prospectors coming up in March, but we'll see how things look. But it is coming around, so it has


been busy. >> Absolutely. The excitement is palpable. Yeah. >> Yeah. Um, I was wondering if we could start with a little bit of background on 55 North Mining. >> Sure. 55 is located in northern Manitoba uh over by the Saskatchewan border just south of the town of Lin Lake, Manitoba. And uh Lin Lake has a long mining history. It was the home of Sheret Gordon. It had about a 50-year life on one of the best nickel mines in Canadian history. And when it ran out in the 1980s, they started looking for more


nickel, but they found gold. Now, none of it ever added up to too much because we had such a low price of gold in the 1980s and 1990s. I put the property package back together about 2006 and um I drilled five different deposits uh over about a six seven-year period and grew it to about 5 million ounces of open pitable material and I sold it to Alamos Gold in 2016. Alamos has since uh worked their way through what I had sold them and uh they came up with a positive decision uh in mid 2025 and they're in the process of


spending about 700 million US in building a 250,000 ounce mine. Uh and so there is a plant a 10,000 ton a day plant that will be being built. It'll start about late 27, early 28 and I'm about 20 kilometers south of that and my deposit which is right on their southern boundary I when I sort of I've owned it two or three times but in my lattest in in inclination I have um taken it from 25,000 ounces to just shy of 400,000 ounces. My average grade is about five and a half grams and I'm just going to


continue to drill it through 2026 and I hope I can double the size of it. >> And you recently finished the acquisition of Last Hope. >> I did. >> And what are your plans there? >> Well, it was um one of the reasons that Alamos never seemed to be that interested in it. It had a balloon payment of $3 million. I didn't think it was that much given what it was. Um, but I bought it finally away from the underlying prospector and um, he was very happy. I paid him $3 million as you


can imagine and uh, we now own it 100%. And uh, our intention is to continue to drill it. Uh, I've got one rig spinning right now and I'll probably have a second rig 6 weeks from now and we will drill all the way through 2026. There might be a small break for break up or you know freeze up, but our intention is to drill all year round. >> And you were talking a little bit about your relationship with Alamos. Sure. And earlier uh this year they announced that they're building a mine and processing


plant at Lin Lake. Yes. >> How does this impact your project? >> Well, significantly, you would think. Now, I don't have an agreement with Alamos at this point. They know who I am and I know who they are. I mean, their office is right across the street from me in Toronto. Um, and I sold them that original project for about $140 million uh, nine years ago roughly. In any case, um, I went to them uh, in 2021 and 22, asked if they wanted to, you know, invest in 55 and help spend money on our


drilling and they said no. And, uh, I'm kind of grateful because they don't own anything of us and so, you know, they're not, it's not the tail wagging the dog. Um, but you got to remember what the price of gold was back then and they had taken a swing at some other sort of silly junior exploration place and came up with nothing. So, they didn't want to, you know, put any further money into that sort of thing. And that's just fine. Here's what you have to know. Their average grade is 1.3


g. Mine is 5.5 g. I have four times the amount of gold per ton that they do. Now, that impacts them significantly if they took us on. Now, I will go to them maybe a year from now to talk about a tolling agreement. I seriously doubt that they want to be in bed with a junior minor. If they do, it's like, oo, I'd be overjoyed if all they wanted to do is toll our ore. I'll build a mine. But you got to remember, I'm not building a tailings. I'm not building a mill. I'm not building a town. I'm not


building roads. I'm just putting a ramp in and taking material out and it becomes quite simple and relatively straightforward. Um, but Alamos, if they take us on for the same tonnage that they're currently contemplating, we'll get 25 to 30,000 more ounces for the same cost. And at today's gold price, 25 to 30,000 ounces, it's about, I don't know, $120 million of extra cash flow that impacts Alamos. That changes the internal rate of return on the Alamos project by 100%. their NPV goes up by 40 or 50% because


this is all I'm not saying it's free on top of it, but it dramatically changes what they do. So just because they're not talking to me right now, they will. >> Absolutely. And you know, you talked about it a little bit, gold is at $5,000 and you started this project and it was much lower than that. >> The last uh 43101 that I did was done at $1,600 gold. Now, we'll do another one with all this additional drilling we do here in 26. And you know, like the moment you start


using higher gold prices, and I'm guessing given the way you do that, it's probably you'll use 3500 or something like that or maybe maybe 4,000. I don't know. I don't I'm not sure. I haven't sort of looked at you use a three-year moving average, but um it means that my cutoff rate goes down and I capture more gold. I'm not trying to tell you how much more I get or how that is all going to work out, but very definitely the higher price of gold dramatically affects the number of ounces that I


have. It also has driven the economics of this project through the roof. Like I can't even for all of you out there that want to do it, try 500 tons a day. I don't know, price of gold in Canadian dollars is just shy of $7,000. um you know, make my cash cost $3,000 an ounce and then figure out what I earn. I have 30 million shares outstanding. Double it to 60 and see what kind of earnings this thing gets. It's like it's I've never seen anything quite like it. And I've been at this for


45 years. >> This current price of gold and the fact that Alamos is building a mill in my front yard is absolutely amazing. you. I couldn't be happier. >> Absolutely. And you mentioned some drilling for 2026. What other catalysts do you have on the horizon? >> Um I will um I will do a little more metallurgy >> just to reconfirm what I already had done about 10 years ago. Just you know to sort of say it it comes out and it all is relatively straightforward. We got about 95% recovery on a CIL uh


operation. We'll do a little more complicated stuff. I'll probably upgrade the road a little bit. But what I will start doing is Manitoba has a really interesting exploration permit process. I currently have all my work permits to drill and do everything I want to do as I currently do until I don't know it's March or April of 27. But there's a thing known as a special exploration permit. And Manitoba allows you to go in and take out a 10,000 ton bulk sample. And it can either be from underground or


open pit and you don't have to do any environmental permits to do it. >> Um, I will need some type of a tolling agreement with either Alamos. I'm talking to other Manitoba groups to send material their way. And um but if I I'll start I'll start applying for that in June and probably get it in July or August, in which case I'll start driving a ramp into this property. And if I built a ramp and, you know, went into, you know, the deposit and took out 10,000 tons, I'll have to put up a


ventilation raise and I'll need to buy a generator and a compressor. Everything else I'll just lease. That's going to cost me 15 to 17 million Canadian. And at that point, believe it or not, I'm in production because I'm not building the mill. I'm not building the camp. I'm not building the road. I'm not building I don't need any more power lines. There is a there's a major power line about 12 km to the west of us. But for as little as that, I'm in production. And I know


that sounds astounding. But I don't know. Anyways, that is stuff we're going to start talking about in the middle of this year. And is that all, you know, um, the the byproduct of your years of experience, this ability to be able to bring that production on so quickly? >> Now, to be fair, I need to go and find the people to design it. I'm not a I'm not an engineer. I'm a geologist by original education. I have I have a geology degree and a finance degree and a degree in music history. But but I I I


know where to go to find the people to design my ramp and you know the size and how you do it and you know you do your stoope development and all that other stuff and I've been around the mining business and worked in mine so I have a pretty good idea what it is I'm going to need but I will hire the right people to do it. Um and I know what costs are these days and sort of what you do and how you do it. And it's not like I'm going to have, you know, I mean, Canada's got some of the best miners and


best engineers and like they're just, you know, I'm not saying that they're not busy, but they're here in Canada. >> I can get them. I can get people to do this and it'll be done at a reasonable rate and in a relatively short period of time. >> And, you know, with Wobb Canoe and, you know, Mark Carney committing to, you know, expediting mining and really opening up Canada resources for Canadians and and, you know, interprovincial trade, are you seeing that on the ground? Is that is that


something that you're benefiting from as well? >> I can't say that I I know Wob personally. Wob's a great guy. Very very fun man. Um and I've been telling him he needs to get a natural gas pipeline to Churchill and start shipping in, you know, NGL out of our natural gas liquid LGN LGN out of Churchill. It would change the economics of Manitoba like night and day. But that permit to build the mine in Lin Lake is as close to the only major mining project that's been permitted in


the last 8 years. I mean, that's how dismal things were in Canada. But you're absolutely right. I mean, things do look good going into the future. And uh very definitely Manitoba has, you know, bring your stuff, bring your, you know, like let's do it. let's start, you know, getting mines getting built and, you know, that that whole building a pipeline to Church Hill and other things. Um, so yeah, I mean it's between that and the commodity prices, things are happening. >> Yeah.


>> And it's good. >> Absolutely. >> Yeah. >> Well, thank you so much for joining me today. >> Thank you very much. And I really appreciate having the opportunity to tell a 55 story. >> Absolutely. And we'd love to tell it. >> Thank you. Um, I'm Georgia Williams and this is Bruce Reed of 55 North Mining.