Bravo Mining (TSX-V: BRVO) (OTC: BRVMF) is a Brazilian company with 100% ownership of the advanced Luanga 3PGE+Au+Ni project — a project with true Tier One potential, notes Gerardo del Real, a leading specialist in mining stocks and editor of Junior Mining Monthly.
This company — which sat dormant for years under the Vale (VALE) banner — has one of the best undeveloped platinum group elements-gold-nickel projects in the world. One I’ve been waiting on and one that will be worth the wait.
The project boasts a suite of metals that are all — and will continue to be — in high demand: palladium, platinum, rhodium, nickel, and gold. The Luanga project has a 5.7 million-ounce palladium-platinum-gold historic resource that does not include the rhodium or the nickel.
Luanga is located in the world-class Carajás Mineral Province, Brazil. Carajas mineral province has a 15.25% effective corporate tax rate. Access and infrastructure are excellent. The project can be accessed via paved highway and unpaved road. Topography is superb, there’s cheap hydropower, water, and labor all readily available.
However, it's the people that make me confident this has 10x potential. The company is led by Executive Chairman and founder Luis Mauricio F. Azevedo. Mr. Azevedo is a Brazilian national based in Brazil, fluent in English, and is a lawyer with over 25 years of dealing with the Brazilian mining cycle.
He also has a history of acquiring assets on very shareholder-friendly terms and then developing, permitting, and monetizing those assets. Mr. Azevedo was formerly the founder and executive director of Avanco, which sold to Oz minerals for A$418 million.
The Avanco team took the project through permitting into operations in a record two years, on schedule and under budget. In fact, Avanco became the first junior mining company to operate a producing mine within Vale’s backyard — the Carajás Mineral Province.
Joining Mr. Azevedo is non-executive lead director Dr. Nicole Adshead-Bell, an Australian/Canadian national who is a rarity in the mining space, a highly intelligent geologist with over 25 years experience in the mining sector and she has a moral compass to match the impressive list of credentials. She also brings past Brazilian CEO experience, which will be helpful in advancing the Luanga project to a production decision.
I also have to mention that Stephen Quin, most recently President of Midas Gold, is also a non-executive director. I am a big fan of Stephen and the way he goes about his business. I’m also a big fan of his involvement with Chalice Mining recently where he served as a Director.
Chalice’s Julimar project is a very compelling analogue to the Luanga project. Luanga has a historic resource of 5.7 million ounces of palladium-platinum-gold and 344 million pounds of nickel. That resource comes as a result of 252 holes or approximately 52,000 meters of drilling. Compare that to Chalice’s project, which boasts 10 million ounces and 1.2 billion pounds of nickel compiled from 520 holes or 137,000 meters of drilling.
Chalice has a market cap of US$2.25 billion. Bravo has a current market cap of C$166 million. The company has approximately 72 million shares outstanding. It is not unreasonable to assume that Luanga could rival or surpass Chalice’s multibillion-dollar project in terms of size and eventually market cap. That’s the opportunity.
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Editor's note: Gerardo Del Real's Top Pick for 2022 was Patriot Battery Metals (TSX-V: PMET) (OTC: PMETF), which rose more than 150% over the past year. The advisor now explains, "The premise was a simple one. Lithium was red hot, the world is pivoting towards cleaner energy that will require massive amounts of lithium and there simply won’t be enough supply to meet demand for several years. Enter Patriot. The company has a world-class lithium district that has the potential to transform the company into an important multi-billion dollar player in the lithium space — and I still consider it a top pick."