Thursday 20 December 2012

Prophecy Platinum forms special committee to respond to BCSC inquiries


Prophecy Platinum Corp. (CVE:NKL) (OTCQX:PNIKF) Thursday said that the British Columbia Securities Commission (BCSC) is asking for details of the events leading up to a news release that revealed the results of a resource estimate for its Wellgreen property.
The release, issued July 14, 2011, provided the findings of an independent mineral resource estimate for the Wellgreen platinum group metals (PGM)-copper-Nickel  property in the Yukon Territory. 
Prophecy said its board has formed a special committee of independent directors to “assess and make recommendations” regarding the BCSC's inquiries. The company said it is cooperating with the BCSC and a response has been provided to its specific requests for information. 
The BCSC has asked for details regarding the company’s insider trading policies and procedures in place during that time and the individuals who had knowledge of the estimate before the news release was issued. 
Further, the BCSC is asking for information regarding the communications relating to the resource estimate made or received by individuals who were directors, officers or employees of Prophecy between June 1, 2011 and July 15, 2011.
The company notes that its current management team, including president and CEO Greg Johnson, CFO Jeffrey Mason, and senior VP and COO John Sagman, were each appointed after August 2012, “well after the relevant period for the purposes of the BCSC's inquiries”. 
Similarly, five out of seven of the directors of the company were first appointed to the board in 2012, also after the period on which the BCSC is focused.
The company’s Wellgreen project is one of the world's largest undeveloped PGM, Nickel, copper and cobalt resources. 
A July 2011, NI 43 101-compliant report provided a resource estimate of 289 million tonnes in the inferred category with grades of 0.38% Nickel, 0.35% copper, 1.18 grams per tonne (g/t) PGM and gold, and 14 million tonnes in the indicated category at 0.69%Nickel, 0.62% copper, 2.25 g/t PGM and gold.
Its preliminary economic assessment, released in June this year, showed Wellgreen had a net present value of $3.0 billion. The economic report, prepared by Tetra Tech, evaluated a base case open pit mine at an 111,500 tonne per day mining rate, and an onsite concentrator at a 32,000 tonne per day milling rate. 
The project is expected to produce 1.959 billion pounds of Nickel in concentrate, 2.058 billion pounds of copper and 7.119 million ounces of platinum plus palladium plus gold over a 37-year mine life, with an average strip ratio of 2.57.
Prophecy said it does not expect that the BCSC's inquiries will interfere with its day-to-day exploration and development operations to advance its PGM-Nickel-copper properties in North America.
Aside from Wellgreen, Prophecy also holds the Shakespeare platinum group metals-Nickel-copper project in Ontario, and its Lynn Lake project in Manitoba.

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