Intention to appoint BNY Mellon to establish ADRs

Phoenix Copper Limited / Ticker: PXC / Sector: Mining

5 August 2021

Phoenix Copper Limited

("Phoenix" or the "Company")

Intention to appoint BNY Mellon to establish American Depositary Receipts Program

Phoenix Copper Ltd (AIM: PXC; OTCQX: PXCLF), the AIM quoted USA focused base and precious metals emerging producer and exploration company, is pleased to announce that it intends to establish an American Depositary Receipt ("ADR") Program over the Company's shares. It is intended that the ADRs will trade on New York's OTCQX Market.

The Level 1 ADR Program (the "Program") is expected to be operational by the end of September 2021, subject to documentation and regulatory filings, with each ADR expected to comprise 10 existing Phoenix ordinary shares of no par value, currently trading on AIM ("Ordinary Shares"). No new Ordinary Shares will be issued to establish the Program, with ADRs being created on demand via the acquisition and deposit of Ordinary Shares.

The Company intends to appoint The Bank of New York Mellon ("BNY Mellon") to establish the Program and to act as the ADR depositary, custodian and registrar, and the ADRs will be issued to trade electronically on OTCQX. The ADRs will trade alongside the Company's Ordinary Shares, under a different OTCQX ticker.

Richard Wilkins, CFO of Phoenix, commented: "We are delighted to be working with BNY Mellon for the purpose of establishing our ADR Program for trading our ADRs on New York's OTCQX Market. BNY Mellon is the market leading depositary bank in the global depositary receipt business, providing OTC ADR Programs to numerous companies, including FTSE100 companies and mining companies. We look forward to working closely with their corporate and investor relations Depositary Receipts teams as they establish and manage our Program.

"Apart from the benefits of being able to trade electronically, as each ADR is expected to consist of 10 existing Ordinary Shares and priced accordingly, the ADRs should be available to a diverse range of potential US investors currently restricted from trading our Ordinary Shares. Given that we operate in Idaho and will be producing metals necessary for the global transition to clean energy, we hope the Program will increase our exposure in the US and attract more US investors to our register. We are also pleased that the Program will be non-dilutive, with the ADRs being created from existing Ordinary Shares and no new Ordinary Shares being issued in conjunction with the Program's establishment."

Overview of Depositary Receipts

Depositary Receipts ("DRs") are negotiable financial instruments that are issued by a depositary bank. In the case of ADRs, they typically represent a non-US company's publicly traded equity and are listed or traded in the US. ADRs enable US investors to own some of the world's leading companies through a well established and well understood instrument. They offer the ease and convenience of holding a US dollar-denominated security that trades, clears and settles under procedures familiar to US investors and with less complexity than holding ordinary shares or other cross-border products. As a result, investors in the US and elsewhere can invest in companies via ADRs on a global basis conveniently and cost effectively.

BNY Mellon is the market leading depositary bank with approximately 47% of the global depositary receipt business, providing over 700 sponsored DR programs. OTC ADR issuer clients include Anglo American, Newcrest Mining, Polyus, Randgold, Compass Group, Experian and J Sainsbury.

Environmental, Social, and Corporate Governance

Phoenix is committed to meeting and exceeding the environmental standards required by law as a core value of the Company.  The baseline environmental data collected to date will be used for furthering the permitting process, but as importantly, will be used as the building blocks for the Company's future Environmental, Social, and Corporate Governance ("ESG") platform. 

Market Abuse Regulation (MAR) Disclosure

The information contained within this announcement is deemed by the Company to constitute inside information as stipulated under the Market Abuse Regulations (EU) No. 596/2014 ('MAR') which has been incorporated into UK law by the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018.  Upon the publication of this announcement via Regulatory Information Service ('RIS'), this inside is now considered to be in the public domain.

Contacts

For further information please visit https://phoenixcopperlimited.com   or contact:

Notes

Phoenix Copper Limited is a USA focused, base and precious metals emerging producer and exploration company, initially targeting copper and zinc production from an open pit mine from late 2022.

Phoenix's primary operations are focused near Mackay, Idaho in the Alder Creek mining district, at the 80% owned Empire Mine property, which historically produced copper at grades of up to 8%, as well as gold, silver, zinc and tungsten, from an underground mine.  

Since 2017, Phoenix has carried out extensive drill programmes which have defined a NI 43-101 compliant PEA (preliminary economic assessment) for an open pit heap leach solvent extraction and electrowinning ("SX-EW") mine, which was updated in October 2020. The contained metal in all NI 43-101 compliant categories of resources, measured, indicated and inferred, stand at 129,641 tonnes of copper, 355,523 ounces of gold, 10,133,772 ounces of silver and 58,440 tonnes of zinc. Phoenix updated its economic model in February 2021 to include the processing of all contained metals through a two phased approach.

In addition to Empire, the district includes the historic Horseshoe, White Knob and Blue Bird Mines, past producers of copper, gold, silver, zinc, lead and tungsten from underground mines.  A new discovery at Red Star, 330 metres north west of the Empire Mine proposed open pit, has revealed high grade silver / lead sulphide ore and from three shallow exploration drill holes a NI 43-101 compliant maiden resource of 1.6 million silver equivalent ounces was reported. Additionally, the district includes Navarre Creek, a volcanic hosted, Carlin-type gold discovery which hosts a 6.1 km gold strike length within a 9.8 km² area.

At Empire, it is estimated that less than 1% of the potential ore system has been explored to date and, accordingly, there is significant opportunity to increase the resource through phased exploration. The stated aim of the Company is to fund this phased exploration through free cashflow generated by its initial mine. A Plan of Operations in respect of the initial open pit mine was filed with the Idaho authorities in June 2021.

Phoenix also has two wholly owned cobalt properties on the Idaho Cobalt Belt to the north of Empire. An Earn-In Agreement has been signed with First Cobalt Corporation, Toronto, in respect of one of those properties.

More details on the Company, its assets and its objectives can be found on PXC's website at https://phoenixcopperlimited.com.