Trump's critical minerals obsession has shone a spotlight on US copper stocks

News.com.au

05-05-2025

US-focused copper stocks see a clearer pathway to production as the Trump administration strives for critical minerals dominance
New World Resources is in line to open its Antler mine within this term in 2027
Boss Nick Woolrych says the environment is looking bright ahead of FID on the Arizona project later this year
Donald Trump's pledge to turn the United States into an energy and resources superpower places the development of new mines front and centre in the new administrations future legacy.
The media's attention has largely been centred on the niche and China-dominated rare earths supply chain, one of the centrifugal forces of the trade war between the competing empires.
But reviving the country's declining copper scene, which has seen US output crumble from 1.92Mt in 1997 to just 1.1Mtpa today, has been seriously placed on the radar as well.
That's come in the form of two key executive orders, one investigating potential tariffs on external copper supplies and whether cheap output from China and elsewhere is crimping US competitiveness, and a key order on March 20 calling for the ramping up of domestic critical minerals supply chains.
As a consequence the massive Resolution copper project in Arizona, owned by Rio Tinto and BHP and stalled for years amid a host of environmental and native title battles, has been placed on the FAST-41 list, smoothing a pathway to gaining approvals.
And smaller, more nimble operators now have line of sight to reaching FID on copper mines of their own with the potential to get into production far quicker than the lumbering Rio development.
One of those is New World Resources' (ASX:NWC) Antler mine, also in Arizona, one of the highest grade undeveloped deposits in copper equivalent terms on the ASX.
On Monday, the developer delivered a new resource with a 25% increase in copper ore tonnes, with the deposit now grading 14.2Mt at 3.8% copper equivalent for 543,000t, with the silver and gold content of that resource also 27% and 15% higher respectively.
Permitting is expected to be wrapped up within the year, with the regulatory environment looking more promising by the day.
"The March 20 executive order is just one of about four or five that have come out in relation to critical minerals and securing the US' energy dominance again," New World CEO Nick Woolrych said.
" Copper is a huge focus. Resolution is an industry changing project if that gets up, but I think for New World the main difference we have is we'll be producing critical minerals which are copper and zinc and a priority mineral – gold – actually during this presidential term."
2027 in focus
The aim for New World is to deliver a definitive feasibility study by year's end and secure all of the company's necessary permits by February 2026.
That would put it on track to become a copper, zinc and gold producer by 2027, with higher prices across its commodity suite likely resulting in major upside over the company's pre-feasibility study.
New World's July 2024 PFS projected a capex bill of US$298m with a US$31.4m contingency included, generating US$115m of annual post tax free cash flow on an annual production capacity of 30,100 copper equivalent tonnes per annum.
Drill down a bit deeper and that would include 16,400t copper, 34,500t zinc, 3600t lead, 533,300oz silver and 6000oz gold, at co-product assisted all in sustaining costs of US51c/lb.
That was conducted using US$4.20/lb copper prices, around 50c below current US market prices, US$25/oz silver and US$2055/oz gold, the latter now over US$1000/oz shy of booming spot prices.
With the new resource update around 90% of the mineralisation in the high-grade sulphide domain at Antler (11.5Mt at 4.3% CuEq) is in the measured and indicated resource categories. 36% is classified as measured, underpinning the first three to four years of the mine's life, during which the costs of developing the asset will be paid off.
It all bodes well for New World's plan to revive a mine which has laid dormant for over 50 years after producing copper previously between 1916 and 1970. Woolrych says there will be more opportunities to grow the underground orebody at depth.
"Seeing a significant portion of the early years of our mine life being in the highest classification of our resource is significant," Woolrych said.
"There's a lot of disaster stories of underground mines where they haven't got that. And I think our resource update is probably going to put us in a pretty good stead."
A decline is expected to be advanced later this year to provide even more clarity on the long-term future of the mine.
"One of the highest grade holes ever drilled at Antler is the deepest hole drilled, but they're very expensive holes to drill from the surface," Woolrych added.
" One of the reasons we're looking to advance our decline and get that started later this year is we are looking to drill from underground. For every metre we can drill from surface we can drill four from underground."
Permitting pleasure
Permitting is commonly a painful exercise in the copper and broader mining sector. S&P claimed last year that in the US it took an average 29 years to get from discovery to production. Only Zambia provides a more stressful experience.
That's an entire generation of technological advancements passing the industry by.
But the shift in sentiment and regulatory environment is moving the needle, Woolrych says, with miners now walking the happier side of the fine line between pleasure and pain.
"This time last week the government announced that an EA, which previously would take 12 months, there's an opportunity for emergency approvals through the Bureau of Land Management and the National Energy Dominance Council, which is a newly established venture," he noted.
"That one year could actually move to 14 days and two years could move to 28 days. So New World hasn't applied for that as yet, but we're certainly looking at how relevant that is for our project and whether we want to go down that emergency approval path."
Even so, NWC has a leg up in that it already has a Determination of Adequacy from the Bureau of Land Management for its mine plan of operations, delivered in February, and just two of the 174 acres across the relatively small footprint is on Federal land. The rest is contained on private ground.
Its development prospects are being recognised by brokers too. Argonaut's George Ross lifted his price target from 5c to 6.5c in an upgrade today, 132% upside on NWC's 2.8c share price.
"Trump's tariff wars and support for domestic primary production are likely to benefits NWC's permitting timeline," Ross noted.
The enthusiasm around the US permitting landscape has drawn earlier stage companies back into view as well.
Dateline Resources (ASX:DTR) soared over 100% on Friday after it got a shoutout from President Trump on Truth Social following the BLM's confirmation of its right to mine the Colosseum gold project in California.
Located near the Mountain Pass rare earths mine, drilling for the critical minerals at Colosseum is now in the works.
Golden Mile Resources (ASX:G88) has, meanwhile, kickstarted its own maiden drilling program at the Pearl copper project in Arizona, planning to drill 14-16 holes for up to 1800m at the Odyssey and Ford prospects.
"The US has made its intentions very clear, as it enters the 'Drill, Baby, Drill' era, to secure domestic energy and critical minerals supply chains, and G88 is in a prime position to capitalise on this strategy," its MD Damon Dormer said after the small cap kicked off its drilling program.
"It has been well publicised that copper has been placed on the critical minerals list by Presidential Executive Order issued in March, and we have certainly noticed the increased attention copper projects in Arizona have drawn from the federal government in the US over recent weeks.
"Given the important role domestic copper production will play in the US moving forward, we are also witnessing multiple new funding pathways becoming available through related government agencies such as the Department of Defense."