Transcription of The Stock Network Interview with Alice Queen (ASX:AQX), Managing Director Andrew Buxton
Lel Smits: Alice Queen is an Australian gold and copper explorer with high-grade opportunities across Fiji and on Horn Island in far north Queensland, Australia. The September quarter delivered strong momentum and a strategic review underway to unlock value at Horn Island, and the company has also recently raised $1 million and appointed mining lawyer Paul Williams to the board. I’m joined today by Managing Director Andrew Buxton to outline more ahead of appearing at StocksOnLocation, the investor event in Melbourne.
Andrew, welcome to The Stock Network.
Andrew Buxton: Great to be here. Thanks, Lel.
Lel Smits: Pleasure. Now, as gold prices surge from $2,450 Australian dollars per ounce at the time of the 2021 scoping study to around $6,000 Australian dollars per ounce today, how is Alice Queen reassessing Horn Island economics? And also, what are the steps involved in refreshing the scoping study and preparing for funding or development?
Andrew Buxton: Good questions. Well, yes, look, I think, so first of all, you’re referencing an announcement we made last week, which foreshadowed a couple of key things.
One is that, yeah, we’re looking seriously now at developing the Horn Island project ourselves, as distinct from, as we had announced several times during the year, as distinct from trying to find a partner to help us do so. And then look, the gold price that you mentioned is really the key driver to that internal decision. You know, when we looked at the 2001 scoping study, it doesn’t take Einstein to work out that you can easily plug in $6,000 Aussie gold and make some benchmarking adjustments for mining costs and capex, et cetera, that have also gone up to be completely objective about this situation.
But none of those costs have gone up as significantly as the gold price. So all of a sudden, we’re looking at a project which, you know, back of the envelope numbers has a net present value of around about $500 million. And it occurred to us that if we had the right partners involved in terms of corporate finance and project finance, why wouldn’t we just do that ourselves? And remarkably, somewhere along the way, a couple of weeks ago, I had a call from Sebastian Gerdner, the Managing Director of GBA Capital and putting that idea to me is, have you ever thought of this before doing it yourself? And of course, I said to him, I’ve been thinking about that for years. But we’ve always been lacking that project finance role in the mix. And Sebastian explained to me that he’d recently appointed a guy called John Signet, a veteran mining project finance guy, to head up a new team for GBA Capital.
And a number of chats with him, you know, we all agree that this is the best plan for the company. So we’re heading down that road now in earnest. And yeah, we’re already well underway.
Lel Smits: That’s great to hear. I know Seb well, and certainly some exciting developments there for Thorn Island. When it comes to Fiji, you’ve also got a footprint there and your project, Viyani, continues to return strong surface sampling, extending strike length to around 5km and also confirming high-grade epithermal gold. Can you outline the latest assays and also how these results are guiding your drilling plans and the potential perhaps for a maiden resource?
Andrew Buxton: Look, it’s probably too early to talk about a maiden resource in Fiji just at the moment, but you make a good point. We’ve got some great samples coming through.
We’ve got another batch actually on the way to the lab now with results due perhaps in the next four to six weeks. We’re optimistic that they will also be good. Look, I think the main message from Fiji is that it’s a huge system.
It’s demonstrably 5km of strike length. We’re proposing to do another thing which is pretty important to us in the short term, and that’s some detailed ground magnetics to firm up our next round of drill targets. And we expect that could be first quarter of calendar 2026.
Look, exciting times on both projects. Horn Island on a development pathway now, and Fiji onto a big system and hoping to make a big discovery at some point there.
Lel Smits: That’s a very strong update, appreciate knowing more about Alice Queen and look forward to seeing you at Stocks On location in Melbourne in a few weeks’ time.
Andrew Buxton: Indeed, looking forward to that. Thanks, Lel.
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