9 May 2025
May 9, 2025 LONDON, ONTARIO, Fortune Minerals Limited (TSX: FT) (OTCQB: FTMDF) (“Fortune” or the “Company”) (www.fortuneminerals.com) is pleased to report that metallurgical test work validation is essentially complete for the bismuth circuits for the Company’s 100% owned NICO cobalt-gold-bismuth- copper critical minerals project in Canada (“NICO Project”). The Process Design Criteria has been compiled and delivered to Worley Canada Services Ltd. (“Worley”) to engineer the facilities and incorporate them into the Company’s updated Feasibility Study. With 12% of global bismuth reserves, development of the NICO Project aligns with the increasing demand for bismuth in traditional and new market applications and the historic high prices (~US$ 27 per pound), compounded by China’s recent export restrictions on this, and other critical minerals.
The vertically integrated NICO Project consists of a planned mine and concentrator in the Northwest Territories (“NWT”) and a hydrometallurgical process facility in Lamont County, Alberta where concentrates from the mine, and other feed sources, will be processed to value-added products needed in diverse industries, the energy transition, new technologies, and defense. Development of the NICO Project will provide a reliable North American supply of cobalt sulphate, gold doré, bismuth ingots, and copper cement enhancing domestic production of three critical minerals. The 1.1 million ounces of in-situ gold in the NICO Project Mineral Reserves is also a highly liquid and countercyclical co-product to mitigate metal price volatility.
Bismuth Process Highlights
- Improved bismuth leaching and cementation circuits with an expected reduction in capital and operating costs and higher metal recoveries
- Efficient and cost-effective regeneration of ferric chloride lixiviant used to leach bismuth prior to cementation to reduce reagent costs and safely dispose of excess process water
- Validation of high-quality 4N bismuth ingot production from smelting and refining bismuth cement
- Positive preliminary test results from blending Fortune bismuth concentrate and Rio Tinto bismuth oxychloride with no adverse impacts on product quality or metal recovery
- Historic high bismuth prices from increasing demand and restricted supply