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PHILEX Mining Corp. said it is jacking up its mining exploration
budget as it continues to search for additional tenements that would
yield copper and gold ores as well as pure gold.
During a special stockholders meeting Thursday,
Walter Brown, Philex chairman, said the company has earmarked P625
million for exploration, a five-fold increase over last year’s
budget. He said this budget would be financed by internally
generated funds and would go to gold and copper exploration
activities in Padcal in Benguet, Negros, Surigao del Norte,
Zamboanga del Norte and Madagascar.
Philex partnered with Anglo American Exploration
(Philippines) B.V., a wholly owned subsidiary of Anglo American Plc.,
to explore the former’s 25,184-hectare Boyongan copper mine in
Surigao. The project may cost P1 billion. Philex is also exploring
the said property under a joint venture with FEC Resources, Brown
said.
Philex has also entered into a joint venture
with Freeport McMoRan Copper & Gold for the exploration and
development of the Sibutad project, a possible huge copper resource
located in Zamboanga del Norte. Brown said Philex would pursue on
its own the rest of its mining projects.
He said the company is looking at diversifying
its mining activities into other metals like nickel but dropped the
plans since “there are good nickel properties but they are more
expensive.” Philex would rather stick to its core business of
mining gold and copper and be more conservative in its business
strategies, he said.
Copper prices would remain “good” in two to
three years, remaining above $6,000 per ton in the world market, the
Philex executive said. In May last year, copper hit a record of
$8,800 a ton, making a handsome margin for Philex.
As for gold, Brown cannot say the same, adding
prices would remain steady in the medium term.
Despite its entry into energy exploration,
Philex would only devote 10 percent of its total assets into this
new venture. It invested about $5 million in Pitkin Petroleum Ltd.,
a Texas-based junior exploration company based in Louisiana with
properties in Peru and Vietnam.
At end-2007, the mining firm’s net income
jumped by 63 percent to P5 billion, or P1.697 per share as operating
revenue rose 22.5 percent to P12.2 billion over the previous year.
In 2006, the firm earned P3.1 billion or P1.044 per share.
-- Likha C. Cuevas-Miel
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