Vision Blue grants Cornish Metals £7 million backing

Cornish Metals (TSXV: CUSN; LSE: CUSN) has received a £7-million (around US$9 million) credit facility from shareholder Vision Blue Resources, to help it reopen the South Crofty tin mine in southwest England.

The Canadian explorer and developer, which received £25 million (US$33 million) from Vision Blue in 2022, said it would use the fresh funding on general operating and corporate purposes. Vision Blue is led by former Xstrata CEO Mick Davis. 

“This funding signals Vision Blue’s continued support for Cornish Metals and our plans to bring tin mining back to Cornwall through the restart of South Crofty, “ chief executive officer Don Turvey said. “We plan to generate value by unlocking the project’s potential as a long-term supplier of tin needed for electrical applications in the U.K. and Europe.”

Now part of the U.K.’s critical metals list, tin is experiencing a revival. Cornish Metals has spent the last eight years working on reopening the past-producing South Crofty tin mine. The operation was shut in 1998, following more than 400 years of almost continuous production.

South Crofty was the last tin mine in Europe when it closed. Several companies attempted to revive the flooded mines between 2001 and 2013, but due to persistent poor market conditions, the assets were put into administration in 2013.

The new South Crofty is expected to produce 49,310 tonnes of tin metal in concentrate over its productive life, peaking at over 5,000 tonnes in year four. 

The goal is achieving first tin production in 2026, as Cornish Metals has already obtained permission for underground mining until 2071, and has also secured the environmental permit to dewater the mine.

Laser vision

Vision Blue Resources’ main strategy is acquiring stakes in assets linked to electric vehicles (EVs) and grid storage growth. 

Vision’s managing partner, Mick Davis, led Xstrata from a US$500 million business in the early part of the last decade to an operation so big that — at one point — it made a takeover offer for Anglo American (LSE: AAL).

In 2012, he sold Xstrata to Glencore (LSE: GLEN) and ventured into setting up X2 Resources, a mining fund that was unable to score any deals in the three years after its launch.

Davis did not get discouraged by that failure. In 2019, he co-founded Niron Metals, an investment vehicle involved in bringing Guinea’s Zogota iron ore deposit into production.

Seeking to seize the opportunity presented by the increasing need for battery metals, which include a host of materials from lithium to nickel, cobalt and copper, Davis launched VBR in December 2020.

The fund has since invested in several companies, including Canada’s NextSource Materials (TSX: NEXT), which is building a graphite mine in Madagascar.