Significant Increase In Mineral Resources At Marimaca Copper Project

VANCOUVER - Marimaca Copper Corp. reported on the updated Mineral Resource Estimate (MRE) for the Marimaca Oxide Deposit (MOD) located in the Antofagasta region of northern Chile. The 2022 MRE demonstrates significant resource growth over the 2019 MRE and marks an important step-change in the scale of the Project, supporting a potential production rate higher than proposed in the Preliminary Economic Assessment (PEA).

The 2022 MRE incorporates 19,580m of ~41,500m of drilling (reverse circulation (“RC”) + diamond) completed in 2022 for a total of over 110,000m of drilling completed since 2016. The balance of the 2022 infill drilling program, totaling approximately 28,000m, will be included in a subsequent MRE planned for early 2023 with the objective of converting the remaining Inferred Resources to the Measured and Indicated Categories to underpin the Definitive Feasibility Study (“DFS”) planned for 2023.

The 2022 MRE was prepared in accordance with the Canadian Institute of Mining, Metallurgy and Petroleum (CIM) Definition Standards and National Instrument 43-101 - Standards of Disclosure for Mineral Projects (NI 43-101).

Hayden Locke, President & CEO, said, “Sergio Rivera and his team delivered two very successful drilling programs in 2021 and 2022 through challenging operating conditions discovering new additional mineralization adjacent and below the current Marimaca pit model. The 2022 MRE is a fantastic achievement and reflects the exceptional exploration and geological work completed by our extremely dedicated team. With the discovery of the MOD depth extensions in 2021, we believed there was the potential to make a step change in the scale of the resource. This MRE has clearly achieved that. It establishes the MOD as one of the most significant greenfield copper oxide discoveries in the last 20 years and confirms its potential to host over one million tonnes of contained copper in a single pit.

Given the M&I resource estimate already points to more than 600,000 tonnes of contained metal, the Project will now clearly support a larger operation in terms of copper cathode production, but also a meaningful mine life extension. We will assess production scenarios between 50,000 and 60,000 tonnes per annum prior to commencing our Definitive Feasibility Study in 2023. Importantly, the positive attributes which were key to the MOD’s industry leading return on invested capital (ROIC) metrics – low life of mine strip ratio, shallow high-grade core in the first five years of the mine life, minimal pre-strip and low expected start up capital cost – remain firmly intact, meaning this resource upgrade will be reflected as a material improvement in project value. We have completed another 28,000m of drilling for which we are waiting on results. These will be released over the coming months and incorporated into a final MRE in early 2023, which will form the basis of our development plans for the Project.”