The Pre-Start

Vale’s iron ore output grew ~4% year on year to its highest quarterly total since 2018, putting it on track to hit the high end of guidance (VALE.NY)
Greatland released a drilling & exploration update, with 53km drilled this FY. West Dome Underground hits were the standout, returning hits such as 35m at 2.9g/t Au and 0.19% Cu from 234m (GGP)
Ora Banda closed with $123m in cash, up $38m. The AISC on the 31koz it produced was down 20% to $2,872/oz, coming in better than expected (OBM)
Aeris produced 10.3kt of CuEq at an AISC of A$4.64/lb CuEq, with cash & receivables closing down $3m to $46m (AIS) +$500m market cap, wowee
Wia shared assays on 100+ holes totalling ~27km, with the headline hit coming from the central zone, returning 27m at 3.3g/t gold from 474m (WIA)
Tesoro published new drilling results, with the best extensional result delivering 10m at 1.7g/t gold from 60m (TSO)
Black Canyon updated its KR2 mineral resource, with 90% now classified as indicated. KR1 & KR2 combined now totals 104Mt at 10.3% Mn (BCA)
Sunshine hit 5.2m at 9g/t gold from 52m from the Francis Creek prospect at Sybil in its latest round of results (SHN)
Hillgrove shared results from resource and infill drilling from Kavanagh, intercepting 9m at 1.9% Cu and 0.49g/t Au from 129m (HGO)
Chris Tuckwell has joined Great Boulder as a non-exec (GBR)

High Grade It

Gold, silver and platinum saw their steepest selloff in years as investors locked in profits, falling as much as 6%, 8% and 7% respectively (Forbes) GDX down 9%, GDXJ down 10%
Beijing declared its opposition to “bloc confrontation” and cast itself as a responsible supplier of rare earths and critical minerals in the first response by Xi’s gov’t to Albanese’s China-focused White House session (Australian)
Iluka is facing mounting pressure as its shares tumble and its $502m debt raises concerns about the future funding of its core operations (Australian)
Operations restarted at Barrick's seized mine in Mali for the first time in more than 9 months, now under state management (Bloomberg)
Bolivia's election of centrist Rodrigo Paz is raising cautious hopes that a more market-friendly leader could pave the way for lithium development (Reuters)
The LME zinc market is facing a severe squeeze due to a dwindling volume of inventories, sending spot prices soaring over futures (Bloomberg)
Appian has predicted more partnerships with governments and institutions after its US$1B agreement with the World Bank’s IFC (FT)

The Intralinks team is putting on some drinks next week. When they said “it’s on us”, we were in. Hit the link and join us 🍻

Ausgold has acquired additional freehold land required for the development of the Katanning gold project, paying $3m for the 50 hectares (AUC)

Private equity firm Appian in partnership with IFC has launched a US$1B critical minerals and mining fund for emerging markets. It will target equity, credit and royalty investments with a focus on Africa and Latin America (Appian)
Manuka raised $15m, primarily to be used towards the refurbishment of their Wonawinta silver processing facility (MKR)
Zuleika announced a $5m funding package (ZUL)
Peel upsized its SPP to $5m (PEX)
Nordic Resources announced an $8.5m institutional placement (NNL)
Broken Hill Mines raised $38m to grow Rasp and Pinnacles (BHM)
Lithium Americas received the first drawdown of US$435m from its US DoE ATVM loan (LAC.NY)
Fortescue has increased the total aggregate principal amount that it’s offering to purchase in its note tender to US$750m (FMG)

With the sale process of Cannington confirmed, the natural question is: who buys it?
DEVELOP’s pillars are underground contracting and opportunistic mine ownership. Cannington straddles both. It’s a technically demanding underground mine that probably needs a hands-on operator to thrive
“But it’s not copper" It’s silver-lead-zinc SEDEX. Remember Woodlawn is zinc-copper-lead-silver-gold VMS.
To us, they seem the most logical owner…

Got Word on the Decline? Simply reply or email [email protected]. We will always take your privacy seriously.

Next critical minerals challenge is countering China’s predatory pricing (AFR op-ed)
Trump bets billions on Australian critical miners: Now comes the hard part (Australian op-ed)
Free money keeps ASX’s rare earth frenzy running (AFR Chanticleer)
Who is really making money out of the rare earths excitement? Stockbrokers, mostly (Australian)

Were you forwarded this email from someone else?

Silver: $50+ USD and reaching new all-time highs.
Silver Juniors & Explorers:
— #Oliver Groß (#@minenergybiz)
11:41 AM • Oct 21, 2025

— #Senator Matt Canavan (#@mattjcan)
8:23 PM • Oct 21, 2025

Paragon just posted a 36.4% month... immediately after a 29.2% month… 2025 YTD is insane 👏