Hello everyone and welcome to today's Rimfire Investor Briefing webinar. It's a pleasure to have you with us. My name is Nicola Gosati from Investor Relations Consultancy Corporate Storytime. Rimfire is an ASX-listed resources company focused on exploring for critical minerals throughout the world-class Lachlan Orogen and Broken Hill districts of New South Wales. I am delighted to be joined by David Hutton, Managing Director of Rimfire today. David will be walking us through Rimfire's recently announced AUD 3.5 million capital raise and will be outlining exploration plans for the company's critical mineral projects in the Fifield District of New South Wales, Australia's scandium epicenter. We will then move into a live Q&A session. If you would like to submit a question at any time during the webinar, the Q&A function is located at the bottom of your screen.
If we are unable to present your question today, we will attempt to address them post the webinar. With that, I am pleased to hand over to David.
Thank you, Nicola, and good morning and welcome to all of the participants in today's webinar, and thank you to Corporate Storytime for organizing it. What I'd like to talk to everybody about this morning is taking them through Rimfire's exciting project portfolio of scandium assets in central New South Wales, which, as you described, and as I like to refer to it as, is the epicenter for scandium in Australia. With this presentation, I'll take you through some of the technological advantages of scandium, why scandium is such a high-value critical mineral. Importantly, take you through what we're going to do with the proceeds of the recent capital raising and how we're looking to build shareholder value through pursuing a number of really exciting exploration work programs over the short to medium term on our scandium projects.
I'm talking to a presentation that was released to the market in the last week or so on the back of our most recent capital raising. The obligatory disclaimer and competent person statement for you to read at your leisure. In terms of the investment highlights, Rimfire, we're an ASX-listed company. We're focused exclusively on exploring, developing, delineating scandium deposits in central New South Wales. We're operating about 75 kilometers west of the town of Parkes in central New South Wales. Along with a number of other companies that are also working in the scandium space, this is rapidly emerging as a strategically important location, not just for New South Wales, but for Australia in the critical mineral space. As I've said, this is Australia's scandium epicenter. We have already identified high scandium grades in a number of our prospects and resources out there.
We have got really exciting upcoming work programs to move a number of these new prospects into resources. We have entered into joint venture partnerships with our exploration partner, Golden Plains Resources at the Fifield and Avondale projects. We also have a new 100% owned scandium project called Rabbit Trap. As I've mentioned, we have a number of concurrent work programs that are all aimed at upgrading our scandium resource inventory by the first quarter of calendar year 2026. In terms of how we're going to do this, we already have a significant landholding prospective for scandium that I will talk to in a moment. There are three strands or three, if you like, strings to our bow to advance these projects going forward. We already have identified a number of mineral resource estimates for scandium. We have a large exploration target out there at Fifield.
What we'll be doing following this most recent capital raise is we're looking to move the Currajong Scandium Prospect, where we have released a number of very recent high-grade air core drilling results. We're looking to move all of those results, that whole prospect, into a mineral resource estimate. That work is happening as we speak, and we aim to, and we're targeting to have a mineral resource estimate for Currajong by the end of September. We're also looking to get back into the Murga Exploration Target, and with further drilling, we're looking to convert the exploration target into a mineral resource estimate by the first quarter of next year.
We're looking, and we're working on this at the moment, we're looking to develop and get onto for the first time a series of new scandium drill targets on our 100% owned Rabbit Trap project, which lies just to the north of the Fifield and Avondale projects. The objective of these three programs is really clear. It's about Rimfire developing, building a globally significant scandium company on a high-value critical mineral resource inventory at Fifield. In conjunction with the companies working around us, Sunrise in particular, Sunrise Energy Metals, I should say, and also Rio , we aim to really position collectively Fifield as the strategic scandium global epicenter for Australia and indeed the Western world. In terms of a corporate overview, this is out of date now. This predates the recent capital raise.
I will say with the recent capital raise, we're actually in the process of allotting shares today. We have received the first tranche of proceeds from that capital raise, supported by a lot of our shareholders, and we're really thankful for the support and the ongoing confidence in the management and the technical team that Rimfire has. In terms of scandium, let's talk about scandium. As people that follow the story that listen to me, they know that I talk a lot about scandium. The reason for it is it's all about the really special, unique properties of scandium. I like to start these presentations with this story. This is a real story that has its origins in the Cold War, back in the late 1980s, where the U.S.
noticed that the Russians at the time were developing jet fighters that, in the Americans' opinion, were very simplistic in their design. When they actually watched how these things performed, they realized that despite these simple designs, these jets were potentially outperforming the American jets. They couldn't understand why. It wasn't until the collapse of the Berlin Wall, the collapse of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s, when they managed to get themselves a couple of these Russian jet fighters. What they realized very quickly when they had a look at the jet fighters is, unlike the Americans who were incorporating titanium alloys in the construction of the jet fighters, the Russians were using scandium aluminum alloys. That was the first clue, if you like, as to something special about scandium. Indeed, when you look closely at scandium, you look at its application, it is a very unique mineral.
When used as an alloy with aluminum, it produces a metal that is super lightweight, super strong, and corrosion resistant. It has a whole range of applications in the aerospace space, defense technology, transportation, and the like. The calculations are that if you were to incorporate scandium aluminum alloys into the construction of a new 737 jet aircraft, the weight savings are anything up to about 12%. When you think about what that means in terms of decarbonization, energy efficiency, you're able to incorporate scandium aluminum alloys with the construction of planes, missiles, boats, and all this sort of stuff. You end up with a plane, for example, that is lightweight but is still as strong. Therefore, you can carry more fuel, you can fly further, or you can actually fly further with less fuel because of the less weight. It's really important in those areas.
It's also incredibly electrically conductive. When you incorporate scandium into the construction of a solid oxide fuel cell, it actually improves the operating efficiencies and lowers the operating temperatures of solid oxide fuel cells. Scandium has these unique properties. It's very much a forward-facing material. It's at the forefront of global decarbonization strategies. There's one major issue with scandium, and that is scandium is supply constrained. The U.S. doesn't have any scandium production. There's no single scandium mine anywhere in the world. The U.S., for example, is totally reliant on China and Russia for its scandium. That, of course, is a problem. The biggest issue around the uptake for scandium is the supply constraints driven by geopolitical risk. That is one of the reasons why when you look at the values for scandium, scandium oxide, and we talk about scandium metal as well, quite phenomenal values.
For example, it's hard to get pricing, but when you go to the United States Geological Survey and look at their own pricing data, these numbers that I'm quoting here, this is from the United States Geological Survey. You're looking for a tonne of metal, anything from AUD 134 million, AUD 153 million a tonne, all the way up to, depending on the processing method, up to AUD 500 million a tonne. Incredibly high value. The consumption at the moment is small, but the consumption is constrained by geopolitical risk. What we are seeking to do at Rimfire and operating within central New South Wales is developing a secure long-term supply of scandium that is free of these geopolitical risks, which will in turn encourage the Western consumer to increase their consumption. We're suddenly seeing a big uptick in the consumption of scandium.
Why I believe we're in a very unique position is because Australia is in a very unique position. When you look at the distribution of all known scandium deposits in Australia, central New South Wales, the area within the big red box there on my map, is the epicenter for scandium. Over 74% of Australia's known scandium sits in that box. When you look at the other companies operating in there, there are four principal companies. There's ourselves, there's Rio Tinto, there's Sunrise Energy Metals, and there's Australian Mines. Collectively, we all share the same view as the potential of this area to be a global source for scandium. What makes this little town of Fifield, population of about 30, what makes this area so special? It's all in the geology. It's all in the underlying rocks.
Fifield sits in the middle of about a 300 km long belt of what we call ultramafic rocks. These are very specific aged ultramafic rock type. While it can be tracked over 300 km, at Fifield, because of the underlying geology, it has a thickened accumulation. You have a thickened accumulation of these ultramafic rocks. We call them peroxenites. These peroxenites are the scandium source rocks, and they are concentrated at Fifield. What happens, when you look at the lower right-hand side of this slide, this is a cross-section or a vertical slice through the Earth's crust. You have these peroxenites. They're purple rocks, sitting under the surface. Where these rocks come to the surface, they weather, and you get a flat-lying blanket or what we call a laterite blanket of scandium.
The scandium that's in these underlying peroxenite rocks, through the weathering process, the lateritisation process, accumulates in these rich blankets at the surface. At Fifield, you have these thickened accumulations of peroxenite, the scandium source rocks, coupled with this overlying weathering of these source rocks, giving you these rich blankets of scandium at the surface. One of the things that characterizes the Rimfire ground is that the majority of the scandium that we have found is very much at the surface. The Fifield scandium story has been known about for some time, but it was about a year or two ago when Rio Tinto bought the adjacent property to Rimfire's ground that we really started to see a major sort of global endorsement of the scandium prospectivity of the Fifield area.
When you look at the relative tenement holdings of the companies, and I mentioned them before, so ourselves, Rio, Sunrise, and Australian Mines, if you look at the map on the left-hand side of the presentation, the Rimfire tenure is in red. The Rio tenure or tenements are in yellow, the Sunrise tenements are in blue, and the Australian Mines tenements are in green. While Sunrise has a very large tenement package, when you look at the respective tenement holdings with respect to the scandium prospective rocks, these ultramafics, which is defined with the black lines, and it's called an ultramafic belt, you can see that the Rimfire ground in red has a very large forward-facing exposure to the ultramafic rocks. I would argue that we probably have one of the largest exposures, if not the largest exposure, to these favorable rock types throughout our projects.
The Fifield and Avondale projects are the two Rimfire tenements, the tenement blocks in the southern half of that map, and our 100% owned Rabbit Trap project is the large area up to the very north outlined by the red tenement outlines. As I said, I strongly believe that Rimfire has the upside. At the moment, there are a number of resources out there. Burra, which is the Rio Tinto property, has a resource of approximately 15,000 tonnes of scandium oxide. Sunrise has got about double that, about 36,000 tonnes of scandium oxide. A key difference is that these deposits are largely landlocked, whereas the Rimfire ground, we have multiple prospects, we have multiple deposits, we have a very large exploration target.
I believe that the Rimfire ground has the unique ability to collectively have and host multiple deposits that in time will equal or, if not, exceed the resource base of our friends at Rio and Sunrise. One of the key areas that we're working on at the moment is a very large target area called the Murga Exploration Target. It is situated literally adjacent to the Sunrise property. If you're following the Sunrise Energy Metals story, they've been doing some great work, getting some really encouraging drill results, and their share price has had a fantastic uplift over the last couple of months, and all credit to them. Sharing similar geology, the Murga Exploration Target, which is an exploration target of 100 million- 200 million tonnes at 100 ppm- 200 ppm scandium for anything up to 46,000 tonnes of scandium oxide. This is a large area.
It's about 20 square kilometers. The magnetic image on the right-hand side, you can see all these, it's like a heat map. You can see all these white areas, and these white areas are the magnetics mapping these underlying peroxenite source rocks. The black dashed line that is effectively enveloping all these magnetic anomalies, this is the boundary of the Murga Exploration Target. This exploration target, it's not a joint resource yet, but this exploration target is based on drilling. It's based on real data. It's based on model drill holes. The exploration target that we came up with is a very conservative estimate of the total scandium potential of this area. At the end of last year, we defined an inferred resource called Murga North at the northern end of this exploration target.
What we're working to do now, and this is one of the three strategies going forward, is we're now working, and we aim to do this, we're aiming to get onto this work very shortly. We're now aiming to complete the infill air core drilling exercise over the Murga Exploration Target with the aim of converting the whole exploration target into a mineral resource estimate in the first quarter of 2026 calendar year. The way we do this, the way we convert these exploration targets, it's all about the drilling. We aim to bring the drill density or the spacing of the air core holes down to a nominal 50 m- 100 m centers over this whole 20 square kilometer area. By doing air core drilling, if the assay is successful, we can convert that into an inferred mineral resource.
We then start putting reverse circulation and diamond drill holes into that drill pattern, and then we can start to lift the category of the resource from inferred to indicated as well. The first of our three pillars to build this significant resource inventory of scandium is to convert the Murga Exploration Target. The second pillar is to get a mineral resource estimate by the end of September out of Currajong. Currajong sits a few kilometers to the south of Murga, and once again, this is a magnetic image on the right-hand side, and the magnetics are mapping out the scandium-prospective peridotite rocks. We have just finished a very large drill program over this entire 3.5 km ultramafic belt. We have released some very strong and encouraging scandium drill intercepts to date.
We've got some more results coming up shortly, and all this data is being passed to the resource geologists to start generating a mineral resource estimate for Currajong. As I say, we'd like to have that completed by the end of September. That's the second pillar of how we're building this globally significant resource inventory. Once again, just a cross-section of Currajong, and you can see it's showing vertical drill holes and these flat-lying blankets of high-grade scandium sitting just below the surface. The third project we've got, this is 100% owned. The other two projects were Fifield and Avondale, and they're part of the earn-in and joint venture agreements with our exploration partners, Golden Plains Resources. This project, Rabbit Trap, sits to the northern end of that ultramafic belt. This is 100% owned, and it's a relatively new acquisition for the company.
The reason we were attracted to Rabbit Trap and we have built this project is that, once again, we're very much driven by looking for magnetic anomalies that are indicative of these peroxenite scandium source rocks. When we turned our attention looking north and south along this ultramafic belt, we saw an opportunity up here at Rabbit Trap. Not only do we have untested magnetic anomalies, and these are these large linear magnetic anomalies inside the areas shown by the red polygons, but there is a small magnetic anomaly at the very southern end of the ground where some historic drilling at a prospect called Malamute actually returned some very encouraging scandium intervals, drill intercepts over quite broad widths. Once again, we see a similar sort of geological setting where we have a flat-lying blanket of scandium sitting over a magnetic peroxenite unit.
We look further afield, as I've shown here, we see these untested magnetic anomalies that have had no work on them at all. When you look at the actual scale, these linear magnetic anomalies, they're several kilometers in length. This is real upside, 100% owned upside for Rimfire and its shareholders. The third pillar of our strategy to achieve building this globally significant resource inventory at Fifield is to get in here and put reconnaissance air core traverses across each of these new magnetic anomalies to hopefully demonstrate that these untested magnetic anomalies are, as we believe, to be scandium bearing. This area is currently under crops. There's a wet crop on this area at the moment.
We're currently working through the land access agreements with a view to as soon as the crop comes off at the end of, probably at the end of the year, around about Christmas time, then we can move in here quickly. We can put drilling across these magnetic anomalies to see and try and demonstrate what we believe to be excellent potential here at Rabbit Trap itself. In terms of the Rimfire story, we are exploring in Australia's most prospective and, you know, scandium epicenter. In terms of the tenements and the exposure to these prospective ultramafic rocks, we have the largest landholding. We have identified high grades at Currajong. We see some very strong grades within areas at Murga. We have a number of resources already at Murga North and Melrose.
We have the Avondale and Fifield projects subject to earn-in and joint venture agreements with our exploration partners, Golden Plains Resources. We have a 100% owned Rabbit Trap project, and we have three parallel high-impact work programs that are going to be implemented following this most recent capital raise with the aim of building this globally significant resource inventory to really promote, in conjunction with our neighbors, Rio Tinto and Sunrise in particular, this central New South Wales area as the scandium epicenter of Australia and a long-term secure supply of scandium for the Western world. Thanks, Nicola.
Thank you, David. We'll now dive into our Q&A. Our first question for you. It's noted that the arbitration between Rimfire and the Avondale and Fifield joint venture partner, Golden Plains Resources, has now been resolved. Is Rimfire able to move forward with GPR after so much water under the bridge?
Yes, I believe that we can move forward with GPR . The earning and joint venture agreements that I've referred to have been reinstated. They're well-written agreements that provide a framework for both parties to work together. The prospectivity of the projects still remains excellent. Nothing has changed there. I'm confident that we can work with GPR . I'm also realistic as well. Like any new relationship, there is a period of having to develop the relationship and get to know each other. I believe that we can. Certainly, where we are in the earning cycle at the moment, we're in a position to put forward sensible, well-thought-out management programs, exploration programs, get them approved, and get on with it.
That sounds good, David. Our next question: Are you satisfied that the scandium prospects you've so far identified possess the potential to deliver deposits with sufficient scale and grade to become viable mines in the future?
I think so. Yes, I think I am satisfied that we've got excellent potential. I think that we, you know, we're still on a journey. What we've done is an excellent starting position. I think this is the upside that Rimfire offers. That's why I'm so keen to get in there and convert the exploration target at Murga and also get the mineral resource estimate for Currajong. I think when we've done that, then we'll have a really good sense of where we sit. I think the potential is there, and I certainly have confidence in the projects.
Thank you, David. Our next question. If and when the milestones of the JV are met by GPR at Currajong and Murga, does Rimfire lose operational control and the casting vote on the committee of those projects? Secondly, does it clearly state in the JV that both parties must act in good faith?
Yeah, I will address the second one first. Yes, the agreements do talk about the parties operating in good faith. In terms of the first question, yeah, so look, at Fifield, GPR 's obligations, sorry, GPR has the right to earn a 50.1% interest in Fifield. To do so, they have to complete the earning expenditure. There's also a series of other obligations around developing mine finance and also coming up with mine development plans and things. At that point, if they satisfy all those obligations, yes, GPR will have earned a 50.1% interest. A joint venture will be formed, and they will obviously, with 50.1%, have control. It's a little different at Avondale. At the moment, they have the right, effectively, it's a staged earning and joint venture agreement.
They have the right, if they complete all of the financial obligations, and there's quite a fair way to go, they could potentially have up to 75% interest in Avondale. Before they get there, there are a number of important steps. They have a decision to make when they get to 40% and then later on at 70%. At each one of those stages, they have to make a decision. Up until the point where they get to, I think it's, they get to, I think it's 70/30, we will retain control. There's a very clear structure in the agreements. At this stage, right now, we still have the control on the casting votes.
Thank you, David. Our next question. The doubling of the gold price in recent years means that the indicated Sorpresa resource of 73,000 ounces of gold has an in-ground value of AUD 374 million Australian. Has Rimfire considered reviewing the economics of mining Sorpresa?
Yes, we have. Yeah, we're very much focused on the scandium, but the Sorpresa deposit, you know, which has got a gold and a silver component to it. Yeah, in light of the current gold price, it is looking very interesting. The other key point about Sorpresa, as I say, we're very much focused on the scandium, but you know, we are very aware that Sorpresa, the deposit itself is open in all directions, and there is potential to expand both the silver and the gold component to it. You know, we're keeping an eye on that, yes.
Good to hear, David. Our next question. Given that Rimfire is one of four potential developers of the scandium deposits in the Fifield area, others being Rio Tinto, Sunrise , and Australian Mines, what level of coordination has there been between the four explorers to potentially do a joint development to contain overall future costs? Also, is there any assistance being offered or provided by either state or federal governments to see this as a major project, given their respective policies to develop rare earth projects?
Yeah, we talk to the other companies. We're certainly all aware of what each other is doing, and we're literally working within a very small area. Yeah, we do talk. There is a degree of collaboration in terms of our geologists seeing what each other's doing and working and talking together. At the same time, each company is focused on pursuing their own objectives and things as well. Yeah, as I say, we're all good neighbors, and we certainly know when we pick up the phone and talk to each other from time to time. In terms of a greater involvement from the government, the New South Wales government is looking at setting up what they're calling a Scandium Working Group to focus specifically on the Fifield District. All of those four companies, as I say, along with us, all of the four companies are involved in that.
The New South Wales government, I think it's fair to say, they've got some really interesting new programs around developing critical minerals potential in New South Wales. Scandium is at the forefront of those plans. We've had a number of conversations with the government, and they're certainly aware of what the four companies are doing at Fifield and what the scandium opportunities at Fifield are as well.
Thank you so much, David. That does wrap our Q&A session for today. If we haven't got to your question, we will attempt to address them post the webinar. As always, if you have any further queries, please feel free to email us at info@corporatestorytime.com. David, do you have any final comments before we close?
I would firstly just like to thank yourselves for hosting this webinar. Thank you to all of the people that have joined us today. The last message is, you know, with the support of our shareholders and our employees, we've got a very significant, unique opportunity here to really create something special for Rimfire in the scandium space. I look forward to bringing further news to the market as and when it arises.
Thank you, David. This does conclude our webinar for today. A recording of this webinar will be made available via Rimfire's and Corporate Storytime social media accounts. Thank you all for joining today, and a special thanks to you, David, and the Rimfire team for the update. Enjoy your day, everyone.
Thank you, Nicola.