We're currently a gold development company advancing two of Canada's largest gold projects, the Duparquet Gold Project in Quebec and the Springpole Gold Project in Ontario. These two projects form the bulk of our resource base, which is 8.2 million ounces of M&I and 3.8 million ounces of Inferred.
The Springpole Gold Project is a large, robust, open-pit gold project that is in the final stages of an environmental assessment process. We released a very robust PFS in December and will embark on a feasibility study later this year.
The Duparquet Gold Project is another large gold development asset located in the Abitibi gold belt in Quebec. Our last economic study, a PEA released in 2023, showed very positive economics in a much lower gold price environment, which was $1,800, and we expect to have much more attractive economics at a higher gold price.
Historically, we've had a portfolio of other assets where we've had a track record of monetizing. In the last six years, we've raised about CAD 90 million in monetizing these assets, which has reduced the need for new dilution and new equity.
We continue to have several key assets in the portfolio that's going to reduce the need for new financing going forward. We have a strong leadership team in place in exploration, permitting, and project development that can successfully de-risk and advance our major projects.
Last but not least, in today's gold price environment, our ownership in two of the largest gold projects in Canada provide unparalleled leverage to a rising gold price. Here's the geographic orientation of our asset base, with Springpole and Duparquet being our flagship assets. Springpole is located in northwestern Ontario.
We released a PFS in December, as we mentioned, and our final environmental assessment was submitted in November of 2024. We expect a federal EA decision in the coming months, which would put this project as the next mining project in Canada to receive a decision. Our current resource base at Springpole is 4.8 million ounces of gold in M&I category and 0.8 million ounces of gold in the Inferred category.
Duparquet, as we mentioned, is located in Quebec. It is on the site of a past-producing mine, once the largest gold producer in Quebec, and now undergoing renewed exploration and advancing towards project development. There's more than 300,000 meters of historical drilling, and we've currently completed a 20,000-meter drill program in 2025 with strong results and will likely add to that this year.
It has a resource base of 3.4 million ounces in the M&I category and 2.6 million ounces in the Inferred category. And with the success of a recent exploration program, we do expect these numbers to increase in the near to medium term.
And we just want to highlight a couple of other assets in our portfolio. They are non-core assets. We currently own a minority position in the Pickle Crow project in Ontario, which is currently being advanced by Firefly Metals.
They recently announced their position, the 70% sale to a company called Bellavista Resources , which is run right now by a group that recently sold De Grey Mining to Northern Star Resources for more than $3.3 billion. With the new team, we see a ton of opportunity, and more importantly, it doesn't require any financial contribution from First Mining because we free carry to a decision to mine.
Our second non-core position is a 48% equity stake in Seva Mining, a new company formed which owns the Cameron Gold Project, which we recently sold to them. It's backed by the Fiore Group and led by Frank Giustra and has a demonstrated track record of generating significant shareholder value.
Our focus here is to highlight our two key assets, Springpole and Duparquet, but wanted to also highlight our other assets because these assets will provide the funding runway to really provide the growth that's needed at Springpole and Duparquet.
Here's a capital markets overview of First Mining Gold, currently trading today at about CAD 0.51, market cap of CAD 700 million, cash balance of CAD 40 million, and a marketable securities portfolio today in excess of CAD 40 million, which includes our stake in Seva Mining.
Management and directors own about 7.5% of the company, including our founder, Keith Neumeyer, who owns about three and 3.5%, and that also includes First Majestic's ownership of 2.4%. 23% is held institutionally, with the rest remaining held by high net worth and retail investors.
And last but not least, we do have strong support in the capital markets with six analysts covering us, and we do expect to expand this coverage universe in the coming months. So here's the compelling opportunity at First Mining.
As we mentioned, we own two of the most advanced gold development assets in Canada, yet there's a huge disconnect between our valuation and other advanced development projects on both a dollar per ounce basis and on a P/NET basis. We trade at about $40 an ounce in the ground. Our peers, our advanced development peers, trade close to $400 an ounce.
On a Price to Net Asset Value basis, we trade at just under 0.2x. Our peers trade close to 1x. As we continue through the development path and de-risk our Springpole project, we expect there to be an opportunity to significantly bridge this gap between us and our peers. Here's an overview of the largest gold projects in Canada.
As we can see, the options are scarce, and at First Mining, we own two of the largest development projects. Our ownership in these two projects are especially favorable because operating in Tier 1 jurisdictions and owning large, robust projects are becoming increasingly more important. More importantly, though, we don't only own two of the largest projects, we also own one of the most advanced projects.
It's important to differentiate because permitting timelines in Canada are usually long and comprehensive, and at Springpole, we're nearing a process which typically takes five years. Just to touch on Springpole just a little bit. We talked a lot about it already, but we have a resource of 4.8 million ounces in the M&I category, of which 3.1 million ounces are in the Reserve category.
It's currently scoped as a large open-pit asset. As we mentioned, latest PFS was released in December with robust economics, which I'll touch on in the next page. It's located in a tier-one mining jurisdiction of Ontario, and geographically, it's about 100 km east of Red Lake. Here are the PFS highlights from our study in December. Project production profile to average about 300,000 ounces life of mine, about 330,000 ounces in the first five years.
The AISC is expected to be sub CAD 950, about CAD 938 an ounce, and with an initial capital cost of $1.1 billion US. Using a study price of CAD 3,100 gold, CAD 3,550 silver, this produces an after-tax NPV at 5% of CAD 2.1 billion NPV and an IRR of 41% and payback of just under two years.
Production profile at Springpole, very steady production profile over the first eight years, averaging over 300,000 ounces a year. Life of mine grade of 0.9 grams a tonne and 1.1 over the first five years.
There's actually significant opportunity to increase this mine life through resource expansion in the existing deposit. More important to note, we also own a district-scale land package, the Birch-Uchi Greenstone Belt, of 75,000 hectares, which can provide meaningful feed through successful exploration. Here's a bit more detail on the PFS. A couple of important metrics to highlight.
The open pit project is scoped as a 30,000 tonne a day project. The strip ratio right now as it sits is 3/1. We do want to highlight, though, that a lot of the waste right now currently in the mine plan is sitting in Inferred and in the pit.
We do see opportunity to process that Inferred material, which would reduce that strip ratio. Secondly, this is a gold and silver deposit. 5% of our revenue comes from silver. As scoped in the PFS, we're using a silver price of $3,550.
That produces an AISC byproduct cost of $938. If we use a silver price more closely resembling spot at about $80 an ounce, that AISC is actually less than $800 an ounce. More importantly, I want to draw your attention to the sensitivity table on the bottom left there.
The base case scenario was $3,100. At the time of publication, spot was $4,200. Silver was $51. If we use those metrics, the NPV increases at $3.8 billion US after tax IRR of 63% and payback of just over one year.
And needless to say, at spot $5,000 gold, these numbers become even more attractive. And so what big projects offer is significant leverage to a rising gold price environment. At Springpole, we mentioned we've flexed this up to $4,200 gold, which showed extremely robust economics and even more so at spot prices.
I wanted to touch on DuParquet just a little bit because we're going to not have enough time to talk about in detail. Our base case study in 2023 was a PEA done at an $1,800 gold price. That produced an after-tax IRR of 18% and NPV of close to $600 million Canadian.
Increasing that to just the high-end sensitivity of our 2023 study at CAD 2,200 gold increases that NPV to CAD 1.1 billion Canadian and 28% IRR. At our current spot prices, that would increase even more. We're limited to what we can disclose because the high-end sensitivity in our 2023 study was at CAD 2,200, so we'll stick to that, understanding that at spot, it's going to be a much higher and robust economics.
Taken together, the high-level math between our two projects is each CAD 100 increase in the gold price increases our total fundamental net asset value inside First Mining by $230 million U.S. For reference, our current market cap today is about CAD 600 million market cap. Each CAD 250 million increase in the gold price would add the equivalent of our market cap in our fundamental value. The opportunity for investors is this.
If you're looking for exposure to leverage the gold price, First Mining doesn't have one, but two large significant gold assets that can provide investors with significant leverage to a rising gold price environment.
We put it all together in this compelling re-rating opportunity here. I previously mentioned we trade at a significant discount to peers. We're trading at 0.16x our Net Asset Value. That's currently made up of CAD 4 billion of NAV, comprised of CAD 2.9 billion at Springpole in Canadian dollars and CAD 1.1 billion at Duparquet at CAD 2,200 gold in Canadian dollars as well.
That gives us an NAV of CAD 2.91 a share. If we assume a spot case at Springpole, that adds another incremental CAD 2.4 billion in NPV, bringing our total NPV in the company to CAD 6.4 billion or CAD 4.66 a share.
Looking at it from a price to net asset value basis, we currently trade at 0.16x, as we mentioned, and our peers are currently trading at a close to 1x. The historical advanced developer average is between 0.6x and 0.8x.
If we re-rate to a 0.6x-0.8x average using the base case, it produces a share price of between CAD 1.74 and CAD 2.32. If we use the spot case, it increases to CAD 2.79 and CAD 3.73. This is a meaningful share price appreciation from current levels in the tune of 3x-7x.
We believe there are significant de-risking milestones ahead that can provide investors with this opportunity to realize this re-rating. 2026 is going to be a very critical year for First Mining.
As we look ahead in 2026, our key focus will be this, sustaining the positive momentum in both the financial and regulatory environment to advance our Springpole project. We expect both a Canadian federal and Ontario provincial decision in the coming months, which will make Springpole the next mining project in the country to receive this decision. This is a monumental catalyst for the company.
We will continue building and fostering relationships with Indigenous communities who, in addition to the government, are very important and critical partners for us. We've signed long-term relationship agreements and process agreements with a lot of communities, and we hope to build on that moving forward. Following the completion of our PFS in December, as we mentioned, we're going to embark on a feasibility, which is going to continue to de-risk this project.
We believe those three things at Springpole will significantly de-risk this project as we progress towards a construction decision, which will ultimately bridge the valuation gap between us and our peers.
On the valuation front, we expect to have updated exploration results at both our Springpole and Duparquet projects. At Duparquet, we're going to be kicking off an environmental baseline work program and also commencing on a new economic study to advance the project and move it through the regulatory permitting process.
Last but not least, we'll continue monitoring our non-core asset portfolio to potentially monetize and provide continued financial flexibility to our flagship assets. Here's an overview of our global gold resource base. As we mentioned, 3.1 million ounce reserve, 8.2 million ounces in the M&I category, and 3.8 million ounces in the Inferred category. I'll leave it at that.
There's a ton more information that I probably don't want to get into too much detail. Thank you for listening. Please visit firstmininggold.com for more information. Our Director of Investor Relations, Paul Morris, is here as well. Feel free to reach out at paul@firstmininggold.com. Thanks for listening. Yeah.
Thank you, Richard. We're going to open it up for questions from the audience. No questions? Okay, Richard, I've got a few questions for you.
Perfect.
just wanted to come back to. You talked about your valuation and being so much cheaper than your peers. My first question is, why do you think that is the case?
Yep.
Maybe you can also discuss your funding.
Yep.
How are you going to fund these two projects?
Yep. No, good question. Permitting is part of any mining development path. For some, it's a foregone conclusion. For others, like First Mining, who owns the Springpole Project, I should have touched on this.
Understandably, for those who understand the project, you can see the open pit on the screen. A part of it sits under the bay of a lake. We're going to have to build two dikes and dewater a basin where the pit is going to be. When this was discovered, it was always stigmatized and had this negative perception that you're the project under the bay of a lake, you're never going to get permitted. We've been through this process for the last eight years.
There's always been that valuation disconnect because the view was always, "Well, come talk to us when you get your permit." We've done a lot of work in the background, work that doesn't get published and people don't see, but we are literally two months away from a decision that has taken eight years to get to.
The only way to satisfy the concerns of these negative perceptions is to get that permit. We feel like that's going to be a huge catalyst. Secondly, on the Indigenous relations front, we're consulting with five different communities.
Typically, if you work with a project, if there's one or two, it can get complicated. Five is, it could be even more complicated. We do have agreements with a couple of them, and we're working very hard and collaboratively to come to terms with the other three.
It's a reason why our CEO isn't here today. He's hard at work trying to finalize these agreements, and we feel confident with these in place and with this decision, it will be two big de-risking milestones that will see our valuation rerate from where we are to where we can be.
Just on the environmental permit that we were expecting to get shortly, with the two dikes that you need to put next to the lake, what is around there? Do you need to move the fish? Do you need to move other fauna?
Yep, no. Yep, good question. There's been a ton of work done on the fish habitat in that basin. There's some fish there, but we're going to take all the fish and we're going to move it over to the broader Springpole Lake.
Just for reference, it is 3% of the broader lake body. This is a very minor disturbance. The dikes are not an engineering challenge by any means. The capital cost to actually build the dikes is CAD 30 million.
Not financially excessive. Not technically challenged. There are 15 years of data on that basin in that lake that have all the data to back up what we're doing is going to be environmentally acceptable. I think it's going to culminate in this federal EA decision that's coming in a couple of months.
Just maybe to finish off on the Indigenous communities, you've got five of them, and yes, it's usually easier when you have one or two. Of the five, are we all on the same page with respect to how they want this project to be developed?
I could start off by saying none of the communities are anti-mining, which is a great start because everyone wants to see a project go through. There is negotiations on what the financial metrics should be, how the environment should be protected, potential job opportunities, contracting opportunities.
With one particular group, there may be some discussion on is there an opportunity where the tailings dam is right now, is there an opportunity to move that to another location? We're in deep discussions on that subject.
It's going to be where it is, but is there an opportunity to make that maybe a little bit smaller and have a second location that could kind of satisfy any requests that they may have? We can kind of be a win-win for both parties, have it there, make it a bit smaller, but have another location as well.
Maybe for just myself, in terms of your two projects, how are we looking to finance them?
Yeah.
How are we looking to sequence there?
Yep
Their build?
Yep. Springpole is the lowest hanging fruit. We're going to embark on an FS. We're going to get to a construction decision hopefully within 18 months of this federal EA, which will bring us to the end of 2027.
I think at a time when the project is so de-risked and shovel-ready, there are I think opportunities to consider whether we will develop this on our own or whether it makes sense for someone else to come partner with us.
If it's shovel-ready, is there someone that's going to want to own 100% of it? Clearly that's our focus. Duparquet we feel has a tremendous amount of potential. It's a project that can be developed by ourself. The capital cost is actually significantly lower, in the tune of $500 million US. It's at an earlier stage, PEA level.
And so the sequencing is let's get us to a construction decision at Springpole, and then go down a traditional project financing path maybe 12 months before then. And then see what the lay of the land is, and then move forward potentially with DuParquet. As we know, developing one project is hard enough. We don't expect to be developing two at the same time.
Thank you very much, Richard.
Yep. Thank you. Great questions. Thank you so much.