ACG Metals to Acquire Turkey's Keşkek Gold Mine Permit, Targeting Gold Production Start by Mid-2027

en.Wedoany.com Reported - On September 7, ACG Metals signed a binding agreement with Meta Nikel Kobalt Madencilik Sanayi ve Ticaret A.Ş. to acquire Mining License No. 60926 and all related rights, securing a 100% interest in the Keşkek Gold Project. The license covers an area of approximately 666 hectares. The initial cash consideration for the transaction is US$4 million, with up to an additional US$3.85 million in deferred cash consideration payable upon the project reaching subsequent permitting and production milestones.

Under the transaction terms, the US$4 million initial payment will be made upon completion of the definitive agreement and approval of the mining license transfer by Turkey's General Directorate of Mining and Petroleum Affairs, which ACG expects to be completed by October 2026. The remaining US$3.85 million is tied to the progress of the Environmental Impact Assessment permit and is expected to be paid when the project commences production in mid-2027. META will also receive a 1% gross revenue royalty on gold sales from the licensed area; for gold discovered outside the existing Keşkek pit boundary that is converted into ore reserves, ACG will pay an additional consideration of US$60 per ounce. Total expenditures for the project acquisition, phased exploration, and mine closure are estimated at approximately US$15 million over the next 10 years.

Keşkek is located within approximately 70 kilometers of ACG's Gediktepe mine. The initial oxide ore source for the project is the Keşkek pit already delineated by META, which currently hosts an estimated 300,000 tonnes of ore at an average gold grade of approximately 0.90 g/t, with a waste-to-ore strip ratio of approximately 1:1. ACG's technical team has also estimated that the entire license area contains approximately 1.5 million tonnes of Indicated Mineral Resources at an average gold grade of 0.65 g/t; further technical review has identified an additional exploration potential of 5 to 10 million tonnes at gold grades of approximately 0.7–1.0 g/t, which remains subject to future drill testing.

ACG plans to transport Keşkek oxide ore to Gediktepe via existing roads for processing. Higher-grade ore will be fed into the existing heap leach facility, while lower-grade material is planned to be stockpiled initially and processed later through the high-grade ore processing facility that ACG is currently advancing. Metallurgical test work conducted by ACG indicates gold recovery of approximately 75%–80% from Keşkek ore via column leaching; with the application of Gediktepe's existing proprietary recovery process, recovery can be increased to approximately 85%. This process has been applied under commercial operating conditions at Gediktepe, where ACG has previously disclosed that its existing heap leach gold recovery has improved from approximately 75% to approximately 85%.

Keşkek transportation will utilize existing paved and gravel roads, and ACG's current mining contractor, Uluova, is already operating at the META project site. Keşkek is also located near ACG's existing concentrate off-take route. ACG plans to commence mining and gold production at Keşkek in mid-2027, after the recoverable gold and silver from the current heap leach material at Gediktepe has been largely recovered, with the exact timing still subject to the completion of the mining license transfer and permits such as the Environmental Impact Assessment.

Gediktepe is currently advancing both copper-zinc production from sulfide ore and oxide ore heap leaching operations. ACG produced its first copper concentrate at Gediktepe in late August 2026, with sulfide production currently ramping up; the Keşkek project corresponds to supplementing the existing gold heap leach facility with a new external oxide ore source, representing a different ore type and processing stream from Gediktepe's sulfide copper-zinc production line.