Golden Minerals Announces Return of El Quevar Silver Project

Golden Minerals Company (“Golden Minerals,” “Golden” or the “Company”) (NYSE-A: AUMN and TSX: AUMN) announced today that Barrick Gold Corporation (“Barrick”) notified the Company it is withdrawing from an Earn-In Agreement (the “Agreement”) on the El Quevar silver project (Salta province, Argentina) which the two parties signed in April 2020. The termination will be effective on April 20, 2024.

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El Quevar District Map (Graphic: Business Wire)

Golden Minerals President and Chief Executive Officer, Warren Rehn, commented today, “The timing of the return of the El Quevar project is fortuitous and quite favorable to the Company as we pivot from production to exploration and development. The El Quevar property is one of the largest contiguous high sulfidation alteration systems in northern Argentina and presents a very prospective opportunity to the Company in further advancing the high-grade Yaxtché silver deposit as well as advancing the newly identified gold prospect just to the south.“

To date, Barrick has spent more than $6.0 million of work expenditures at El Quevar and has completed a five-hole, 1,300-meter drill program that identified a potential gold prospect in the central Eastern part of Quevar’s land package. That report noted the presence of vuggy silica alteration, which is commonly associated with high sulfidation epithermal gold-silver deposits, in all holes. Final assays confirmed potentially economic gold values in vuggy silica in one of the drill holes.

The Agreement offered Barrick the opportunity to earn an undivided 70% interest in the El Quevar project by spending $10.0 million on work expenditures over a total of eight years, which included spending $0.5 million per year in years one and two, $1.0 million per year in years three, four and five, and $2.0 million per year in years six, seven and eight. Additional earn-in terms under the Agreement required Barrick to deliver an NI 43-101-compliant Pre-Feasibility Study describing a potentially profitable operation with mineral resources of not less than 2 million gold equivalent ounces, also within eight years.