Central Asia Metals ups offer for New World Resources to fend off Kinterra

[Ben Graham]

The takeover battle for Australian copper developer New World Resources (ASX: NWC) is heating up after Central Asia Metals (LON: CAML) raised its offer shortly after Canada’s Kinterra Capital made its bid.

In an announcement Friday, the UK-based CAML proposed to increase its offer from A$0.055 per share to A$0.062, giving New World a fully diluted equity value of A$230 million. The offer takes the form of both a court-approved agreement under Australian regulations and an off-market takeover as its alternative.

Right before that, CAML bought approximately 253 million shares (equating to 7.1%) of New World at the offer price, and now holds 12.1% of its share capital.

CAML’s offer represents an 8.8% premium over that of Kinterra, which offered A$0.057 the day before. It is also 24% more than what CAML initially proposed on May 21, when it offered A$0.05 per share.

New World, in a press release Friday, confirmed the increased offer, adding that neither CAML nor Kinterra has declared their offers to be “best and final”.

Shares of New World Resources closed Friday’s trading session at A$0.065, with a market capitalization of A$228.4 million.

US copper portfolio

The Australian company currently holds three copper projects across the southwestern US. The most advanced is the 100%-owned Antler project in Arizona, which it considers to be one of the world’s “highest-grade emerging copper development projects”.

Located 15 km east of Yucca in northwestern Arizona, the Antler property is host to a high-grade, polymetallic deposit with a resource of 11.4 million tonnes grading 4.1% copper equivalent. This resource was used to underpin a 2024 prefeasibility study, which outlined a 12-year mine producing 341,100 tonnes of copper equivalent during that span.

The project’s post-tax net present value (discounted at 7%) is estimated at $498 million, with an internal rate of return of 30.3% and a payback period of 3.3 years.

About 75 km southeast of Antler, New World also holds the exploration-stage Javelin project, which hosts a contiguous series of mining claims linked to high-grade volcanogenic massive sulphide deposits that it believes are of similar age and style to the Antler deposit.

In New Mexico, the company has the Tererro VMS project, which has a historical resource estimate of 5.8 million tonnes grading 1.96 g/t gold, 1.02% copper, 0.24% lead, 1.46% zinc and 21.4 g/t silver.