Kootenay Silver Inc.
Kootenay Silver is advancing a portfolio of FOUR silver deposits across two Mexican states, not one: Columba and La Cigarra in Chihuahua, and Promontorio and La Negra in Sonora (correcting an earlier description that placed all four in Chihuahua). La Cigarra is now the company's most advanced project by evidenced milestone: a positive NI 43-101 Preliminary Economic Assessment was announced 15 Jun 2026 (US$763M after-tax NPV at 5%, 41% IRR, 14-year mine life, US$332.2M initial capex, base case US$50/oz Ag), with the supporting Technical Report filed 7 Aug 2026, built on an updated Measured+Indicated resource (effective 4 Apr 2026) of 23.02 Mt @ 81 g/t Ag for 60.02 Moz contained silver. Columba, the company's most-drilled and most-publicized deposit, carries only a maiden Inferred resource (May 2025: 5.92 Mt @ 284 g/t Ag for 54.1 Moz contained silver, no M+I category) and remains at an earlier stage despite the exploration attention. Promontorio separately carries a Measured & Indicated resource (27 Aug 2023: 42.1 Mt @ 34.5 g/t Ag for 46.77 Moz contained silver M+I) but no economic study. La Negra carries only a maiden resource estimate (announced alongside Promontorio's 2023 update) not yet independently re-verified in detail.
Notable vs. Peers
- Financials score of 10/10 is stronger than the peer average of 6.5/10.
Lifecycle Milestones
Combined view across 3 projects. Figures below are only combined where the underlying basis genuinely matches -- see the notes under each.
A relative ranking of how closely this company matches the profile of juniors that have actually been acquired — not a probability, and not a reason to buy. Acquisitions are rare: only a few dozen significant deals happen a year across a universe of thousands of juniors, so even a high score here describes a long shot. The strongest signal the underlying research identifies — whether a major already holds a JV, earn-in, or 5–19.9% strategic stake — isn't tracked yet and is absent from this score.
Your Rankings
Management Team
President, Chief Executive Officer and Director of Kootenay Silver Inc., and a founder of the company. (PGeo) More than 30 years of combined technical and financial experience in the mining sector. Co-founded and successfully developed National Gold, which merged with Alamos Minerals to form Alamos Gold, for which he was a Director and served on numerous committees until June 2012. Also served as President of Genco Resources, which operated the La Guitarra Silver Mine in Mexico, and is a co-founder and former director of Northern Vertex Mining Corp.
Chairman of Kootenay Silver Inc., listed under the company's own "Officers/Management" heading, and a founder of the company. (B.Comm) Over 30 years of experience in finance and venture capital markets. Began his career in the Canadian brokerage industry as an investment advisor before founding various publicly traded companies, with roles including senior management positions and directorships responsible for finance, business development, strategic planning and corporate restructuring. Was the co-founder, CEO and Director/Chairman of Northern Vertex Mining Corp. Prior to his career in the capital markets he enjoyed a professional hockey career and was a participant in the 1980 and 1988 Winter Olympics.
Chief Financial Officer, Corporate Secretary and Director of Kootenay Silver Inc. and Kootenay Resources Inc., and Chief Financial Officer, Corporate Secretary & Director of Galactic Gold Corp. Over 25 years of financial experience across public and private companies including Salares Lithium, Gryphon Gold, Star Shipping and Steppe Gold. NOTE: with three concurrent tracked CFO (executive-type) seats -- Kootenay Silver, Kootenay Resources and Galactic Gold -- computeManagementScore()'s overextension penalty is expected to apply on this merge; captured before/after in the Task #526 closure note. (Task #526 merge; sourced from Galactic Gold Corp.'s own Qualifying-Transaction press release naming him CFO, Corporate Secretary and Director.)
Vice President of Exploration of Kootenay Silver Inc. (BSc, PGeo) A professional geologist with 25 years of mineral exploration experience, working on projects in Australia, Canada, Mexico, the USA and Brazil, with particular expertise in identifying and upgrading early stage projects and a track record of successful stakeholder negotiations resulting in productive land access agreements. Based in Vancouver, B.C., he has 10 years of experience managing exploration projects in northern Mexico for junior exploration companies Kootenay Silver, Astral Mining, Orex Minerals Inc. and Silver Viper Minerals Corp. Holds a Bachelor of Applied Geology degree from Curtin University of Western Australia and a Bachelor of Science (Environmental) degree from the University of Western Australia, and is a member in good standing of Engineers & Geoscientists British Columbia.
Vice President of Exploration Emeritus of Kootenay Silver Inc.; the company prints his name with the honorific 'Dr.' (BSc, PhD). An accomplished author and co-author of numerous publications in the science of geology through central British Columbia. Was a Research Scientist with the Geological Survey of Canada during the 1970s doing regional mapping in British Columbia, and conducted regional exploration in Canada, the United States and Mexico to the early 1990s as an independent geologist and prospector with junior and major mining companies including Teck, Inco, Esso, Newmont, Falconbridge and Union Carbide, and throughout northwest Argentina until 2007. Has been involved with Kootenay in Mexico from 2007 to present.
Insiders, Investors & Smart Money
Notable shareholders and insiders whose involvement is worth knowing about, plus what we're seeing from institutional/large-investor activity.
Eric Sprott invested $5 million in Kootenay Silver in 2019 (31,250,000 units); after his warrants expired unexercised in August 2022, he retained 30,150,000 shares, approximately 8.4% non-diluted -- a real share position, not an 'expired' one, since only the warrants lapsed. Falling below the 10% early-warning threshold at that point means no further disclosure has been legally required since, so whether he still holds any of those shares today cannot be confirmed either way despite thorough searching; Agnico Eagle's separate 2013 stake is long gone. No resource fund currently holds a meaningful, currently-disclosed position. The only recent insider activity was a director selling a modest number of shares in August 2026.
No notable insiders tracked for this miner yet.
Reports, Presentations & Documents
Preliminary Economic Assessment for the La Cigarra Silver Project, Hidalgo del Parral, Chihuahua, Mexico -- PEA economics announced 15 Jun 2026 (prnewswire.com, "Kootenay Silver Announces Positive PEA with a US$763 Million After-Tax NPV & 41% IRR for La Cigarra Silver Project"; same-day correction reissue only fixed a missing engineering-firm credit in paragraph 1, economics unchanged), with the supporting NI 43-101 Technical Report filed 7 Aug 2026 ("no material differences between the technical report and the June 15, 2026 disclosure"). Prepared by Sacre-Davey Engineering Inc. (lead) with Canenco Consulting Corp., SGS Canada Inc., AKF Mining Services Inc., and Knight Piesold Ltd.; QP Dale Brittliffe, P.Geo. Base case (consensus metal prices, this schema's headline convention -- not the spot-price case): after-tax NPV(5%) US$763M, after-tax IRR 41%, after-tax payback 1.9 years (pre-tax NPV(5%) US$1,265M, pre-tax IRR 55% -- not written, headline convention is after-tax). Spot-price case (not written): NPV US$1,295M, IRR 64%. Price deck: Ag US$50.00/oz (base case), Au US$3,611/oz, Pb US$0.91/lb, Zn US$1.25/lb byproduct credits. Initial capital US$332.2M; sustaining capital US$79.7M (LOM capital not separately summed here). AISC US$18.73/oz Ag -- not written to aiscValue in this pass, flagged as its own fillable gap. 14-year mine life, 6,000 tpd open-pit. Average annual payable Ag production 6.22 Moz (years 1-5) / 4.55 Moz (LOM average); ~63.6-63.7 Moz total payable silver over the mine life (secondary sources round this figure slightly differently; not written to a DB field). Average silver recovery 89.3%. Mineralization traced over ~9 km with a 4.4 km continuously mineralized strike length. Underlying mineral resource effective 4 Apr 2026 (the update that feeds this PEA's mine plan -- NOT the older Nov 2023 figure still shown on kootenaysilver.com's own La Cigarra project page, which lags its own press releases): Measured+Indicated 23.02 Mt @ 81 g/t Ag = 60.02 Moz contained silver (straight Ag metal, not AgEq); Inferred 6.78 Mt @ 79 g/t Ag = 17.25 Moz (excluded per this schema's M+I-only ouncesFound convention). Cross-checked across the PR Newswire correction release, Yahoo Finance syndication, and the company's own site -- all consistent on the 23.02 Mt / 81 g/t / 60.02 Moz figure. [Task #549 stage correction, 2026-08-23] RESOLVED 2026-08-23 (Task #549): raised stage RESOURCE_DEFINITION -> PEA, and set stageEnteredAt = 2026-06-15 (the PEA results-announcement date; the 7 Aug 2026 technical report filing is a later formality on the same, unchanged economics). Resolves the stage flag raised (deliberately unfixed) by the Task #338/#546a currentMilestoneLabel/stageEnteredAt backfill campaign. Independently re-verified via fresh WebSearch + WebFetch of the company's own primary releases (prnewswire.com, not a search-engine summary), per this session's standing anti-hallucination practice. Multi-project convention applied (prisma/schema.prisma Stage enum comment; docs/GOLD-DATA-OPERATIONS-PLAYBOOK.md 7.4): Kootenay Silver holds FOUR Mexican silver deposits at different stages -- Columba (Chihuahua, Inferred-only, RESOURCE_DEFINITION), Promontorio (Sonora, M+I resource but no economic study, RESOURCE_DEFINITION), La Negra (Sonora, only a maiden estimate mentioned, not independently re-verified this pass), and La Cigarra (Chihuahua, completed dated positive NI 43-101 PEA, PEA). La Cigarra is unambiguously the most advanced of the four -- not a close call -- so it sets Miner.stage per the explicit 'most advanced project, not necessarily the market-narrative flagship' rule (same reasoning as the VCU/Task #99 precedent and the XTR counter-example in playbook 7.4, where deferring to narrative-flagship framing instead of the most-advanced project understated stage by four levels). PROJECTNAME/OUNCESFOUND MOVED TO LA CIGARRA (was previously Miner.projectName='Columba Silver Project' while Miner.ouncesFound/technicalReportNote actually described Promontorio -- a pre-existing internal inconsistency, not introduced by this script, also corrected here): per VCU/BTG precedent, Miner-level headline fields describe the most-advanced/flagship project once multiple real projects exist. Promontorio's real, already-cited 46,773,000 oz M+I figure is NOT deleted -- relocated to its own new Project row ('Promontorio-La Negra Project, Sonora, Mexico') exactly as Woodjam/Poplar were split out under VCU, so no cross-project evidence laundering occurs and the existing citation stays correctly attributed to the deposit it actually describes. Columba's existing Project row is left as-is (already correctly RESOURCE_DEFINITION with null economics, matching its Inferred-only resource). Numeric backfill from La Cigarra's own PEA (see technicalReportNote for full detail): ouncesFound 60,020,000 (was 46,773,000/Promontorio; now La Cigarra's own M+I), dcfNpvUsd US$763,000,000 (after-tax NPV5%), dcfNpvDiscountRatePct 5, irrPct 41 (after-tax), mineLifeYears 14, initialCapexUsd US$332,200,000, technicalReportPriceAssumptionUsd 50 (SILVER). Sources: https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/kootenay-silver-announces-positive-pea-with-a-us763-million-after-tax-npv--41-irr-for-la-cigarra-silver-project-302800667.html ; https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/kootenay-silver-files-ni-43-101-technical-report-supporting-positive-pea-for-la-cigarra-silver-project-302846188.html ; https://finance.yahoo.com/markets/commodities/articles/kootenay-silver-announces-positive-pea-142900312.html ; https://www.kootenaysilver.com/news/2026/ . Full reasoning: scripts/correct-ktn-stage-task549.ts.