White Cliff Minerals (ASX:WCN) has secured $8.8 million from Hancock Prospecting to accelerate drilling at its Rae Copper Project in Nunavut, Canada.
Hancock Prospecting will acquire around 515.8 million shares at $0.017 each through a private placement, subject to shareholder approval at an extraordinary general meeting on 19 October 2026.
Completion of the placement is expected three business days after the meeting, governed by a subscription agreement containing customary representations and warranties.
Managing Director Troy Whittaker says Hancock Prospecting’s decision to invest represents a major milestone for the company.
“We have spent the past two seasons demonstrating that Rae can deliver exceptional grades across a mineralised system with genuine district-scale potential,” Whittaker says.
“The timing could not be more compelling. Copper prices have reached record highs, supply is tightening and global demand continues to grow.
“The search for large, high-quality new copper discoveries has rarely been more important, and we believe Rae has the potential to become one of them.”
“We are still at an early stage in understanding the full scale of the system, but the results to date demand an ambitious program, and that is exactly what we now intend to deliver.”
Funds are earmarked for further drilling across multiple targets at Rae. Priority focus includes fast-tracking an exploration target and maiden resource estimate at Danvers 1, systematic step-out drilling at Danvers 2 and Danvers 3, and an accelerated regional program for sediment-hosted copper targets supported by an upcoming airborne geophysical survey.
Recent drilling at Danvers returned intercepts of 175m @ 2.50% copper (Cu) and 8.66 grams per tonne silver (Ag), 90m @ 4.00% Cu and 7.50g/t Ag, and 58m @ 3.08% Cu and 13.30g/t Ag.
Additionally, regional step-out drilling extended mineralisation 5km down-strike at Danvers 2 with 15m @ 4.80% Cu.
Finally, drilling at Danvers 3 delivered 20m @ 6.64% Cu, 23m @ 6.18% Cu, and 79.24m @ 1.59% Cu.
At the Hulk prospect, 2025 drilling returned 3.50m @ 7.20% Cu and 25m @ 0.60% Cu. Diamond drilling in 2026 intersected visible chalcopyrite in all three completed drill holes, extending mineralisation 3.7km east and expanding the interpreted footprint to 6.3km2.
White Cliff also intends to deploy downhole electromagnetic equipment around identified mineralisation. The company notes regional dataset reviews have identified similar geophysical signatures to Danvers at the Thor, Rocket, Vision, and Stark prospects.
White Cliff Minerals is a mineral explorer focused on discovering and advancing copper and critical energy metals in tier one jurisdictions in Canada and Australia.
Write to Paula Fabe at Mining.com.au
Images: White Cliff Minerals
