Could you talk a bit about your background and organizations, Golden Prospect, Ambrian Capital, and JP Jenkins?
My career background in last 20 years was mainly focused on financing junior miners and other natural resource sectors in Australia, Canada, Africa as well as in the UK. I floated Golden Prospect Precious Metals 12 years ago and remain Founder Chairman during my time controlling and building Ambrian into London’s premier natural resource brokers which I sold out of just prior to the Lehman crash. Since then I have been a partner in Arlington Group Asset Management and an advisor to Altus Strategies and more recently Terrastream all active in the natural resources space. Although I am still privately active investing in the commodity sector my main interest in the more recent past has been exploiting opportunities in secondary markets. We have been fortunate with our US Tech Fund which has unique access to private company disruptors like AirBnB, Uber, DropBox, Spotify and many other so-called unicorns. We are also building an eco-system for Second Market Limited in the UK using the long-standing unquoted trading platform operated by J P Jenkins. This well-known platform is now hosting a new service to Canadian and Australian mining juniors that are seeking a more global cross border trading facility for their shares in the UK.
What are some of the main difficulties and costs that junior miners have today with dual listing?
As I say many companies are increasingly aware of the importance of cross border markets and are more and more participating in expanded investor awareness programs in London. Some companies choose to dual list on the AIM market at uneconomically viable costs of circa $500k with no guarantees of extra liquidity and unattractive price spreads by over-hungry market makers.
“There is considerable interest in the junior mining space which is so under serviced in the UK”
What kind of alternatives and solutions do junior miners have?
Following the launch of our new service other companies have already decided to join J P Jenkins (JPJ) platform for matched share trading at a fraction of the costs to trade on AIM. In some cases, JPJ will invest portion of the admission fee which can provide the initial liquidity to commence the dealing process. The admission fees are circa £10,000 for small cap companies (moderately higher fees for larger companies).
Can you expand upon how share matching works with JP Jenkins?
JPJ doesn’t make markets, the purchase and sale prices are matched. JPJ will admit a company and all its links to its platform and help them find new UK and EU shareholders using news releases and webinars etc. JPJ will also position your company for coverage on suitability chosen investor awareness programs including social media. JPJ invites companies to take a look at its website (jpjenkins.com) and information material and contact the mangers personally if companies would like to consider a listing using this extremely cost-effective method. As I say dealing in foreign shares is a relatively new service JPJ offers. Moreover, due to my involvement with the junior mining space as founder of Golden Prospect and AMBRIAN as well as venture backer of the former Minesite conferences, JPJ expects to have a growing number of Canadian and Australian listed and unlisted stocks using its unique service.
What are the benefits for junior mining companies?
Raising their global profile, disseminating their information to a wider cross border investor community attracting UK investors from which funds can be raised from time to time and at an extremely nominal cost in relative terms. This of course assists the liquidity in their stock.
Do you believe that retail investors on AIM are missing an opportunity to invest in overseas junior mining companies in high value commodities?
Absolutely, retail investors in London and elsewhere in EU do not tend to open broker accounts in Australia and Canada (sometimes because a same country bank account is required) and therefore they miss out on specific stock sector successes such as the battery metals group, like lithium, cobalt and more recently Canadian and USA blockchain companies and medical marijuana IPOs. There is considerable interest in the junior mining space which is so under serviced in the UK. There are only a handful of good resource prospects trading on AIM compared with literally hundreds of opportunities in other markets. With commodities sectors ripe for recovery and looking like a commanding a place for investor asset allocation in the near future, more and more shares will be sought after in precious metals, uranium, rare earths, graphite and other related securities.
