Marcventures inks deal with Singapore firm

MANILA, Philippines - Marcventures Mining & Development Corp. (MMDC), a wholly-owned subsidiary of publicly-listed Marcventures Holdings Inc., has signed a deal with Singapore-based commodities trader Noble Resources Pte. Ltd. to sell up to $1.5 million worth of nickel ore from its mine site in Cantilan, Surigao del Sur.

In a disclosure to the Philippine Stock Exchange, Marcventures Holdings said under the agreement, Noble Resources has committed to purchase from MMDC 250,000 wet metric tons of saprolite nickel ore, which includes the present stockpile of 45,000 WMT.

A company official said the value of the shipment, targeted from June to December 2011, could be worth around $12 million to $15 million based on current industry estimates. The goods are bound for Japan or China, the official said.

MMDC, a company headed by former Lepanto Consolidated Mining president Ramon Recto, has a mineral production sharing agreement to mine 4,799 hectares of the Surigao del Sur property for nickel and gold.

MMDC is aiming to produce 600,000 metric tons of nickel ore in its first year of operations. This could go up to 800,000 MT and 1.2 million MT in the second and third years, respectively.

Noble Resources is a unit of Noble Group, a leading global supply chain manager of agricultural, industrial and energy products. It manages the supply of commodities to distribution centers; performs financing/risk control management; and handles execution coordination and accounting consolidation.

MMDC’s P474-million nickel mining project was granted tax holidays, duty free importation, and exemption from local government taxes by the Board of Investments.

The company is majority owned by Mario G. Vijungco and Dy Chi Hing, both prominent traders in various businesses in Mindanao.

MMDC earlier tapped Japan’s Hanwa Co. Ltd. for the exclusive distribution of its nickel ore to countries such as Japan, South Korea, China, India, United States and Europe.

Nickel is commonly used in producing stainless steel, super alloys, electroplating, batteries, coinage, magnets and other industrial and commercial materials.