Topic: How To Invest

Pat: May I have your expert opinion regarding PacificOre Mining? It appears to be a start-up company with properties in Quebec containing vanadium as one of its ores. Apparently the hype for vanadium is that it is a metal for the future, especially in battery production.

Article Excerpt

PacificOre Mining, $0.05, symbol PC on Toronto (Shares outstanding: 114.2 million; Market cap: $7.3 million; www.pacificoremining.com), has three vanadium properties in Quebec: Lac Dore; IRON-T; and Game Changer. Vanadium is used to strengthen steel, which means its value should rise as an economic recovery pushes up demand from industry. As well, vanadium may be used in electric-car batteries, so it should benefit from demand for these vehicles. Right now, however, the steel industry still accounts for over 90% of vanadium demand. In the battery industry, vanadium is mainly used in vanadium redox batteries (VRBs), which are large-scale energy-storage systems. Each VRB requires between one and five tonnes of vanadium, depending on its size. VRB technology is still under development, but early-stage projects are starting to be used in some parts of the world. All three of PacificOre’s properties are in the earliest stages of exploration, including airborne electromagnetic surveys to detect anomalies and channel sampling to extract rock samples. (Channel sampling involves cutting…