Jean-Marc Lulin, PhD, P.Geo., called me first thing in the morning Monday to share the great news:  SOQUEM, a subsidiary of Ressources Quebec, and Azimut Exploration (AZM, TSX-V) are expanding their existing exploration partnership in a major way.  We’re talking substantial commitments here, folks!

SOQUEM can earn an initial 50% interest in Azimut’s Rex-Duquet, Rex South, and Nantais projects by spending $16 million in exploration over the next 4 years.  There’s a firm commitment in place to spend $8 million or more in the first 2 years.  With success, SOQUEM will have an option to increase its stake by 10% (for a total of 60%) by investing another $8 million into the properties and delivering a PEA (certainly puts the Crystal Lake-Romios deal into proper perspective, doesn’t it?).

About these particular property packages, namely the “Rex Trend”, they’re remote (located in Quebec’s far north, Nunavik) but absolutely substantial in size.

Using Azimut and Lulin’s proprietary big data approach for project generation, they were able to stake the entire trend (330 km long by up to 50 km wide) many years ago.  As you can see, the red lake-bottom sediment anomaly lights up a large portion of the map yet remains entirely under-explored.  SOQUEM is arguably the perfect partner Azimut could have on this for one key reason:

Over and above having nearly unlimited access to money, SOQUEM’s mandate is to find mineral deposits and move them toward production.  Their job is to create jobs relating to the natural resources industry in Quebec.  They’ve been working at it in Quebec for 50 years now.  They’re in it for the long-term.  They’re not going anywhere.  And they’ve helped write a wide reaching economic plan, The Plan Nord, aimed at developing Quebec’s mineral potential in the far north (sounds like a committed partner to me).

SOQUEM was also kind enough, and dependent on Azimut’s proprietary technology enough, to amend the terms of their exploration agreement in James Bay (one of Canada’s hottest emerging Gold camps, home to Goldcorp‘s $2 billion Eleonore mine).  With these amended terms, Azimut can regain a 50% interest in several high-potential Gold projects by conducting $3.3 million worth of exploration expenditures over 3 years (the same amount SOQUEM has spent thus fare to earn its 100% interest).

This news is important because Azimut will upgrade to an equity interest as opposed to waiting and hoping a royalty interest might someday payoff (which takes too long).

Azimut was a first mover in James Bay and thus has a very strong presence in the district.

Lulin told me he’s got a lineup of news flow. The coming weeks and months should be a very interesting time for AZM as Mr. Market starts waking up to Azimut’s strategic exploration plans.

I should note, as project(s) manager, the company will be earning fees from SOQUEM along the way.

This is a big deal for Azimut, which currently has a market cap of just $17 million at 32 cents per share.

Note the 2-year horizontal channel between the low 20’s and the upper 40’s on this long-term chart.

If you accumulate around 30 cents, you risk is very low and you’ve got an excellent opportunity to make at least 50% on your investment in 2019 – perhaps a lot more.

Lulin has done a heck of a job positioning Azimut for success, over a decade’s time now, while maintaining a strong share structure (roughly 50 million shares outstanding).  They’ve got many irons in the fire, which ultimately improves their odds of participating in an economic discovery.  Given today’s news and prospects going forward, in what’s sure to be a “discovery driven bull market”, I’d say the odds of AZM dropping below 25 cents are slim to none.

Azimut holds a highly strategic position for Gold and base metals in Quebec totalling 29 properties comprising 7,448 claims or 3,660 sq. km.

By the way, AZM once traded above $9 per share on the back of a Uranium discovery.