Battle North Gold (formerly Rubicon Minerals) was a Canadian company that was pursuing the development of the Bateman (formerly Phoenix) gold project near

Red Lake, Ontario Red Lake is a municipality with town status in the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of Ontario, located northwest of Thunder Bay and less than from the Manitoba border. The municipality consists of six small communities� ...

. Headquartered in

Toronto Toronto ( ; or ) is the capital city of the Canadian province of Ontario. With a recorded population of 2,794,356 in 2021, it is the most populous city in Canada and the fourth most populous city in North America. The city is the ancho ...

, the company was listed on the

Toronto Stock Exchange The Toronto Stock Exchange (TSX; french: Bourse de Toronto) is a stock exchange located in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is the 10th largest exchange in the world and the third largest in North America based on market capitalization. Based in t ...

in Canada and the

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and then the OTCQX market exchange in the US. The company's board of directors had approved the construction of the mine in 2014 and raised $700 million but little gold was recovered. Consequently, the company sought creditor protection and re-structured. By 2018 the company had a market capitalization of $80 million as it pursued new resource estimates. The company was acquired by

Australian Securities Exchange Australian Securities Exchange Ltd or ASX, is an Australian public company that operates Australia's primary securities exchange, the Australian Securities Exchange (sometimes referred to outside of Australia as, or confused within Australia as ...

-listed company

Evolution Mining Evolution Mining is an Australian gold mining company with projects across Australia and in Ontario, Canada. Evolution owns and operates mines at Cowal, New South Wales; Mt Carlton, Mt Rawdon, and Ernest Henry, Queensland; and Mungari, Western Au ...

in 2021.

Corporate history

Battle North Gold was incorporated on March 4, 1996 in

Vancouver Vancouver ( ) is a major city in western Canada, located in the Lower Mainland region of British Columbia. As the List of cities in British Columbia, most populous city in the province, the 2021 Canadian census recorded 662,248 people in the ...

as Rubicon Minerals Corporation for acquiring and exploring the mineral properties that had been assembled by the

holding company A holding company is a company whose primary business is holding a controlling interest in the securities of other companies. A holding company usually does not produce goods or services itself. Its purpose is to own shares of other companies ...

Rubicon Management Ltd. It became a public company in November 1997 with its shares listed on the

Vancouver Stock Exchange The Vancouver Stock Exchange (VSE) was a stock exchange based in Vancouver, British Columbia. It was incorporated 1906. On November 29, 1999 the VSE was merged into the Canadian Venture Exchange (CDNX). History It was incorporated 1906 and was th ...

. It conducted

mineral exploration Mining in the engineering discipline is the extraction of minerals from underneath, open pit, above or on the ground. Mining engineering is associated with many other disciplines, such as mineral processing, exploration, excavation, geology, and ...

work in

Haines, Alaska Haines (Tlingit: ''Deishú'') is a census-designated place located in Haines Borough, Alaska, United States. It is in the northern part of the Alaska Panhandle, near Glacier Bay National Park and Preserve. As of the 2020 census, the populat ...

, and on its Canadian properties in Ontario and Newfoundland. On September 30, 2003, the Company graduated to the

, and in September 2004, became cross-listed on the

American Stock Exchange NYSE American, formerly known as the American Stock Exchange (AMEX), and more recently as NYSE MKT, is an American stock exchange situated in New York City. AMEX was previously a mutual organization, owned by its members. Until 1953, it was known ...

with the trading symbol "RBY". Rubicon would be listed on the

S&P/TSX Composite Index The S&P/TSX Composite Index is the benchmark Canadian index, representing roughly 70% of the total market capitalization on the Toronto Stock Exchange (TSX) with about 250 companies included in it. The Toronto Stock Exchange is made up of over 1, ...

between December 2009 and December 2013. Rubicon also owned a one-third stake in the private company Africo Resources which was conducting mineral exploration in the Kalukundi copper-cobalt deposit in

Katanga Province Katanga was one of the four large provinces created in the Belgian Congo in 1914. It was one of the eleven provinces of the Democratic Republic of the Congo between 1966 and 2015, when it was split into the Tanganyika Province, Tanganyika, Hau ...

, Democratic Republic of the Congo. Rubicon re-structured, effective December 8, 2006, to make Africo Resources a public company listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange (though it would be acquired by the private company Camrose Resources in 2016) and spun-off the new company called Paragon Minerals Corporation to hold its Newfoundland assets (though it would be acquired by Canadian Zinc Corporation in 2012). Canadian businessman and former CEO of

Goldcorp Goldcorp Inc. was a gold production company headquartered in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. The company employed about 15,800 people worldwide, engaged in gold mining and related activities including exploration, extraction, processing and ...

Rob McEwen Rob McEwen, CM (born April 15, 1950) is a Canadian businessman. He is the chairman and chief executive officer of McEwen Mining and was the founder and former chairman and chief executive officer of Goldcorp. In January 2019, Goldcorp merged wi ...

became a significant investor and strategic advisor to the company beginning in 2006 and controlled over 30% of shares. Rubicon's Ontario property, called the Phoenix gold project, in the Red Lake area became the company's primary focus. On the strength of a 2013 preliminary economic assessment which indicated a gold reserve of 3.3 million ounces with gold per ton of ore, Rubicon's board of directors authorized the construction of the mine without a feasibility study. With the

Wabauskang First Nation Wabauskang First Nation is a Saulteaux First Nation in northwestern Ontario, and is a member of the Bimose Tribal Council and the Grand Council of Treaty 3. Their reserve Reserve or reserves may refer to: Places * Reserve, Kansas, a US city * ...

in opposition to the project, the company had to defend its permits in a

Supreme Court of Canada The Supreme Court of Canada (SCC; french: Cour suprême du Canada, CSC) is the Supreme court, highest court in the Court system of Canada, judicial system of Canada. It comprises List of Justices of the Supreme Court of Canada, nine justices, wh ...

case deciding that the province could issue mining permits on treaty land. The project proceeded with the company raising $700 million from investors, including the

CPP Investment Board The Canada Pension Plan Investment Board (CPPIB; french: Office d'investissement du régime de pensions du Canada), operating as CPP Investments (french: Investissements RPC), is a Canadian Crown corporation established by way of the 1997 ''Cana ...

and Agnico Eagle Mines, and its stock peaking at $6 per share. However, once the mine started producing gold in 2015 unexpectedly low yields were achieved. Consequently they had to revise their gold reserve estimate down to 413,000 ounces and their stock collapsed down to 5 cents a share by January 2016. Consequently, the company sought creditor protection as it re-structured and was delisted from the

. As part of the re-structuring, their stock was consolidated at 162 shares for one new share, followed by new shares being issued to

secured creditor A secured creditor is a creditor with the benefit of a security interest over some or all of the assets of the debtor. In the event of the bankruptcy of the debtor, the secured creditor can enforce security against the assets of the debtor and avo ...

s, and

Royal Gold Royal Gold is one of the world's leading precious metals streaming and royalty companies engaged in the acquisition and management of precious metal streams, royalties and similar production-based interests. Royal Gold owns a large portfolio of pr ...

's streaming agreement being renegotiated. With George Ogilvie being hired as its new CEO, the re-structured company raised funds by issuing new shares to fund better resource estimates and a new preliminary economic assessment. In 2020, the company re-named itself from Rubicon Minerals to Battle North Gold and re-named its Phoenix Gold project to the Bateman Gold project. In May 2021

-listed

completed the acquisition of Battle North Gold for

CAD$ The Canadian dollar (currency symbol, symbol: Dollar sign, $; ISO 4217, code: CAD; french: dollar canadien) is the currency of Canada. It is abbreviated with the dollar sign $, there is no standard disambiguating form, but the abbreviation Can ...

343 million.

References

{{reflist Companies formerly listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange Gold mining companies of Canada