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EMX Executes Agreement to Acquire Royalty Portfolio from SSR Mining

Figure 1: Locations of assets in the Royalty Portfolio

EMX Executes Agreement to Acquire Royalty Portfolio from SSR Mining

Vancouver, British Columbia, July 29, 2021 (NYSE American: EMX; TSX Venture: EMX; Frankfurt: 6E9) – EMX Royalty Corporation (the “Company”, or “EMX”) is pleased to announce that it has entered into an agreement (the “Royalty Purchase Agreement”) dated July 29, 2021 with SSR Mining Inc. and certain of its subsidiaries (“SSR Mining”) to purchase a portfolio of royalty interests and deferred payments (the “Royalty Portfolio”). The Royalty Portfolio consists of 18 geographically diverse royalties, with four royalty assets at advanced stages of project development, and also includes U.S. $18 million in future cash payments to be made to the owner of the Royalty Portfolio (see Figure 1 and Table 1). Upon closing of the transaction EMX will pay to SSR Mining U.S. $33 million in cash and U.S. $33 million in common shares of EMX. EMX will also make deferred and contingent payments to SSR Mining of up to U.S. $34 million if certain project advancement milestones are achieved. Further details of the commercial terms are provided below. Completion of the transaction is subject to customary closing conditions, including acceptance by the TSX Venture Exchange (the “TSX-V”).

The portfolio is highlighted by the Gediktepe royalties, which cover assets currently being developed by Lidya Madencilik (“Lidya”), a private Turkish company that expects initial production from Gediktepe in late 2021. These include a 10% NSR royalty on production from an oxide gold-silver deposit and a 2% NSR royalty on underlying polymetallic volcanogenic massive sulfide (“VMS”) mineralization. Yenipazar (Turkey) and Diablillos (Argentina) are additional royalties on advanced stage projects (see summaries below) and the other 14 royalty interests cover both precious metal and base metal assets in South America, Mexico, the United States (Nevada) and Canada.

This transaction will leverage EMX’s experience base in Turkey, is expected to provide significant near-term cash flow to the Company, and establishes a pipeline of quality royalty assets in numerous well-recognized mineral belts around the world. EMX has been working in Turkey for nearly 20 years and looks forward to building its relationship with both SSR Mining and Lidya. In Lidya, EMX sees a well funded and highly capable operator that is developing both the Gediktepe and Hod Maden mines in Turkey. The Gediktepe and Yenipazar royalty interests will bolster EMX’s existing royalty portfolio in Turkey, which includes an uncapped 4% NSR royalty on the Balya North polymetallic deposit and other royalty interests in Turkey. Balya North is being developed by Esan Eczacibaşi Endüstriyel Hammaddeler San. ve Tic. A.Ş. (“Esan”) and remains on schedule to commence commercial production in 2021.

This Royalty Portfolio acquisition is well aligned with EMX’s corporate growth strategy, whereby the Company leverages its in-region expertise in identifying opportunities in jurisdictions where EMX already has a strategic presence. Through the years this approach has led to continuous value creation for the Company and synergies with existing EMX initiatives around the world. Further, securing near term positive cash flow will represent an important step in the Company’s evolution.

Rodney Antal, President and Chief Executive Officer of SSR Mining, commented “We are very excited to become a shareholder of EMX where our investors will have the opportunity to participate in the value creation associated with an established, growth-oriented company with an attractive portfolio of precious, base and battery metals royalties”.

Commercial Terms Overview. As stated above, upon closing of the transaction EMX will pay to SSR Mining U.S. $33 million in cash and U.S. $33 million in common shares of EMX. The number of common shares to be issued by EMX to SSR Mining will be based on the volume-weighted average price (“VWAP”) of the shares on the NYSE American stock exchange for the 20 days prior to the date of completion of the transaction (the “Closing Date”). All such shares will be subject to a hold period of 4 months and a day from the Closing Date. Upon closing, SSR Mining will own an approximate 12% undiluted equity interest in EMX, subject to final calculation at closing.

Additional deferred payments of up to U.S. $34 million will be made by EMX to SSR Mining in consideration for the Net Profits Interest (“NPI”) royalty on the Yenipazar property in Turkey. These will be payable as follows: (i) U.S. $2,000,000 in EMX common shares based on the 20-day VWAP prior to the date of commencement of construction of a mill on the Yenipazar property; (ii) U.S. $2,000,000 in EMX common shares based on the 20-day VWAP prior to the date of commencement of commercial production; (iii) U.S. $15,000,000 in cash, payable when EMX has received U.S. $10,000,000 in net profits interest payments under the Yenipazar NPI; and (iv) U.S. $15,000,000 in cash, payable when EMX has received a second U.S. $10,000,000 in net profits interest payments. All such shares will be subject to a hold period of 4 months and a day from the date of issue.

EMX intends to pay up to U.S. $10,000,000 of the cash payable at closing with the proceeds of a U.S. $10,000,000 senior secured credit facility (the “Credit Facility”) provided for in a non-binding term sheet EMX has entered into with Sprott Private Resource Lending II (Collector), LP (“Sprott”). The Credit Facility is to mature one year from the Closing Date, bear interest at a rate of 7% per annum, and be secured by general security agreements over the assets of EMX and certain of its subsidiaries, and pledges of the shares of certain of EMX’s subsidiaries, who will, at Sprott’s election, also be guarantors of the loan. In addition to interest payable, the U.S. $10,000,000 to be advanced under the Credit Facility will also be subject to an original issue discount equal to 5% of the amount of the advance. Under the term sheet, Sprott will subscribe for U.S. $300,000 of EMX common shares at closing, at a deemed price equal to U.S. $2.74 per share. All such shares will be subject to a hold period of 4 months and a day from the Closing Date.

If the Credit Facility is not ultimately entered into, the Royalty Purchase Agreement provides for vendor takeback financing by SSR Mining of up to U.S. $5,000,000 (the “VTB Note”), and EMX will pay the balance of the cash payable at closing from available working capital. The VTB Note will bear interest at 14% per annum and will mature 60 days from the Closing Date. If unpaid within such 60 day period, the VTB Note ‎will bear additional interest at a rate of 2% per annum for each 60 day period past due‎.

Royalty Portfolio Overview. As summarized in Figure 1 and Table 1, the Royalty Portfolio spans over 69,000 hectares across seven countries on three continents. Summaries for Gediktepe, Yenipazar and Diablillos are provided here, and further information on the Royalty Portfolio and other EMX assets can be found at www.emxroyalty.com. Upon completion of the transaction, of the royalties purchased, only the royalty over the Gediktepe property in Turkey will be material to EMX at the present time. EMX is currently preparing a technical report on the Gediktepe property to be filed on SEDAR.

Gediktepe VMS Deposit, Western Turkey: The Gediktepe VMS deposit was discovered by a Joint Venture (“JV”) initiative between Alacer Gold Corp. (“Alacer”) and Lidya in 2012-2013 and was quickly advanced to PEA (2014) and Prefeasibility stages (2016). The deposit is comprised of a polymetallic VMS system with precious metal, copper, and zinc rich domains. The upper portion of the deposit is oxidized, forming a precious metal-enriched gossanous cap that will be mined first, followed by production from the underlying polymetallic sulfide deposit. Operator Lidya has commenced development and construction of the project and is anticipating initial production in late 2021.

Alacer, the previous owner of the Gediktepe royalties, completed a merger with SSR Mining in September of 2020. The Gediktepe Royalties consist of: (i) a perpetual 10% NSR royalty over metals produced from the oxide zone (predominantly gold and silver) after cumulative production of 10,000 gold-equivalent oxide ounces; and (ii) a perpetual 2% NSR royalty over metals produced from the sulfide zone (predominantly copper, zinc, lead, silver and gold), payable after cumulative production of 25,000 gold-equivalent sulfide ounces.

The Gediktepe property is the subject of an NI 43-101 Prefeasibility study entitled “Gediktepe 2019 Prefeasibility Study” prepared by OreWin Pty Ltd. on behalf of Alacer with an effective date of Mar. 26, 2019 (the “Gediktepe Report”). The 2019 Gediktepe Report is filed on SEDAR and contains historical mining reserve and resource estimates (summarized in Tables 2.1 and 2.2).

Yenipazar VMS Deposit, Central Turkey: The Yenipazar polymetallic VMS deposit was discovered in the late 1990’s by YAMAS, a predecessor of Alacer and SSR Mining. Aldridge Minerals Inc. (“Aldridge”), a public Canadian corporation formerly listed on the TSX-V, formed a JV with Alacer in 2004 with the right to earn a majority interest in the project. Later modifications to the JV agreement in 2006 led to Aldridge acquiring a 100% project equity interest, with Alacer retaining an NPI royalty that is set at 6% until U.S. $165 million in revenues are received by the royalty holder, after which the NPI converts to a 10% interest.

Aldridge delivered a feasibility study in 2013 that was updated in 2014 before Aldridge encountered financial difficulties. Ultimately, Aldridge (and Yenipazar) were sold to a new private company (Virtus Madencilik) headed by Aldridge’s major shareholder, Ahmet Taçyildiz. Trafigura Ventures V B.V. also owns a 30% interest in Virtus. Virtus recently updated the feasibility study for Yenipazar and is currently seeking project financing for development of the project.

Diablillos Gold-Silver Epithermal deposit, Argentina. Diablillos is an extensive 7,900 hectare property located in the mining friendly Province of Salta in the Argentine Puna region. There are currently seven known mineralized zones on the Diablillos property, with the Oculto zone being the most important and the most explored. Oculto is a deeply oxidized, high-sulfidation epithermal silver-gold deposit.

Operator AbraSilver Resource Corp. (TSX-V: ABRA, “AbraSilver”) has an option to acquire 100% of the Diablillos property, with one outstanding payment due on the earlier of the date on which commercial production occurs at Diablillos or July 31, 2025. A 2018 PEA reported historical Indicated Resources at Oculto of 26.85 million tonnes grading 93g/t silver and 0.85g/t gold, for 80.3 million ounces of contained silver and 732 thousand ounces of contained gold[1]. Preliminary metallurgical tests indicate high recoveries from a crushing, grinding and agitated leach plant with a Merrill-Crowe circuit. High-grade copper intercepts have been discovered at depth and may suggest deeper porphyry-style potential.

AbraSilver continues to drill Oculto as well as advancing other targets on the property. An updated PEA is expected in Q3 2021, with a feasibility study slated for 2022.


Note: A qualified person has not performed sufficient work to classify the historical resource estimate for Diablillos as current, and EMX is not treating the historical estimate as current mineral resources. Significant data compilation, confirmation drilling, re-sampling and data verification by a qualified person may be required before the historical estimates can be classified as current mineral resources. The historical estimate is considered by EMX to be reliable and relevant, and is presented for the purpose of describing the extent and nature of mineralization as presently understood. The historical estimate should not be relied upon until verified.

Summary: By agreeing to acquire the Royalty Portfolio, EMX seeks to secure near term and sustained cash flow from a diverse collection of royalty interests and deferred consideration payments. Further, EMX welcomes SSR Mining as a strategic shareholder in EMX. EMX views this transaction as wholly accretive to its overall business, where royalties over multiple advanced and resource stage assets add significant value and diversity to EMX’s global portfolio.

Eric P. Jensen, CPG, a Qualified Person as defined by National Instrument 43-101 and an employee of the Company, has reviewed, verified, and approved the disclosure of the technical information contained in this news release.

[1] As reported in Technical Report on the Diablillos Project, Salta Province, Argentina, prepared by Roscoe Postle Associates (RPA) and filed on SEDAR by AbraPlata Resource Corporation with an effective date of April 16, 2018. Mineral Resources were reported to CIM guidelines and definitions. The resources were estimated using Ordinary Kriging within grade shell domains and reported within an optimized pit based upon metal prices of $1500/oz gold and $23/oz silver and variably calculated recoveries (refer to the technical report for details).

About EMX. EMX is a precious, base and battery metals royalty company. EMX’s investors are provided with discovery, development, and commodity price optionality, while limiting exposure to risks inherent to operating companies. The Company’s common shares are listed on the NYSE American Exchange and TSX Venture Exchange under the symbol EMX. Please see www.EMXroyalty.com for more information.

About SSR Mining. SSR Mining Inc. is a leading, free cash flow focused intermediate gold company with four producing assets located in the USA, Turkey, Canada, and Argentina, combined with a global pipeline of high-quality development and exploration assets in the USA, Turkey, Mexico, Peru, and Canada. SSR Mining is listed under the ticker symbol SSRM on the NASDAQ and the TSX, and SSR on the ASX.
For further information contact:
David M. ColePresident and Chief Executive OfficerPhone: (303) 979-6666Dave@EMXroyalty.com
Scott CloseDirector of Investor RelationsPhone: (303) 973-8585SClose@EMXroyalty.com
Isabel BelgerInvestor Relations (Europe)Phone: +49 178 4909039Ibelger@EMXroyalty.com
Neither the TSX-V nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in policies of the TSX-V) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release.
Forward-Looking Statements

This news release may contain “forward looking statements” that reflect the Company’s current expectations and projections about its future results. These forward-looking statements may include statements regarding completion of the transaction, perceived merits of properties, exploration results and budgets, mineral reserves and resource estimates, work programs, capital expenditures, timelines, strategic plans, market prices for precious and base metal, or other statements that are not statements of fact. When used in this news release, words such as “estimate,” “intend,” “expect,” “anticipate,” “will”, “believe”, “potential”, “upside” and similar expressions are intended to identify forward-looking statements, which, by their very nature, are not guarantees of the Company’s future operational or financial performance, and are subject to risks and uncertainties and other factors that could cause the Company’s actualresults, performance, prospects or opportunities to differ materially from those expressed in, or implied by, these forward-looking statements. These risks, uncertainties and factors may include, but are not limited to: unavailability of financing, failure to identify commercially viable mineral reserves, fluctuations in the market valuation for commodities, difficulties in obtaining required approvals for the development of a mineral project, increased regulatory compliance costs, expectations of project funding by joint venture partners and other factors. It is possible EMX may not complete the transaction, as a result of failure to fulfill conditions of closing, unavailability of financing or for other reasons EMX cannot anticipate at this time.

Readers are cautioned not to place undue reliance on these forward-looking statements, which speak only as of the date of this news release or as of the date otherwise specifically indicated herein. Due to risks and uncertainties, including the risks and uncertainties identified in this news release, and other risk factors and forward-looking statements listed in the Company’s MD&A for the quarter ended March 31, 2021 and the year ended December 31, 2020 (the “MD&A”), and the most recently filed Revised Annual Information Form (the “AIF”) for the year ended December 31, 2020, actual events may differ materially from current expectations. More information about the Company, including the MD&A, the AIF and financial statements of the Company, is available on SEDAR at www.sedar.com and on the SEC’s EDGAR website at www.sec.gov.

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KEVIN VECMANIS What Happens When Central Banks Unwind Balance Sheets

Kevin Vecmains the founder of VanAurum Financial Technologies sits down with Maurice Jackson of Proven and Probable to discuss: What Happens When Central Banks Unwind Balance Sheets.

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Source: Maurice Jackson for Streetwise Reports  (1/30/19)

Maurice JacksonKevin Vecmanis, founder of VanAurum Financial Technologies, sits down with Maurice Jackson of Proven and Probable to discuss what the unwinding of central bank balance sheets may mean for investors.

Dollar
Maurice J.: Joining us for a conversation is Kevin Vecmanis, the founder of VanAurum Financial Technologies. Mr. Vecmanis, welcome to the show, sir.
Kevin V.: Hello, Maurice. It’s great to be here. Thanks a lot.
Maurice J.: Glad to have you back on the program. In our last interview, we addressed the value proposition for the next capital vortex. Today, we will address central banks unwinding their balance sheets, and the duplicitous effects that may occur. And what actions you, the investor, may take to prepare yourself.
But before we begin, Kevin, your company uses a unique skill set that I find intriguing, which is artificial intelligence for investing. For our first time listeners, please introduce us to VanAurum Financial Technologies.
Kevin V.: VanAurum is an intelligent lead generator for trading opportunities. That’s probably the best way to summarize it. We use machine learning techniques to detect anomalies, and unusual market behavior and then we report on it to members on a daily basis.
Our platform attracts a global cross-section of sectors, ratios and economic data points. And then when something occurs that has some kind of historical precedent for being either positive or negative for forward returns, VanAurum will report on it to members.
We believe that by having an intelligent filter that’s hand-picking market events to look at, it frees up our members’ time to focus their efforts on more productive means, such as, constructing trading strategies and or analysis on their own. So if someone uses a charting service, or trades on technical analysis, VanAurum’s definitely worthy of membership consideration.
Maurice J.: Kevin, your research has noted a mega trend occurring that is related to central banks unwinding their balance sheets. Beginning at the 10,000-foot level, can you share with us why central banks are unwinding their balance sheets, and what this means for investors?
Kevin V.: Stepping back for a moment, in 2009, the Federal Reserve came up with an explicit program called Quantitative Easing, to buy mortgage-backed securities and other debt-related securities from the balance sheets of different institutions, and most central banks globally eventually caught on to this well, to bail out financial institutions in the sector that were carrying this “toxic debt” on their balance sheets.
The Fed conversely grew its balance sheet from about $800 billion to almost $4.5 trillion. And it was maintaining it at that level for a while. When the Fed is maintaining the size of its balance sheet with these debt-related securities what its intentions are as follows: as the securities mature on its balance sheet, it is actively seeking out other similar securities to buy to replace them, so that the Fed can keep the size of its balance sheet at a constant level.
So, the process of expanding the balance sheet, as well as maintaining it at a certain level, there was an implicit assumption in the market that the central bank was going to be there, and be a significant source of debt demand for a lot of these securities, which would be the primary driver behind interest rates ultimately hitting rock-bottom yields. The Fed was such a heavy influence on interest rates that, in January of 2018, the yield on the S&P 500 was about 1.73%. And the yield on the three-month Treasuries, which is considered to be the United States’ riskless asset, was higher than that.
The end result is that the S&P equity yields, which are considered to be risky assets on somebody’s balance sheet, or within their portfolio, these yields are essentially risk-free. Which is a really amazing thing if you think about it. A situation that is really unsustainable.
Going forward, the Fed has now communicated that it is going to shrink the size of its balance sheet. So in effect what that’s actually doing is removing a major source of demand out the market, for not only U.S. Treasuries, but other mortgage-backed securities as well. This is a simple supply and demand factor. The likelihood of supply and demand to equalize will not be accomplished until rates are much higher.
Maurice J.: I always find it disingenuous that the U.S. Treasury references the nominal rate of return and omits the real rate of return on Treasuries.
Twofold question here for you. How will this impact currencies and capital markets?
Kevin V.: We have witnessed the Fed go through hiking cycles in the past, typically any kind of economic turmoil that led to a flight to safe haven assets increased the demand for Treasuries and the U.S. dollar.
I am of the opinion that the Federal Reserve is in a bit of a tricky situation right now. And over time, more and more investors are going to actually start picking up on this. In a historical context, the level to which they’ve actually raised interest rates is not really that high. What is unprecedented is the extended period of time that the Fed has pinned along interest rates to zero. The Fed recognizes that it needs to raise rates because it has artificially suppressed interest rates, which were driving the yields on the S&P and of bonds respectively to disproportionate levels.
Should the market witness again that the Federal Reserve is willing to reverse course, by printing currency (inflation) to buy up a lot of assets and thus further expand its balance sheet again, I believe the market will react violently to the Fed’s attempts. I think this time around, the impact could actually be very negative on the U.S. dollar and Western currencies as investors will begin to realize maybe how unsustainable some of the debt trajectories actually are.
Maurice J.: If currencies and equities will be negatively impacted, what is the prudent investment decision that one should make now?
Kevin V.: In this situation, I like to look at what were the major beneficiaries within the broad markets when the Federal Reserve decided to embark down this path of explicit balance sheet expansion. And I guess the answer to that is bonds, equities, and to a large extent, real estate within major urban centers. So we’ve seen significant inflation in a lot of these markets. They were the major beneficiaries of what I call the risk premium compression that resulted from the Fed artificially lowering interest rates.
After the crisis everybody thought that commodities and other markets like that were going to go hyperbolic. But we actually didn’t see that. And, in my opinion, a lot of the reason why we didn’t see that was because the market was front running all these explicit purchases from the central bank. Why wouldn’t you buy bonds if you knew that the Federal Reserve was going to be buying, $30, $40 billion of them a month, on an open-ended basis.
So I think that drew a lot of capital away from resource sector stocks, from commodities. Any commodity, really. And so I think this time around, when we see this whole process unwinding, to me it only seems logical that the markets that were previous beneficiaries might suffer. Conversely, the markets that didn’t benefit we will start to see a lot of those begin to mean revert. I foresee big potential in platinum, gold, resource sector stocks and energy stocks, which have been punished to a significant degree, especially within the explorers and the producers, which experienced some of the sharpest declines in record.
So, I think it all depends on how the market decides to react with the U.S. dollar. Whatever it is, we get the next major trajectory change from the Federal Reserve. But my inkling, my instincts right now, and all the data that I look at with VanAurum and our research, suggests that the U.S. dollar will probably be negatively impacted the next time around.
Maurice J.: So then the answer will be, if I’m correct here, would physical gold be the first prudent investment decision?
Kevin V.: Yes, definitely at this point. I always advocate having some allocation to gold in your portfolio, especially right now with the debt-based currencies in the West really starting to balloon out of control. But there’s lots of fear in the market right now. We’ve experienced a significant correction on the S&P 500 and the broad equities. A lot of the valuation extremes that we saw leading up to this point was causing everybody to warn of bubbles. We’ve actually seen a fair amount of that lead off. And it’s come back into nominal territories.
I sent a message out to my members earlier this week saying that at this juncture, if the correction in the S&P 500 extends into bear market territory, closer to it being down 20%, which at that point, going back to 1980 within our data that VanAurum analyzes, most of the precedence, if not all of them, are actually positive for one-year returns going forward once the market has experienced a selloff greater than 20%.
So there could be draw downs in the broad equity market from here. In September 2008, the market ultimately fell 40% before hitting its ultimate bottom. And then exactly one year later, from September 2008, the market was almost unchanged again. So, could the market accelerate to the downside again, and resume a bear market? It’s likely. But at this point, I think prudent investors will start trying to anticipate some type of accumulation program for broad equities.
I have my attention on what I would term as the kind of the forgotten markets right now, like gold, which is carving out a multi-year base; platinum, which has been absolutely crushed recently; and silver are going to do extremely well in the environment that we’re about to move into.
Maurice J.: Regarding physical precious metals, would precious metal equities be the right place to be as well, once someone has secured a position first in the physical metals?
Kevin V.: Yes, full disclosure, I have long positions in GDX and GDXJ. With VanAurum, and my research, I study sectors. There are lots of people who are really good at picking individual issues. But when we’re working with our machine learning system, for reasons that maybe are beyond the subject of this interview, we try to stick with a sector. So, I do have exposure to the gold mining equities, through GDX and GDXJ.
Depending on what the investors are looking for, royalty companies and the gold streaming companies really tend to do well during downside turmoil in gold and equity markets. We saw companies like Franco-Nevada, whose stock performed incredibly well during the gold bear market from 2011 to 2015. Where you really get your upside leverage, in the gold mining and the resource space, is when you’re dealing with an issuer whose cost of production is really close to the prevailing gold price.
What happens there is you get profit leverage. So, if you have a gold mining company that’s selling gold for $1,200 an ounce, and say its all-in cost to produce that ounce of gold are $1,199. So it’s making $1 of profit. If the price of gold increases by a dollar, then the earnings for that particular company increased by 100%. So you go from $1 to $2, you double your earnings. And so that’s what we mean by profit leverage.
You start to see a lot of the high-cost companies really start to accelerate when you see gold moving into a particularly strong bull market. I think what’s happening right now is you’re seeing a lot of the accumulation, and a lot of the higher quality issuers, and they’ve been doing well for quite some time.
But the sectors like GDX and GDXJ, I think have been languishing partly because they’re full of lots of producers that a lot of them haven’t been particularly well in this environment. But I think that will change if gold can stage a major breakout. I think you’ll see a bid under, pretty much any company that’s producing gold. And stage a breakout, and sustain it above $1,400 US.
Maurice J.: Switching gears, Mr. Vecmanis, what is the next unanswered question that VanAurum Technologies is researching? And when do you believe we will have an answer?
Kevin V.: Right now, to me the elephant in the room are interest rates, and how the market is fully going to react to the Federal Reserve removing itself as a major demand source in the debt markets. So, it seems to me like there’s a little bit of disbelief. You’re starting to see two-year Treasury yields, which is a fairly close proxy for interest rate hike expectations, you’ve seen a lot of those rates come down recently. Some of that might have been because the yields were overbought. And the bonds were due for a rally.
But to me that really is the biggest question, because the Federal Reserve was such a huge component of this equity rally that we had from 2009 until now. And I think whatever its action will be is going to be a major component of how the market plays out going forward. You can see the market starting to begin to call its bluff. But what I’m really interested in finding out is what the Federal Reserve actually intends to do. If the markets truly start to react violently to the rate hike cycle, it is going to end it? And is the Fed going to start to ease again, meaning increasing the size of its balance sheet. Or is it going to start cutting rates?
I think if the Fed starts cutting rates, having only reached the levels that they’re at, I think that’s going to be a really, really scary warning sign to market participants everywhere that the U.S. economy just can’t handle higher rates and has become almost addicted to Federal Reserve accommodation. And I think at that point, how the market reacts to that is going to be the primary determinant of which people are going to make a lot of money, and which people are going to lose a lot of money. And I think we’ll have the answer to that probably by the summertime.
Maurice J.: Truly interesting times, and unprecedented times. And I’m tickled to death to be here just to watch it all, and actually participate. Sir, last question. What did I forget to ask?
Kevin V.: I think we covered a lot, Maurice. But, I’d like to discuss a little bit about VanAurum’s AI curated newsletter that we put out daily. The core of our research service that we offer right now is our daily AI curated report, which is a combination of human and machine learning and behavior. So, I’m a big believer fundamentally in the convergence of machine learning-based systems and human-based systems. I believe the people and machines are really good at particular things. And what I try to do at VanAurum is to create workflows that combine the best of those worlds.
The AI curated report analyzes a global cross-section of assets, whether it’s Chinese stocks, Israeli stocks, resource sector stocks, yield curves and economic data points. And it figures out when something is behaving unusual in the market. It performs some hypothesis testing on it, to see if there’s any historical precedent for meaningful positive or negative returns. And then it presents that in a report to our members. And that’s kind of the launch point for the analysis that we do.
So, we’re getting this pipeline of trading and investment suggestions coming from VanAurum daily, which are really high quality. Our members love it. The feedback I get from the members is that it’s exposing them to things in markets that they wouldn’t have thought to look at before, which is really what it’s all about.
Maurice J.: For readers that want to get more information about VanAurum Financial Technologies report, please share the contact details with us.
Kevin V.: Sure. Readers and listeners can visit vanaurum.ai. And we have a public version of the report, which is delayed a certain number of days, to keep our best information fresh for our members. But if they’re interested in how that report works, there’s a link on our homepage to the public report. And they can also take a look at the other services that we offer as well.
Maurice J.: And we would like to take this opportunity to remind our listeners, if you’re interested in buying or selling physical precious metals, please call us at 855-505-1900. Or visit our website, provenandprobable.com, where we interview the most respected names in the natural resource space. You may reach us at contact@provenandprobable.com.
Kevin Vecmanis of VanAurum Financial Technologies, thank you for joining us today on Proven and Probable.
Maurice Jackson is the founder of Proven and Probable, a site that aims to enrich its subscribers through education in precious metals and junior mining companies that will enrich the world.

Disclosure: 

1) Maurice Jackson: I, or members of my immediate household or family, own shares of the following companies mentioned in this article: None. I personally am, or members of my immediate household or family are, paid by the following companies mentioned in this article: None. My company has a financial relationship with the following companies mentioned in this article: None. Proven and Probable disclosures are listed below.
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