Magmatic Strengthens Fortescue Partnership to Advance Calais Copper-Gold Prospect

About Magmatic Resources Limited

Magmatic Resources Ltd (ASX: MAG), a junior copper-gold exploration company with significant tenure in New South Wales’ East Lachlan region, has entered a key exploration partnership with Fortescue to accelerate work at its emerging Calais discovery. The agreement marks a significant milestone for Magmatic as it continues to attract top-tier collaborators in its search for large-scale porphyry systems in one of Australia’s most geologically prospective belts.

The Calais prospect, located within Magmatic’s Myall Project near the town of Narromine, has generated growing interest due to recent exploration results indicating potential for copper-gold porphyry mineralisation. With Fortescue now formally engaged, the two companies will jointly pursue further geophysical, geochemical, and drilling programs aimed at defining resource potential.

Strengthening Strategic Partnerships in Exploration

The new collaboration reinforces Magmatic’s strategic approach to exploration—leveraging technical partnerships with larger players to accelerate development and minimise capital constraints. Fortescue’s involvement brings not only funding support, but also deep technical experience in early-stage target evaluation, project modelling, and resource delineation.

Under the terms of the agreement, Fortescue will contribute exploration funding and technical personnel to assist in the current work program at Calais. The partnership will initially focus on expanding current geophysical datasets, refining drill targeting, and conducting systematic deep drilling to test the extent of mineralisation.

This model reflects an increasingly common trend in junior exploration, where smaller companies partner with major resource players to unlock the full potential of large-scale, high-cost discoveries without overextending their balance sheets.

Calais Prospect: High-Potential Copper-Gold Target

The Calais discovery is part of Magmatic’s broader Myall Project, a 244km² tenement package that lies within the northern portion of the East Lachlan Fold Belt—a prolific porphyry terrain that hosts world-class operations such as Newcrest’s Cadia and Alkane’s Boda deposits.

Initial drilling results at Calais have confirmed multiple zones of porphyry-style alteration and copper sulphide mineralisation at depth, including broad intercepts of low-to-moderate grade copper and gold. Follow-up induced polarisation (IP) surveys have indicated large chargeability anomalies at depth, consistent with porphyry system architecture.

The latest round of exploration aims to vector in on the high-grade cores of the mineralised system, leveraging Fortescue’s geoscience expertise to improve targeting accuracy. The scale of the geophysical footprint and the alteration intensity suggest that Calais may represent the upper levels of a significant copper-gold system.

Market Reaction and Investor Sentiment

Following the announcement of the Fortescue partnership, shares in Magmatic Resources climbed over 7% in intraday trading, reflecting renewed investor interest in the company’s exploration portfolio. The market has interpreted Fortescue’s involvement as an endorsement of the geological prospectivity at Calais and a validation of Magmatic’s long-term strategy.

The junior explorer has historically traded at a modest valuation relative to its peers, but strategic moves such as this partnership could help re-rate the company if drill results continue to support the potential for a Tier-1 discovery. For investors, the collaboration introduces a near-term catalyst path while also de-risking the project execution phase.

Additionally, the agreement provides a foundation for potential future farm-in or joint venture arrangements should the exploration program yield positive outcomes.

Magmatic’s Broader Exploration Portfolio

While Calais is currently the flagship focus, Magmatic holds a diversified portfolio of tenements across the East Lachlan corridor. The company’s other key assets include the Wellington North and Parkes Projects, which lie near existing operations and infrastructure.

These tenements are strategically located near major deposits, enabling cost-effective exploration and strong logistical advantages. Magmatic has previously identified multiple geochemical anomalies, alteration zones, and magnetic targets across its portfolio, many of which remain underexplored.

Outlook: A Pathway to Value Creation

The partnership with Fortescue marks a turning point for Magmatic as it transitions from early-stage explorer to a company with the potential for resource delineation and pre-development optionality. With increasing interest in Australian copper and gold projects amid global energy transition trends, the timing of the collaboration is advantageous.

Magmatic enters the next exploration phase with strong technical backing, supportive shareholders, and an expanding data platform that can guide future targeting. If Calais delivers further evidence of a large porphyry system at depth, the company could emerge as a key exploration success story in the Australian market.

As drilling resumes in the second half of 2025, all eyes will be on the next round of results to validate the scale potential of Calais and determine whether Magmatic and Fortescue are on track to define one of Australia’s next major copper-gold systems.