TVI Pacific’s Philippines operating company TVI Resource Development (Phils) (TVIRD), in which TVI has a 30.66% interest, has filed a preliminary prospectus with the Philippine Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the Philippine Stock Exchange (PSE) relating to a proposed Initial Public Offering of TVIRD shares in the Philippines.

Subject to registration with and approval by the SEC, and listing approval by the PSE, the IPO and listing of the TVIRD shares on the main board of the PSE are expected to be completed in mid-December 2015.

In the preliminary prospectus, TVIRD has indicated that it proposes to use the net proceeds from the primary offer to fund certain capital expenditures for the construction, development and operation of TVIRD’s Balabag Gold-Silver Project in Zamboanga del Sur.

“The filing of the preliminary prospectus represents a major milestone in TVIRD’s IPO process,” says TVI chairman and CEO Clifford James, who is also TVIRD chairman.

“TVI Pacific continues to enthusiastically support the TVIRD IPO as we believe the establishment of a public market for TVIRD shares will allow North American investors to better evaluate the value of TVI’s indirect investment in TVIRD.

“In addition, we expect that the secondary offer component of the IPO and the liquidity associated with a public listing will allow TVI to monetize portions of its TVIRD holdings which could provide us with an ongoing source of non-dilutive funding during a time when capital is difficult to raise for new project acquisition and development activities,” he concluded.

The preliminary prospectus contemplates a primary offer of up to 272.02 million shares from the unissued capital stock of TVIRD, which represents 10% of TVIRD's projected outstanding common share capital, and a secondary offer of up to 136.01 million shares from the holdings of existing shareholders. Following the IPO, and assuming the primary offer is fully subscribed, TVIRD will have approximately 2.72 billion common shares outstanding.

TVIRD was incorporated under the laws of the Philippines on January 18, 1994 and was an indirect subsidiary of TVI until July 2014 when Prime Resource Holdings Inc became a controlling shareholder. TVIRD was the first foreign-affiliated Philippine company to reach production stage, following the enactment of the Philippine Mining Act of 1995, with the Canatuan project in the municipality of Siocon, Zamboanga del Norte. At Canatuan TVIRD established gold and silver operations from 2004 to 2008 and transitioned to copper and zinc operations from 2009 until 2014, during which time TVIRD ranked among the country’s top copper and zinc producers.

Since then, TVIRD has evolved into a diversified mining company that focuses on the acquisition, exploration, development and production of resource projects in the Philippines. Key projects include the Balabag gold-silver project in the municipality of Bayog, province of Zamboanga del Sur and nickel laterite direct shipping ore operations at the Agata project in northern Mindanao.