Dealmaking in the mining industry

The mining landscape has seen some major developments all over the globe, which have all had an impact on our local industry.

“For once, [Canada’s] industry is not entirely wearing a black hat because of the role it’s playing in the energy transition,” partner and head of Torys’ Mining and Metals practice Michael Pickersgill told Lexpert in its Special Edition on Mining publication.

“Suddenly, being part of the mining sector is actually being part of the solution instead of just being someone who pollutes, and that creates a bit of a tailwind, psychologically, for a lot of the participants in the industry, which is great.”

Many companies in the battery-electric supply chain have started making mining-related deals that contribute to the clean energy transition.

“GM put significant capital into Lithium Americas this year; Ford Motor Company entered into a series of off-takes with a variety of different lithium producers, including some in Québec; Volkswagen has made a significant investment, similarly into mining assets, but critically into the development of downstream processing of battery metals. And that trend will continue,” Michael explained.

Read: Q4 Torys Quarterly: The next wave: energy transition projects to expand dramatically

Noting the 2023 year, Michael said M&A activity has been down and transactions have been smaller in comparison to previous years. Though, he still considers this a successful run.

“I would say it’s been a big year. M&A activity and traditional corporate finance have been down in 2023, but you wouldn’t know it by the number of things going on in the industry,” he said.

“I think the health of the industry itself in Canada… can’t really be correlated to how many M&A deals have been completed in 2023.”

You can read more about our Mining and Metals work on our practice page.

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