China’s Antimony Restrictions Exposed a U.S. Defense Weakness — NevGold May Be One of the Only Near Term Domestic Solutions

Issued on behalf of NevGold Corp.

The U.S. critical minerals reset is no longer theoretical — it’s a national security scramble after China restricted antimony exports for U.S. military end use, exposing a supply chain the Pentagon depends on across more than 300 weapons systems. NevGold Corp. (TSXV: NAU | OTCQX: NAUFF | FRA: 5E50) has spent the last six weeks delivering the kind of operational, metallurgical, and financing milestones that move a junior from exploration narrative to strategic relevance: High grade antimony intercepts, oxide metallurgy, and an upsized C$42.2 million brokered placement with no warrants has fueled excitement.

NEW YORK, May 13, 2026 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- World Street Intelligence News Commentary — Critical minerals are no longer a policy talking point — they are a live operational risk for the U.S. defense industrial base. Antimony, a metal used in ammunition, night-vision systems, missile guidance, flame retardants, and certain semiconductors, has become one of the most strategically exposed materials in the U.S. supply chain. China controls 80–90% of global antimony refining, and in late 2024 Beijing restricted exports to the United States — with military end use remaining prohibited even after a partial pause in 2025. The U.S. relies on imports for 100% of its antimony needs, yet domestic production remains below 1,000 tonnes per year against demand of 30,000–40,000 tonnes. Against that backdrop, NevGold Corp. (TSXV: NAU | OTCQX: NAUFF | FRA: 5E50) has emerged as one of the few U.S. based projects with a realistic near term pathway to antimony metal production — not antimony concentrate — at a time when the Pentagon cannot source Chinese supply for military applications. With its previously announced C$25 million brokered private placement upsized to over C$42 million on April 20, 2026, the Company is now fully funded through its maiden antimony-gold Mineral Resource Estimate, targeted for Q2 2026, and is positioning for a potential 2027 antimony metal production scenario — a timeline that aligns with the urgency and precedes the earliest U.S. production window from other domestic projects.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• C$42.2 million upsized brokered placement closed the catalyst sequence. On April 20, 2026, NevGold’s previously announced C$25 million private placement was upsized to over C$42 million (22,223,946 common shares at C$1.90), with Clarus Securities Inc. as sole agent and bookrunner — a roughly 69% increase on strong demand, with no warrants attached, expected to close on or about May 12, 2026. [1]
• 1.11% antimony intercept inside a 1.93 g/t AuEq over 100.6m envelope. April 9, 2026 drill results at Resurrection Ridge (Limousine Butte district, Nevada) returned 1.93 g/t gold equivalent over 100.6 meters from surface — 1.07 g/t Au + 0.22% Sb — incorporating a higher-grade 1.11% antimony interval over 6.1 meters. [1]
• Up to 99% gold recovery — after the antimony was already leached out. Phase II metallurgical testwork (April 2, 2026) on residual tailings from the historical leach pads returned average gold recoveries above 93%, with individual samples reaching 99%; antimony extraction ranged from 54%–92%. The sequential antimony-then-gold process means both metals can be processed with positive recoveries. [1]
• Brownfield, and on a 2027 production runway. The historical gold leach pads are already crushed, already stacked, at surface, with a more straightforward, simple permitting situation as there will be no mining activities and significantly less disturbance. [1]
• Q2 2026 maiden antimony-gold NI 43-101 MRE is the next direct catalyst. NevGold has not yet established a current NI 43-101 mineral resource at Limousine Butte; the maiden MRE is forthcoming in Q2 2026, with near-term antimony production targeted for 2027. [1]
• 2026 TSX Venture 50. NevGold was named to the 2026 TSX Venture 50 — a 330% share price appreciation and 515% market capitalization growth in 2025 supported the inclusion. [1]

The Setup: Why The Antimony File Has Real Teeth In 2026

Antimony is one of those metals investors heard about for years before they had to learn how to spell it. It is a U.S.-designated Critical Mineral, used in military munitions, lead-acid batteries, flame retardants, semiconductors, and high-temperature alloys. The U.S. has 100% import reliance — China restricted antimony exports for U.S. military end use in late 2024, creating an immediate supply chain vulnerability across more than 300 defense systems.    While China announced a partial pause in late 2025, this pause did not apply to U.S. military end use — meaning the Pentagon remains effectively cut off from Chinese antimony. Translation: U.S. defense procurement is operating under the assumption that Chinese antimony cannot be relied upon at all — and that domestic feedstock capable of producing antimony metal is now a strategic priority.

Which brings us to NevGold.

The Six-Week Run That Changed The Conversation

Between mid-March and late April, NevGold released six operational disclosures that, taken together, look more like the cadence of a project moving into the U.S. critical minerals conversation — exactly the type of near term oxide antimony feedstock highlights as strategically scarce:

• March 12, 2026 — Drill rig mobilized to Limousine Butte— Drill rig mobilized to Limousine Butte (White Pine County, Nevada); permits in hand; objective is to advance the historical gold leach pads toward a maiden antimony Mineral Resource Estimate. [1]
• March 19, 2026 — High grade antimony at Bullet Zone Hole LB25-024 returns 11.42 g/t AuEq over 7.7m (2.64% Sb + 1.17 g/t Au), within 4.91 g/t AuEq over 27.4m at the Bullet Zone discovery (2025) inside the Resurrection Ridge target area. [2]
• April 2, 2026 — Metallurgy confirms sequential antimony then gold extraction— Phase II metallurgical testwork: up to 99% gold recovery, sequential antimony-then-gold, additional surface antimony identified in pre-strip waste dump. [1]
• April 9, 2026 — 1.93 g/t AuEq over 100.6m at Resurrection Ridge from surface, including 1.11% Sb over 6.1m. CEO Brandon Bonifacio described Limo Butte as “one of the highest grade antimony projects in North America that is near-surface and oxide.” [2]
• April 14, 2026 — Sonic drill confirmation from historical leach pads— Sonic drill confirmation results from the historical leach pads: 0.34% Sb / 0.41 g/t Au over 12.5m, plus consistent neighboring intervals from the first 10 of 17 holes on the Crushed leach pad — all above the Phase I test pit averages of 0.27% Sb and 0.34 g/t Au. [1]
• April 20, 2026 — Brokered placement upsized to over C$42 million [1]  — China’s military specific export ban, U.S. reliance on imports, and the absence of domestic oxide feedstock — helps explain why institutional demand was strong enough to upsize the deal with no warrants.

Six releases. No warrants on the financing — a rarity in the junior space and a signal of institutional conviction. A maiden MRE expected in the same quarter as the print of this article. That is the kind of cadence that aligns with the U.S. needs near term antimony metal, not decadelong development timelines.

The Comparable Set: Where NevGold Sits On The Critical-Mineral Map

It helps to see who else is being measured on the same yardsticks — domestic supply, federal awards, near-term production timelines, and the willingness of capital to underwrite junior balance sheets. Four names worth tracking alongside NevGold (www.nev-gold.com)

Read the full report on NevGold here

Nova Minerals Limited (NASDAQ: NVA / ASX: NVA / FRA: QM3) is the cleanest direct comp on the antimony side. Nova’s Estelle Gold and Critical Minerals Project in Alaska is supported by a US$43.4 million U.S. Department of War Defense Production Act Title III award to fund stage-1 antimony production. [3] During the March 2026 quarter, Nova mobilized heavy mining and processing equipment to Estelle via a 150-kilometer winter snow road from Willow, Alaska — with approximately 95% of major equipment received in Willow and roughly 70% dispatched along the winter trail. [3] Nova has also secured a 42.81-acre commercial-industrial-zoned land use permit at Port MacKenzie for an antimony refinery, and the company is targeting first antimony production in the late 2026 / early 2027 window. [4] On a corporate level, Nova plans to redomicile to a Nevada parent and list on the NYSE by end-June 2026. [3] Q1 2026 closed with access to over A$89.4 million in funding, no debt, and approximately 5.65 quarters of runway. [3] What Nova illustrates — is that federal capital is deploying into a very short list of U.S. antimony projects capable of producing metal before 2030. To be clear, oxide feedstock is the bottleneck, and NevGold is one of the only juniors with oxide material at surface.

Equinox Gold Corp. (NYSE American: EQX / TSX: EQX) completed its acquisition of Calibre Mining in June 2025 to form an Americas-focused diversified gold producer with a portfolio of mines across five countries, anchored by two Canadian mines: Greenstone (Ontario) and Valentine (Newfoundland & Labrador). [5] Q1 2026 production was 197,628 ounces of gold, with $990 million of debt reduction and an inaugural quarterly dividend of US$0.015 per common share paid March 26, 2026. [6] FY2026 production guidance is 700,000–800,000 ounces, and new technical reports estimate Canadian production averaging 543,000 ounces per year from 2026–2036 (Greenstone ~320,000 oz/yr; Valentine ~223,000 oz/yr post Phase 2 expansion). [6]Equinox represents the institutional benchmark for multi asset execution in Tier 1 jurisdictions. This emphasis on jurisdictional security aligns with why producers like Equinox command premium valuations.

Perpetua Resources Corp. (Nasdaq: PPTA / TSX: PPTA) holds the only identified domestic reserve of the critical mineral antimony at its Stibnite Gold Project in central Idaho, with reserves of approximately 4.8 million ounces of gold and 148 million pounds of antimony. [7] Stibnite is projected to be one of the highest-grade open-pit gold mines in the United States and is expected to produce roughly 450,000 ounces of gold annually over its first four years. [7] On October 21, 2025, Perpetua broke ground on early works construction at the US$1.3 billion Stibnite project after posting US$139 million in financial assurance and receiving notice from the U.S. Forest Service that the 2025 Record of Decision requirements had been satisfied. [7] Perpetua received an indicative term sheet for up to US$2 billion in debt support from the U.S. Export-Import Bank and is targeting a final investment decision in 2026. [7] Perpetua’s relevance to NevGold is direct: it is the most-watched domestic gold-antimony pairing in the United States, and the federal capital being deployed behind Stibnite is the same critical-minerals tailwind that supports NevGold’s brownfield antimony-gold setup at Limousine Butte — at an earlier stage and a fraction of the market capitalization.

McEwen Inc. (NYSE: MUX / TSX: MUX) runs gold and silver operations across the Cortez Trend in Nevada (Gold Bar Complex), the Timmins district of Ontario (Fox Complex), and the Deseado Massif in Argentina (San José Mine, 49%); the company is also reactivating the El Gallo gold-silver mine in Mexico. [8] McEwen reported Q1 2026 consolidated production of 30,471 GEOs (including 14,582 GEOs attributable from San José), supporting 2026 consolidated production guidance of 114,000–126,000 GEOs and a stated company-wide target of 250,000–300,000 GEOs by 2030. [9] At the Stock Mine (Fox Complex, Timmins), pre-commercial production remains targeted for Q4 2026, with $9.9 million invested in Q1 and approximately $39.4 million since the start of underground development the prior year. [9] McEwen also holds a 46.3% equity stake in McEwen Copper, owner of the advanced-stage Los Azules copper development project in San Juan, Argentina, with a Feasibility Study completed October 2025 and Argentina’s RIGI large-scale investment incentive program approval in place. [8] [10] McEwen is a useful read on multi asset optionality. The framing — that U.S. supply chains now require domestic, diversified, geopolitically secure sources — aligns with why multi jurisdiction producers remain relevant comps.

Why The Maiden MRE Matters More Than The Headline Drill Holes

Junior mining is a sequence game. Drill holes win the press; resource estimates win the institutions. The Q2 2026 maiden antimony-gold NI 43-101 Mineral Resource Estimate at Limousine Butte will be the first time NevGold’s antimony tonnage in the historical leach pads is quantified under modern reporting standards. [1] That estimate sets the technical baseline for the near term production scenario the company is targeting for 2027 — a timeline that is unusually fast for any U.S. antimony project, given that most domestic alternatives (e.g., sulfide deposits) require complex processing and expensive, multiyear construction timelines. 

It also sets the comparable-table reference point for institutional investors who model U.S. antimony juniors against named federal procurement files. A maiden MRE is the qualifier and reinforces that U.S. policymakers and defense focused funds are now screening for projects with antimony feedstock, near surface geometry, and the ability to produce antimony metal rather than concentrate. Investors should review the Company’s filings and qualified persons’ technical disclosures via nev-gold.com before drawing conclusions; the maiden MRE remains forthcoming.

Note: U.S. antimony demand is 30,000–40,000 tonnes per year versus less than 1,000 tonnes of domestic production — a gap that underscores why a maiden oxide based antimony-gold MRE at Limousine Butte carries more strategic weight than a typical junior resource.

The Bottom Line

For a Vancouver junior to put up — high grade oxide antimony, up to 99% gold recovery after antimony extraction, and a C$42 million upsized brokered placement with no warrants — all inside six weeks is the kind of operational density that does not happen by accident.

It happens when a project’s geology, metallurgy, jurisdiction, and timing all line up, and when the institutional book agrees with the thesis enough to upsize a deal without warrants.

It happens as the U.S. has no real domestic antimony supply, China has restricted military end use exports, and the Pentagon depends on antimony across more than 300 weapons systems. That macro backdrop is why a junior showing near term oxide feedstock is getting attention.

NevGold is now fully funded into Q2 2026’s maiden MRE, operating under a BLM-approved Exploration Plan of Operations at Limousine Butte, and operationally past the proof-of-concept phase on its near-term antimony production scenario. For investors triangulating NVA, EQX, PPTA, and MUX as anchors of the North American precious-and-critical-mineral universe, NevGold (TSXV: NAU | OTCQX: NAUFF | FRA: 5E50) is the rare junior that —compresses multiple strategic themes — oxide antimony, gold optionality, brownfield infrastructure, and near term production — into a single ticker at a stage where the next catalyst lands in the very next reporting window. The urgency is clear: U.S. antimony demand is 30,000–40,000 tonnes per year, domestic production is under 1,000 tonnes, and most U.S. projects are multiple years away from being producing. NevGold’s oxide leach pads represent one of the only near term pathways to antimony metal production — not antimony concentrate — inside the United States.

The next print is the one investors should be reading for. Visit www.nev-gold.com for the full set of recent disclosures.

Frequently Asked Questions

Q: What does NevGold Corp. do? A: NevGold (TSXV: NAU | OTCQX: NAUFF | FRA: 5E50) is a Vancouver-based exploration and development company with four 100%-owned projects across Nevada and Idaho. The two flagship programs are Limousine Butte (gold-antimony, Nevada) and Nutmeg Mountain (gold, Idaho); Cedar Wash (gold, Nevada) and Zeus (copper, Idaho) round out the portfolio. [1]

Q: Why is the antimony piece so important right now? A: Antimony is a U.S.-designated Critical Mineral with 100% U.S. import reliance, used in military munitions, batteries, flame retardants, and semiconductors. China imposed export restrictions on the U.S. in December 2024; the restrictions were partially suspended in November 2025, but licensing controls remain in place. Federal procurement attention on a domestic antimony supply chain is unprecedented. [3]

Q: What was the headline drill result? A: At Resurrection Ridge (Limousine Butte, Nevada), NevGold intersected 1.93 g/t gold equivalent over 100.6 meters from surface (1.07 g/t Au + 0.22% Sb), including 1.11% antimony over 6.1 meters within that broader interval. [1]

Q: Why does the metallurgy matter? A: Phase II testwork showed average gold recoveries above 93% (with individual samples up to 99%) on residual tailings after the antimony had been leached out. Antimony extraction ranged from 54%–92%. The sequential process — antimony first, gold second — means both metals can be recovered from the same material. [1]

Q: Is NevGold fully funded? A: The upsized C$42.2 million brokered placement (closing on or about May 12, 2026) funds the Company through its Q2 2026 maiden MRE, continued drilling, and metallurgical testwork at Limo Butte, plus advancement at Nutmeg Mountain. [1]

Q: What is the next catalyst? A: A maiden antimony-gold NI 43-101 Mineral Resource Estimate at Limousine Butte, targeted for Q2 2026. [1]

What exactly did China restrict?

China restricted antimony exports specifically for U.S. military end use in late 2024. A partial pause was announced in late 2025, but military end use remained prohibited, meaning the Pentagon still cannot source Chinese antimony.

Why does antimony matter to the U.S. defense sector?

Antimony is used in ammunition, night vision systems, missile guidance, flame retardants, and certain semiconductors. Antimony appears in more than 300 U.S. weapons systems, making it one of the most defense critical minerals with no domestic supply chain.

How much antimony does the U.S. actually need?

U.S. demand is 30,000–40,000 tonnes per year, while domestic production is under 1,000 tonnes. This is why the U.S. is 100% import reliant.

Why is oxide antimony such a big deal?

Most global antimony deposits are sulfide, which require complex processing and smelting. This emphasizes that oxide antimony — especially near surface oxide — is the only feedstock that can be converted into antimony metal quickly. NevGold’s historical leach pads contain oxide material that is already crushed and stacked.

Is NevGold the only U.S. oxide antimony project?

No — but the list is extremely short. near surface oxide antimony in North America is rare, and NevGold is one of the few juniors with oxide material that can be processed into antimony metal rather than antimony concentrate.

How does NevGold compare to Perpetua?

Perpetua Resources (Idaho) is the most advanced U.S. antimony project, but:

• It is a sulfide system
• It requires a full mine build
• Earliest production is ~2030
  

NevGold’s oxide pads represent a near term pathway, with a 2027 scenario under evaluation.

What is the next major catalyst?

The Q2 2026 maiden antimony gold NI 43101 Mineral Resource Estimate at Limousine Butte. This is the first time the antimony tonnage in the historical leach pads will be quantified under modern standards.

Why did the financing price at C$1.90 come with no warrants?

— China’s military specific export restriction and the U.S. supply gap — helps explain why institutional demand was strong enough to upsize the deal to C$42.2 million with no warrants.

Is NevGold a gold story or an antimony story?

Both. NevGold’s oxide pads allow sequential antimony then gold extraction, meaning both metals come from the same feed. This reinforces that this flow sheet is exactly what U.S. defense procurement needs: antimony metal, not concentrate.

Article Sources

[1] https://www.globenewswire.com/news-release/2026/04/20/3277330/0/en/nevgold-announces-upsized-42mm-brokered-private-placement-financing.html
[2] https://nev-gold.com/news/ (Apr 9, 2026 / Mar 19, 2026 NevGold drill releases — Limousine Butte / Resurrection Ridge / Bullet Zone / Hole LB25-024)
[3] https://www.stocktitan.net/sec-filings/NVA/6-k-nova-minerals-ltd-current-report-foreign-issuer-1968ca063444.html
[4] https://www.mining.com/nova-minerals-secures-land-for-alaska-antimony-refinery/ [5] https://www.stocktitan.net/news/EQX/equinox-gold-and-calibre-mining-complete-business-xwbprrv2v24m.html
[6] https://www.globenewswire.com/news-release/2026/04/09/3270748/0/en/Equinox-Gold-Delivers-Strong-First-Quarter-with-197-628-Ounces-of-Gold-Production-990-Million-of-Debt-Reduction-and-Inaugural-Dividend-Payment.html
[7] https://www.perpetuaresources.com/about/about-the-stibnite-gold-project (Perpetua Resources Stibnite Gold Project / October 21, 2025 ground-breaking — https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/perpetua-resources-breaks-ground-on-the-stibnite-gold-project-302590660.html)
[8] https://investingnews.com/mcewen-q1-2026-results-conference-call/
[9] https://www.mining.com/press-release?id=69fbf7b06e975e5df02b261e
[10] https://finance.yahoo.com/news/mcewen-mux-revises-gold-output-151037224.html

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