Leviathan Metals to acquire prospecting licence in Botswana

Leviathan Metals Bolsters Kalahari Copper Belt Presence with Key Acquisition

GABORONE, BOTSWANA – March 20, 2026 – Leviathan Metals has announced a pivotal acquisition that significantly enhances its strategic position within Botswana’s highly prospective Kalahari Copper Belt (KCB). The company has entered into a purchase agreement with an undisclosed vendor to acquire a new prospecting licence, directly adjacent to its wholly owned Central Project. This expansion is set to increase Leviathan’s total landholding in the region by 270km², bringing its comprehensive Central Project area to an impressive 590km².

This calculated expansion is not merely about increasing land size; it is strategically focused on enhancing Leviathan’s geological potential for new copper discoveries. The newly acquired ground encompasses more than 10km of interpreted D’Kar-Ngwako Pan Formation contact, a geological feature widely recognized in the KCB as a key host for significant sediment-hosted copper mineralization. The move signals Leviathan’s aggressive pursuit of high-potential targets in one of Africa's most promising copper frontiers.

Strategic Expansion in the Kalahari Copper Belt

The Kalahari Copper Belt is globally recognized for its significant sediment-hosted copper deposits, a geological setting that the U.S. Geological Survey has identified as a prime area for such mineralization worldwide. Leviathan Metals’ Central Project is strategically located within this belt, a region that has attracted considerable interest from major and junior mining companies alike due to its proven endowment and largely underexplored potential. The initial Central Project already held promise, but this latest acquisition builds upon that foundation by consolidating a more extensive and geologically contiguous land package.

The addition of 270km² brings Leviathan’s total acreage in the Central Project to 590km², providing a much larger canvas for systematic exploration. For mining professionals, a larger land package under contiguous control offers several operational and strategic advantages. It allows for more efficient regional exploration programs, enables a better understanding of geological trends across a broader area, and can potentially host multiple independent targets or a single, large-scale system. Furthermore, the expansion directly strengthens the Central Project's potential with critically important extensions of its key stratigraphic contact, now totaling more than 30km around the prominent Hyena Hills dome structure within the expanded area. These contacts and structural features are precisely where exploration teams focus their efforts for discovering economic mineral deposits.

Geological Promise: Targeting Sediment-Hosted Copper

The core of this acquisition’s value lies in its geological endowment, specifically the presence of the D’Kar-Ngwako Pan Formation contact. In the context of the Kalahari Copper Belt, this contact represents a significant geological boundary where changes in rock type and geochemical conditions often create ideal environments for copper-silver mineralization. Sediment-hosted copper deposits are typically characterized by large tonnages and often favorable metallurgical characteristics, making them attractive targets for long-life mining operations.

The "D’Kar Formation" and "Ngwako Pan Formation" are well-known geological units within the KCB, with the interface between them serving as a primary target horizon. This contact zone is known to host significant copper-silver occurrences in other deposits across the belt. By acquiring more than 10km of this interpreted contact, Leviathan Metals has significantly enhanced its probability of discovering new zones of mineralization. Furthermore, the mention of increased stratigraphic contact around the Hyena Hills dome structure, extending to over 30km within the enhanced Central Project, indicates multiple structural and stratigraphic traps for mineralizing fluids, offering diverse exploration targets.

The U.S. Geological Survey's identification of the Kalahari Copper Belt as a prime area for sediment-hosted copper deposits lends significant credibility to Leviathan’s strategic focus. This endorsement, coupled with historical exploration successes by other operators in the region, provides a robust geological framework for Leviathan’s intensified exploration efforts.

The Financial Framework of the Deal

The acquisition terms demonstrate a pragmatic approach to securing high-potential ground through a combination of upfront and performance-based considerations. Under the agreement, Leviathan Metals will acquire a 100% interest in the new prospecting licence, transacting through its wholly owned subsidiary, Innovation Surveyors. The financial structure of the deal is multifaceted:

• Initial Cash Payment: A payment of USD $200,000 (equivalent to C$274,374) will be made once the prospecting licence is successfully renewed and the ownership transfer process to Innovation Surveyors is initiated. This initial step ensures the legal standing of the licence and sets the stage for formal transfer protocols.
• Completion Payments: Upon satisfaction of critical closing conditions, Leviathan will make a further payment of USD $300,000 in cash. These conditions include securing all necessary approvals for the transfer from relevant Botswana authorities, which is a standard regulatory requirement for such transactions, and obtaining approval from the TSX Venture Exchange, where Leviathan Metals’ shares are listed.
• Share Issuance: Concurrent with the second cash payment, Leviathan will issue 991,666 common shares to the vendor. The inclusion of shares aligns the vendor’s interests with future success of the project, as they will benefit from any increase in Leviathan’s share value resulting from positive exploration outcomes.
• Net Smelter Royalty (NSR): The vendor will also receive a 1% net smelter royalty on the licence. An NSR is a common form of royalty in the mining sector, entitling the holder to a percentage of the gross revenue from mineral production, after smelting and refining costs, but before operating expenses and capital costs. This provides the vendor with a long-term interest in any successful production from the acquired ground.
• Royalty Buy-back Option: Significantly, Leviathan Metals retains the option to repurchase and cancel the 1% net smelter royalty for a payment of USD $1.5 million. This buy-back clause offers Leviathan future flexibility to consolidate full economic control over the project should exploration prove highly successful and the company wishes to avoid ongoing royalty payments. It represents a common strategy by mining companies to manage future costs and maximize project value.

This structured payment plan reflects typical industry practices for exploration-stage assets, balancing immediate financial commitments with future obligations tied to project milestones and success.

Leveraging Proximity to Established Success: The Khoemacau Precedent

One of the most compelling aspects of Leviathan’s Central Project, particularly with this expanded footprint, is its direct adjacency to MMG’s established Khoemacau deposits and recent discoveries within the Kalahari Copper Belt. MMG’s Khoemacau Copper Mine is a significant, modern operation in Botswana, showcasing the KCB’s potential for world-class deposits. The publicly reported mineral resources for MMG's Khoemacau operations provide a crucial benchmark for the quality of mineralization that can be expected in the immediate vicinity.

MMG’s Khoemacau deposits boast combined measured and indicated mineral resources of 94 million tonnes (mt) at an impressive grade of 1.8% copper and 22 grams per tonne (g/t) silver. Additionally, the project holds inferred resources of 188mt at 1.6% copper and 20g/t silver. These figures represent substantial tonnages and high grades for a sediment-hosted copper system, making Khoemacau a prime example of the KCB’s prospectivity.

For Leviathan, being "directly adjacent" to such a successful operation is highly significant. It implies that the geological settings, structures, and mineralization controls that contribute to the Khoemacau deposits very likely extend into Leviathan’s expanded Central Project area. This geological continuity significantly de-risks early-stage exploration and provides clear vectors for targeting. Successful deposits rarely exist in isolation; their geological environments often span across property boundaries, making adjacency a powerful indicator of potential. This proximity allows Leviathan to leverage geological knowledge gained from Khoemacau and apply it to its own ground, potentially accelerating exploration success.

A Broader Strategic Vision in Botswana

This latest acquisition by Leviathan Metals is not an isolated event but rather a continuation of a broader strategic initiative to establish a robust presence in Botswana’s critical minerals sector. In September 2025, Leviathan announced an amalgamation agreement with Cura Botswana (Cura) and its subsidiary, 1555801 B.C. (Subco). This earlier agreement was designed to acquire a 100% interest in an extensive portfolio of Kalahari copper and uranium exploration assets in Botswana.

The Cura amalgamation signals Leviathan's overarching strategy to consolidate significant land packages in Botswana, targeting not only copper but also uranium, another critical mineral with growing global demand. The successive nature of these acquisitions—first the broader portfolio, and now a targeted expansion of a key project—demonstrates a methodical and long-term commitment to Botswana. This integrated approach allows Leviathan to develop a diversified exploration pipeline within highly prospective geological terrains, offering multiple pathways to value creation for its shareholders.

Market Implications and Future Outlook

The global demand for copper is projected to grow significantly as the world transitions towards renewable energy, electric vehicles, and increased urbanization. Copper is fundamental to nearly all aspects of electrification, from power generation and transmission to battery technology and consumer electronics. Against this backdrop of increasing demand and concerns about future supply, new discoveries and the expansion of exploration in proven copper belts like the KCB are critically important.

Leviathan Metals' expansion in the KCB positions it favorably to capitalize on this megatrend. Establishing a significant and prospective land position in a mining-friendly jurisdiction like Botswana reduces geopolitical risk and provides a stable operating environment. The next steps for Leviathan will logically involve detailed geophysical surveys, geochemical sampling programs, and ultimately, targeted drilling campaigns to define and delineate mineral resources on the newly acquired ground, as well as across the enhanced Central Project area.

For investors and industry professionals, this acquisition underscores Botswana’s continued appeal as an exploration and mining destination. It highlights the strategic value of sediment-hosted copper deposits and signals Leviathan Metals as a growing player committed to unlocking the KCB’s significant potential. As exploration progresses, updates from Leviathan on initial findings, drill results, and resource estimations from this expanded Central Project will be closely watched by the market, potentially influencing investment flows into the region and contributing to the global copper supply narrative.