The better question to ask is what was the price of copper doing...

The better question to ask is what was the price of copper doing eleven years ago? Look at the copper price in 2011 and look what happened between 2011 and 2016. A junior explorer is highly leveraged to the underlying commodity price. They have to keep going back to the market to raise funds to pay for exploration, but there is no demand for shares in a loss making junior explorer when the commodity price is down the toilet so they have to issue more shares at depressed prices and throw in options to raise money to keep going. Massive dilution ensues. They have to issue convertible notes because they can't pay interest on the principle and that continues to dilute. It's a matter of survival. Then as prices start to rise there is a massive overhang of supply as people who felt stuck in the stock see an opportunity to get out.