Say what you will about CHN being a nickel player, it is also a...

Say what you will about CHN being a nickel player, it is also a rather significant PGM player too. Looks like there's some big names moving in to have a crack at it. Would be good for POD for some hype in the space, I expect.

A recent article by Barry Fitzgerald says:

Chalice abuzz with Hancock-Twiggy-BHP takeover talk as Dorsch reveals ‘corporate sitting at 4.9%’
And another big position said to be held through derivatives...

Lots of interesting things were said at the RIU Explorers conference at Fremantle’s Esplanade Hotel during the week, both from the pulpit and in the nearby bars.Perhaps though, the most interesting couple of lines came from Alex Dorsch, boss of Chalice (ASX:CHN).Chalice was a $50 million explorer back in 2020 when it made the remarkable Julimar discovery to the north of Perth. It is now a $2.3 billion company.In the preamble to his Chalice presentation to the conference, Dorsch said that the company’s share register had been the “topic of some speculation over the last few months”.He is right about that. Gina Rinehart is rumoured to have put together a stake and Andrew Forrest is believed to be there too through some derivative action which is too complex to divine.Dorsch didn’t ping either multi-billionaire as being active in the stock. He shouldn’t have either, given that’s what the 5% disclosure threshold is for, and given that any buyers of stock below the threshold have a right to their privacy.But Dorsch did disclose that apart from BlackRock’s recent arrival as a 5% shareholder, Chalice does have a “corporate sitting at 4.9%, which is very interesting”.It is interesting alright. The assumption is that the 4.9% is held by Ms Rinehart’s Hancock Prospecting, with any buying by Forrest/Fortescue hidden away in derivatives, if at all.It has been reported previously that Forrest has previously bid Chalice founder and former chairman Tim Goyder for his 9% Chalice stake. Again, lots of smoke but no fire.But the arrival of an unnamed corporate with a 4.9% stake in Chalice is enough in itself to suggest we’re in the early stages of a shootout for control of Chalice and the remarkable Julimar.And given the size of the prize, it is unlikely that out two iron ore barons will have a free run.Julimar’s Tier 1 status means that mining heavyweights like BHP and Rio Tinto, along with a bunch of foreign groups, could well join the fray. Deposits like Julimar are rare finds.The resource at the Gonneville deposit at the southern end of the Julimar intrusion stands at 350Mt grading 0.58% nickel equivalent or 1.8g/t palladium for the equivalent of 2Mt of nickel or 20Moz of palladium.It is just the start of the story. A resource update will be out in a few weeks and will incorporate information from 110 infill drill holes as well as 80 wide-spaced step-out holes.Then there is what is to come from Chalice’s exploration beyond Gonneville. The same ultramafic geology and magmatic sulphides have been encountered along a 10km strike length of the 30km Julimar complex.Gonneville itself occupies just 2km of the Julimar complex which sits on the western margin of the Yilgarn Craton. Over on the eastern margin, about 25Mt of nickel has been found since the 1960s.With Gonneville the first on the western margin, it has got to be thought that there are more to be found. So it can be thought of as a province in the making, something that will appeal to the big name miners.While speculation about a Chalice shootout builds, Chalice is on the hunt for a minority strategic partner.A strategic partner means more than the potential for a corporate to become a partner. Because of Julimar’s metals mix, it could well mean any groups in the battery materials supply chain. And that’s a big field.