A US company founded in 2025 by Austrian investor Cevdet Caner is working to boost production at the Tres Valles mining complex in Chile, seeking to profit from a looming global copper shortage, according to Reuters. The company also continues to buy ore from local small miners and processes it into copper cathodes for sale to customers. A review of documents from US-registered Global Critical Resources (GCR) shows the company is pursuing a hybrid approach: expanding output from its own mine while supplementing supplies with ore mined by more than 90 independent small and medium-sized miners.
Tres Valles, a junior operation originally developed by Brazil's Vale, has changed hands several times and has been through bankruptcy proceedings. The mine lies about 290 km from Santiago, in Chile's Coquimbo region, close to other small and medium-sized producers. Chile is the world's top copper-producing country.
Despite past financial troubles, Tres Valles has retained its infrastructure and permits, which makes a restart feasible in a country where miners complain that red tape can delay new projects for decades. Possible obstacles include unresolved charges brought by an environmental regulator, protests by suppliers who have yet to be paid for their ore, and an ongoing lawsuit over GCR's purchase of Tres Valles. According to company documents, GCR plans for its underground project to start production by the end of the year.
Global copper prices have surged in recent years on demand from electric vehicles, renewable energy grids and data centres, while supply has been constrained by declining ore grades and long development timelines. This has renewed interest in smaller operations and brownfield restarts, meaning the revival of existing sites, which can move faster than large greenfield projects, or new mines built from scratch. Sites from Canada to Spain have been revived in recent years to speed up supply.
Caner formed GCR around assets his investment group had bought in Chile and Botswana, including Tres Valles. Few details of the deal or of the plans to revive output at Tres Valles have emerged. The documents were obtained by Reuters through a public records request; the company had submitted them to Chile's energy ministry ahead of an April meeting.
The projections had not previously been reported, and Tres Valles and GCR did not respond to requests for comment. The company document projections show a target of peak annual core earnings (EBITDA) of US$157 million, from revenues of nearly US$238 million a year. EBITDA should average about US$80 million a year from 2026 to 2031, according to the same document.
The flagship Papomono underground mine, set to begin operations at the end of this year, could contribute about 30,800 tonnes of copper annually. The Don Gabriel open-pit mine, currently under maintenance, is projected to restart around 2030. Unlike the region's major operators, Tres Valles supplements its own ore with material from more than 90 small and medium-sized miners, processing it into copper cathodes at an on-site plant.
As of April, the company said it was producing cathodes at an annual rate of 14,100 tonnes, in line with guidance but well below its capacity of 18,500 tonnes a year. This supply matters more as major producers struggle to raise output. Chilean state miner Codelco has blamed declining ore grades and delays to major revamps for weaker production.
Analysts see players like Tres Valles as key to plugging the looming supply gap in a global copper market, where booming demand can only be met if producers invest an estimated US$210 billion ($301.91 billion) by 2035. In April, Chile's government said it was simplifying permitting to help unlock an estimated US$100 billion in mining investment. Tres Valles faces significant hurdles.
Chile's environmental regulator brought eight charges against the miner this year, mostly for failing to report monitoring processes. Possible penalties, yet to be decided, range from a written warning to closure. In August, suppliers protested outside the site, saying payments were overdue.
The miner blamed a cash squeeze caused by ongoing litigation over GCR's purchase of the mine. Source: Reuters, republished by Mining.com.au on 16 October 2026 (reporting by Kylie Madry; editing by Lucinda Elliott and David Gregorio). Main image: Codelco.
Source: mining.com.au