Candente Copper Jumps on Peru Exploration Drilling: Lima Mover

Candente Copper Corp. (DNT), a Canadian mining exploration company with operations in Peru, rose the most in four years after starting a delayed drilling project.

Candente surged 38 percent to 58 cents at 11:56 a.m. in Lima, the biggest intraday gain since November 2008. The stock has jumped 53 percent in two days.

Candente said in a statement that it began exploratory drilling at its Canariaco deposit in the southern Andes after reaching an accord with local community members whose protests over land rights had delayed the $1.5 billion project for a year. The company’s stock slumped over the past two years during the protests and after President Ollanta Humala increased a mining windfall tax in 2011.

“Investors were relieved to get information on the project after the community problems last year,” Jorge Rodriguez, an analyst at Kallpa Securities SAB, said in a phone interview from Lima. “We’re seeing more investor confidence in the project, which has a large amount of mineral resources.”

The company expects to make new discoveries at the deposit, Chief Executive Officer Joanne Freeze said in a Dec. 4 interview. Candente, which received a water permit from the government last month, plans to drill a total 13,500 meters to boost the project’s reserves, currently estimated at 7.5 billion pounds of copper.

To contact the reporter on this story: Alex Emery in Lima at aemery1@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: David Papadopoulos at papadopoulos@bloomberg.net