Vale Base Metals completes sale of 81.1% interest in Thompson Mine Complex to Exiro Nickel consortium

On October 16, 2026, Vale Canada Limited (“Vale”) completed the sale of control of the Thompson Mine Complex (“Thompson”) in northern Manitoba to Exiro Nickel Company (“Exiro Nickel”), a newly formed company owned by Exiro Minerals Corp. (“Exiro”), Orion Resource Partners LP (“Orion”) and Canada Growth Fund Inc. (“CGF”). Upon closing, Exiro, Orion and CGF collectively held an 81.1% interest in Exiro Nickel, while Vale retained an 18.9% interest. The transaction included a commitment to invest up to C$280 million in the Thompson operations and Vale entered into a multi-year nickel concentrate offtake agreement for nickel concentrate produced at the Thompson mill.

Following completion of the transaction, Exiro Nickel assumed day-to-day operational responsibility for Thompson. 

Thompson includes two underground mines and an adjacent mill, and remains an important source of nickel production and employment in northern Manitoba.

McCarthy Tétrault LLP advised Vale with a team led by Eva Bellissimo that included Daniel Bornstein, Christopher Langdon, Peter Quon, Robin Mahood, Mitchell Lui, Dorian Morrison, Emma Good (Business), Gwenyth Wren (Environmental), Mike Hegedus, Jeremy Ho (Tax), Ben Aberant (Labour and Employment), Jessie Bachinsky (Real Property and Planning), Casey Halladay (Competition/Antitrust & Foreign Investment) and Michael Scherman (Cyber/Data).