Minister for Resources and Northern Australia Madeleine King said on Saturday (November 1) that Australia and Canada have strengthened their critical minerals partnership with a new joint declaration of intent.

The new agreement is between Australia’s Department of Industry, Science and Resources and the Department of Natural Resources of Canada.

It builds on the Australia-US rare earths deal signed by Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and President Donald Trump, under which both nations committed to investing over US$1 billion each in initial projects within the next six months.

King signed with Canadian Minister for Resources and Energy Tim Hodgson at the G7 Energy and Environment Ministers’ Meeting in Toronto.

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“Like Australia, (Canada) holds some of the world’s most significant critical minerals and rare earths reserves,” she commented, adding that it is important for both producing countries to collaborate.

“From defence applications to clean manufacturing, critical minerals are at the heart of the economic and national security of both our countries … (We need to) ensure both our communities and industry can benefit from growing demand.”

While the joint declaration is not legally binding and comes with no financial commitment, it highlighted that an in-person ministerial will be established within 6 months of the date of signing.

The ministerial will be responsible for assessing progress and establishing a work plan for the coming year, to be led by King and Hodgson themselves.

Key areas of the partnership include project financing, investment and trade, maximising assets to co-invest in “commercially viable projects.”

The countries also agreed to share best practices in meeting ESG standards and project development and execution. Joint research and sharing of information on stockpiling and respective project development pipelines were also cited.

No target projects have been mentioned, but among Australia’s awaited critical minerals projects is the Dubbo rare earths project by Australian Strategic Materials (ASX:ASM,OTC Pink:ASMMF).

Dubbo received AU$5 million under the Australian government’s International Partnerships in Critical Minerals (IPCM) Program in October 2024, and an AU$6.5 million grant from the government’s Critical Minerals Development Program in May 2023.

It is targeting a final investment decision in 2026 and is expected to deliver up to 1,000 local jobs during the construction period and approximately 270 jobs once operational.

For Canada, the Matawinie mine near Montreal, Quebec by Nouveau Monde Graphite Inc. (NYSE:NMG,NOU:CA) was first on its list of investments under the G7 Critical Minerals action plan, wherein it mentioned a letter of interest for the project for up to US$430 million from Export Development Canada.

Nouveau Monde Graphite is also reportedly on its journey to create the largest fully integrated natural graphite production facility in North America.

“By working together, we can build…

AF2 Capital Corp. (TSXV: AF.P) (“AF2” or the “Company“) is pleased to announce it has entered into a non-binding letter of intent dated October 14, 2025 (the “LOI“) with EverKind Inc. (“EverKind“), an AI-powered emotional wellness platform, which sets forth, in general terms, the basic terms and conditions upon which EverKind and AF2 will combine their business operations resulting in a reverse takeover of AF2 by EverKind and its shareholders (the “Transaction“). It is intended that the Transaction will constitute the “Qualifying Transaction” of AF2 as such term is defined in Exchange Policy 2.4 – Capital Pool Companies, resulting in the combination of EverKind and AF2, with the common shares of the resulting issuer to the Transaction (the “Resulting Issuer Shares“) being listed on the TSX Venture Exchange (the “Exchange“), subject to approval of the Exchange.

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AF2 is a capital pool corporation (a “CPC“) as defined under the policies of the Exchange, and it is expected that an application for the listing of the Resulting Issuer Shares will be submitted to the Exchange following the execution of the Definitive Agreement. Completion of the Transaction is subject to a number of conditions, including but not limited to, receiving all required shareholder, regulatory, and other approvals. The Transaction is considered a related party transaction under Multilateral Instrument 61-101 – Protection of Minority Security Holders in Special Transactions and will be subject to majority of the minority shareholder approval. There can be no certainty that the Transaction will be completed on the terms set out in the LOI or at all.

A comprehensive news release will be issued by AF2 in due course disclosing details of the Transaction, including financial information with respect to EverKind, the names and backgrounds of all persons who will constitute insiders of the Resulting Issuer, the issued and outstanding…