Dr. Timothy Marsh reports

CORDOBA 51 PER CENT EARN-IN COMPLETED, 2026 PERSEVERANCE ARIZONA PORPHYRY EXPLORATION PROGRAM ANNOUNCED

Bell Copper Corp. and its joint venture partner, Cordoba Minerals Corp., have approved a 2026 exploration program of 1,700 metres of drilling at the Perseverance copper project in Arizona, United States. Cordoba is also confirming today that its earn-in at the Perseverance copper project has ended without Cordoba earning an additional interest, meaning the project is a 51/49 joint venture with Bell Copper.

• Cordoba completes 51-per-cent earn-in of Bell's Perseverance porphyry copper project, Arizona;
• JV approves 2026 $1.7-million (U.S.), 1,700-metre drilling program for supergene copper;
• Bell Copper drilling K-24 to test stacked MT target and faulted Big Sandy analogue target.

The Perseverance copper project is located in Arizona's Copper Triangle, a Tier 1 jurisdiction with major copper deposits and mines. The project is located 50 miles north northwest of Freeport McMoRan's Bagdad copper mine, approximately 19 miles southeast of Kingman, Ariz., and 150 miles northwest of Phoenix, with a land package comprising more than 19,000 acres.

2026 exploration program at Perseverance tests potential for supergene enrichment at depth

The 2026 exploration program will seek to deepen three existing drill holes (originally drilled by Rio Tinto) to new depths:

• K-23: current ending depth 590 metres, deepening 500 m to 1,100 m total depth;
• K-19: current ending depth 420 m, deepening 700 m to 1,100 m total depth;
• K-13: current ending depth 424 m, deepening 500 m to 900 m total depth.

Hole K-23 originally drilled through young valley fill gravels and into a thick basalt layer and terminated in a hematite-stained leached cap.

Hole K-19 also drilled through alluvial cover and hit Laramide age granite porphyry at 250 m, heavily stained by hematite and goethite indicative of a leached cap. The hole was terminated at 420 m in hydrothermal breccia with pyrite and sphalerite in granodiorite porphyry. An induced polarization survey performed by Quantec Geophysics in 2017 for Rio Tinto (who held an option on the property from Bell Copper), shows strong chargeability indicative of sulphide mineralization immediately below where the hole was terminated.

Hole K-13 is a 525 m stepout from K-19. This hole also stopped in hematite, goethite stained leached cap with strong chargeability below where the hole was terminated.

The total 2026 exploration program budget is approximately $1.7-million (U.S.), including up to 1,700 m of drilling, of which Bell Copper is responsible for funding 49 per cent. Drilling is not expected to commence until required permits have been obtained, which is not anticipated prior to late Q3 2026.

Bell Copper drilling K-24 to test stacked MT and fault targets with single hole

In order to accelerate the exploration of the Perseverance copper project and separately from the 2026 exploration program, Bell Copper, at its discretion and cost, chose to deepen a previously drilled hole for water on a private parcel of land on the eastern limit of the Perseverance land and mineral package.

Bell Copper is drilling hole K-24 to test two distinct, stacked targets with a single drill hole. Located immediately to the west of State Highway 93, this hole is drilling through water-saturated sand and gravel deposits in order to test the source of a broad, magnetotelluric (MT) resistivity low potentially indicative of conductive sulphide, and which was originally identified in 2020 (eastern MT anomaly). The lower of the two targets is the faulted top of the Wheeler Wash porphyry root zone, an analogue of the same fault slip vector (13 kilometres at N70E) that yielded the chalcocite blanket discovery in BS-3 at Bell's Big Sandy project, 30 kilometres to the south.

Bell Copper president and chief executive officer Dr. Tim Marsh stated: "Bell Copper is pleased to have Cordoba Minerals, under freshly motivated leadership, as a partner in the exploration of the Laramide porphyry system at Perseverance. Like our Big Sandy copper discovery 30 kilometres to the south, Perseverance offers the opportunity of a globally significant copper discovery in the stable jurisdiction of Arizona. Having future exploration costs at Perseverance reduced by 51 per cent while gaining access to the talent of Cordoba's team is a big win for Bell's shareholders."

Cordoba's interim chief executive officer, Quentin Markin, commented: "With the successful closing of the Alacran sale now behind us, we are turning our attention to identifying new opportunities for Cordoba while also moving forward with Perseverance. This year's program with Bell Copper will deepen three existing drill holes that show the potential for supergene copper enrichment. The three holes were stopped in hematite, goethite-rich, 'leached cap' rocks beneath a young, 20-million-year-old basalt flow covering proterozoic and Laramide basement rocks. In Arizona this is indicative for the potential for copper-rich chalcocite replacing pyrite and chalcopyrite below the leached cap rock. Our goal is to identify the potential for a high-grade copper deposit at Perseverance that can be mined by similar underground mining methods to the Santa Cruz deposit that is currently being developed by Cordoba's majority shareholder, Ivanhoe Electric Inc., at Casa Grande south of Phoenix."

Qualified person

The technical content of this release has been reviewed and approved by Timothy Marsh, PhD, PEng, the company's chief executive officer and president and a qualified person as defined under Canadian National Instrument 43-101.

About Bell Copper Corp.

Bell Copper is a mineral exploration company focused on the identification, exploration and discovery of large copper deposits located in Arizona. Bell Copper is exploring its 100-per-cent-owned Big Sandy porphyry copper project and the Perseverance porphyry copper project which is controlled by Cordoba Minerals (51 per cent) with Bell (49 per cent) under a joint venture.

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