Mr. Kirby Renton reports

NIOBIUMX MINING OUTLINES ITS STAGED EXPLORATION STRATEGY AT SHIPSHAW, APPROXIMATELY TWO KILOMETRES FROM NORTH AMERICA'S ONLY PRODUCING NIOBIUM MINE, AS BRAZIL SUPPLIES APPROXIMATELY 93% OF WORLD NIOBIUM AND THE UNITED STATES HAS NO DOMESTIC MINE

Niobiumx Mining Inc. has set out its strategy to find and drill test a second niobium system in the Saint-Honore carbonatite district of Quebec, home to North America's only producing niobium mine.

The Shipshaw property

The Shipshaw property comprises 48 mineral claims totalling approximately 2,686 hectares in the Saguenay region of Quebec. Its nearest claim boundary lies approximately two kilometres from the Niobec mine, North America's only operating niobium producer, in production since 1976.

The Shipshaw carbonatite is one of five carbonatite intrusions in the Waswanipi-Saguenay zone selected by Geologie Quebec for characterization in metallogenic bulletin BM 2024-02, each marked by a negative magnetic anomaly.

Exploration strategy

Carbonatite-hosted niobium systems in the Saint-Honore corridor share a recognizable geophysical signature: a magnetic low, commonly accompanied by elevated thorium. the property covers a low-magnetic anomaly of this type, defined by a helicopter-borne magnetic survey flown in 2010. Diamond drilling by a previous operator in 2010 and 2011, 23 holes totalling approximately 5,850 metres, intercepted the carbonatite complex in all holes.

The company is advancing the property in four stages. Each one shrinks the search area before the next, more expensive one begins, so that the drill goes where the evidence is strongest:

1. Compile the record: Bring the historical drilling, assay, mapping and geophysical record for the property and the surrounding district into a single verified, machine-readable database so that every later interpretation is tested against the full body of existing data.
2. Image the system at modern resolution: Survey the full 48-claim package with high-resolution airborne magnetics and radiometrics. Radiometrics have a direct precedent in the district: The Niobec deposit was discovered in 1967 by a radiometric survey during uranium exploration.
3. 3Rank targets against the district signature: Integrate the new survey data with the compiled record using machine-learning methods and 3-D magnetic inversion, scoring the property against the signature of known carbonatite systems in the district and ranking targets by the overlap of magnetic, radiometric and structural evidence.
4. Drill test the highest-ranked targets: Advance the best-supported targets to diamond drilling.

The company intends to report on each stage as it advances. No mineral resource or mineral reserve has been estimated on the property.

Why niobium, why now

Few critical minerals have a supply chain as concentrated as niobium's. According to the U.S. Geological Survey Mineral Commodity Summaries 2026, world mine production was approximately 112,000 tonnes of contained niobium in 2025, of which Brazil accounted for approximately 104,000 tonnes and Canada approximately 6,000 tonnes. The United States has had no domestic niobium mine production since 1959 and is 100 per cent net-import reliant, with an estimated import value of approximately $525-million (U.S.).

Niobium has no exchange-traded contract and no LME (London Metal Exchange) or COMEX (Commodity Exchange) price. The market is supplied largely under long-term contracts, and price discovery depends on assessments published by price reporting agencies. The USGS reports a ferroniobium average unit value of approximately $26 (U.S.) per kilogram (gross weight) for 2025 and estimates U.S. consumption at approximately 77 per cent steel and 23 per cent superalloys. Niobium is added to high-strength, low-alloy steel at fractions of a per cent, where small additions deliver disproportionate increases in strength.

Two demand vectors sit outside the traditional steel market. Niobium-titanium-oxide anode materials are being commercialized for fast-charge lithium-ion batteries; CBMM and Echion Technologies opened a niobium anode plant at Araxa, Brazil, with a stated capacity of 2,000 tonnes per year. Separately, niobium-tin and niobium-titanium superconductors are core to magnetic resonance imaging and to fusion energy; the toroidal field coils of the ITER fusion project alone required approximately 420 tonnes of niobium-tin strand.

Niobium appears on the critical minerals lists of Canada, the United States, the European Union and Australia. In early 2026, the government of Quebec released its 2025-2031 Quebec Strategy for the Development of Critical and Strategic Minerals, which names niobium among Quebec's critical and strategic minerals and notes that Quebec is the only producer of niobium in the northern hemisphere.

"Four Western governments call niobium critical, and one country supplies almost all of it," said Kirby Renton, president and chief executive officer. "North America has exactly one niobium mine. Our ground starts about two kilometres from it, sits on the same kind of geophysical signature and has never been surveyed at modern resolution. We intend to change that, one stage at a time."

About Niobiumx Mining Inc.

Niobiumx Mining is a Canadian mineral exploration company focused on niobium. The company's principal asset is the Shipshaw property, a package of 48 mineral claims totalling approximately 2,686 hectares in the Saguenay region of Quebec, situated within the Saguenay graben of the Grenville geological province and characterized by a swarm of carbonatite and lamprophyre dikes. The Shipshaw carbonatite is one of five carbonatite intrusions in the Waswanipi-Saguenay zone selected for characterization by Geologie Quebec in metallogenic bulletin BM 2024-02.

Niobium is designated a critical mineral by Canada, the United States, the European Union and Australia.

Qualified person

The scientific and technical information in this news release has been reviewed and approved by Deepak Varshney, PGeo, a consultant to the company and a qualified person as defined by National Instrument 43-101.

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