Northern Dynasty Minerals (NDM), owner of the proposed Pebble Mine project, announced in October 2025 that it had received the final tranche of a royalty-linked investment totaling US $12 million. The final tranche had been expected by December 31, 2025, so the October payment came in more than two months ahead of the deadline. This represents a cumulative royalty investment in NDM at roughly US $60 million.
The royalty agreement provides the investor with a percentage of potential future mine revenues if the project proceeds.
Each tranche has been released on schedule since 2023, providing NDM with operating funds as it pursues ongoing litigation related to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s 2023 Clean Water Act 404(c) determination that restricts mine development in Bristol Bay.
Who is the private investor?
When the new financing was announced in 2022, NDM executive Mike Westerlund told KDLG Radio that the name was kept private so that Environmental NGOs could not pressure them.
There are several indicators that the investor could be Kopernik Global Investors, LLC:
Overlap in financing approach. Northern Dynasty’s royalty-linked structure aligns with Kopernik Global Investors’ disclosed investment activities. Kopernik’s Global Long-Term Opportunities (GLTO) Fund was established as a public equity strategy in 2013. It was restructured in 2022 as a crossover fund, allowing investment in both public and private assets. This structure is more compatible with creative tranches or royalty-style financing than a traditional public-equity fund.
Shared management and governance ties. The GLTO Fund is co-managed by Isabel Satra, who joined NDM’s Board of Directors in April 2023. Her appointment was described in an NDM news release noting Kopernik as a “significant shareholder” that endorsed her board role.
Portfolio composition. Kopernik’s Q2 2025 GLTO Tear Sheet shows roughly 75 percent of fund assets categorized as U.S. gold and silver royalties, though it does not identify specific projects.
Fund scale and capacity. In a July 2025 investor call, Kopernik management stated that the GLTO strategy was “right around $100 million.” This represents the total assets under management across all of GLTO’s holdings and illustrates that the fund is large enough to participate in the Northern Dynasty financing arrangement.
Public confirmation of a royalty link. Also in the investor call, Dave Iben, Kopernik Co-Chief Investment Officer and Co-Portfolio Manager of the GLTO along with Satra, discussed Northern Dynasty directly. “This is not something that’s going to get built tomorrow. The world doesn’t like uncertainty. They don’t like patience. Because of that, we’re able to get one of the best mining properties on the earth for next to a song. We have some common stock in most of the funds, and we have one strategy that has a royalty on the property.” This publicly confirms that one Kopernik strategy includes a royalty interest related to the Pebble project, though neither company has disclosed the specific terms or size of that interest.