Finance heavy mining equipment for contract mining companies. Haul trucks, drill rigs, excavators, LHD loaders. Funding structures built around contract revenue. $50k minimum.
A contract mining company lives or dies by its ability to mobilize. You win the stope development contract, the open pit mining contract, or the haul contract, and then the clock starts. The client expects equipment on site, equipment that performs at spec, and equipment that will not create downtime problems that become your problem on a fixed-price or unit-rate contract. Financing the iron quickly and correctly is the difference between a profitable mobilization and one that starts in the red.
Contract miners occupy a distinct position in the mining equipment financing landscape. Unlike an owner-operator mine that holds its equipment against a resource asset, a contract miner holds its equipment against a contract. The contract is the cash flow. Lenders who understand contract mining underwrite the deal around the contract terms: contract duration, client creditworthiness, payment cycle, and the miner's demonstrated ability to execute.
We finance contract mining equipment from $50,000 minimum, with most deals in the $200,000 to $3 million range depending on the equipment type and contract scope. Application-only approval is available up to approximately $400,000. Larger deals require three months of bank statements and, for significant contract-backed transactions, a copy of the contract itself. Funding in one to two weeks from a complete application is the standard timeline.
The Contract Miner's Equipment Situation
Contract mining companies range from small single-contractor operations running a handful of haul trucks on a unit-rate haulage contract to large diversified miners running fleets of equipment across multiple mine sites simultaneously. The equipment needs and financing structures differ by scale, but the underlying logic is the same: the equipment has to be available when the contract is active, and the financing has to be structured so that contract payments can cover debt service without creating a cash flow crunch during the mobilization phase before billing starts.
Common contract mining scopes include open pit drilling and blasting, load and haul operations, underground development (portal establishment, decline development, and crosscut work), underground stope production, and ore processing on a toll basis. Each scope type has a different equipment set. Open pit load and haul contracts require haul trucks andhydraulic mining excavators. Underground development contracts require drill jumbos, loaders, and support equipment. Processing contracts require crushing and grinding plant. We finance equipment across all of these scopes.
Operators in coal country aroundGillette, WYand the hard rock districts of Arizona and Nevada frequently work on contract or sub-contract basis. Operators in the Iron Range of Minnesota nearHibbing, MNrun contract haulage and crushing operations as well. Geographic scope does not restrict what we can finance.
How Contract-Backed Equipment Financing Is Structured
For contract mining deals, the contract itself is relevant supporting documentation. A signed contract from a creditworthy mining company, ideally a publicly listed or well-established operator, provides meaningful context for the lender. It tells the story of the cash flow against which the debt service will be measured. We do not require a contract to approve a deal, but a strong contract from a known client in hand often improves the terms and shortens the approval timeline.
Loan terms typically run 36 to 72 months for contract mining equipment. Longer terms may be available for newer equipment or longer-duration contracts. The term length question is worth thinking through carefully: a 5-year underground development contract supports a 60-month term on the jumbos and LHDs mobilized for it. A 2-year haul contract is better matched with shorter-term financing or equipment that has broad residual market value at the end of the contract.
For operators adding to an existing fleet, we can finance new additions alongside a refinance of existing iron, structuring everything around the total fleet's debt service capacity rather than evaluating each piece in isolation.Mining equipment loansare the most common structure for contract miners who want to build equity in the fleet over the contract term.Mining equipment leasingworks better for operators who want to return or swap equipment at the end of a contract cycle.
Equipment Contract Miners Finance
Open pit load and haul is the highest equipment volume segment within contract mining. Haul trucks in the 100 to 250 ton range are the backbone of a load and haul fleet.Rigid-frame haul trucksfrom Caterpillar, Komatsu, and Liebherr make up the majority of these fleets in North American contract mining. Hydraulic excavators in the 100 to 500 ton operating weight range do the loading work. These are machines with long service lives and strong secondary markets, both of which support financing.
Underground contract miners need drill jumbos for face development, LHD loaders for muck removal, underground haul trucks for ore transport, and roof bolters for systematic ground support. A complete underground development fleet for a single active face might run three to five pieces of equipment, representing $1 to $3 million in financed equipment depending on make, model, and age.
Crushing and screening equipment for toll processing contracts and aggregate production contracts rounds out the common contract mining equipment set. A portable crushing plant that can be mobilized to the contract site and demobilized at completion is a natural fit for contract-based financing because the equipment moves with the work rather than being site-dedicated.
- Rigid-frame haul trucks for open pit contracts
- Hydraulic mining excavators for load and haul
- Drill jumbos and LHD loaders for underground development
- Roof bolters and underground support equipment
- Portable crushing and screening plants for toll processing
- Water trucks and service vehicles for mine site support