Ms. Tara Christie reports

BANYAN ANNOUNCES $4.3 M FINANCING, BEGINS PHASE 2 AURMAC EXPLORATION PROGRAM

Banyan Gold Corp. has arranged a private placement financing of up to $4.3-million. Alexco Resource Corp., Victoria Gold Corp. and Osisko Gold Royalties indicate they will participate pro rata along with other strategic and current shareholders. This will allow the company to advance a phase 2 exploration program at AurMac. Phase 2 exploration will include additional diamond drilling, geotechnical drilling, metallurgical test work, environmental baseline data collection and community consultation. Further details of the expanded program will be released in the coming weeks.

The company proposes to raise up to $4.3-million with a combination of up to 12.5 million charity flow-through shares at 28 cents, up to two million regular flow-through shares at 25 cents and 1.5 million regular shares at 20 cents. The financing is expected to close on or before July 28, 2020, and the shares issued will be subject to the customary hold period. There will be no warrants issued with the offering.

"Our current significant shareholders and new strategic shareholders participating in this financing are a strong endorsement of the growth potential of AurMac and confidence in our team," stated Tara Christie, president and chief executive officer. "With a strong treasury, we are now well positioned to advance this project to the next level through 2020 and 2021. Banyan is taking this opportunity in finance at a time when there is strong interest in road accessible, near-surface gold projects in an enviable jurisdiction, adjacent to two operating mines."

The flow-through gross proceeds component received from the sale of the shares will be used to incur Canadian exploration expenses as defined in Subsection 66.1(6) of the Income Tax Act (Canada) on the company's properties in the Yukon territory, and renounced to subscribers in the offering effective Dec. 31, 2020. Such Canadian exploration expenses will also qualify as flow-through mining expenditures as defined in Subsection 127(9) of the tax act. There may be fees up to 6 per cent on a portion of this financing.

Closing of the offering is expected to occur on or about the week of July 28, 2020, and is subject to the satisfaction of certain conditions, including receipt of all applicable regulatory approvals including the approval of the TSX Venture Exchange.

The company is also pleased to announced that it has received Yukon government mineral exploration grants totalling $80,000 for exploration in 2020. Banyan commends the Yukon government for its additional investment in the exploration industry to assist with the recovery of the Yukon economy.

In a May 25, 2020, news release Banyan Gold announced an initial mineral resource estimate prepared in accordance with National Instrument 43-101 guidelines for the AurMac property of 903,945 ounces of gold. It is a near-surface, road-accessible pit-constrained mineral resource contained in two near/on-surface deposits: the Airstrip and Powerline deposits. The mineral resource is summarized in the attached table.

          PIT-CONSTRAINED INFERRED MINERAL RESOURCES AT A
               0.2 G/T AU CUT-OFF -- AURMAC PROPERTY

                                              Average
                                                   Au
Grade                                           grade            Au
Deposit          Classification      Tonnage   g/t Au    content oz

Airstrip               Inferred   45,997,911    0.524       774,926      
Powerline              Inferred    6,578,609    0.610       129,019      
Total combined         Inferred   52,576,520    0.535       903,945      
                                                                        

Notes

(1) The effective date for the mineral resource is May 25, 2020. 

(2) Mineral resources that are not mineral reserves do not have 
    demonstrated economic viability. The estimate of mineral resources 
    may be materially affected by environmental, permitting, legal, 
    title, taxation, socio-political, marketing, changes in global gold 
    markets or other relevant issues. 

(3) The CIM definitions were followed for classification of mineral 
    resources. The quantity and grade of reported inferred mineral 
    resources in this estimation are uncertain in nature and there has 
    been insufficient exploration to define these inferred mineral 
    resources as an indicated mineral resource and it is uncertain if 
    further exploration will result in upgrading them to an indicated or 
    measured mineral resource category.

(4) Mineral resources are reported at a cut-off grade of 0.2 g/t Au, 
    using a U.S./Canadian exchange rate of 0.75 and constrained within an 
    open-pit shell optimized with the Lerchs-Grossman algorithm to 
    constrain the mineral resources with the following estimated parameters: 
    gold price of $1,500 (U.S.) per ounce, $1.50 (U.S.) per tonne mining 
    cost, $2 (U.S.) per tonne processing cost, $2.50 (U.S.) per tonne 
    general and administrative expenses, 80-per-cent heap leach recoveries, 
    and 45-degree pit slope.

(1) Mineral resource estimate prepared in accordance with NI 43-101 guidelines by Marc Jutras, PEng, MASc, principal, Ginto Consulting Inc., with technical report filed July 7, 2020.

Qualified persons

Paul D. Gray, PGeo, vice-president of exploration for the company, is a qualified person as defined under NI 43-101 and has reviewed and approved the content of this news release.

Banyan has taken pro-active measures to protect the health and safety of its employees and communities from COVID-19 and exploration activities in 2020 will have additional safety measures in place, following and exceeding all the recommendations made by Yukon's chief medical officer.

There have been 11 COVID-19 cases confirmed in Yukon to date, with all patients having fully recovered. No cases have required hospitalization.

About Banyan Gold Corp.

Banyan is focused on gold exploration projects that have the geological potential, size of land package and proximity to infrastructure that is advantageous for a mineral project to have potential to become a mine. Its Yukon-based projects both fit this model and its objective is to gain shareholder value by advancing projects in its pipeline.

We seek Safe Harbor.