Penco

Penco (Mapudungun: See (Pen), Water (Ko)), is a Chilean city and commune in Concepción Province, Bío Bío Region on the Bay of Concepción. Founded as the city of Concepción del Nuevo Extremo (lit. 'Beginning of the New Extreme') on February 12, 1550, by Pedro de Valdivia, it is the third oldest city in Chile, after capital Santiago founded first in 1541 and La Serena second in 1544. As there may be confusion between the demonyms of the inhabitants of Concepción and Penco, due to the previous location of Concepción, inhabitants of that city are called penquistas while inhabitants of Penco are known as pencones. The commune is since 2016 the site of a project to mine rare-earth elements by Aclara Resources, a publicly traded company with a 55.9% and 10.1% ownership of Hochschild Mining and CAP respectively.