Craig Nolan

Horizon Minerals has kicked off mining activities at its recently-approved Boorara gold development operation that sits adjacent to Northern Star’s massive Super Pit mine in the regional WA city of Kalgoorlie. Management last month gave approval for the mining of four open pits containing 1.24 million tonnes of ore grading 1.24g/t gold for 49,500 ounces and says it has already kicked the plan into action.

Surefire Resources has executed a joint co-operation agreement with WA’s Mid West Ports Authority to define the best pathway forward for exporting magnetite product from the company’s Victory Bore operation. Management’s aim is to secure port access for 1.25 million tonnes per annum to be shipped to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA), where the ore will be processed into a suite of valuable products.

Higher silver and zinc prices have led Horizon Minerals to dust off the mothballed Nimbus project that sits adjacent to its flagship Boorara gold operation, some 17km from Kalgoorlie in WA’s Eastern Goldfields region. The company has set a big exploration target to chase in a drilling campaign planned for next year as it looks to ramp up its resources for an upcoming feasibility study.

Aurumin is preparing to launch into a drilling campaign to expand its gold inventory and potentially find economic iron mineralisation at its range of projects around Western Australia’s historic Mid West town of Sandstone. The company has a 946,000-ounce gold resource at its projects and recently retrieved 320 pulp samples to be assayed for the iron it identified from rock-chip sampling.

This week’s Bulls N’ Bears Runner of the Week is … antimony. The grey metal was behind significant share price jumps for Larvotto Resources and several other ASX-listed companies. Also, Dundas Minerals jumped 188 per cent on news of finding solid gold up to 9.5g/t in re-assayed samples, while other movers and shakers this week were MTM Critical Metals and First Lithium.

Novo Resources has produced a suite of high-grade gold assays after an intensive reassessment of core from past drilling at its Belltopper project in Victoria – just 50km south of Agnico Eagle’s world-class Fosterville mine. The company says its re-assaying of 11 historic diamond drillholes has confirmed multiple mineralised intercepts across several priority target corridor zones prospective for gold and other “in-demand” minerals.

King River Resources has punched 68 reverse-circulation (RC) holes for 7998m into its Tennant Creek East and Kurundi projects that sit near the town of Tennant Creek in Australia’s Top End. The $2 million drilling campaign has been designed to also test a range of new targets generated from an intensive geophysics program that was completed last year.

Reach Resources says it has secured the vital heritage clearance that will allow it to launch a drilling program at its Wabli Creek niobium-rare earths project in Western Australia’s Gascoyne region. The company now plans to target a series of highly-prospective areas at its ground after recently revealing several high-grade assays from rock chips that were taken directly from outcropping granitic bedrock.

This week’s Bulls N’ Bears Runner of the Week is … LiveHire. Its share price jumped 95.83 per cent on news of it entering a bid implementation agreement for an all-cash takeover offer priced at 4.5 cents per share – an impressive 75.8 per cent premium to its 30-day volume-weighted average price (VWAP). Other movers and shakers this week were Artemis Resources, LTR Pharma and Noxopharm.

Australia’s Foreign Investment Review Board (FIRB) has given its approval for a powerful Japanese consortium consisting of Sumitomo Metal Mining and Mitsubishi Corporation to join forces with Ardea Resources for the development of the Goongarrie Hub operation within the latter’s giant Kalgoorlie Nickel Project (KNP) in Western Australia’s Goldfields region. A joint venture (JV) agreement was signed by the three parties in April this year.

In tough recent times for many junior mining companies on the ASX, luring a financially-powerful “big dog” onto the share register to provide some much-needed muscle has become a common boardroom pursuit. Bulls N’ Bears takes look at some of those companies which have received both a timely cash injection and a share price boost up to recent highs.

Buru Energy has locked in a local drilling company to drill two oil wells in Western Australia’s onshore Canning Basin that form the centrepiece of the company’s farm-in joint venture with Sabre Energy. The campaign is set to test the promising Rafael Shallow and Mars exploration wells and binding drill rig hire agreements are to be executed shortly to enable drilling to kick off in September-October.

Terrain Minerals plans to test its promising Wildflower gold project in Western Australia later this month, with an air-core drill program for 41 holes comprising about 2100m. Drilling will test the company’s two priority targets, Wildflower and Cota, where previous drilling and soil sampling produced encouraging results that management is keen to pursue at the project that sits within WA’s Murchison gold province.

A compelling prefeasibility study (PFS) for Larvotto Resources’ Hillgrove gold-antimony project in New South Wales shows the operation will spit out an EBITDA of $652 million during a seven-year mine life. Using conservative pricing estimates, the company also revealed a post-tax NPV of $157 million, a post-tax IRR of 50 per cent and a maiden ore reserve of 606,000 ounces at 6g/t gold-equivalent.

Terrain Minerals is poised to launch a multi-mineral exploration mission at two projects in Western Australia after bolstering its bank balance with a timely $1.045 million raise from sophisticated and professional investors. The raise, including $102,000 from executive director Justin Virgin, smashed its original $750,000 target out of the park as investors scrambled to be involved in the company’s upcoming exploration plans.

This week’s Bulls N’ Bears Runner of the Week is … Killi Resources. Its share price jumped 262.5 per cent on the back of several stunning rock-chip assays that returned grades of 238 grams per tonne gold and 5.4 per cent copper. Other movers and shakers this week were Augustus Minerals, Moab Minerals and Clara Resources.

Strickland Metals has kicked its drilling program into overdrive by marching a second diamond drill rig into its Horse Well gold camp that is part of the company’s Yandal project, sitting about 85km north-east of Wiluna in Western Australia. A combined three rigs are now punching the drill bit into four prospective targets with the financial assistance of a State Government grant.

White Cliff Minerals has unearthed widespread visible iron oxide-copper-gold and uranium-silver mineralisation during the company’s initial field program at its promising Great Bear Lake project in northern Canada. The swag of targets discovered include outcropping copper-uranium-cobalt-silver mineralisation and several off-the-charts uranium readings from a handheld scintillometer. Management also revealed that a CAD$168,000 (AU$183,000) Canadian Government grant has been received to further exploration activities.

American West Metals says it likes what it sees in visual sulphide hits at the company’s Storm copper play in Canada after unveiling results of 16 holes drilled at its Cyclone deposit and Lightning Ridge prospect. Management completed 4453m of reverse-circulation drilling as it aims to upgrade and extend the Cyclone and Chinook deposits and define resources at its Lightning Ridge and Thunder prospects.

This week’s Bulls N’ Bears Runner of the Week is … Infini Resources. Its share price jumped nearly 226 per cent on the back of a slew of lab-busting soil-sampling uranium results that showed grades so high that they have been dispatched back to the lab for another round of analysis. Other movers and shakers this week were Waratah Minerals, AML3D and Wellard.

Ardea Resources has kicked off definitive feasibility study drilling planned to stretch for 51,745m in 888 holes at the Goongarrie Hub nickel project that it now shares with a giant Japanese consortium in the Western Australian Goldfields town of Kalgoorlie. The aim is to upgrade the project’s massive nickel-cobalt resource to the coveted measured mineral category to boost the confidence in its initial five-year plan.

Buxton Resources is employing a high-tech magnetic survey in a bid to define potential targets for the company’s maiden drill program at its recently-acquired Matrix manganese play in Arizona’s Mohave county. The survey will be flown at 30m flight lines above the 12-square-kilometre ground that sits on the interpreted western extension of Artillery Peak’s 277 million-tonne manganese resource grading at 2.8 per cent.

This week’s Bulls N’ Bears Runner of the Week is … InteliCare Holdings. Its shares jumped 144 per cent on the back of a $2 million capital raise to kickstart key commercial agreements for its AI-driven platform aimed at enabling the elderly to stay in their homes for longer. Other ASX movers and shakers were Encounter Resources, Vonex and Actinogen Medical.

Surefire Resources says it has identified a significant opportunity to produce high-grade iron and titanium concentrates from its Unaly Hill magnetite deposit that sits in Western Australia’s Mid West region. The company is also engaging with potential stakeholders interested in fast-tracking the development of its flagship Victory Bore project abutting its Unaly Hill ground, about 450km north-east of Perth.

Red Metal’s metallurgical testwork has given a green light to the rare earths at its Sybella play near Mount Isa in Queensland, with bulk mining and a low-cost heap leach process to lead to a potential mining operation. The company says granite-hosted soft ore that appears to be abundant in its ground, offers simple crushing and processing options that provide an economic edge to the project.

The Federal Government has paved the way for Triangle Energy Global to complete the $15 million sale of its Cliff Head oil assets off the WA coastline after approving the site for permanent offshore carbon storage. The approval confirmed today by Resources Minister Madeleine King will allow Pilot Energy to acquire the project, while Triangle will set a stronger focus on its Perth Basin targets.

Ardea Resources’ high-tech mineral processing technique has boosted the nickel-cobalt inventory at its Goongarrie Hub project near Kalgoorlie in Western Australia and earned it a healthy Federal Government grant of $1.1 million. It comes less than two months after a giant Japanese consortium committed to backing the development of the project described by the Federal Government as “globally significant”.

Middle Island Resources has secured the maximum $300,000 grant from the NT Government, which the company says is an endorsement of the significant targets at its Barkly copper-gold “super-project” in the Top End. The co-funded payment will enable the first-round testing of a spread of iron oxide-copper-gold targets at its Georgina project and one deep diamond-hole at its Bedrock prospect within the Barkly ground.

Lindian Resources has shortlisted two experienced contractors to vie for the prize of designing and constructing a processing plant at the company’s hulking Kangankunde rare earths project in the south-east African nation of Malawi. Management, which is close to completing a stage-one feasibility study for the project, says both firms have a track-record of delivering significant-scale mining and processing operations in several African countries.

The bright lights of a future Saudi Arabia are enticing Australian companies such as Surefire Resources to the Arabian Peninsula – and the company is looking to supply the minerals needed to build the Kingdom’s pipeline of significant projects planned for the coming decades. The super-wealthy country has openly acknowledged it needs help from “experienced mining heads” to help develop its fledgling industry.

ABx Group has confirmed that its “Alcore” technology has delivered its best fluorine recovery result to date, returning 93 per cent in testwork at its Technology Centre on the NSW Central Coast – increasing the company’s confidence in the commercial viability of the process. Management says detailed experimental work and an in-depth knowledge of the relevant process underpinned the impressive result.

Neometals has taken a first-hand look at the extraction of high-value metals palladium and gold from metallurgical testwork at the United State-based Precious Metals Recovery pilot plant as it considers taking an 80 per cent stake in the high-tech operation. A second trial has also now begun in a bid to replicate the success when using the preferred feedstock and re-agents process.