Matt Birney

Medicinal marijuana player, MGC Pharmaceuticals, is looking to tap into one of Europe’s largest public markets through a dual listing on the London Stock Exchange in the second half of the 2019 calendar year. The company will be one of the first medical cannabis companies to list in the UK since legislation was changed in 2018 to allow doctors to prescribe medical cannabis to patients.

Rox Resources has signed a binding term sheet to earn up to a 75% interest in Cullen Resources’ Mt Eureka tenements that host extensions of the company’s existing Fisher East nickel deposits. Rox can earn a 51% stake in Mt Eureka by spending $1m on exploration within three years and the remaining 24% by spending an additional $1m on exploration over a further three-year period.

King River Resources has flagged the potential to further reduce the estimated capital cost of its giant Speewah vanadium/titanium/iron project in WA’s Kimberley region by USD$152m to USD$524m. According to a recommendation by Perth-based engineering firm, Como Engineers, the cost reduction could be achieved by reducing the planned start-up mining rate to correspond with a more standard-sized acid plant installation.

Alterra has executed a three-year local partner services agreement with West Australian-based avocado grower, French’s Group. French’s Group will provide local representation, assistance with origination and assessment of investment opportunities, localised production experience and technical support to Alterra in the Peel, South West and Great Southern regions of WA.

Horizon Minerals has firmed up confidence in the Crake prospect within its Binduli gold project near Kalgoorlie after drilling returned a top intersection of 3 metres grading 7.41 grams per tonne gold from 81m down-hole. The results demonstrate both width and grade continuity across a 450m strike length with the company saying that mineralisation remains open in all directions.

Calidus Resources has kicked off a major drilling campaign at its Warrawoona gold project located near Marble Bar in WA’s eastern Pilbara region, which is aimed at improving confidence in the existing mineral resources and expanding the mine-life beyond the initial six years. The work will be centred around the Klondyke open pit and underground resources, but will also include regional greenfields exploration at Klondyke West.

ClearVue Technologies is jumping on the growing micro-home bandwagon with the signing of a collaboration agreement with Swedish developer Attefallshus AB. Under the agreement, Attefallshus will integrate ClearVue’s proprietary solar glass window technology into its micro-homes and other construction projects where appropriate, exclusively in Sweden, Denmark, Norway and Finland.

Spectrum Metals’ ongoing drilling campaign at the Penny North gold discovery near Youanmi in WA continues to impress. The company has now extended the length of its high-grade ore shoot to 260 metres with exceptional new intersections like 3m @ 83.7g/t gold. Spectrum has also revealed more gold mineralisation from Penny South, beneath the historical Penny West pit, with 2m @ 17.1g/t gold from 182m down-hole.

Lithium Australia has now extended the strike of lithium-bearing pegmatites at its Youanmi project near Sandstone in WA’s Murchison region to over 2,500 metres after its recent drill campaign returned more lithium hits. The results include a top hit of 1 metre grading 4.1% lithium oxide from 23m down-hole within a broader intercept of 6m @ 1.6% lithium oxide from 22m.

Blackstone Minerals has nailed a plethora of new nickel sulphide exploration targets from its maiden geophysical survey program at the emerging Ta Khoa project, west of Hanoi, in northern Vietnam. The induced polarisation survey showed a strong correlation with existing positions of nickel mineralisation at the flagship Ban Phuc prospect and outlined new targets at the Ban Khoa and King Snake prospects nearby.

TNG Limited has flagged the potential to reduce mining costs and costs associated with waste haulage of tailings at its flagship Mount Peake vanadium-titanium-iron mine in the Northern Territory. The company said this could be achieved by focussing on two higher grade vanadium pits during the first 10 years of operation, which will lower ore mining and processing rates without affecting production.

Australian telco disruptor, Vonex, has officially launched its partnership with Australia’s largest business to business loyalty program, Qantas Business Rewards. The partnership allows businesses of any size in the QBR program to earn reward points for their expenditure on the company’s products and has the potential to grow its brand awareness, recognition and sales growth.

Clutching an armoury of excellent previous gold drilling results, Classic Minerals is now well and truly blooded and up for the hunt at Kat Gap near Southern Cross. The ASX minnow has kicked off a new drilling campaign aimed at testing down-dip projections of high-grade mineralisation it previously intersected with drilling to focus on the 400 metres of strike to a depth of about 100m, double the average depth of previous holes.

Venus Metals and Rox Resources have recommenced reverse circulation drilling to follow up on high-grade hits of more than two ounces to the tonne gold at the Currans Find North prospect, near Youanmi in Western Australia. The current drill program will explore the down-plunge and along-strike extensions of the high-grade gold mineralisation that was intersected in previous drilling.

Hammer Metals is gearing up to kick off its maiden drill program at the Bronzewing South gold project in Western Australia over several targets that are located immediately south and along strike of Echo Resources’ 4 million ounce Bronzewing mine. A recent survey over these targets identified conductive zones that are in most cases spatially associated with areas of higher gold accumulation anomalies in historical drilling.

Buru Energy has identified the potential for an 11 metre oil pay zone in the Upper Anderson section after completing wireline operations at its Adoxa-1 conventional oil exploration well on shore in the Canning Basin, Western Australia. The company will now case the well before mobilising the NGD 405 rig to drill the nearby Ungani-7H production well at the Ungani oil field before returning to Adoza-1.

AVZ Minerals has improved on initial metallurgical test work at its giant Manono project in Africa with the production of a lithium concentrate grading 6.6% with recoveries of 70.4% from ores crushed to a finer size than in previous tests. The company has also updated President Tshisekedi Tshilombo from the Democratic Republic of Congo and senior government officials on the progress being made at the project.

ClearVue Technologies, has secured a significant foothold in the US for its solar glass “PV technology” after signing a collaboration agreement with sustainable infrastructure specialist AquaGen Infrastructure Systems. Under the agreement, AquaGen will integrate ClearVue’s energy generating windows into all of its planned sustainable village developments, some of which are already at an advanced planning stage.

Altech Chemicals is proceeding with its German equity strategy to sell up to a 49% stake in its high purity alumina, or “HPA” project for USD$100 million to Frankfurt Stock Exchange-listed company, Youbisheng Green Paper. Altech is also acquiring a 29% stake in Youbisheng, which will change its name to Altech Advanced Materials and seek to raise up to €70 million in new equity to fund the acquisition.

TSX-listed conglomerate gold explorer, Novo Resources, has unearthed an Aladdin’s cave of gold nuggets in a single pathfinder trench at its exciting Egina gold project, near Port Hedland in WA’s Pilbara region. 162 gold nuggets weighing 324 grams were plucked from the trench in the first pass with most of them recovered from a swale in the underlying basement rock near the northern end.

St George Mining has intersected nickel-copper sulphide mineralisation that extends known zones of high-grade mineralisation at the Investigators prospect within its Mt Alexander base metals play near Leonora in WA. The drilling includes a top intersection of 15.1m of sulphide mineralisation from 172.2m down-hole in an area where there has been very limited drilling to date.

MGC Pharmaceuticals has added another notch to its belt with 100 patients that have been prescribed or are being processed to receive prescriptions of its medical cannabis-based pharmaceutical products in Australia. The company has also extended its local reach after Tetra Health, who assists medical professionals and patients to obtain safe access to medicinal cannabis products, added MGC’s products to their product range.

Lithium Australia has hit another milestone on its road towards recycling lithium-ion batteries with the successful production of lithium phosphate from mixed metal dust derived from waste battery electrodes. The company is currently in the process of using this lithium phosphate to produce lithium-ferro-phosphate cathode powder that will then be used to manufacture coin cells for testing.

BlackEarth Minerals’ ongoing test work has confirmed that spherical graphite produced using concentrates from its flagship Maniry project in Madagascar, meets specifications required by lithium-ion anode manufacturers. Additionally, the test work by German testing outfit, Dorfner ANZAPLAN, has achieved production yields of up to 52%, well above the industry average of around 40%.

Surefire Resources is finalising a drilling program to test anomalous zones of gold mineralisation previously identified within greenstones at its Victory Bore project located near Sandstone in Western Australia’s Mid-West region. Previous drilling in the 1990s defined a gold-in-soil anomaly about 4.4 kilometres long and up to 750 metres wide with a top intersection of 8m @ 10.2g/t gold from just 20m down-hole.

Venus Metals and Rox Resources have commenced a 5,000m aircore drill program at their Venus JV near the topical Penny West gold mine in the Youanmi region. The companies are targeting a prominent magnetic low identified by an airborne survey which includes the historical Penny West gold mine, the historical Magenta and Columbia prospects and Spectrum Metals’ recent Penny North discovery.

Strike Energy has inked a fourfold increase in the net reservoir within the secondary objective Wagina sandstone to 10.2 metres with porosities of up to 14% at its multi-target West Erregulla-2 well in the Perth Basin, Western Australia. The company said this compares favourably to the nearby producing Beharra Springs fields, which flowed up to 38 million cubic feet of gas per day from a 10.4 metre net gas reservoir in the Wagina sandstone.

Northern Minerals has signed an offtake agreement with German raw material distributor thyssenkrupp Materials Trading for the purchase of all heavy rare earth carbonate produced from its Browns Range pilot plant project near Halls Creek, WA. The offtake agreement will commence immediately, with all current stockpiled product and future production included in the agreement.

Black Rock Mining’s Mahenge project in Tanzania has successfully produced spherical graphite that exceeds industry standards for battery anode materials with yields of up to 53% and purity of 99.98% TGC during a large-scale trial in a commercial environment. The results are higher than Chinese industrial benchmark yields of between 35% and 45% and purity of 99.5% TGC and replicate results achieved during laboratory testing.

MGC Pharmaceuticals has received the green light to start construction of its large scale, GMP compliant medical cannabis production facility in Malta that will increase its existing production capacity after signing a long-term lease agreement for the 6,000 square metre site. The site works for the facility will commence immediately and the company plans to start construction of the multi-storey building during the current quarter.

Buru Energy has observed hydrocarbon shows after intersecting the secondary target Anderson Formation at its Adoxa-1 conventional oil exploration well in the Canning Basin, Western Australia. The significance of these individual sand bodies with hydrocarbon shows in cuttings samples will be evaluated with wireline logs once the well is completed to its total planned depth of 2,200m.

Sovereign Metals’ new Wofiira rutile prospect in Malawi just got interesting, with analyses of the titanium-rich ore concentrate showing the products are likely suitable for all major markets, including the chloride pigment, titanium metal and welding flux sectors. Metallurgical studies show that the ores have a favourable particle grain size distribution, comparable to other leading natural rutile products in the market.