Matt Birney

Legend Mining’s aircore drilling program for its Area D prospect at the Rockford project in the Fraser Range of WA has given the company encouragement that it is zeroing in on a larger mineralised system. Recent assay results from drilling at the D4 and D5 conductors turned up strongly anomalous nickel, copper and cobalt results, as the company seeks to define a high-grade sulphide system in the area.

Geopacific Resources has appointed former Bank South Pacific Limited Group CEO Ian Clyne as its Chairman to drive financing arrangements for the company’s flagship Woodlark gold project in PNG. Last November, the company released a DFS supporting the project’s development, saying the project could generate $257m in free cash during the first five years of production and about 1 million gold ounces over 13 years.

Kairos Minerals has started its exploration field season in WA’s Pilbara region on two fronts, following up extensive surface gold anomalies previously identified at the Croydon project and investigating the gold and lithium potential of its Kangan project. At Croydon, work is underway to investigate a prospective conglomerate horizon along strike from recent gold nugget discoveries and anomalous results from geochemical sampling.

Hot Chili has outlined thick zones of porphyry-related copper and gold mineralisation during its maiden RC drilling campaign at the large Cortadera deposit located in central Chile. Results included 122m @ 0.6% copper and 0.3g/t gold directly from the surface, including a high-grade intercept of 20m @ 1.2% copper and 0.5g/t gold from 40m down-hole, related to a wide supergene enriched zone of copper.

TNG Ltd has been granted Vietnamese patents for its proprietary TIVAN technology for the extraction and recovery of high-purity vanadium, complementing its existing patents in Australia, Russia, Canada and the US. The patents provide further protection for the hydrometallurgical process as it progresses its Mount Peake vanadium-titanium-iron project in the Northern Territory.

Hammer Metals’ rock chip sampling at the Malbon region near Mount Isa in northwest Queensland has returned intriguing grades of up to 12.9 grams per tonne gold and 15.8% copper and identified the new Speculation, Pioneer Prince and Alice-Kings trends. The company said that outcrop in the area is sparse and further mapping and sampling would be required to understand the extent and structural controls of mineralisation.

Blackstone Minerals is set to acquire a 90% interest in the advanced Ta Khoa nickel project in northern Vietnam from AMR Nickel Limited over a 12-month period costing AUD$1.6m in cash and scrip. The project includes an existing 450,000 tonne per annum concentrator and is located in a prospective, underexplored district that contains numerous massive and disseminated sulphide occurrences with nickel, copper, cobalt and PGEs.

Massive UK investment fund, M & G Investments, who has a whopping £286b under management, has stumped up $6.3m to cornerstone Perth small cap, Troy Resources’ latest capital raise. Troy will use the money to develop a resource at its exciting, high grade, near mine exploration play in South America known as Ohio Creek, that looks set to turbocharge the economics of its operating Karouni gold mine.

Adriatic Metals has intersected very encouraging, thick intersections of base and precious metals mineralisation from drilling in its new Concession area at the northern end of the exciting Rupice prospect in Bosnia. The new results include 30m @ 9.7% zinc, 5.2% lead, 265g/t silver, 4.6g/t gold, 0.4% copper and 43% barite from 246m down-hole that will be incorporated into a mineral resource estimate for Rupice later this year.