Announcements

Horizon Minerals is on the path to generating its first cash flows from mining its Boorara gold deposit in WA after entering an ore sale agreement with Paddington Gold for the treatment of 1.4 million tonnes of ore at the Paddington mill. The agreement will start in the next quarter and run for 22 months, with the mill sitting about 56km by road from Boorara.

Shaw and Partners WA State Manager Davide Bosio waxes lyrical about the stubbornness of junior gold exploration stocks that many thought would run hard or be taken over amid the highest of gold price highs. Is this a perfect setting for M&A activity? Will junior gold stocks finally be dragged skywards by the inevitable M&A activity that should flow from times like this?

In the first of Bulls N’ Bears’ new weekly series, “Doug Bright’s Greatest Hits”, our senior analyst gets the dirt under his well-worn fingernails to pull apart some of last week’s most intriguing ASX finds. The column will run the rule each week over a range of commodities, geological successes, oddities and matters of processing and metallurgical interest.

This week’s Bulls N’ Bears Runner of the Week is … Krakatoa Resources. Its share price jumped 130 per cent on a Meekatharra niobium find to join fellow movers and shakers Adisyn, Canterbury Resources and Pivotal Metals.

Phase one drilling at Chariot Corporation’s Black Mountain hard rock lithium project in Wyoming has wrapped up, with all holes hitting highly-fractionated pegmatites and high grades expected to soon emerge. Buoyed by the fractionated nature of the drill intercepts, the company is prepping the drill bit for phase two efforts to follow grades as high as 1.12 per cent lithium oxide from the first three holes.

ABx Group has expanded the rare earths resource at its combined Deep Leads-Rubble Mound-and Wind Break deposits in Tasmania by 70 per cent, to 89 million tonnes at a grade of 844ppm total rare earths oxides. Importantly, the resource contains what the company describes as “the highest proportion of combined dysprosium and terbium magnet rare earths oxides of any clay-hosted rare earths resource in Australia”.

A recent trip to several Chinese lithium producers has reinforced Lithium Universe’s commitment to building its proposed 16,000 tonnes per annum battery-grade lithium carbonate refinery in Canada. The trip, undertaken by the company’s key management figures, took in the Jiangsu lithium carbonate refinery that was built by Lithium Universe executives Iggy Tan, Dr Jingyuan Liu and John Loxton during their time with Galaxy Resources.

Meeka Metals says a $180,000 WA Government grant is a glowing endorsement for its 100 per cent-owned “kilometre-scale”, gold-rich Circle Valley project near Esperance in Western Australia’s deep south. Previous drilling at the project has thrown up impressive gold drill hits as high as 16m at 1.5g/t drilling is scheduled to begin in the second half of this year.

Si6 Metals will assume a more commanding role in its Brazilian critical minerals joint venture with Foxfire Metals after lifting its stake in the partnership to a 70 per cent interest in any future licences – up from its 50 per cent share in the existing 10 licences. It signifies Si6’s commitment to its already massive Brazilian ground-holding, which is prospective for rare earths and lithium.

A surging uranium price has led Toro Energy to re-evaluate the mineral resource of its Dawson Hinkler deposit in Western Australia, leading to a 115 per cent increase in the site’s contained uranium oxide. Management says the market supports a lower cutoff grade for the deposit’s economics, allowing it to lift its resource from 9.44 million pounds of uranium oxide up to 20.29 million pounds.

Novo Resources will kick off 4km of RC drilling next week to follow up on high-grade gold hits reaching up to 6m at 6.12g/t at its Nunyerry North prospect, about 150km south-west of Port Hedland in Western Australia. Results from the company’s maiden drill program turned heads, with other intercepts running as high as 11m at 2.52g/t from 22m including a 6m chunk at 4.19g/t.

A successful Lindian Resources infill drill campaign has underpinned an indicated resource boost of 61 million tonnes at 2.43 per cent total rare earth oxides (TREO) at the company’s giant Kangankunde project in Malawi. Management confirmed this morning that the updated indicated resource also includes a higher-grade component of 25 million tonnes at an impressive 3.26 per cent TREO.

After getting a long-awaited green light last week to start exploring its Stansmore niobium-rare earths project in Western Australia’s West Arunta region, Lycaon Resources is now building a war chest to fuel its mission. The company today revealed it had completed a $2.5 million capital raise and also secured a $180,000 State Government grant to drill two holes to test its Stansmore and Volt prospects.

A recent drone aeromagnetics survey by Buxton Resources has unveiled a north-east-trending cluster of magnetic anomalies in the south-central part of the company’s 100 per cent-owned Wolverine prospect in Arizona. The cluster coincides with the orientation of copper-molybdenum mineralised porphyry dykes, with rock chip sampling yielding 1.2 per cent copper and 383ppm moly next to Buxton’s permitted drill site.

Aurum Resources has reassembled part of the management team that helped establish Tietto Minerals’ Abujar gold mine in West Africa to drive the development of its new Boundiali operation in Côte d’Ivoire. The company has named Yao N’Kanza as country manager, reuniting him with former Tietto workmates Caigen Wang and Yaya Ouattara in a bid to expedite Aurum’s project and business development initiatives.

Triangle Energy Group has capped off a solid quarter, raking in $6.54 million courtesy of oil sales associated with its Cliff Head JV partnership with Pilot Energy. The proceeds are earmarked for high-impact exploration drilling near Geraldton in Western Australia’s Mid West region, with the company set to kick off its hunt for hydrocarbons at the Booth-1 well by July.

Horizon Minerals has tipped $2.93 million into its till after selling a share package it received from Vox Royalty late last year following a royalties divestment deal relating to gold projects in WA’s Goldfields region. Horizon also collected an initial $4 million when the agreement was struck and Vox later decided to complete the deal via the share package instead of a further cash consideration.

Mining software provider K2fly has recorded a remarkable 15 straight quarters of annual recurring revenue (ARR) growth, which it says has been driven by contract renewals from two major clients. According to its March quarterly report, the company delivered an ARR of $8.3 million in the first three months of the calendar year, representing a 19 per cent increase compared to the previous corresponding period.

Larvotto Resources says engineering studies have shown it can double the process plant throughput at its Hillgrove gold-antimony operation in NSW up to 500,000 tonnes per annum, with only minimal upgrade and modification required. The company says its capacity to produce gold concentrate and doré in conjunction with antimony concentrate can easily be increased by expanding the crusher feed rate from 220,000 tonnes per year.

A giant Japanese consortium has committed to backing the development of Ardea Resources’ Goongarrie Hub project in Western Australia’s Goldfields region – a major milestone for the nickel-cobalt operation billed by the Federal Government as “globally significant”. Sumitomo Metal Mining and Mitsubishi Corporation have agreed to join Ardea to form an incorporated joint venture to be known as Kalgoorlie Nickel.

Buxton Resources is poised to launch a drilling campaign to pump up the 2014 mineral resource at its Graphite Bull project in Western Australia’s Gascoyne region after securing clearance from a recent Aboriginal heritage survey. The company can now complete infill drilling along a 2.1km potential strike zone where drilling last year confirmed further high-grade graphite mineralisation at the project.

Galan Lithium says it already has a contained inventory of 1000 tonnes of lithium carbonate equivalent at its Hombre Muerto West project in Argentina as the initial evaporation process at the site builds steam. The company says about a third of the overall project has been completed, with total pond construction at 45 per cent and the first two evaporation ponds operating.

Strickland Metals says it has delivered samples from its first three diamond drillholes in Western Australia’s Yandal gold belt to the laboratory for assay, while reverse-circulation and diamond drilling is continuing. The company says it expects assay results to be returned in June. All three holes were drilled at Palomino, with two being put into the existing mineral resource for structural information.

DiscovEx Resources is on the cusp of a major transformation after its bid to snare Finland-based private Australian company Latitude 66 Cobalt was given a unanimous tick of approval from that firm’s board of directors. Latitude owns several projects in Finland, with its most advanced project containing Europe’s second-biggest undeveloped cobalt-gold resource that features 5800 tonnes of cobalt and 650,000 ounces of gold.

This week’s Bulls N’ Bears Runner of the Week is … Osteopore. Its share price hiked up more than 478 per cent to join mining movers and shakers Base Resources, Orion Minerals and Rincon Resources.

Buru Energy’s interpretation of 3D seismic data from its wholly-owned conventional Rafael condensate-rich wet gas discovery has thrown up a new shallow resource in its exploration permit in the Canning Basin. The new target zone, which it has designated Rafael Shallow, consists of two clastic reservoirs sitting at less than 1200m depth, with one stacked about 130m to 170m above the other.

The door has been kicked open for Lycaon Resources to start exploring its Stansmore niobium-rare earths project in Western Australia’s West Arunta region after it secured consent from Mines Minister, David Michael. The company says the approval will allow it to start exploration programs, including heritage and gravity surveys and drilling campaigns, on a site designated for the use and benefit of its Aboriginal inhabitants.

ra Banda Mining has further bolstered its bank balance after pocketing $11.71 million as its lucrative joint venture deal with business goliath Wesfarmers at the Davyhurst project in Western Australia’s Goldfields region nears completion. Ora Banda will now receive a final $4.29 million next week to complete the Davyhurst transaction after all conditions of the deal were satisfied.

Xanadu Mines continues to deliver positive metallurgical testwork for its Kharmagtai copper-gold project in Mongolia, with its latest figures showing recoveries of up to 94 per cent copper and 92 per cent gold. Management says tests using the “Eriez HydroFloat” system showed the company could recover valuable minerals within the 150-to-200 micron range that conventional flotation methods are unable to achieve.

Aurum Resources has scored high-grade gold hits charging as high as 45 grams per tonne from scout drilling at just the second target to be tested at its Boundiali project in West Africa’s Côte d’Ivoire. Diamond drilling designed to test a 1.7km-by-1km gold prospect revealed solid initial results, with a 6m section going 9.95g/t gold from 165m including 2m at 28.9g/t from 169m.

Galan Lithium has taken a major step towards selling product from its Hombre Muerto West lithium brine project in Argentina both locally and internationally after signing a crucial new deal with the Catamarca Government. Managing director Juan Pablo Vargas de la Vega and Catamarca Governor Raúl Jalil signed a commercial agreement that supports the grant of permits for the commercialisation of Galan’s lithium chloride concentrate.

Aurumin has secured five new exploration tenements to stretch its near 1 million-ounce Sandstone gold operations that sit about 600km north-east of Perth in Western Australia’s historic East Murchison region. The tenements sit on more than 60 square kilometres of the Youanmi terrane greenstone and consist of various historical workings and old deposits that make up several compelling targets.