Bulls N' Bears (Commercial Content)

BlackEarth Minerals is nearing completion of its maiden drill program at the Maniry project in Madagascar and will report a JORC-compliant resource by the end of June. The program has outlined two continuous graphitic lenses 900 metres long and up to 50m thick from surface. The company is undertaking comprehensive mineralogical and metallurgical test work programs to determine the quality of its defined graphite product.

Myanmar Metals has hit a 23m drill intersection in Myanmar that is brimming with lead, zinc, copper and silver with excellent grades. The company is now compiling its highly anticipated maiden JORC- resource for the project. Last week the company received Government advice allowing it to proceed with the exercise of the Bawdwin option, where it will acquire 85% of the project.

There’s more to Ironbark Zinc than just the giant Citronen zinc project in Greenland, with the company and heavyweight joint venture partner Glencore lifting the pace of exploration at their high-grade base metals project in NSW. The companies are about to fly a high-tech EM survey at the Captains Flat project near Canberra, where drilling has already produced exciting base metal hits.

Draig Resources has grown its holdings in the northern Goldfields by over 2,000 square kilometres in a mining district well endowed with gold and base metals. Historical exploration was largely ineffective due to poor outcropping and masking cover that downgraded the potential. The company believes there is great opportunity for the discovery of new mineral resources on the new tenements.

King River Copper has secured two new tenements in the underexplored Tennant Creek copper-gold belt in the Northern Territory. Its extensive 6,634km2 tenement holding is highly prospective for iron oxide copper gold deposits similar to Westgold’s Rover 1 project nearby. The company is awaiting grant of its remaining applications and it is collating drill programs to target priority positions later this year.

Metallurgical testwork shows Galena Mining’s Abra deposit is not only one of the world’s most significant undeveloped lead-silver deposits in terms of tonnes and grade, but it also has the mineralogy to produce clean, high-grade concentrates. New testwork for the PFS shows lead recoveries of 90% plus and concentrate grades of more than 72%, well above the typical quality of other operating mines says Galena.

The historic Wiluna gold project never fails to surprise the market with the latest drilling by Blackham Resources uncovering multiple extensions of high-grade shallow mineralisation right on the doorstep of the rejuvenated mill. The company said it was working on another upgrade of resources and reserves after a string of gold hits, including 16m at 4.41 g/t from just 2m below the surface.

The election of a new pro-mining Government in Greenland might just be the enabler required for Greenland Minerals to fast track its massive rare earths and uranium project into production. The incoming Government has specifically expressed its support for developing Greenland’s rare earths and uranium riches, the largest and most advanced owner of which is Perth based Greenland Minerals.

Shares in Azumah Resources have jumped by more than 50% on spectacular gold hits from its Wa project in Ghana, including 44m at 5.37 g/t gold. The West African-focused explorer believes a new geological model has led it to a high-grade oreshoot that could plunge to extensive depths and may lead to a material upgrade in resources. The company has enough funding to find out too.

Neometals has announced it has mined a bulk sample of high grade titanium-vanadium ore from its Barrambie project for dispatch to metallurgy research institutes in China. The material selected is potential ore feed for a future direct shipping operation and samples will undergo extensive beneficiation and pyrometallurgical test work to confirm the optimal processing pathway ahead of offtake pricing negotiations with the Chinese.

Australian Potash has announced the appointment of Jay Hussey to the position of Chief Commercial Officer to take charge of the company’s DFS for its Lake Wells potash project near Laverton. Mr Hussey is a fertiliser industry executive, having served 10 years as VP of China’s Migao Corporation. He has an extensive background in potash marketing, supply contracting, off-take and JV negotiations.

Galena Mining has commenced deep exploration drilling at its Woodlands copper prospect, 200km north of Meekatharra. The company is targeting two high priority electromagnetic targets delineated last year from heliborne geophysical surveys. The targets coincide with historical drill intersections that include 60m @ 0.3% copper from 505m and 3m @ 1.6% copper from 188m down-hole.

Security surveillance company Spectur will roll out state-of-the-art artificial intelligence technology on its suite of security camera systems, enabling its remotely monitored solar-powered cameras to learn and recognize peoples’ faces, vehicle number plates and even specific objects. Perth-based Spectur expects field trials of the new smart camera technology to commence in the next two months.

Emu NL says it might be on the cusp of an exciting gold-silver discovery at the Vidalita project, within the strongly mineralised Maricunga belt in Chile. The company has completed a drill campaign that identified wide intervals of rock types, textures and alterations that could represent the top of a high value, epithermal gold system. Visible sulphides were intersected beneath anomalous surface sampling.

With the wet season out of the way, King River has finally begun follow up drilling at Mt Remarkable in the East Kimberley, where drilling in November produced one of the year’s most exciting gold hits. One rig is already on site, and another is on its way to the high-grade epithermal gold discovery that produced 11m at 27.9 g/t gold, including 1m at 90.7 g/t.

Terrain Minerals is about to kick off its maiden drill program at the Red Mulga project, 100km east of Kalbari. The company believes that a large mafic-ultramafic geological complex may exist at the project, based on anomalous nickel, copper and chromium assays returned from surface sampling. Drilling will also target elevated gold, copper, silver and lead assays returned from extensive quartz veining.

Legend Mining has announced anomalous nickel-copper assays from an aircore drill program at its Rockford project in the Fraser Range of W.A. The work returned results up to 37m @ 0.34% nickel and 0.22% copper from 56m depth, extending the mineralisation at the Area D prospect to over 300 metres. The company also reported that end-of-hole drill chips contained nickel-copper sulphide minerals.

Blackham Resources suddenly has more gold reserves available for processing through its existing Carbon in Leach plant at the Matilda-Wiluna project thanks to positive results from recent metallurgical testwork. The testing found that transitional ore between oxides at the surface and the bedrock sulphides is suited to CIL treatment, and can be processed at a 30% lower cost than previously thought.

After a period of relatively low activity, ASX listed junior, Spectrum Rare Earths looks like it has stumbled across a potential company maker in Northern California. The Perth based company has locked down an option to purchase a mothballed, fully permitted gold mine that has historically produced around 250,000 ounces of gold at an amazing average grade of around an ounce to the tonne.

Northern Minerals’ heavy rare earths project at Browns Range in the East Kimberley appears to be timed to perfection following last week’s shock announcement of production cut backs by China. With construction of Browns Range on track to be completed next month, there could hardly be a better time for Northern to emerge as the only dysprosium source outside of China.

Strike Energy’s share price has been on a white knuckle ride over the last few weeks as investors desperately try to work out if it is going to be the next large cap gas producer in Australia, or fail whilst daring to create a new technical frontier in the search for coal seam gas riches. Strike significantly de-risked its Jaws-1 well this week with the installation of a liner and its fracture stimulation sleeves.

In what appears to be a serious opportunity for W.A, the smart money in the lithium space is now moving downstream into the production of lithium-ion battery chemicals such as lithium carbonate and lithium hydroxide and the mining of lithium is now looking a bit like the poor cousin. Neometals has kicked off its engineering and design study for a proposed Kalgoorlie lithium hydroxide plant.

In what looks to be an astute move, Calima Energy is set to race from 20% to outright ownership of its coveted Montney shale liquid/gas project in Canada through friendly, all-scrip takeover bids for its joint venture partners. The Perth-based junior has secured board recommendations and pre-bid acceptances from several major shareholders in a deal that will bulk up its profile in the revered oil and gas basin

Hot Chili has announced a $4m placement to fund a drill program at the El Fuego copper project in Chile. The program is aimed at increasing high grade mineral resources and extending the initial mine life of the flagship Productora asset beyond 10 years. The small scale mines at San Antonio and Valentina will be targeted first, having defined potential for extended shallow, high grade copper sulphide mineralisation

Phylogica has continued its march towards commercialisation of its game-changing drug delivery platform, after the Perth company boosted its disease-fighting genome library in the March quarter. Phylogica said it has improved both the complexity and biodiversity of its collection of genomes as it progresses its journey towards animal-based clinical trials of the unique intracellular drug delivery technology.

Geopacific has announced a $10M placement to advance its resource development drilling at the Woodlark gold project in PNG. The company is completing a DFS and the new drill programs are aimed at increasing resource and reserve inventories to extend the initial mine life beyond 10 years. The capital raise had strong support and the company said it could now potentially triple its gold endowment.

In a tour de force of drilling expertise, Strike Energy and its big-name drilling contractors have successfully completed one of the most difficult wells ever attempted onshore in Australia. Strike reported that the Jaws-1 horizontal well had met its objectives and was being prepared for hydraulic stimulation, sending the junior explorer’s shares up by more than 10%.

Is it a zinc play ? Is it a lead play ? Is it a gold play ? Is it a copper play ? Perhaps a silver play ? How about a barite play ? Investors may well be asking these questions of the Adriatic Metals float that will debut on the ASX today with a multi-mineral beast of a deposit in mineral rich Bosnia. Base metals giant Sandfire Resources has ploughed $2m into the float and will hold nearly 8% of the company.

ASX-listed specialist pumping company Babylon Pump and Power is in full swing, with the company reporting robust revenues for the March quarter on the back of strongly performing specialty rental and diesel businesses. The recently listed Kalamunda-based company says year-to-date revenues have now hit $1.5m as it accelerates its rental, rebuild and maintenance offering in the resurgent mining sector.

Lithium Australia’s large scale pilot plant to be based on its SiLeach processing technology has received a boost, with test work achieving a breakthrough that improves lithium recoveries and enhances the production of a key by-product. The results have led to an innovative change to the process that has the potential to reduce capital and operating costs and strengthen the project economics.

A decrease in Chinese production of dysprosium highlighted by research commissioned by Northern Minerals, has placed an increasing focus on the company’s Browns Range rare earths project. Chinese production has dropped by 34% since 2013 and research consultants Adamas Intelligence believe Chinese production will be insufficient to cope with global demand for the burgeoning electric vehicle market.

A big oil and gas liquids discovery near Calima Energy’s acreage in the Montney Basin has added yet more backing for the company’s early move into one of the hottest shale basins in North America. The nearby discovery tested at more than 2,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day and was rich in highly prized condensate and other natural gas liquids. Calima's move into the area is starting to look smart.