Bulls N' Bears (Commercial Content)

This week’s Bulls N’ Bears top ASX runner is … Kula Gold. Its share price rose 100 per cent to join fellow movers and shakers Tali Digital, Bioxyne and Venture Minerals.

A second round of testwork on Surefire Resources’ breakthrough pre-treatment metallurgy has lifted the direct vanadium recovery from its Victory Bore magnetite resource in Western Australia to 97 per cent. The company says its proprietary method alleviates the vanadium industry’s standard needs for high-pressure treatment or high-temperature roasting of pre-treated magnetite and brings significant capex and opex advantages.

Xanadu Mines boss Colin Moorhead says funding security from the company’s union with Chinese giant Zijin Mining fosters a strong investment case for production at its Kharmagtai copper-gold project in Mongolia. Just last month, the company tabled a staggering resource estimate upgrade for Kharmagtai, jumping to 1.3 billion tonnes with 3.4 million tonnes of contained copper and 8.5 million gold ounces.

BMG Resources is planning to beef up its holdings in WA’s West Arunta region – known as elephant country for niobium and rare earths – with an option to nab a 90 per cent interest in 1470sq km of ground. The package sits 30km from Encounter Resources’ Crean project and its resource of 282 million tonnes at 0.54 per cent niobium oxide and 0.17 per cent TRE0.

Askari Metals says a detailed trench sampling campaign at its Uis project in Namibia has revealed a more significant lithium-rich pegmatite system than interpreted during initial mapping, with an average thickness of about 10m. The main pegmatite body has been mapped along a strike of about 2km and includes a south-west zone with an average thickness of 21m along 350m of strike.

Perth-based explorer King River Resources is on the hunt for high-grade gold in elephant country in Australia’s Top End. It has plenty of cash and a gaggle of lucrative-looking targets begging to see a drill bit. With miners selling gold at record highs, King River’s focus on Tennant Creek in the NT, an area that has historically pumped out millions of gold ounces, is timely.

Aruma Resources is putting its shoulder to the wheel to expand the gold and rare earths footprint at its Salmon Gums project in Western Australia’s Eastern Goldfields region after completing a 63-hole air-core drilling program. The campaign included 39 holes targeting rare earths, with the other 24 drillholes following up previous drilling to assess gold-bearing lodes at the company’s Thistle gold discovery.

Testwork on ore from Infinity Lithium’s San José project in Spain has confirmed recoveries of more than 90 per cent, a result that will support a definitive feasibility study and pilot plant design. The company says the results exceed recoveries assumed in the project’s scoping study and confirm consistent production of battery-grade lithium hydroxide monohydrate from the 111-million-tonne orebody.

Joint venture (JV) partners Horizon Minerals and Dundas Minerals have hit high-grade gold from an initial drilling program at their Windanya gold project after the two companies recently completed an option agreement.

Altech Batteries is getting closer to producing its Cerenergy solid-state battery pack that uses ordinary table-variety salt following an upgrade which has transformed its previously small trial batteries up to a 60kWh capacity. The upgrade came after Altech established a strategic joint venture with Germany’s Fraunhofer IKTS, which had initially developed battery packs with 5kWh and 10kWh capacities for testing.

Venus Metals has kicked off its maiden reverse-circulation drill campaign at its Youanmi lithium project where lithium-bearing pegmatites were recently discovered at its highly-compelling Deep South lithium prospect. The Deep South lithium prospect sits 44km south of the Youanmi Gold Mine, which is about 450km north-east of Perth in Western Australia’s rugged Murchison region.

The complex mineralisation at Strickland Metals’ Marwari trend is unravelling to reveal a 2.6km-long corridor with similar gold enrichment style to that seen at Millrose – which the company sold for $61 million. The corridor contains six leads that have seen little drilling to date. The company is planning to get its drill bit in the ground in April.

Ora Banda Mining’s Sand King deposit near Kalgoorlie is firming as the preferred site for its second underground gold mine following significant high-grade results from its first-phase drill campaign. Assays from the first 17 holes sunk at the operation produced grades considered favourable for underground mining after drilling extended the mineralised system to 1km of strike and 300m below surface.

An immune system protein being developed by Radiopharm Theranostics has for the first time been shown to have the potential to detect and target a specific cellular marker found in a wide range of cancers. The company’s monoclonal antibody known as “DUNP19”, is a first-in-class therapy designed to track down, image and destroy cancer cells in human patients.

88 Energy is eyeing up contingent resources in Alaska as it prepares to flow test two reservoir intervals in its Hickory-1 well, both of which showed strong hydrocarbon indicators during drilling. If the tests are successful, the company hopes the results will lead to the conversion of some of the prospective resource to the higher-confidence contingent category.

ChemX Materials has been granted a vital patent in Australia for its 100 per cent-owned proprietary disruptive “HiPurA” high-purity alumina process as it eyes commercialisation options. The granted patent opens the pathway to global commercialisation of the company’s scalable and modular system, which it plans to take to pilot testing with plant commissioning planned for the second half of this year.

Larvotto Resources’ $8m acquisition of the Hillgrove project in NSW comes with a million ounces of gold, Australia’s biggest antimony resource, gold-laced tailings and a mothballed processing plant and exploration package that has soaked up $200m. The project was put on the chopping block by administrators when Red River Resources experienced a fall-of-ground event at its Thalanga base metals mine in Queensland and never recovered.

Red Metal Ltd’s “metallurgy-first” approach to defining the potential of its unusual rare earths discovery in Queensland has paid early dividends, with tests showing extraction levels of up to 90 per cent on two key elements. Its Sybella project represents a potentially new deposit style for Australia – and possibly the world – with its rare earths hosted by partly weathered and fresh granite extending through a 12km-by-3km area.

DiscovEx Resources’ joint venture partner Carnaby Resources has drilled a high-grade intercept of 4m running a grade of 7 per cent copper at their Greater Duchess copper-gold project in Queensland. The latest hit is included in a longer intercept from the Duchess Central Lode of 10m going 3.3 per cent copper and 0.1g/t gold, with the steeply-dipping mineralised structure remaining open at depth.

Askari Metals has secured two additional exploration concessions at its Yarrie lithium project in the prolific Pilbara region of Western Australia – and in proximity to Pilbara Minerals’ globally-renowned Pilgangoora lithium resource. The company says the acquisitions represent a significant milestone and it now plans to launch further exploration works at what it describes as a “highly-anticipated” project.

This week’s Bulls N’ Bears top ASX runner is … Avira Resources. Its share price rose more 100 per cent to join fellow movers and shakers DiscovEx Resources, Volt Power Group and Singular Health Group.

Gold Mountain is set to kick-off rare earths exploration this month at its Down Under project in Brazil, along strike from and flanking ground hosting Brazilian Rare Earths’ massive 510.3-million-tonne resource. Management says its drilling will be guided by a local geologic consultant, who will assess radiometric and magnetic data in conjunction with satellite imagery to define prospective areas begging to see the drill bit.

Javelin Minerals has renewed the exploration licences for its Husky and Malamute projects in New South Wales for an additional three years after getting the green light from the State’s resources regulator. The Perth-based explorer considers both projects to have excellent prospectivity for scandium and rare earths, in addition to precious, base and battery metals.

The United Kingdom Government has shown its confidence in Triangle Energy Global, offering it a North Sea license containing five prospects with at least 269 billion cubic feet of gas, along with multiple shallow leads. The acreage bolsters Triangle’s global portfolio as the company matures plans to drill two wells in the onshore Perth Basin this year.

Chariot Corporation has hit the ground running at its Black Mountain lithium project in Wyoming, with the first three holes drilled delivering initial hard rock results peaking at 3.09 per cent lithium oxide. The company says all three holes intersected high-grade spodumene mineralisation, confirming the potential of the lithium-caesium-tantalum pegmatite swarms at the United States-based project.

Lindian Resources is taking aim at upgrading a significant portion of its massive Kangankunde rare earths deposit in Malawi to the high-confidence indicated category ahead of a feasibility study due this quarter. The deposit’s 261 million tonnes grading 2.19 per cent TREO currently sits in the inferred category and the company hopes to make an eyebrow-raising maiden ore reserve statement as part of its study.

Buxton Resources says a second diamond drillhole into the Dogleg prospect it shares with IGO in Western Australia’s West Kimberley region has thrown up a 2.89m hit going 4.17 per cent nickel and 0.83 per cent copper from 233.63m. The hole drilled by IGO, Buxton’s ASX 100-listed joint venture partner, also reported 0.14 per cent cobalt in the same intercept.

Buxton Resources’ growing union with mining giant IGO has set up the company for a big 2024, with the latter pumping in $579,000 to help fund a new exploration campaign at their Copper Wolf joint venture project in Arizona. It comes on the back of a busy financial quarter where Buxton also advanced its Graphite Bull and Quick Shears projects in Western Australia.

AVZ Minerals has increased the resource at its Manono project in the Democratic Republic of Congo to an extraordinary 842 million tonnes at 1.61 per cent lithium oxide, representing a massive 47 per cent rise. The remarkable resource expansion comes after the company generated results from a 53-hole diamond drill campaign across 15,684m along strike from known mineralisation at its Roche Dure deposit.

Software provider K2fly says cost management remains its major focus as the company’s latest financial report today revealed a remarkable 14th consecutive quarter of annual recurring revenue growth. The ARR was at $8 million in the past quarter, up 16 per cent compared to the previous corresponding period (PCP) and revenue was at $3.4million, up 21 per cent from the PCP.

Venture Minerals has engaged resources-focused advisory company Argonaut PCF to undertake a strategic review of the Riley iron ore mine in Tasmania following increased interest due to high iron ore prices. The company believes it is in a position to consider its options after its offtake agreement with Prosperity Stell lapsed and the iron ore price rose to more than $220 per tonne in December.

Lycaon Resources is nearing heritage survey completion at its West Arunta Stansmore project as it prepares for drill-testing of its modelled 3D magnetic targets for carbonatite-hosted niobium-copper-gold mineralisation. WA1 Resources’ tier-one Luni discovery that sits 90km to the south and has a drill intercept of 30m at 4.7 per cent niobium oxide, highlights the world-class discovery potential of the West Arunta region of central Australia.