Public Company News

ASX-listed explorer, White Cliff Minerals’ maiden RC drilling program at its historic Reedy South gold project near Cue in WA’s Murchison Goldfields has returned some encouraging initial gold sniffs including seven metres at an average grade of 3.16 grams per tonne from 53m depth, 11m at 2.29 g/t from 21m, 16m at 1.74 g/t from 72m and 7m at 1.5 g/t from 48m.

Venture Minerals has jumped on voracious investor appetite for iron ore players to raise $10 million in an equity placement, with the bulk of the funds set to be funnelled into its Riley hematite project in north-west Tasmania. The company received commitments from sophisticated, professional and institutional investors for the capital raise via the placement of 181.81 million new Venture shares.

Delecta Limited has joined the hunt for gold in the United States, picking up the Speedway gold project in western Utah. The company’s latest acquisition is situated in the Great Basin district, which boasts a total endowment of more than 200 million ounces of gold. The company’s sampling program has already returned several anomalous results including assays of 1.24 g/t gold and 43.8 g/t silver.

Horizon Minerals has wasted little time shaking off any festive season cobwebs and fired up the drill bit again as it edges closer to finalising a feasibility study on the potential development of its Boorara gold project near Kalgoorlie. The company has resumed its massive exploration campaign targeting a multitude of advanced and early-stage prospects within 75km of the proposed Boorara gold processing plant site.

Lithium Australia is confident an evolution in the global electric vehicle industry will underpin a 500 per cent expansion in the lithium-ferro-phosphate type, lithium-ion battery market within the next 10 years and is preparing to reap the windfall. The company’s subsidiary, VSPC has successfully developed new lithium-ion battery cells using lithium ferro phosphate, under its patented processing technology developing advanced cathode powders.

ASX-listed West Africa gold explorer, Mako Gold, has added a second drill rig to its workforce in a significant expansion of its gold exploration program around the Gogbala and Tchaga prospects at its flagship Napié project in Côte d’Ivoire. The second RC/DD drill rig will target geophysical anomalies mapped up along a 5km portion of a 23km long soil/auger anomaly running through its Napié tenement.

Lindian Resources has been buoyed by the successful results of screening test work done on high-grade sample ores from the Bouba conglomerate bauxite deposit at its Gaoual project in Guinea. The company says the simple dry screening process used significantly reduced the levels of the silica impurity and delivered an increase in the aluminium oxide grade in high-grade conglomerate ore samples, with minimal loss of tonnage.

Horizon Minerals has cleared a $4 million debt with Germany-headquartered investment group, Sparta with the early repayment of $4.6 million, including interest, courtesy of a successful trial gold production campaign at its flagship Boorara gold project near Kalgoorlie. The contract mining and toll milling exercise has also delivered “important” grade reconciliation data for the consolidated feasibility study on Boorara currently being undertaken by Horizon.

Barton Gold has landed a major concession by the South Australian government with the Tunkillia gold project being granted “new mine” status. New mine status will reduce the effective royalty rate payable to the government on any gold production from 3.5 per cent to 2 per cent, potentially delivering a multi-million dollar saving to the company and an additional incentive to expedite a move to production.

Australian Bauxite’s 89 per cent-owned chemical refining subsidiary, Alcore has clinched the services of Dr Mark Cooksey as its Chief Executive Officer after he filled the position on a leave arrangement with national science agency, the CSIRO. Australian Bauxite says Dr Cooksey’s appointment is a shot in the arm for Alcore’s efforts to commercialise a new process for aluminium fluoride production.

Aspiring ASX-listed heavy rare earths developer Northern Minerals, has delivered on its pre-Christmas plan with 8,500m of RC drilling at its Browns Range project in WA’s East Kimberley region. The results produced some solid hits including 9m at 0.54 per cent TREO from 53m downhole and 11m at 0.37 per cent TREO from 52m in two separate holes at its greenfield Toad prospect.

Si6 Metals has kicked off an RC drilling program at its Monument gold project about 40km west of Laverton in WA following an encouraging reconnaissance rock chip sampling program. The latter returned several high-grade values including 39.3 g/t gold, 25.8 g/t, 21.3 g/t and 13.15 g/t from the Fred’s Well prospect, and 21.5 g/t, 15.15 g/t, 15.15 g/t and 10 g/t at the Perseverance prospect.