Public Company News

Middle Island Resources has named Roland Bartsch, a geologist with 35 years’ experience, as its new CEO. The industry veteran will lead the company’s copper-gold hunt at its flagship Barkly project in the Northern Territory. With its maiden drilling program delivering the trademarks of an iron oxide-copper-gold-style mineralisation, the company has plucked a CEO with a background of developing and managing similar projects.

Infinity Mining plans to dig deeper for gold at its Victor Bore project in the Central Goldfields after new drill results highlighted an 8m hit at 3.46 grams per tonne gold from 56m, including 1m going a solid 21.86g/t gold from 57m. A total of 13 of the 16 holes drilled at Victor Bore returned anomalous results of more than 1g/t gold.

ASX-listed oiler 88 Energy has hit the pay zone after successfully drilling at its Alaskan Hickory-1 oil well. After reaching a total depth of 3,246 metres and through all levels, the explorer discovered a new oil reservoir as it hunts for a potential billion-barrel resource. The news sent the share price 33 per cent higher by the close of day’s trading.

A women’s hospital in India has delivered good news for reproductive biotechnology innovator Memphasys, reporting the first successful birth for the company’s “Felix” sperm separation system. Memphasys has also scored a separate win with its first commercial sales in another key market – Japan. India offers Memphasys a $50 million opportunity, while Japan is twice that size.

Conico expects to transform the economics at its Mt Thirsty cobalt-nickel project near Norseman in WA by adding high-pressure acid leaching and a lithium-ion battery cathode precursor plant in an updated scoping study. The company also plans to reveal an updated mineral resource estimate ahead of an initial public offering to come later this year.

Venus Metals Corporation has upgraded the mineral resource estimate for its Bellchambers gold deposit in WA’s Goldfields region with a 35 per cent increase in tonnage and a 40 per cent rise in gold ounces. The updated JORC-compliant resource now sits at 722,000 tonnes at 1.31 grams per tonne gold for a total of 30,500 ounces at a cut-off grade of 0.5g/t gold.

Javelin Minerals’ latest testwork program has confirmed the presence of both gravity-recoverable gold and free-milling gold at its Coogee project near Kalgoorlie. Latest results also show copper can be recovered separately. Further testing will continue at the project, which last year unveiled a new gold mineral resource estimate of 1.42 million tonnes at 1.07 grams per tonne gold for a total of 49,000 ounces.

Infinity Mining has secured a five-year licence extension for its Strelley Gorge project in the Pilbara that is considered prospective for volcanic-hosted massive sulphide-style copper-zinc mineralisation. Just last year the company completed a helicopter electromagnetic survey across the site with initial data showing several conductive targets. Follow-up testing is planned for later this year.

Meeka Metals is bringing modern techniques to historical areas at its Murchison gold project with high impact drilling targeting the 25km long greenstone hosted Fairway shear zone that hosts its 700,000-ounce Turnberry gold deposit. The company’s St Anne’s gold deposit also lies in the Fairway zone and will have a mineral resource estimate scheduled for release in April. A detailed pre-feasibility study for the project remains on track for June.

Venus Metals will become a major shareholder in joint venture partner Rox Resources after the companies agreed to consolidate their ownership interests in the greater Youanmi gold project in Western Australia. Shares in Venus jumped more than 20 per cent on the back of the latest announcement to touch 17.5 cents during intraday trading after closing yesterday at 14.5 cents.

Auric Mining is set to become WA’s next gold producer after executing a 150,000 tonne gold ore toll milling agreement with the Greenfields Mill at Coolgardie for its Jeffreys Find gold deposit near Norseman. In a major milestone for the company mining will commence in early April with the 150,000 tonnes of ore to be delivered to the mill. Processing will then be completed and its gold delivered by the end of September 2023.

ASX-listed ChemX Materials has signed a memorandum of understanding to work towards an offtake deal from its high-purity manganese project in South Australia with US battery technology company C4V. The non-binding agreement is based around the potential supply of high-purity product from ChemX’s Jamieson Tank project on the Eyre Peninsula and is a significant step in the company’s plans to become a sustainable and reliable global supplier of battery materials.