Public Company News

Askari Metals will accelerate lithium exploration at its Uis project in Namibia after meeting the conditions for $2.5 million in strategic equity investment by global battery materials supplier Huayou International Resources. Huayou will subscribe for 4.5 million fully-paid ordinary shares in Askari at an issue price of 55 cents per share. Askari has a current share price of about 40c, offering a healthy premium.

Emu NL has enlarged its mineralised footprint in the heart of Esperance’s rare earths region after rock chips returned results of up to 1242 parts per million total rare earth oxides (TREO) from its latest reconnaissance survey. Management says fieldwork from outcropping Booanya suite granites has revealed high-value magnet rare earth oxides averaging about 22 per cent of TREO grade from 28 rock-chip samples.

Infinity Mining will kick off a maiden 1700m RC drilling program at its Brisbane nickel-chromium prospect in the Pilbara in early June. The company will drill 10 holes across its ultramafic basal contact target where previous rock chips returned up to 0.764 per cent nickel and 0.892 per cent chromium and also where electromagnetic survey returned a prominent conductive target that may represent nickel sulphides.

Globe Metals & Mining has ticked off a 10-tonne sample from its Kanyika niobium project as part of a plant feasibility study in Malawi. Management says it will be used to design a pilot plant, a testwork program and for commercial grade offtake samples. Globe recently became the first to sign a Mining Development Agreement with the Malawian Government for the advancement of its project.

Meeka Metals has bumped its total Murchison gold project resource up to 12.7 million tonnes at 3g/t for 1.215 million ounces of gold after revealing an initial oxide gold resource from its St Anne’s deposit. The St Anne’s resource of 270,000 tonnes at 2.8g/t gold for 25,000 ounces will be included in the company’s Murchison prefeasibility study to be released in June.

Aruma Resources has produced lithium concentrate from early metallurgical testwork at its Mt Deans project, 10km from Norseman in WA. Floatation has recovered 80 per cent of the lithium into 25 per cent of the mass with capture of tantalum, tin, potassium, rubidium and caesium giving the prospect of valuable additional by-products. Further testwork is to be undertaken with fresh outcropping pegmatite samples.

Infinity Mining is gearing up for its first East Pilbara drill campaign for 2023 after receiving cultural heritage clearance from the Nyamal Aboriginal Corporation to explore its Hillside nickel-copper project. The company has appointed iDrilling Australia to kick off a nine-hole RC program to test surface geochemistry and anomalies highlighted in a 2018 air-borne electromagnetic survey.

Venus Metals and IGO have inked a binding agreement for exploration – and possibly development and extraction – at the pair’s Henderson nickel-lithium project in WA’s Eastern Goldfields. The deal involves a farm-in and joint venture in which a subsidiary of IGO can progressively acquire up to a 70 per cent interest in the project by spending $4 million on exploration and reimbursing Venus with $1 million.

WA explorer Terrain Minerals has extended an induced polarisation survey at its Smokebush project in the State’s Mid West region after its initial scrutiny picked up a third hidden target that has more than whetted its interest. Key permits have already been granted, with drill rig quotes also received, and Terrain hopes to get the drill bit spinning by the end of next month.

Horizon Minerals is targeting extensions to its known resource of 270,000 tonnes at 4.99g/t gold in a new drilling campaign at its high-grade Penny’s Find gold deposit, 50km north-east of Kalgoorlie. The company will drill 2400m of RC with diamond core tails. Penny’s Find gold production will follow Horizon’s Cannon gold mine, which will start production in the second half of this year.

Surefire Resources has commissioned METS Engineering to undertake vital metallurgical testwork at its Victory Bore project in Western Australia’s Mid West region to help further its bid to impact Australasia’s emerging vanadium battery sector. Management hopes the move will boost the project’s value by finding a streamlined separation process to extract vanadium from its magnetite hosts.

Galan Lithium has labelled its beefed-up resource “world class”, with 6.6 million tonnes of lithium carbonate equivalent at 880 milligrams per litre lithium at its Hombre Muerto West project in Argentina. Management says it is the third significant resource upgrade in three years and 72 per cent of the new figure sits in the higher “measured” category, representing 4.7 million tonnes grading 873 mg/l lithium.