Public Company News

Fresh from last month’s $3.5m capital raising, Reedy Lagoon has wasted no time signing up a contractor to begin exploration drilling at its Columbus Salt March lithium brines project in Nevada. Boart Longyear has been contracted to drill a deep, large-diameter core hole that will extract brine samples from depths of up to 1000 metres.

Nzuri Copper has now taken final delivery of $10milllion from a placement to Chinese mining giant Huayou Cobalt and is kicking 2018 off on an upbeat note as it steps up the hunt for copper riches in central Africa. The Perth-based, ASX-listed junior will use the funds to develop its flagship copper-cobalt project in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and to shore up its prospects from an aggressive exploration campaign.

Altech Chemical’s journey towards development of a high-purity alumina plant has taken another significant step from drawing board conception to sod turning reality with the application for a manufacturing licence from Malaysian authorities. The Perth-based company has also applied for ‘pioneer status’ in a bid for the project to be awarded a special tax exemption for the first five years of operation.

St George Mining has extended the strike length of nickel-copper sulphides at its Cathedrals prospect to 400 metres after assays revealed more high-grade drill hits from step-out holes. The latest results from Cathedrals, part of the Mt Alexander project just south of the Agnew-Wiluna belt, continues an exceptional run of news that has driven a rally in St George shares since November.

A land access and exploration agreement between Kalia Ltd and Bougainville locals has brought the minerals rich PNG island a step closer to reviving its former mining glory. The signing represents the first significant endorsement of the new Bouganville mining act in the now autonomous country that vests all mining rights with customary land owners. Kalia now has a serious first mover advantage.

After failing to hit target depth at all three maiden drill holes at its alluring Chile Gold project due to technical failures, Perth based ASX listed explorer Emu N.L has received a temporary setback and has remobilised a new drilling contractor at the project. Emu is about to test their intriguing theory of a large gold system sitting under a geological "steam cap" in a region that is rich with world class players.

After experiencing frightening stripping ratios in 2017 at the Wiluna Gold project, Blackham Resources now appear to have unearthed enough high-grade ore to produce a solid 2018. The company mined almost as much gold in the last month of 2018 as the entire September quarter and is building high-grade stockpiles for the first time in almost a year.

ASX-listed MGC Pharmaceuticals will fast track an Australian operational base to cultivate medicinal marijuana after the federal government announced a plan to legalise exports of cannabis-based medicines. MGC said the regulatory changes, expected to be in place from February, would allow it to establish a pharmaceutical grade medicinal cannabis cultivation strategy to target key export markets.

Medical marijuana company MGC Pharmaceuticals has launched its first “Derma Plus” skin repair product which has been specifically developed to treat mild forms of psoriasis and has hit the shelves for sale through MGC’s website and existing eCommerce platforms. The product is available in Australasia, the European Union and the lucrative North American market, where 29 states and counting have legalised marijuana for medicinal use.

Northern Minerals has swelled its war chest by $9.74m with a debt and equity program to further develop and expand the life of its Browns Range rare earths project near Halls Creek in the north of Western Australia. The Perth-based junior revealed that it has long-term mining aspirations to increase the life of the full scale, expanded project from 11 years to 20 years.

DroneShield has secured critical radio-frequency safety certification for its DroneGun anti-drone countermeasure device. The new approval allows DroneGun to be used within specific frequencies to intercept, jam and retrieve invasive drones deployed for nefarious purposes. The latest approval satisfies a number of international requests from major defence and government procurement agencies.

New assay results from the Mt Remarkable gold project, 200km south of Kununurra, suggest 100%-owner King River Copper has barely scratched the surface of this forgotten gold field in the East Kimberley. Gold mineralisation on the Trudi vein, which recently produced an 11-metre interval at 27.9 g/t gold, is now shown to extend over a strike length of 1km, three times its previously known extent.