Public Company News

ASX-listed Cobre Limited’s largest shareholder, Metal Tiger, moved to maximise its shareholding in the budding base metals explorer this week. The savvy investment fund ploughed a further $310k into Cobre in a placement that will see Metal Tiger holding 19.99 per cent of the company as it ramps up exploration across the revered Kalahari Copper Belt in Botswana.

ASX-listed clinical-stage oncology company, PharmAust, has achieved a further annual extension to its current contract with the Drugs for Neglected Diseases initiative, or “DNDi”. The extension marks the 13th year that PharmAust’s wholly-owned subsidiary, Epichem, has been engaged by DNDi. The contract is expected to generate up to $1.02 million in revenue during 2021.

ASX-listed agribusiness developer, Alterra’s sale of the final sections of its “non-core” Dambadgee Springs farming property in Dandaragan north of Perth has gone unconditional. The final tranche of the overall transaction, which incorporates the rights to income from the nearby Yandin wind farm, comprised two blocks of land that fetched $2.8 million. The property was sold to a local farmer for a total price of $4.4 million.

St George Mining is set to hit the ground running in 2021 with ongoing exploration at its Mt Alexander project continuing to identify a swag of new EM targets. Geophysical surveying at the project has lit up a grab bag of new sulphide targets for drill testing whilst the company’s program of metallurgical test work has delivered excellent recoveries of both nickel and copper from the Strickland ore body.

Neometals and its giant JV partner, German-headquartered SMS group have delivered on key design, procurement and permitting milestones, paving the way for its lithium-ion battery recycling demonstration plant to be built. The innovative pair recently received approvals to build the demonstration plant at SMS’s manufacturing centre in the German town of Hilchenbach as they look to commercialise their joint recycling technology in Europe.

Origin Energy has given Buru Energy a significant shot in the arm by farming into seven of Buru’s oil and gas permits in the onshore Canning Basin in Western Australia. The farm-in significantly strengthens Buru’s planned 2021 exploration program, including drilling of the highly prospective Rafael 1 oil well. Origin will spend $35 million inclusive of a two-well drilling program and seismic work.

Godolphin Resources has again returned some tantalising RC drill hits it says continue to point to the margins of a potential copper-gold porphyry-style mineralised system at its Turrawonga discovery in NSW’s Lachlan Fold Belt. Notable intercepts from the latest round of drilling were 30m at 0.64 g/t gold and 0.04 per cent copper from 178m including 18m at 1.0 g/t gold, which in turn includes a 2m section going an intriguing 6.9 g/t.

Native Mineral Resources looks to be closing in on the deeper source of copper mineralisation at its Leane’s prospect in Far North Queensland, with drilling returning some interest tweaking hints of the red metal. Latest results from Leane’s include 6 metres at 0.33 per cent copper including 1 metre at 0.61 per cent copper from 74 metres down-hole. Results from deeper, sulphidic diamond drilling are currently in the laboratory awaiting assay.

Lithium Australia’s 90 per cent-owned subsidiary, Envirostream Australia, has harvested the grain from its test site in WA’s Wheatbelt, completing its trial of zinc and manganese derived from recycled alkaline battery waste as a source of fertiliser micronutrients. Envirostream will now move on with the statistical analysis of the grain and overall yield to assess the performance of the micronutrients.

Vancouver-based Novo Resources has defied the weather gods to keep the refurbishment of its Golden Eagle gold processing facility on schedule and budget as the company closes in on first gold production from its developing Beatons Creek mine in WA’s East Pilbara. The TSX-V-listed budding Pilbara gold producer is also set to graduate to a listing on the main Toronto Stock Exchange next year.

Podium Minerals is set to pocket $2.4 million after finalising a deal with privateer, EV Metals Australia, for its nickel tenure north of the Parks Reef PGM deposit in WA. ASX-listed Podium, will peg a new mining lease to secure its position over the Parks Reef deposit, with EV Metals set to take ownership of the balance of the existing Weld Range tenure.

PolarX’s drilling program over its Zackly East discovery in Alaska has extended the strike length of the prospect to more than 300 metres and continued to return anomalous intercepts including 1.5 metres at 5 grams per tonne, 3.15 per cent copper and 26 grams per tonne silver from only 11.6 metres down-hole.