Welcome to our roundup of some of the most interesting mining investment, exploration, and development stories on Theassay.com from the last week.
Financing news
There were two acquisition stories this week. The first was Argentina Lithium & Energy Corp. (TSXV: LIT) has closed a private placement for aggregate gross proceeds of $3,326,000.
The company has also closed the acquisition of the Rinconcita II mining concession area located on the Salar de Rincon in Salta Province, Argentina from provincially owned company Recursos Energéticos y Mineros Salta S.A. (REMSA).
The proceeds of the financing were used, in part, to complete the acquisition of Rinconcita II from REMSA. The balance of the proceeds will be used for general working capital and exploration on its properties in Argentina.
In consideration for the acquisition of Rinconcita II, the Company made a payment to REMSA of US$2,500,000 and granted REMSA a 3% net smelter return of mineral and refined products sourced from Rinconcita II over its production life if the property advances to the production stage.
The second acquisition story was First Mining Gold Corp. (TSX: FF) has moved to the threshold of fill ownership of Beattie Gold Mines Ltd.
The remaining 45,000 common shares of Beattie Gold, representing 2.4% of Beattie Gold’s outstanding common shares, have been tendered and deposited under the Beattie Offer.
Together with the 97.6% of the outstanding common shares of Beattie Gold that have already been tendered and deposited under the Beattie Offer, First Mining will own 100% of the outstanding common shares of Beattie Gold upon closing of the Beattie offer.
New exploration and development
There has been plenty of development news over the last seven days, starting with Galileo Mining Ltd (ASX: GAL) intersecting massive sulphide mineralization which displayed the potential for high-grade zones within the mineralized system from the company’s Callisto palladium-platinum-gold-rhodium-copper-nickel discovery within the company’s 100% owned Norseman project in Western Australia.
“Intersecting massive sulphides at the shallow depth of 190m downhole is an exceptional result from our first programme of diamond drilling at Callisto,” Managing Director, Brad Underwood, said.
Kairos Minerals (ASX: KAI) reported that it is confident its Mt York project has emerged as a top-shelf Western Australia gold project with genuine scale and ongoing growth potential following the release of a significantly upgraded resource.
The 26% increase in the resource stems from recent highly successful drilling campaign; ~15,000m of drilling completed in 2021.The 1,104,000oz Au resource has increased to 1,329,000oz Au at 0.5 g/t Au lower cut-off. The company says the resource growth also reflects extension of assumed pit depth to consider significant mineralization excluded from previous inventory.
“This substantial resource increase is a game-changer for Kairos on several levels,” Managing Director, Dr Peter Turner, said.
Maritime Resources Corp. (TSXV: MAE) announced feasibility study results for its 100% owned Hammerdown Gold Project in the Baie Verte mining district of Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada.
The company’s Feasibility Study supports a technically straightforward, brownfields open pit mine and gold processing operation benefiting from low capital investment and rapid payback.
Drilling results
In drilling news, Cannindah Resources Ltd (ASX: CAE) has expanded the known extent of the copper rich breccia deeper and further than any previous drilling with new assay results from the drilling programme currently underway at the Mt Cannindah copper gold silver project south of Gladstone near Monto in central Queensland.
“Once again Mt Cannindah has delivered a huge copper result, which pushes the high-grade copper breccia further to the northeast and deeper in that area than any previous drilling,” Executive Chairman, Tom Pickett, said.
Hot Chili Ltd (ASX: HCH | TSXV: HCH) has drilled a new, shallow high grade, copper-silver drill intersection from its Valentina copper deposit in Chile.
The new drill result represents exceptional near-surface grades, providing an exciting potential additional front-end ore source for the company’s Costa Fuego coastal range copper-gold development.
Assays results returned for VALMET0002, a twin Diamond Drill (DD) hole of Reverse Circulation (RC) drill hole VAP0009 recorded 3.0m grading 12.1% CuEq (11.8% Cu & 52.6g/t Ag) within a broader drilling intersection of 12m grading 4.6% CuEq (4.5% Cu & 16.5g/t Ag) from 25m depth down-hole.
Production news
Cerrado Gold Inc. (TSXV: CERT | OTCQX: CRDOF) has announced its operational and financial results for the second quarter of 2022. Q2 2022 represents the third quarter of mine operations post completion of operational restructuring at its Minera Don Nicolas (“MDN”) Mine in Argentina.
Q2 2022 financial and operational highlights include the production of 11,296oz of gold in Q3 2022 (11,640 Gold Equivalent Ounces), this runs in line with the annual guidance of 45,000 – 55,000oz of production.
The average gold head grade of 3.44g/t represented a decrease over the previous quarter due to the integration of new mining areas but is expected to improve in the second half of the year. AISC of $1,409/oz of gold sold due to lower head grades and throughput during the quarter.
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