Announcements

Taruga Minerals has upped the ante at its Mt Craig project in South Australia after it identified a 34-kilometre-long copper bearing structure at the project. The ASX-listed junior explorer has identified five priority targets along the extensive Worumba Anticline with surface sampling adjacent to historic mine workings returning grades of up to 12 per cent copper.

Impact Minerals can revel in the festive season after earlier-than-anticipated results from drilling at its Rockwell prospect in NSW delivered a timely Christmas present, unwrapping encouraging sniffs of platinum group elements over at least 400m. Better assays include 61m at 0.4 g/t 3PGE from 31m including 12m at 1.4 g/t 3PGE from 73m, which in turn includes 1m at 2.3 g/t 3PGE from 73m and 1m at 2.6 g/t 3PGE from 79m.

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.

ASX-listed White Cliff Minerals has topped up the piggy bank with the sale of its Merolia gold project near Laverton for $274,000 to UK-based Panther Metals. The sale was flagged in November as part of a strategic review of White Cliff’s gold and base metals exploration portfolio, as it focuses on developing the highly prospective Reedy South and Midas projects, both located in Western Australia.

ASX-listed explorer, Impact Minerals looks to be on the money with its first reconnaissance drill program at its Rockwell prospect encountering widespread occurrences of copper-nickel-PGE anomalies over about 1.5 kilometres. The drilling included an RC hole the Perth-based company described as a breakthrough hole that intersected elevated copper over a 25m-wide sulphide zone.

Hot Chili’s ongoing drilling program has identified a second high-grade copper-gold core to its Cortadera porphyry in southern Chile. The latest results from the discovery include an extensive 248m intercept grading 0.4 per cent copper and 0.1 grams per tonne gold, hosting 32m at 0.6 per cent copper and 0.3 grams per tonne gold, from 446 metres down-hole.

Novo Resources, in conjunction with Sumitomo Corporation of Tokyo, has completed its earn-in obligations acquiring a 70 per cent interest in the precious metal rights on Essential Minerals’ Kangan project leases on the eastern side of the company’s Egina gold project tenements, in WA’s Pilbara gold region. Sumitomo joined Novo on Egina back in September 2018 via a $30m farm-in deal.

ASX-listed gold explorer, Okapi Resources, has picked up an “underexplored” historic gold project 30 kilometres south-east of Armidale near the historic Hillgrove antimony-gold mine in north-eastern NSW in a cash-and-scrip deal. The company says the Enmore gold project already boasts a couple of walk-up drill targets brimming with high-grade gold values from drilling and rock chip sampling work done by previous owners.

Western Australia-based InteliCare has continued its east coast expansion booking a significant order with Eremea Home Care Services in New South Wales. Eremea will initially take delivery of more than $150,000 of home care monitoring systems for use across its 1000 aged care and disability client base, including InteliLiving hardware and software and a 12-month subscription to the commercial InteliCare Pro platform.

Dampier Gold is set to hit the ground running in 2021 with planning underway for 30,000 metres of drilling across its Eastern Goldfields projects in WA. The aspiring miner has enjoyed a feast of success through 2020 and having recently topped up its coffers to the tune of $6 million, is champing at the bit to get back on the ground and kick up some dust.

ASX-listed Lithium Australia continues to kick goals with its unique approach to lithium-ion battery innovation with its latest modelling demonstrating improved cost efficiencies from its proprietary lithium-ferro-phosphate technology. The company now believes it has overcome all the significant cost, safety and performance hurdles it needs to produce a better product than its competitors in the expanding global electric vehicle battery market.

ASX-listed smart home technology provider, Quantify Technology, has completed an exciting merger with like-minded GSM Innovations while successfully raising $4 million. Adelaide-based GSM-I, a subsidiary of unlisted electrical specialists Gerard Private Holdings, manufactures the segment-leading Zimi integrated home technology products. The deal also sees Gerard Private take a 40 per cent major shareholder position in Quantify.

Estrella Resources has gone back-to-back at its Carr Boyd nickel discovery following up previous stellar numbers with a 20-metre thick nickel sulphide intercept from recent diamond drilling grading 1.02 per cent nickel and 0.65 per cent copper from 368.5 metres down-hole. The results also included a higher-grade core of 2.45m at 1.64 per cent nickel and 1.97 per cent copper.

TSX-listed Novo Resources has identified multiple highly prospective oxide gold targets within its newly consolidated and 100 per cent-owned Nullagine Gold Project, stretching south and east of its developing Beatons Creek project in WA’s emerging Northern Pilbara gold region. Several prospects are clustered into three separate trends which stretch across Novo’s Millennium Minerals ground for up to 50km, east from Beatons Creek.

Comet Resources says drilling is expected to commence in the new year at its 50 per cent-owned Santa Teresa Gold Project in the Baja California region of Mexico where Comet has already booked a maiden high-grade resource of 369,000 tonnes at a solid 7.47 g/t gold. The company said local contractors were already on the ground in preparation for the start-up of fresh drilling around the historical workings.

ASX-listed Canada gold explorer, Ardiden, has skidded into the northern winter festive season with plans to fan out the drilling coverage at its Pickle Lake gold project in north-west Ontario beyond the promising 110,000-ounce Kasagiminnis gold deposit to test a couple more underexplored, brownfields prospects.

Cobre has unearthed 3 priority copper targets, including a 10km long by 3km wide copper anomaly, at its recently acquired Kitlanya project on the Kalahari Copper Belt in Botswana. The company has been conducting due diligence over the extensive southern African tenure where recent exploration has included stratigraphic drilling and remodelling of geophysical surveys, as it hones in on a swag of copper-rich targets across the veldt.

ASX-listed aspiring West Africa bauxite developer, Lindian Resources, has received the Guinea Ministry of Mines’ approval to acquire a 61 per cent stake in the strategic Woula bauxite project. The company sees Woula as a possible near-term entree to production given the Woula bauxite resource’s direct shipping ore potential and the project’s close proximity to the mature Guinea bauxite industry’s transport and export infrastructure.

Native Mineral Resources is building confidence that an extensive copper system may lurk beneath its Leane’s prospect in Queensland. Shallow drilling at Leane’s has tested the near-surface, skarn-style copper mineralisation, with deeper diamond holes probing for a porphyry feeder system at depth returning broad intervals of disseminated sulphides, including chalcopyrite with assays for several drill holes due in the coming weeks.

On the back of a recent stellar share price uplift, Surefire Resources has tabled more gold intercepts at its Yidby Road and Cashens Find prospects in the Murchison Goldfields north of Perth in WA. The best intercept of the latest bunch returned 16m at 1.51 grams per tonne gold from 50m, including 4m at 4.18 g/t with one rich metre going 13.43 g/t gold from 51m downhole.

ASX-listed base metals and gold play, Si6 Metals, has taken the plunge at its flagship Maibele North nickel-copper project in Botswana with a diamond drill hole boring day and night on an exploration voyage down to more than 500m depth in the hunt for nickel sulphide mineralisation.