Announcements

Rio2 Limited is targeting an early 2026 gold pour at its Fenix Gold heap leach project in Chile. Construction is 19 per cent complete and on budget at one of the Americas' biggest undeveloped oxide gold plays. The company has so far spent US$30.1 million of its US$135 million construction budget, with major milestones already checked off and a string of other developments to come this year.

Horizon Minerals’ updated mineral resources summary highlights a massive nickel boost from its recent merger with Poseidon Nickel, which has added a huge spread of nickel icing to its Kalgoorlie golden cake. Some 422,000 tonnes of nickel metal now bolster the company’s mineral portfolio, which also includes 1.8 million ounces of gold scattered across a plethora of Goldfields deposits, including several being mined to benefit from a surging gold price.

Javelin Minerals has completed a maiden 22-hole reverse circulation drilling program at its recently acquired Eureka gold project, 54km north of Kalgoorlie in WA’s Eastern Goldfields. The 2779m campaign was planned to confirm and possibly expand the existing 2.45Mt JORC-compliant resource, which averages 1.42g/t gold for a contained 112,000 ounces of gold. About 62,000 ounces are in the indicated category.

Lindian Resources has executed a binding agreement to grab the remaining 25 per cent share of the Lelouma bauxite project in the African nation of Guinea to take full ownership of the tier-1 asset. The company will be targeting direct shipping ore from the current resource containing a whopping 900 million tonnes grading 45 per cent aluminium oxide.

Kalgoorlie Gold Mining has launched a fresh air core drilling campaign at its Lighthorse gold discovery near Pinjin in WA’s Laverton Tectonic Zone. The 100-hole program will punch 5500m of drilling along a 2.4km corridor. Rigs will target a 1400m extension to the north and tidy up patchy historic drilling across 1000m to the south. The program is set to wrap up within three weeks.

Great Southern Mining has assayed 3m at 2.55g/t gold from 33m, including 1m at 6.48g/t gold, in the final results from a February RC drilling program at its Golden Boulder East trend at its Duketon project in WA. The hole included a separate 2m hit going 1.81g/t gold from 42m. A second hole probed 1m assaying 1.02g/t gold from 53m and 2m at 1.42g/t gold from 60m.

This week’s Bulls N’ Bears ASX Runner of the Week is… Redstone Resources, which announced a biblically deep drill hole to test for copper in WA’s West Musgrave area. Anteris Technologies ran on a $9/share price target from US-based Cantor Fitzgerald’s research department and Jindalee Lithium shot up on news its flagship McDermitt project had received US government backing to be listed on a strategic fast permitting framework.

Latitude 66’s KSB project in Finland is a key part of a wide-scale, European Union-funded geophysical and geological exploration and innovation program hunting for new critical mineral resources. The imminent $9M UNDERCOVER project aims to increase Europe’s raw materials production and will include the Kuusamo Schist Belt, which hosts Latitude’s flagship project.

McLaren Minerals has put a bow on a 6000m air core drilling campaign at its flagship McLaren titanium project in WA’s Eucla Basin, aiming to improve resource definition and progress feasibility studies. The six-week program covered 64 per cent of planned priority locations, with infill drilling enhancing the existing 280-million-tonne resource and step-out holes revealing thick new heavy mineral sands zones to the north and east.

American West Metals has revealed a sizeable new copper target at its Storm project in Nunavut, Canada, with historical drill tests intersecting visual copper sulphides at its newly titled Midway prospect. The company says a 2018-hole intersected 58m of visual sulphides, primarily chalcocite, with intervals containing up to 2.5 per cent estimated sulphide content.

With upgrades almost completed and a first gold pour under its belt Aguia Resources is about to kick off a 2500m diamond drill campaign targeting down-dip extensions to the vein systems at the company’s Santa Barbara gold project in Colombia. Aguia aims to deliver a maiden JORC resource for the project by year’s end. The company has also received government approval to sell its gold.

This edition of Bulls N’ Bears Big Hits singles out an exceptional recent hit. Patriot Battery Metals’ latest caesium discovery in Quebec, Canada, includes a best hit of 5m at 13.2% caesium oxide, while another hole produced a top grade in 1.1m at 26.61% caesium oxide.

Fear or fortune? Bulls N’ Bears takes a look at some ASX-listed companies trading at sub-1c a share that are flying under the radar despite doing interesting things after Trump’s tariffs sent the market sharply south. Should they indicate fear or point to fortune? You be the judge.

Dateline Resources has kicked off a bankable feasibility study at its 1.1-million-ounce Colosseum gold project in California, aimed at transforming the deposit into a long-life, high-margin open pit operation. By planning a two million tonnes per annum process operation, the company is targeting 75,000 ounces of gold production per year across 8.5 years, all as gold prices soar past US$3400 per ounce.

This week’s Bulls N’ Bears ASX Runner of the Week is… Grand Gulf Energy, after it acquired an option over a billion-barrel oil prospect off the coast of Namibia. Meteoric Resources announced a maiden resource for its ionic clay deposit in Brazil, Aus Strategic Materials flourished under US rare earths supply concerns following Chinese export bans and NeuroScientific Biophamaceuticals acquired an innovative and life-changing stem cell technology company.

Image Resources has shipped its first heavy mineral concentrate from its new Atlas project in the Dandaragan shire, 170km north of Perth, under an existing off-take agreement used for its previous Boonanarring project. The company shipped a nominal 10,000 tonnes of wet HMC from the port of Geraldton last week, just two months after commissioning the plant.

In a dramatic plot twist, Xanadu Mines has indefinitely postponed a shareholder meeting to approve a 25 per cent sell-down of its massive 4.7- million-tonne copper and 11-million-gold-ounce Kharmagtai project in Mongolia to Zijin Mining. The company says the delay will allow both parties to discuss a range of potential corporate outcomes. The big question is: What’s brewing behind the scenes?

Strickland Metals jumped 21% to 11c after securing $5M from Chinese mining giant Zijin to turbocharge drilling at its 7.4M-ounce Rogozna project in Serbia. The strategic placement gives Zijin a 2.4% stake and adds firepower to Strickland’s drill blitz, including a fast-track push to deliver a maiden resource at the high-grade Gradina gold deposit. Zijin already operates major copper-gold projects in Serbia, adding weight to the new alliance.

GreenTech Metals has hailed significant results from its first two diamond drill holes at its Whundo volcanogenic copper-zinc project south of Karratha, including 7.14m at 1.46% copper and 1.23% zinc from 277.16m. That intercept from the company’s unmined Austin conductor target includes 6.3m going 1.84% copper and 1.4% zinc from 278m, including 3.45m assaying 2.42% copper and 2.41% zinc from 278m.

Galan Lithium has announced a transformation partnership with US lithium expert Authium for a funding and offtake package that will propel its Hombre Muerto West lithium brine project toward first production. The deal includes a fully funded and operated plant to be supplied by Authium, eliminating a substantial US$41.5 million (A$65.5M) in capital expenditure for Galan.

In a major step toward its clean energy pivot, Pilot Energy has secured $5 million via a heavily oversubscribed placement priced at an impressive 100 per cent premium to its last trade. Pilot will use $4.5M to shore up the acquisition of a remaining 82 per cent stake in the Cliff Head oil project from Triangle Energy.

Ardea Resources has secured a pivotal $4.6 million strategic placement from Japanese joint venture partner Sumitomo Metal Mining to progress the company’s mammoth Kalgoorlie Nickel project in Western Australia. The cash injection will primarily fuel working capital, ensuring Ardea’s expert team continues to drive the ongoing $98.5M definitive feasibility study, which Sumitomo will pay for.

Aurum Resources has smashed out another big gold hit in West Africa, striking a massive 89 metres at 2.42g/t gold from 213m at its Boundiali gold project in Cote d’Ivoire. The standout hit came from its BDT1 deposit, which makes up part of Aurum’s 1.59-million-ounce gold JORC resource. The drill bit also picked up sections of 7m at 14.46g/t gold and 6m at 9.01g/t gold in the hole.

Askari Metals’ recent trawl through a historical exploration database at its Uis project in Namibia has identified significant tin, tantalite and rubidium mineralisation within its licence area. The review reveals “exceptionally high” tin, tantalum and rubidium responses from a 492-sample rock chip database, with assays including 3.17% tin oxide, 5226ppm tantalum pentoxide and 0.87% rubidium oxide.

Kalgoorlie Gold Mining has struck gold up to 9m grading 3.52 grams per tonne from 58m in fresh rock at its Lighthorse project near Pinjin, 140km northeast of Kalgoorlie. The company says the first-pass reverse circulation drill program appears to have cracked the code by confirming high-grade primary mineralisation exists below a shallow supergene blanket that was discovered two months ago.

St George Mining plans to start a maiden drill program within weeks focussing on expanding a 40.64Mt rare earths resource estimate from early April for its Araxá project in Brazil. The company’s mineral resource estimate for the venture came in at 41.2Mt and 0.68 per cent niobium pentoxide and 40.6Mt and 4.13 per cent total rare earths oxides.

Strickland Metals has hit top gear at its monster 7.4-million-ounce gold equivalent Rogozna project in Serbia by mobilising a sixth diamond rig to fuel what the company says is the biggest drilling campaign in the project’s history. The fresh rig is hard at work at the gold-rich Gradina deposit as part of Strickland’s effort to deliver a maiden resource at the prospect by the end of the year.

Aurumin Limited has wrapped up its latest RC drill program at the company’s Johnson Range project, which is part of its wider Central Sandstone gold project in the WA Goldfields, as it aims to ramp up its existing 64,700-ounce resource. The project is on a granted mining lease and near multiple processing centres, potentially enabling near-term development and mining opportunities to cash in on a roaring gold price.

Triangle Energy has started drilling its hotly anticipated Becos-1 oil exploration well in Western Australia’s Perth Basin. The rods for the conventional well started spinning two days ago to target a fault-trapped rock layer called the Bookara Sandstone from the Triassic period. The company estimates there could be 1-21MMbbl in the pay zone, with a best guess of 5MMbbl.

Javelin Minerals has kicked off its maiden drill program at the company’s recently acquired Eureka gold project, 50km north of Kalgoorlie, targeting extensions to mineralisation outside its existing 112,000 gold-ounce resource. The company has hit the ground running and has already completed four holes at the southern end of the Eureka pit and plans to test several high-grade targets to the pit’s north.

Ardea Resources has completed a 287-hole infill reverse circulation drilling program to support potential resource classification upgrades at its vast Goongarrie Hub nickel project, 5km south of Menzies. The company drilled 186 holes at its Big Four prospect for 10,238m, while 101 holes were put in at Scotia Dam for 6332m. Ardea has sampled a total of 16,570m of vertical holes at 2m intervals over their full depths.

This week’s Bulls N’ Bears ASX Runner of the Week is… Osteopore Ltd after its 3D-printed bone regrowth implants were approved by the European Union for distribution. Leeuwin Metals’ historical gold results unveiled extensive shallow high-grade mineralisation over 3km at its new Marda project in WA, Golden Horse Minerals returned stellar gold extensions at its WA project and Pivotal Metals ran up on no news other than renewed interest in its Canadian copper project with a sizeable resource.