Bulls N' Bears (Commercial Content)

White Cliff Minerals is set to resume its maiden RC drilling program this month at the historic Reedy South project 40km north of Cue in WA’s Murchison Goldfields. The company managed to churn out 38 holes for an aggregate coverage of 3,537m at Reedy South before Christmas and it is now looking to sink the final five holes totalling about 1,400m targeting depth extensions to the known mineralisation.

Kairos Minerals has returned a clutch of encouraging gold drill hits from a round of RC drilling at its Mount York gold project in WA’s Pilbara region. One of the more notable drill intercepts from the 16-hole program totalling 2,130m was 5m going 2.67 g/t gold from 60m including 3m at 3.78 g/t from 61m and 1m at 6.37 g/t gold from 63m at the project’s Old Faithful deposit.

With a fresh $20m in the vault, ASX-listed Northern Minerals has tabled the final results of the 2020 drilling blitz at its 100 per cent-owned Browns Range heavy rare earths project in WA. A total of 72 holes have tested several targets, confirming the existing resources at the Dazzler deposit and indicating the potential for new resource growth close by.

Impact Minerals has uncovered what it believes to be the most prospective targets in its entire portfolio at the Aspley copper-gold prospect in its Commonwealth project in NSW’s Lachlan Fold Belt. The company has prioritised the new targets and believes it is drilling for jam in a zinc doughnut. The anomalies were uncovered following a geophysical survey and the company has fast-tracked its drilling program.

Horizon Minerals has reeled off a swag of high-grade gold drill hits from another of its core satellite gold deposits that form part of its proposed Boorara gold production hub, 10km east of Kalgoorlie. Infill and extensional drilling carried out at the company’s Jacques Find gold deposit at the Teal gold camp returned bonanza shallow high-grade intersections including 19.2m at 12.53 g/t gold from 42m and 8m at 12.10 g/t from 60m.

Blackstone Minerals continues to strike nickel sulphides at the company’s King Snake discovery in Vietnam, with diamond drilling intersecting 19.55 metres of disseminated to massive sulphide mineralisation within the emerging high-grade vein system. This latest interval follows up on a raft of new intercepts from two electromagnetic targets identified below the high-grade discovery, with the sulphide lode appearing to thicken at depth.

Classic Minerals has returned a plethora of high-grade gold hits from a significant infill and extensional drilling program at its Kat Gap gold project about 170km south of Southern Cross in WA. Stand-out drill intersections were 3m at 12 g/t gold from 127m including 1m at 17.90 g/t, 2m at 9.45 g/t from 174m including 1m at 17.80 g/t, and 4m at 7.96 g/t from 77m including 1m at 20.90 g/t from 77m.

Pet owners have rallied to help ASX-listed PharmAust start to evaluate the effects of its newly formulated anti-cancer drug, Monepantel on dogs suffering from B-cell lymphoma in a planned phase IIb clinical trial. The Perth-based company, who hopes to further substantiate Monepantel’s tumour-reduction qualities, says several hounds have already been successfully recruited and have commenced treatment with Monepantel tablets.

Diamond drilling by gold producer in waiting, Calidus Resources, has threaded the eye of the needle, striking gold more than 600 metres below surface at its under-construction Warrawoona gold mine in WA’s East Pilbara region. According to the company, the narrow, high-grade gold drill hits provide it with plenty of encouragement for a potential longer-term underground mining proposition at Warrawoona.

Having made good on its promise to breathe new life into Eastern Goldfields Ltd’s Davyhurst gold project near Kalgoorlie after that company fell over a couple of years ago, Ora Banda Mining has moved to usher in a new management era with the appointment of Peter Nicholson as its new CEO. Mr Nicholson hails from global mining-focused private equity firm Resource Capital Funds.

ASX-listed Altech Chemicals’ 75 per cent-owned German subsidiary, Altech Industries Germany is set to begin a pre-feasibility study on the potential construction of a battery materials high purity alumina coating plant in Germany. The company says the PFS will assess the commercial viability of building the plant, which would coat anode-grade battery materials with HPA using its own alumina coating technology.

Ardiden has picked up an encouraging hint of gold-bearing mineralisation similar to that of an adjoining historical high-grade gold mine from drilling at one of its high-priority brownfields targets within its Pickle Lake gold project in north-west Ontario, Canada. The company’s South Limb prospect is located immediately along strike of the former Dona Lake mine, which produced 246,500 ounces of gold from ore grading 6.6 g/t before closing in 1993.

Terrain Minerals is hunting down a wealth of newly defined gold targets in WA’s Murchison Goldfield, with geophysical surveying at its Smokebush project highlighting key prospects for drill testing. The company recently completed detailed ground magnetic surveys across the Monza, Paradise City and Wildflower targets with each of the developing prospects having previously returned anomalous gold results.

Podium Minerals is drilling again at its Parks Reef platinum group element discovery in WA’s Mid West as it sets about filling in up to 6.5km of strike length along the mineralised trend which now totals around 15km. Drilling to date has delivered an inferred mineral resource containing almost 1.4Moz of combined platinum, palladium and gold, plus some base metal credits.

Legend Mining’s strategy at its Mawson nickel discovery in WA continues to pay dividends, with first-pass metallurgical test work knocking out high-grade nickel and copper concentrate samples. Recent test work produced two critical products, with the primary stream yielding a concentrate grading an impressive 13.1 per cent nickel, whilst the secondary stream delivered a copper concentrate weighing in at a stunning 31.8 per cent copper.

Element 25 has bounded over the final hurdle in its bid to become an international manganese concentrate producer, this week locking down a vital groundwater allocation from the Department of Water and Environmental Regulation at its Butcherbird Project in Western Australia’s southern Pilbara region. The allocation was the final domino to fall in the approvals process and the company says the project is now shovel ready.

Barton Gold has executed two Native Title Mining Agreements with the Gawler Ranges Aboriginal Corporation RNTB. The most important of the agreements involves three exploration tenements covering the entirety of the Tunkillia project. A second agreement was inked to cover a small portion of one lease over the Tarcoola project area 70km north of the 965,000-ounce Tunkillia gold deposit.

ASX-listed Infinity Lithium has become involved in a Spanish battery consortium led by one of its key strategic partners, EIT InnoEnergy that hopes to snare a whopping €1.2 billion in pandemic recovery funding from the Spanish Government. The company’s San Jose lithium project may be in line for a €256 million CAPEX injection if the consortium’s application is successful.

Horizon Minerals has decided to hang onto full ownership of the historic Nimbus silver-zinc project near Kalgoorlie adjacent to its flagship Boorara gold project after turning down several acquisition and farm-in proposals for the asset. Nimbus hosts high-grade lodes totalling 260,000 tonnes at the bonanza grades of 774 g/t silver and 12.8 per cent zinc for 6.4 million ounces of contained silver and 33,000 tonnes of zinc within a larger resource.

ASX-listed aspiring West African bauxite developer, Lindian Resources has continued to put potential infrastructure building blocks in place to help accelerate the development of its Lelouma, Gaoual and Woula bauxite projects in Guinea. Its subsidiary, Terminal Logistics and Holdings recently struck a memorandum of understanding with the Guinean Government to appraise the possible joint development of the Dobali port and an associated logistics corridor in Guinea.

Ora Banda Mining has added to its rapidly developing story at the Davyhurst gold project that it rescued from the Administrators of the failed Eastern Goldfields Ltd after it nailed a set of drill results at its Riverina South Project. The development comes just days after the company churned out its first gold bar from the re-invigorated project north of Kalgoorlie.

Zuleika Gold has kicked off a 30,000-metre drilling program across its namesake project in the fertile Eastern Goldfields in WA. First cab off the rank for the company is the Paradigm East target where previous drilling has returned a wealth of mineralised intercepts including 27 metres at 2.87 grams per tonne gold from 33m and 7m at 9.8 g/t gold from 42m down-hole.

Australian-based Blackstone Minerals has graduated to the US-based OTCQX Best Market, the highest market tier of OTC Markets, on the back of its progress in developing a significant “green” nickel business in Asia. The company is currently developing the Ta Khoa nickel sulphide project in northern Vietnam, with recent results from its King Snake discovery continuing to showcase the project.

Aspiring ASX-listed heavy rare earths developer, Northern Minerals is looking to shave two years off its target date for commercial production and cash flow at its 100 per cent-owned Browns Range project in WA. The company is now aiming for first cashflows from a full-scale beneficiation plant at Browns Range in WA’s top end as early as 2023.

Victory Mines has returned a clutch of broad gold intersections from a second major drilling program at its historic Coogee gold project about 55km south-east of Kalgoorlie. The company says results from 14 holes at Coogee – out of 40 holes to be drilled in the current RC campaign totalling 6,000m – highlight the high‐grade nature of some of the thicker gold intersections at the project.

Altech Chemicals has taken a giant leap towards securing the remaining financing required for its proposed US$280 million HPA processing plant at Johor in Malaysia, with preparations well under way for a US$144 million listed green bond instrument. Altech’s Malaysian subsidiary plans to use US$100 million of the total amount raised as a secondary debt facility for the partial funding of plant construction costs.

Hot Chili expects a VAT tax refund payment of up to $4 million this year against all expenditure associated with its Cortadera copper-gold discovery, the centrepiece of its overarching Costa Fuego porphyry copper-gold project in Chile. Hot Chili says the VAT refund was given the nod by the Chilean Government and the tax refunds will shore up the company’s cash position as it gradually moves to full ownership of Cortadera.

Venture Minerals is poised to ride the crest of the monster iron ore price wave as it counts down to the start of iron ore production at its revived Riley mine in north-west Tasmania. The company has just raised $10 million and has been busy getting its ducks in a row for the main construction phase push at the Riley project development site including the critical wet screening plant.

ASX-listed Eclipse Metals has vectored in on a large circular magnetic anomaly containing multiple conductive exploration targets on its ground just a kilometre or two east of its recently acquired Ivittuut cryolite mine in southern Greenland. Eclipse is targeting cryolite, rare earth elements, high-purity silica and even nickel sulphides as it continues to explore its tenement in the frozen north.

Australian Bauxite appears to have added a second string to its bow with the company encountering intriguing levels of rare earth elements at its Tasmanian and Queensland bauxite projects that it describes as “potentially game changing”. Initial results from exploration undertaken over the past 15 months returned encouraging hits of rare earth elements at the Binjour bauxite deposit within its Sunrise project 115km south-west of the Bundaberg port and at the DL130 prospect in north-east Tasmania.

Comet Resources has rattled the tin and raised a million dollars from sophisticated and institutional investors. The cash injection will largely go towards funding an expansion of exploration activities at its historic Barraba copper project in the New England Fold Belt region of NSW. Recent geochemical sampling results at the project included up to 4.6 per cent copper, 4.0 per cent zinc and 0.7 per cent cobalt.

Indiana Resources has uncovered an historic gold assay that has laid dormant in the annals of the South Australian mineral core library for nearly six years without anybody actioning it. Indiana’s decision to re-examine historic core held by the South Australian Government could lead to a golden pay off after wide mineralised intersections were observed in a historic drill hole.