Bulls N' Bears (Commercial Content)

Big River Gold said this week that a usually insignificant waste mineral known as “mica”, could potentially make the company some good money at its Borborema gold project in north-eastern Brazil. Perth-based consulting group, Wave, identified the potential to process and extract the mica minerals and sell them as a separate, commercially viable product. The micas make up approximately 30% of the volume of the Borborema deposit and carry half the gold grade.

Strike Energy is firing on all cylinders, tabling a maiden resource of a massive 1,185 billion cubic feet of 2C gas at its West Erregulla-2 well in the Perth Basin of Western Australia. Strike’s gas play is arguably Australia’s largest onshore conventional gas field and the company’s excitement is still building with multiple targets at West Errugulla underpinning the potential for the gas resource to grow even further.

Coziron Resources will soon be on the ground at its Croydon Top Camp project in WA’s Pilbara region, after expanding its gold target zone by re-assaying historic samples that peaked at 4.9g/t gold. The company has secured a rig and is preparing to drill approximately 2000m across some very prospective rock sequences, where a prospector recently recovered an astounding 203 gold nuggets in the area.

AVZ Minerals’ quest to develop the giant Manono lithium project in the DRC has been given a major shot in the arm after it received $14.1 million from Chinese lithium chemical producer, Yibin Tianyi. The strategic investment, which could lead to an offtake agreement, will allow AVZ to increase its stake in the project and start early development works as it completes Manono’s definitive feasibility study.

Kairos Minerals has defined a coherent, 2.5km long gold and copper in-soil anomaly where company Geologists also stumbled across some lucrative looking rock chip samples grading up to 16.8% copper and 4.3g/t gold at its Croydon project, located near Port Hedland in WA. The soil anomaly contains a coherent, higher-grade core that stretches over 1.5km, with best numbers going around 200ppb gold.

Terrain Minerals has optioned up its Great Western Gold project near Leonora for potential sale to ASX-listed Red5 for $2,500,000. The Great Western gold project is situated on a granted mining lease and contains a 63,000-ounce resource. Terrain will retain its Wild Viper project, which fully envelopes the Great Western project. The sale of Great Western will see Terrain cashed up and on the hunt for new projects.

St George Mining has discovered a 700m long nickel-in-soil anomaly across the same trend that is well known for its nickel and copper prospectivity at the company's Mt Alexander project in WA. St George is now planning to conduct a moving loop electromagnetic survey across the Fish Hook prospect to identify new drilling targets.

Rox Resources and Venus Metals’ Youanmi South prospect in Western Australia doesn’t look like being closed off anytime soon with more high-grade gold results continuing to roll off the drill bit, including 4m at 11.23g/t gold from 92m. Other solid numbers at the Plant Zone prospect, including 8m grading 2.62g/t gold from 60m, continue to underline the porospectivity of the project.

Hawkstone Mining has increased the Exploration Target for its Big Sandy lithium clay project in Arizona state USA, by 23% through new geological mapping and surface sampling in the Northern Mineralised Zone. The updated total Exploration Target for Big Sandy now sits at between 271.1 million and 483.1 million tonnes grading from 1,000 ppm lithium to approximately 2,000 ppm lithium.

Aspire Mining has released an updated PFS for its Ovoot Early Stage Development metallurgical coal project in Mongolia, saying the operation will pump out a stunning annual EBITDA of AUD$279m from the production of 4 Mtpa of high-value, “fat” coking coal, delivered into China. The updated PFS shows material reductions in capital and operating costs, with exceptional margins based on a coal price of AUD$218 per tonne.

King River Resources has again spotted visible gold in the drill samples from the Trudi Main vein prospect at its Mt Remarkable project in WA – a positive sign that will no doubt create some anticipation around the assay numbers when they come out. Historical intercepts at the project include 4m @ 113.29g/t including a staggering metre at 11 plus ounces to the tonne gold.

Big River Gold has achieved a significant goal this week, after it signed an agreement with the local Brazilian State of Rio Grande do Norte, to underpin the future development of its flagship Borborema gold project in Brazil. The agreement ensures that the company will have full access and co-operation from the State’s departments for power, roads, water and the environment and includes important tax concessions for mine start-up.

Lithium Australia’s partial subsidiary, Envirostream Australia, has executed an offtake MoU with South Korean company SungEel HiTech Co., Ltd for the sale of its recycled battery metals as a “mixed metal dust” product. SungEel will refine the materials into suitable chemicals for the production of new lithium-ion batteries and effectively “close the loop” for the battery manufacturing and recycling business.

ASX-listed agricultural asset development firm Alterra, has entered into some potentially lucrative agreements that secure exclusive rights to access quantitative avocado data with Western Australian producer, French’s Group. Alterra will have access to genetic information from avocados that have been selectively produced over the past 33 years and use the science behind the fruit to optimise soil, water and nutrient use in under-utilised agricultural lands.

King River Resources has updated the resource at its Central deposit at the company’s giant Speewah metals project in WA’s Kimberley. As part of an investigation into additional revenue streams, the company has formally analysed the “alumina” and “magnesia” contents of the Central deposit and produced a 1.24 billion tonne resource grading 12.5% alumina and 4.7% magnesia.

AVZ Minerals has commenced environmental and social impact studies at its Manono lithium project, located in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, appointing in-country organisation, EmiAfrica, to conduct the work. The studies will form the bases of its later ESIA documentation for permitting the project. The company also met with stakeholders and dignitaries in the region affected by the future mining proposal for Manono.

Indonesia-focussed gold developer, Nusantara Resources, has secured the right to fully extinguish a third-party royalty arrangement over future gold production from its Awak Mas gold project on Sulawesi Island. The company can terminate the existing net smelter royalty deal with Vista Gold Corporation, by paying a small consideration of cash and shares and then two payment tranches up to USD$4.9m before 30th April 2021.

Strike Energy has kicked off a 3D seismic campaign at its Walyering conventional gas discovery in the southern Perth Basin, where it has previously defined prospective resources of up to 263 billion cubic feet of gas and 6.3 million barrels of associated liquids condensate. The discovery was made in 1971 at about 3,350m depth, where the Walyering-1 gas well flowed at 13.5 million standard cubic feet per day.

Calidus Resources has lengthened its successful list of drilling results whilst firming up the mining credentials of its rapidly developing Warrawoona gold project in WA’s East Pilbara region. The company is also continuing to de-risk its million ounce-plus ore resource with recent results including a tidy 12m grading 5.58g/t from 12m down-hole, 15m at 4.33g/t from 6m downhole and visible gold in diamond drill core.

Legend Mining has kicked off its next phase of exploration at its Rockford project in the Fraser Range of Western Australia. A two-hole, 1000 meter diamond program has now commenced that will test for nickel-copper sulphide mineralisation at the D1 and D5 prospects. These new prospects were identified by a low-frequency moving loop electromagnetic survey in some of the area’s most prospective nickel-copper ground.

Canning Basin focussed hydrocarbon explorer and producer, Buru Energy, has largely completed its lateral section drilling at the emerging Ungani 7H well within the productive Ungani oilfield in the Kimberley region of WA. The company also reported some $3m in revenue from other wells within the Ungani oilfield this week, with two further production wells in the field, Ungani 6H and 7H, expected to come on-line during December.

Venus Metals and Rox Resources have hit high grade gold in aircore drilling at their Venus JV project near Youanmi in WA. The drilling is located north of the old Penny West gold mine and Spectrum Metals’ recent much-heralded Penny North discovery. Best numbers came in at 4 meters grading just over 7 grams per tonne from 24m depth and 5m grading nearly 2.5 grams per tonne from 60m downhole.

ASX listed biotech, PharmAust, has put a call out for canine volunteers to join its anti-cancer drug treatment trials in partnership with veterinary practices across Australia. The trials will study the effectiveness of Pharmaust’s anti-cancer drug in dogs suffering from B cell lymphoma – the most common canine cancer. Preliminary findings from phase I trials were very positive, with a notable reduction in tumours and prolonged lifespan.

Blina Minerals will cash in its 11% stake in private New Zealand focused explorer, Condamie Resources and will pocket around $200,000 from the transaction. The company will use the funds to explore its recently acquired Barkly gold-copper project in the NT. The Bluebird prospect is arguably the most promising target at Barkly and historically threw up some lucrative drill intercepts like 20m @ 8.17g/t gold and 0.61% copper.

ASX-listed, cloud-based telecommunications pacesetter, Vonex, last week revealed it had generated quarterly contract revenues of $1.62m, a 25% jump over its June quarter results and an 18% hike over the same quarter last year. Vonex’s business received a shot in the arm this year after the telco upstart inked a partnership agreement with Qantas Business Rewards, with a noticeable upswing in numbers now starting to occur.

MGC Pharmaceuticals has expanded the number of patients prescribing for or being processed to receive prescriptions of its medical cannabis-based pharmaceutical products in Australia and the UK to around 500 with the company racking up its 1000th prescription this month. Management said that the key milestone readily demonstrates its strengthening position and momentum in those key markets, with its sales graph continuing to climb month by month.

Venus Metals has wasted no time in getting a drill rig on top of its four new electromagnetic, or “EM” targets that were thrown up just last week at the company's Vidure copper-nickel prospect in the Youanmi region of WA. The new EM targets represent potentially un-discovered massive sulphide occurrences that may be hiding beneath the surface. With Youanmi a hot area right now, the results should be interesting.

Blina Minerals is all set to kick off a maiden drilling program at its recently acquired Barkley project near Tennant Creek in the NT. The company will drill test extensions to high-grade copper-gold-bismuth mineralisation at the Bluebird prospect, where historical drilling hit numerous stellar intersections such as 20m going 8.17g/t gold, 0.61% copper and 0.22% bismuth from 157m down-hole.

TNG Limited has submitted a comprehensive Environmental Impact Statement for its Darwin TIVAN processing facility to the NT Government in support of its wholly-owned, integrated Mount Peake vanadium-titanium-iron mining project near Alice Springs in the NT. The company will establish a world-class integrated downstream minerals processing operation in Darwin, to treat magnetite concentrates sourced from the Mount Peake mine.

Altech Chemicals is inching closer to production of high-purity alumina after completing Stage 1 of construction at its HPA plant in Malaysia, both on time and budget. The company is now progressing Stage 2, which includes the development of an on-site electrical substation for the processing facility. Altech will produce 4,500 tonnes a year of HPA sourced from pure kaolin clays in WA.

Adriatic Metals has raised $25m via a two-tranche institutional placement to expedite an aggressive exploration program through to a BFS at its exciting, Vareš multi-metals project in Bosnia. The company is also seeking a secondary listing of its shares on the London Stock Exchange during the current quarter to capture further interest from UK and European investors that are looking to support the world-class, high-grade project.

Hot Chili’s drilling at the Cuerpo 3 deposit within its Cortadera porphyry discovery in Chile has hit a 264m long, near-surface intercept of copper and gold mineralisation from just 52m down-hole, opening up the potential for future open-pit extraction. Another hole 250m to the southwest recorded a strongly mineralised porphyry system from surface to at least 313m depth, confirming the zone is also situated in shallow up-dip positions.