In a manner akin to trading a few cards in a game of draw poker, ASX-listed Horizon Minerals has shuffled its tenement deck around near Kalgoorlie and it appears to have landed a few trump cards that it says will be value accretive for the company.
The deals come courtesy of a swag of work done by Horizon management as the company seeks to be true to its strategy of vectoring in on prospects within 75 kilometres of its proposed Boorara mill site near Kalgoorlie.
In the latest round of deals for the junior gold producer, Horizon announced three tenement acquisitions and one gold mine purchase which cost a total of $182,000.
Almost simultaneously, Horizon has farmed out 90 per cent of one non-core prospect area north-west of Coolgardie for $120,000 cash, payable over four years, plus $300,000 of exploration spend over the same period.
The company also divested a prospecting license immediately west of the Eureka gold mine to Warriedar Mining for $200,000 in shares. With Warriedar now acquired by TNT Mines, Horizon said it now has a holding of 1.52 million shares in TNT Mines.
Horizon Minerals Managing Director, Jon Price said: “Horizon’s intimate knowledge and experience in the WA goldfields region has enabled a number of value accretive acquisitions to be completed in line with our regional consolidation strategy.”
“The Company is also pragmatic and open to divestment of non-core assets that have another natural owner and the deal with Warriedar/TNT Mines enables them to progress with development plans at Eureka with Horizon shareholders retaining upside through our TNT shareholding.”
Horizon’s shopping cart was topped up with the outright purchase of the Phoenix gold mine from a private syndicate for a cash consideration of $80,000. Phoenix was previously worked as a small, narrow-vein, underground mine, giving up high-grade dirt at grades above 50 grams per tonne gold, but has seen only limited near mine exploration below a depth of 100 metres.
Of particular importance to Horizon is its acquisition from Tasex Pty Ltd of the Perkolilli and Parkeston tenements which are also located in the Kalgoorlie region.
The Perkolilli ground is just a few km’s northwest of the Balagundi mining centre and the felsic volcanic rocks there contain a historical gold soil anomaly covering over 2.2km of strike length adjacent to the Mt Monger fault, within.
The Parkeston tenement group straddles the Boorara Shear, which also hosts its 1.05 million-ounce Boorara gold deposit and the Kanowna South application area sits on the edge of the Panglo Basin.
Horizon considers all its new areas to be prospective for gold and most are likely to be drilled during 2021. The company is aiming to build a strong pipeline of development assets to underpin a long-term gold production profile on the back of a full-scale development at Boorara.
Elsewhere in the refreshed portfolio, the Phoenix gold mine close to Coolgardie sits on trend with a number of other gold mines, including Lindsays, Bayleys and Kings Cross, which together gross over 1Moz of gold.
The Phoenix geology comprises an east-west sequence of mafic and ultramafic rocks with associated felsic porphyries and black shale horizons. Reported historic production from the Phoenix shaft was stated as 873 tonnes at 57g/t gold, according to Horizon.
With the company’s planned $5 million, 50,000-metre diamond, RC and aircore drilling program now underway involving four drill rigs, Horizon look set to drill up a storm this year, all within a 75km radius of Boorara.
Watch this space…
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