Bulls N' Bears (Commercial Content)

Aspiring WA gold producer, Horizon Minerals is set for a $7m boost through the sale of its Janet Ivy and Otto Bore mining royalty streams from WA gold mines. The proceeds, of which at least $4m will be cash, will add to Horizon’s existing cash reserves of $9.8 million as the company advances a feasibility study at its Boorara mining hub in the Goldfields.

Major Chinese construction outfit, China Railway Seventh Group has completed a visit to Lindian Resources’ bauxite assets in Guinea, West Africa, as agreed under a memorandum of understanding executed earlier this year. China Railway Seventh Group is a key player in Lindian’s infrastructure grand plan and bid to bring its Guinean bauxite projects on stream in the near term.

Bardoc Gold has released a cracking definitive feasibility study on its proposed Bardoc gold mining and processing operation approximately 40 kilometres north of Kalgoorlie. The company says the recent financial study shows the Bardoc gold mine spitting out an average of $113 million a year in free cash flows based on a total recovered gold target of 1.1 million ounces across an initial processing life of about eight years.

Anglo Australian Resources continues to pump out high-grade gold hits, as it charges towards a maiden resource over its Mandilla gold project in WA. Drilling at Mandilla East has returned a series of impressive results, with the latest batch including an impressive 18 metres at 4.74 grams per tonne gold from 54m and 29m at 1.81 g/t gold from 105m down-hole.

Venus Metals has racked up encouraging near-surface gold hits from a second round of RC drilling at the Range View prospect nearby the Bellchambers deposit as part of its Sandstone gold project in WA. Better intercepts from the latest drilling were 6m at 2.06 g/t gold from 20m including 1m at 6.14 g/t and 5m at 2.76 g/t from 45m including 1m at 6.23 g/t.

Things just got interesting for King River Resources at its immense Speewah Dome project in the Kimberley region of WA with its share price soaring 27 per cent on the back of news the company has produced high purity alumina at greater than 99.99 per cent purity. The company is currently looking to finish its ongoing feasibility study over the project.

Ardiden’s three hard-rock lithium projects in north-west Ontario, Canada may be in play as the company weighs up options to advance its lithium asset portfolio. One of the projects already hosts a resource of 4.8 million tonnes of ore grading 1.25 per cent lithium oxide. Management says it is evaluating strategic alternatives for the projects including retention, potential sales, spin-offs, joint ventures or business collaborations.

TNT Mines is preparing to drill test its key, high-grade uranium targets at the East Canyon project in Utah. The company is paying the requisite bonds to the US government and entering the final phase of the permitting process, with initial drilling to focus on the historical mine workings in the north of TNT’s tenure, including the targets at None Such and Bonanza.

ASX-listed junior explorer, Kingwest Resources has finalised the acquisition of its advanced, multi-deposit Menzies gold project about 130 kilometres north of Kalgoorlie and the greenfields Goongarrie gold project 90km north of Kalgoorlie. Horizon Minerals has now banked the last instalment of $1.625 million cash and 10.83 million Kingwest shares to complete the $8 million sale to Kingwest announced in 2019.

Neometals has highlighted the strong environmental credentials of its proprietary, patent-pending, vanadium recovery process flowsheet after an independently assessed, ISO-compliant, life cycle assessment showed potential to produce zero-carbon vanadium from the company's proposed Scandinavian vanadium recycling project. Neometals remains on track to deliver a ‘peer-reviewed’ PFS to recover vanadium from a vanadium-bearing steel making by-product, known as “slag”, by the end of June.

Aruma Resources has unveiled plans to undertake a maiden round of RC drilling at its Mount Deans lithium project approximately 10 kilometres south of Norseman in WA. The Perth-based company says the project should benefit from its location close to road and rail infrastructure that provides easy access to the Port of Esperance. Mount Deans contains a “swarm” of 71 recognised pegmatites covering 4.5km by 1.5km.

Zuleika Gold’s namesake project in WA’s Eastern Goldfields continues to deliver some tantalising results, with aircore drilling across the company’s Paradigm East discovery outlining gold mineralisation along more than 1.8 kilometres of strike. Results from the recent drilling program include 12 metres at 3.3 grams per gold, which included 4m at 6.0 g/t gold from 72 down-hole, pointing to the deeper potential of the extensive ore system.

Element 25 has wasted no time in laying the foundations for a “stage two” development at its new Butcherbird manganese mining and beneficiation operation in WA. The Perth-based company has just squared away a capital raise worth $35.5 million that it says will largely go towards a planned expansion of Butcherbird’s annual manganese concentrate output from about 365,000 tonnes to more than one million tonnes a year.

Wiluna Mining is edging closer to executing its expansion plans at its Wiluna mine. Firm commitments to raise $7.5m have been received as major shareholders and Wiluna’s Executive Chairman, Milan Jerkovic, line up to plough in another $14m. The money will be used to lift the mine’s production to 120,000 ounces of gold a year and study the potential for it to move to 250,000 ounces per annum.

ASX-listed Altech Chemicals’ 75 per cent-owned subsidiary, Altech Industries Germany has kicked off a pre-feasibility study for a 10,000 tonne per annum high purity alumina battery materials coating plant in Saxony, Germany. The PFS will integrate Altech’s “nano-layer” HPA coating technology with HPA produced at the company’s plant in Malaysia which will be fed from Altech’s kaolin deposit near Meckering in Western Australia.

Podium Minerals has tabled an array of high-grade intercepts from drilling at its Parks Reef PGM discovery in WA. Exploration across the central and eastern sectors of the emerging deposit has delivered some exciting results including 46 metres at 2.01 grams per tonne 3PGM from only 12m and 7m at 5.75 g/t 3PGM, which includes an impressive 1m at 25.74 g/t 3PGM from 89m down-hole.

Kingwest Resources has released a “strong economic case” for mining to kick off at its multi-deposit Menzies gold project in WA. The company’s scoping study on Menzies points to a proposed open-cut mining and toll treatment operation spitting out estimated net revenue of $330 million and free cash flows of between $64 million and $95 million across an initial project life of just over two-and-a-half years.

The rods are set to spin again for Oar Resources at the Gibraltar halloysite-kaolin project on South Australia’s Eyre Peninsula. A recently completed maiden air-core campaign netted kaolinite and high-grade halloysite up to 20 per cent in grade, with halloysite reported in 24 of the 59 holes drilled. An aggressive 2,500m air-core drilling campaign has commenced to follow-up on the intriguing discovery.

ASX-listed explorer, Venus Metals says latest drill hits have extended the known area of high-grade gold mineralisation at the exciting Grace gold discovery at its joint-ventured Youanmi gold project in WA by 100 metres to the south. Stand-out RC drill intersections received for three of 18 recently completed holes were 8m at 19.9 g/t gold from 68m including 4m at 38.3 g/t.

Novo Resources is set to pocket another $5 million in cash as the sale of its Blue Spec mine draws to a close. The company has offloaded the high-grade mine in the Pilbara to aspiring gold miner Calidus Resources, who has recently commenced construction of its Warrawoona mine and will use the ores from the mothballed operation to boost its own developing production profile.

Legendary former New Zealand national rugby team captain, Sean Fitzpatrick is about to become a regular at ASX-listed junior explorer, White Cliff Minerals. Fitzpatrick has been appointed as Strategic Advisor to the company in a deal that will see White Cliff pick up a slew of lucrative-looking gold projects in the land of the long white cloud.

ASX-listed budding gold producer, Calidus Resources says its Blue Spec high-grade satellite gold deposit is set to significantly boost annual production at its under-construction Warrawoona gold mine in WA’s East Pilbara region, following a Blue Spec “integration” study. According to the study, the company is now looking at forecast gold production averaging 110,000 ounces per annum across the first seven years of production at Warrawoona.

Indiana Resources is kicking its exploration efforts into high gear with an upcoming drilling blitz at the Minos discovery in South Australia’s Gawler Craton. The ASX-listed company was well blooded for the hunt after it recently unearthed an extraordinary 38m drill intersection going 6.54 g/t gold from just 29m. Other targets along strike will also be tested.

ASX-listed PharmAust subsidiary, Epichem, has entered into a multi-year license agreement to harness “Oxidative Hydrothermal Dissolution” technology from IP owner, Illinois-based Thermaquatica. Epichem will research, develop and promote Thermaquatica’s disruptive waste to fuels technology that uses waste and biomass as a feedstock. The company will also target government grant funding to accelerate its research and development initiative.

ASX-listed junior explorer, Kalamazoo Resources has consummated a deal with C$740 million market-capped Pilbara gold producer, Novo Resources. TSX-listed Novo will issue A$2 million worth of its stock to Kalamazoo to take on 50 per cent of Kalamazoo’s Queens gold project in Victoria and Novo then has the right to move to 70 per cent by ploughing a further $5 million into the project.

Strike Resources is looking to get a foothold in the burgeoning battery metals space with plans to spin out its lithium and graphite assets into a new IPO to be known as Lithium Energy. Strike will retain a 43 per cent stake in the new company that is slated to raise around $9 million ahead of its listing on the ASX.

Perth-based explorer PolarX Limited is expanding its footprint in America by proceeding with the acquisition of the high-grade gold and silver Humboldt Range project in Nevada. Off the charts samples grading as high as 3,384.14 g/t gold and 2,083.3 g/t silver highlight the potential of the project in the multi-million-ounce American mining region.

Victory Mines has wrapped up a second round of reverse circulation drilling at its Coogee gold project 55km southeast of Kalgoorlie on the north-eastern shore of Lake Lefroy. One of the best intercepts from Victory’s latest bundle of samples returned a broad width of 28m at 1.2 g/t gold from 128m downhole, including 16m at 1.68 g/t gold.

Perth-based explorer Kingwest Resources continues to make waves in the Goldfields of WA with an initial aircore drilling campaign at the Goongarrie gold project returning significant results from three areas where the company appears to have defined a gold anomaly over 1,000m in strike length at Area 9. Further drilling on newly identified targets at the project is planned for quarter two.

Buru Energy and its new farm-in partner, the giant Origin Energy, are gearing up to roll out a fresh oil exploration drilling campaign in WA’s revered Canning Basin during this year’s Top End dry season. Buru is chasing as much as 97 million barrels of oil across two prospects, including the highly anticipated Rafael-1 test well that sits east and along strike from the company’s producing Ungani oil field.

88 Energy has cracked 1,512 feet, or 460 metres, as it drills its way towards its highly anticipated 600-million-barrel prospective oil target at an interpreted depth of 6,000 feet, or 1,829 metres, below the frozen arctic ground in Alaska. Its moment of truth will arrive in just three to five days when it will get to test the reservoir sands of the oil-rich Nanushuk formation target.

Coda Minerals continues to receive solid results from its copper discovery at Emmie Bluff in SA including 7.58 metres at 1.51, however it is now casting its eye further afield as it looks to build a pipeline of copper projects in Australia, with the company picking up the interesting looking Cameron River copper project near Mt Isa in Queensland.