Bulls N' Bears (Commercial Content)

Neometals has continued to build its inventory of resources at its Mt Edwards nickel project in WA, with a recent review and upgrade of the Zabel deposit estimating it to now contain some 351,000 tonnes of ore grading at 1.9 per cent nickel. The revision of the Zabel deposit brings the global resource across the project area to a solid 8.74 million tonnes at 1.7 per cent nickel.

Middle Island Resources has discovered what it says is “significant” copper oxide mineralisation at surface at the Crosswinds prospect within its greenfields Barkly copper-gold project in the NT’s East Tennant mineral district. The company’s share price touched 38.5¢ today, rising from its closing price of 30.5¢ yesterday, after it revealed cracking spot portable XRF-gun readings of between 24.8 per cent and 76.2 per cent copper at Crosswinds.

ASX-listed high purity alumina hopeful, Altech Chemicals has finalised the terms of a staggered €5 million sale of a 25 per cent interest in German subsidiary, Altech Industries Germany to Frankfurt Stock Exchange-listed Altech Advanced Materials. Perth-based Altech, who retains ownership of the other 75 per cent of AIG, says it has now received the initial cash payment of €250,000 under the terms of the agreed deal.

Oakdale Resources is already looking to expand its drilling program over the Gibraltar halloysite project in the SA, with the company seeking approval to extend the drilling pattern to the north of the prospect. In other news, drilling has also wrapped up in the US for Oakdale, with planning underway now for the 2021 field season at both the Lambarson and Douglas Canyon gold projects.

Victory Mines has nailed the projected ‘down-plunge’ extensions to its recently acquired Coogee gold project in WA, with the latest assays from its maiden RC drill campaign returning more high-grade drill intercepts. The best result was an exciting 10m intersection at 12.01 grams per tonne gold from 93m down-hole that included an even sweeter 3m going 35.87 g/t gold from 94m.

Antilles Gold is betting on more normalised relations between the United States and Cuba when Joe Biden moves into the White House. The ASX-listed explorer hopes the Biden Presidency will lead to more global investment in Cuba, including for the company’s La Demajagua gold and silver project. Antilles will undertake a drilling program in January to establish an initial JORC resource for the planned open pit mine.

Neometals’ innovative program of metallurgical test work has recorded a significant breakthrough in the processing of ores from its Barrambie vanadium-titanium project. The company has generated high-quality ilmenite samples from a simple flowsheet utilising gravity separation, low-temperature roasting and a final phase of magnetic separation, clearing the path for a move into production.

Blue Star Helium has picked up significant additional acreage across two leading prospects and other prospective ground at its Las Animas helium project in the US as it champs at the bit to kick off a highly anticipated maiden drill campaign comprising three and up to five wells in early 2021. The company has more than doubled its lease holdings around the historic high-grade Model Dome helium field this year.

ASX-listed oncology innovator, PharmAust, has received Government ethics approval to recommence a trial treating pet dogs suffering from cancer with its oral drug, Monepantel. PharmAust previously announced the first set of trial results had exceeded expectations by demonstrating that MPL tablets can make certain cancer lesions disappear and the recommencement of the trial is the next step on the pathway to commercialisation for the biotechnology specialist.

Si6 Metals looks set to stock up Santa’s sack with a mass of gold-rich results following first-pass exploration across the company’s Monument project in WA. High-grade grab samples from the project returned assays of over an ounce per tonne gold, setting the scene for a move into drilling early in the new year.

Taruga Minerals has upped the ante at its Mt Craig project in South Australia after it identified a 34-kilometre-long copper bearing structure at the project. The ASX-listed junior explorer has identified five priority targets along the extensive Worumba Anticline with surface sampling adjacent to historic mine workings returning grades of up to 12 per cent copper.

Impact Minerals can revel in the festive season after earlier-than-anticipated results from drilling at its Rockwell prospect in NSW delivered a timely Christmas present, unwrapping encouraging sniffs of platinum group elements over at least 400m. Better assays include 61m at 0.4 g/t 3PGE from 31m including 12m at 1.4 g/t 3PGE from 73m, which in turn includes 1m at 2.3 g/t 3PGE from 73m and 1m at 2.6 g/t 3PGE from 79m.

ASX-listed Cobre Limited’s largest shareholder, Metal Tiger, moved to maximise its shareholding in the budding base metals explorer this week. The savvy investment fund ploughed a further $310k into Cobre in a placement that will see Metal Tiger holding 19.99 per cent of the company as it ramps up exploration across the revered Kalahari Copper Belt in Botswana.

ASX-listed clinical-stage oncology company, PharmAust, has achieved a further annual extension to its current contract with the Drugs for Neglected Diseases initiative, or “DNDi”. The extension marks the 13th year that PharmAust’s wholly-owned subsidiary, Epichem, has been engaged by DNDi. The contract is expected to generate up to $1.02 million in revenue during 2021.

ASX-listed agribusiness developer, Alterra’s sale of the final sections of its “non-core” Dambadgee Springs farming property in Dandaragan north of Perth has gone unconditional. The final tranche of the overall transaction, which incorporates the rights to income from the nearby Yandin wind farm, comprised two blocks of land that fetched $2.8 million. The property was sold to a local farmer for a total price of $4.4 million.

St George Mining is set to hit the ground running in 2021 with ongoing exploration at its Mt Alexander project continuing to identify a swag of new EM targets. Geophysical surveying at the project has lit up a grab bag of new sulphide targets for drill testing whilst the company’s program of metallurgical test work has delivered excellent recoveries of both nickel and copper from the Strickland ore body.

Neometals and its giant JV partner, German-headquartered SMS group have delivered on key design, procurement and permitting milestones, paving the way for its lithium-ion battery recycling demonstration plant to be built. The innovative pair recently received approvals to build the demonstration plant at SMS’s manufacturing centre in the German town of Hilchenbach as they look to commercialise their joint recycling technology in Europe.

Origin Energy has given Buru Energy a significant shot in the arm by farming into seven of Buru’s oil and gas permits in the onshore Canning Basin in Western Australia. The farm-in significantly strengthens Buru’s planned 2021 exploration program, including drilling of the highly prospective Rafael 1 oil well. Origin will spend $35 million inclusive of a two-well drilling program and seismic work.

Godolphin Resources has again returned some tantalising RC drill hits it says continue to point to the margins of a potential copper-gold porphyry-style mineralised system at its Turrawonga discovery in NSW’s Lachlan Fold Belt. Notable intercepts from the latest round of drilling were 30m at 0.64 g/t gold and 0.04 per cent copper from 178m including 18m at 1.0 g/t gold, which in turn includes a 2m section going an intriguing 6.9 g/t.

Native Mineral Resources looks to be closing in on the deeper source of copper mineralisation at its Leane’s prospect in Far North Queensland, with drilling returning some interest tweaking hints of the red metal. Latest results from Leane’s include 6 metres at 0.33 per cent copper including 1 metre at 0.61 per cent copper from 74 metres down-hole. Results from deeper, sulphidic diamond drilling are currently in the laboratory awaiting assay.

Lithium Australia’s 90 per cent-owned subsidiary, Envirostream Australia, has harvested the grain from its test site in WA’s Wheatbelt, completing its trial of zinc and manganese derived from recycled alkaline battery waste as a source of fertiliser micronutrients. Envirostream will now move on with the statistical analysis of the grain and overall yield to assess the performance of the micronutrients.

Vancouver-based Novo Resources has defied the weather gods to keep the refurbishment of its Golden Eagle gold processing facility on schedule and budget as the company closes in on first gold production from its developing Beatons Creek mine in WA’s East Pilbara. The TSX-V-listed budding Pilbara gold producer is also set to graduate to a listing on the main Toronto Stock Exchange next year.

Podium Minerals is set to pocket $2.4 million after finalising a deal with privateer, EV Metals Australia, for its nickel tenure north of the Parks Reef PGM deposit in WA. ASX-listed Podium, will peg a new mining lease to secure its position over the Parks Reef deposit, with EV Metals set to take ownership of the balance of the existing Weld Range tenure.

PolarX’s drilling program over its Zackly East discovery in Alaska has extended the strike length of the prospect to more than 300 metres and continued to return anomalous intercepts including 1.5 metres at 5 grams per tonne, 3.15 per cent copper and 26 grams per tonne silver from only 11.6 metres down-hole.

ASX-listed White Cliff Minerals has topped up the piggy bank with the sale of its Merolia gold project near Laverton for $274,000 to UK-based Panther Metals. The sale was flagged in November as part of a strategic review of White Cliff’s gold and base metals exploration portfolio, as it focuses on developing the highly prospective Reedy South and Midas projects, both located in Western Australia.

ASX-listed explorer, Impact Minerals looks to be on the money with its first reconnaissance drill program at its Rockwell prospect encountering widespread occurrences of copper-nickel-PGE anomalies over about 1.5 kilometres. The drilling included an RC hole the Perth-based company described as a breakthrough hole that intersected elevated copper over a 25m-wide sulphide zone.

Hot Chili’s ongoing drilling program has identified a second high-grade copper-gold core to its Cortadera porphyry in southern Chile. The latest results from the discovery include an extensive 248m intercept grading 0.4 per cent copper and 0.1 grams per tonne gold, hosting 32m at 0.6 per cent copper and 0.3 grams per tonne gold, from 446 metres down-hole.

Novo Resources, in conjunction with Sumitomo Corporation of Tokyo, has completed its earn-in obligations acquiring a 70 per cent interest in the precious metal rights on Essential Minerals’ Kangan project leases on the eastern side of the company’s Egina gold project tenements, in WA’s Pilbara gold region. Sumitomo joined Novo on Egina back in September 2018 via a $30m farm-in deal.

ASX-listed gold explorer, Okapi Resources, has picked up an “underexplored” historic gold project 30 kilometres south-east of Armidale near the historic Hillgrove antimony-gold mine in north-eastern NSW in a cash-and-scrip deal. The company says the Enmore gold project already boasts a couple of walk-up drill targets brimming with high-grade gold values from drilling and rock chip sampling work done by previous owners.

Western Australia-based InteliCare has continued its east coast expansion booking a significant order with Eremea Home Care Services in New South Wales. Eremea will initially take delivery of more than $150,000 of home care monitoring systems for use across its 1000 aged care and disability client base, including InteliLiving hardware and software and a 12-month subscription to the commercial InteliCare Pro platform.

Dampier Gold is set to hit the ground running in 2021 with planning underway for 30,000 metres of drilling across its Eastern Goldfields projects in WA. The aspiring miner has enjoyed a feast of success through 2020 and having recently topped up its coffers to the tune of $6 million, is champing at the bit to get back on the ground and kick up some dust.

ASX-listed Lithium Australia continues to kick goals with its unique approach to lithium-ion battery innovation with its latest modelling demonstrating improved cost efficiencies from its proprietary lithium-ferro-phosphate technology. The company now believes it has overcome all the significant cost, safety and performance hurdles it needs to produce a better product than its competitors in the expanding global electric vehicle battery market.