Welcome to a roundup of some of our financing, exploration, and development stories on Theassay.com over the last week. To keep up to date with all the latest headlines, subscribe to our weekly newsletter.
Financing and M&A
This week, Marvel Discovery Corp. (TSXV: MARV | FSE: O4T | OTCQB: MARVF) has closed the final tranche of its previously announced non-brokered private placement by issuing more than 2.5M non-flow-through units (NFT units) at C$0.04 each for gross proceeds of C$101K.
Each unit consists of one non-flow-through share (NFT share) and one share purchase warrant. Each warrant entitles the holder thereof to acquire an additional NFT share at C$0.075 each for a period of five years.
Pursuant to the private placement, the company issued an aggregate 12M flow-through units (FT units) at $0.05 each and over 3.7M NFT units at $0.04 per NFT unit for aggregate gross proceeds of C$751,000.
Norwest Minerals Limited (ASX: NWM) has entered into a binding agreement to acquire four West Arunta tenements prospective for niobium and rare earth elements. The 360km² ground package includes tenements located immediately adjacent to tenements held by WA1 Resources Limited and Encounter Resources Limited, where niobium-REE mineralized carbonatites have recently been discovered.
Norwest’s newly acquired ground package includes E80/5846 which is the closest tenement south of the WA1 Luni niobium discovery. To the north, ELA80/5938 is strategically lodged between tenements held by WA1 and Encounter. Tenements E80/5898 & E80/5899 are located west along strike of Norwest’s 1560km² Arunta West project area where significant clay hosted REE mineralization has been reported. The West Arunta region is one of Australia’s critical metals ‘exploration hotspots’ attracting significant investment from a growing number of ASX listed resource explorers.
New exploration and development
In addition, Ascot Resources Ltd. (TSX: AOT |OTCQX: AOTVF) has provided a construction update on the company’s Premier Gold Project, located on Nisga’a Nation Treaty Lands in the prolific Golden Triangle of northwestern British Columbia.
Project construction was 86% complete as of 31 December 2023, and is currently nearing completion, with first ore delivery to the mill anticipated by the end of March 2024, with the first gold pour anticipated in April.
Derek White, president, and CEO, commented, “With project construction nearing completion and early commissioning underway, we eagerly anticipate progressing to the production and operations phase at the Premier Gold Mine. The project also accomplished an impressive safety milestone having surpassed 1M hours without a lost time incident, along with another quarterly reduction in total recordable incident frequency.”
Millennial Potash Corp. (TSXV: MLP | OTCQB: MLPNF | FSE: X0D) has filed the technical report “Initial Mineral Resource Estimate for the North Target of the Banio Potash Project, Mayumba Permit, Republic of Gabon” (MRE), with SEDAR, in compliance with NI 43- 101.
The technical report was completed by ERCOSPLAN and was authored by Dr. Sebastiaan van der Klauw. The Banio Project MRE provides details of the indicated mineral resource estimate of 657Mt grading 15.9% KCl, and the inferred mineral resource of 1.159Bt grading 16% KCl.
Meanwhile, Sayona Mining Limited (ASX: SYA | OTCQB: SYAXF) announced a definitive feasibility study (DFS) that demonstrates the value of its Moblan Lithium Project, forming the centre piece of the company’s Eeyou Istchee James Bay Hub in northern Québec, Canada.
The project has an estimated post-tax NPV (8%) of C$2.2B. The operation is expected to generate estimated total net revenue of C$14.4N over its 21.1 life of mine (LOM), with an EBITDA of C$11.2B.
Drilling results
KEFI Gold and Copper Plc (AIM: KEFI) has announced the discovery of a third copper-gold-zinc-silver deposit in the broader Hawiah district by the company’s Gold & Minerals Ltd (GMCO) joint venture, Saudi Arabia.
Harry Anagnostaras-Adams, executive chairman, commented, “Ongoing exploration near our Hawiah copper-gold-zinc-silver deposit has now quickly yielded two additional discoveries, Al Godeyer and Abu Salal. Discovery of the latter has further strengthened our view that the Hawiah deposit itself is only the first in a cluster of deposits, as often occurs with this style of mineralization, in a much broader district.”
Lahontan Gold Corp (TSXV: LG | OTCQB: LGCXF) has this week announced the results from rock-chip sampling and geologic mapping at its 19.7km2 West Santa Fe project in Nevada, USA. West Santa Fe is located only 13km from the company’s flagship Santa Fe Mine project in Nevada’s Walker Lane.
New geologic mapping and sampling have identified high-grade gold and silver mineralization in an area north of the historic Mindora shaft with individual samples containing up to 2.61g/t gold and 899g/t silver (14.60 g/t Au Eq). Samples range in value from 0.02 to 2.61g/t gold and 0.7 to 899g/t silver, and average 1.97g/t Au Eq.
11 surficial rock chip samples were collected in an area proximal to the historic Mindora shaft area to further expand potential drill targets and better understand distribution of epithermal gold and silver mineralization at the surface.
Other company news
Finally, Katoro Gold PLC (AIM: KAT) has proposed the appointment of Sean Wade as non-executive chairman of the company.
Mr. Wade has extensive professional experience in the junior resource exploration sector, with board experience across multiples entities encompassing a wide variety of commodities and geographies. He is the CEO of Power Metal Resources PLC (AIM: POW), Katoro’s joint venture partner at the Haneti Project in Tanzania, targeting a major metal discovery (KAT 65%: POW 35%).
