• The ASX 200 barely broke even this week, up about 0.11pc 
  • Rio’s buy-out of Arcadium Lithium was the most exciting news, duh
  • Who won the Small Caps race? Read on to find out…

 

It’s Friday afternoon, and you know what that means… it’s time to wrap what’s happened for the week.

It’s a short one this week, because – full disclosure – I wasn’t here for most of it, and for the past two days I’ve been battling to get my brain to think of anything other than how much I want to be back in Tasmania, fishing for trout and not worrying about the stock market.

So… here’s an abridged version of Weekly Wrap, so I can get back to planning on flying south again as soon as humanly possible.

Overall, the ASX 200 benchmark finished the week pretty much flat, edging up 0.11% – a lot of effort for little reward, after China reportedly baulked at the idea of further stimulus and took most of the wind out of the market’s sails. US CPI and jobs data mopped up any debris left behind.

 

WHAT THE SECTORS DID

Here’s what the market sectors did:

 

Chart via Marketindex.

 

Decent returns for Health Care and Financials were more than offset by a poor showing among the resources crowd this week – leaving aside a solid week for the goldies, which put in a 2.3% gain under difficult conditions.

Energy broke even, thanks to a late push from burgeoning crude oil prices, as the market digested the results of Hurricane Milton’s trail of destruction in Florida, which has soaked up a huge amount of petroleum products as residents flee, and put strain on production in the region.

Here’s how the rest of the sub-sectors and ASX indices landed at the end of the week.

 

Chart via Marketindex.

 

THIS WEEK’S ASX SMALL CAP WINNERS

Here are the best performing ASX small cap stocks:

Swipe or scroll to reveal full table. Click headings to sort:

Wordpress Table Plugin

 

Thrive Tribe Technologies (ASX:1TT) is nominally in top spot this week, but it’s moved from virtually nothing to slightly more than virtually nothing on no news, so it was probably just the wind or something.

Iris Metals (ASX:IR1) rose sharply on news that the company has successfully converted its spodumene concentrate to 99.5% battery grade lithium carbonate, using ore entirely sourced from its Beecher Project in South Dakota, USA. The conversion to lithium carbonate was done in the US, using “a domestic process and IP, marking a significant new capability in America’s efforts to secure domestic supply chains of critical minerals and IRIS’ role in that,” the company says.

Diablo Resources (ASX:DBO), however, is a curious one – it’s jumped by a significant margin this week, on no news… so there might be something happening there that the broader market hasn’t been clued into just yet, or… something else. I don’t know. I’ve been on holiday in Tasmania for most of this week, so I’m groping about in the dark like everyone else today.

Island Pharmaceuticals (ASX:ILA) has also had a banger this week, largely off the back of a really interesting investor webinar / presentation that landed on Monday, following a big Daniel Tillett backed placement. That put a bit of a rocket up the company’s share price with its talk of finding a fix for terrible things like Dengue Fever.

 

THIS WEEK’S ASX SMALL CAP LAGGARDS

Here are the best performing ASX small cap stocks:

Swipe or scroll to reveal full table. Click headings to sort:

Wordpress Table Plugin

 

HOW THE WEEK SHOOK OUT

Monday 07 October, 2024

Rhythm Biosciences (ASX:RHY), a predictive cancer diagnostics technology company, is also shooting up the bourse today, having announced it’s received the first batch of the ‘Alpha’ version of multiplex antibody detection kits developed and manufactured by the Company’s CMO, Quansys Biosciences, in the USA.

Meanwhile, Kali Metals (ASX:KM1) has expanded its JV with Chilean lithium giant SQM, adding two new tenements: DOM’s Hill and Pear Creek. Kali is acquiring the new DOM’s Hill tenements from major shareholder Kalamazoo Resources (ASX:KZR) for a cash consideration of $100,000, while the Peak Creek tenement is being snapped up from KZR for just $20,000.

Arcadium Lithium (ASX:LTM) surged as Rio Tinto (ASX:RIO) confirmed its interest in acquiring the smaller company, known for its direct lithium extraction at the El Fenix site in Argentina’s Hombre Muerto Salar.

Speculation about a takeover has been growing since a report in The Australian suggested Arcadium and Albemarle as potential targets for Rio, which aims to secure a major producer as lithium valuations have dropped. Rio is also testing its own DLE technology at the Rincon project, with a pilot set for completion this year. Despite recent challenges in lithium prices, Arcadium plans to expand production from 5,000tpa to 170,000tpa LCE by 2028.

Nimy Resources (ASX:NIM), one of the small-cap stand-outs last month, saw its stock price rise 106% on the back of the identification of massive sulphides at its Mons nickel project in WA. Mons is at the northern end of the renowned Forrestania nickel belt, host to the world-class nickel endowment at the Southern end with numerous other high-grade nickel deposits extending north. With an ever-growing pipeline of targets, NIM has intersected high-grade copper, nickel, cobalt and PGE mineralisation within broad intervals at Masson – confirming the prospect as a ‘significant discovery’.

Results include 13m at 0.62% copper, 0.36% nickel, 0.04% cobalt, 0.25g/t PGE and 2.30g/t silver from 126m. All three holes returned grades at greater than 1% copper, signifying a dynamic system that is part of a much larger mafic intrusion.

Piedmont Lithium (ASX:PLL) was up on no news.  In February, the lithium producer cut its workforce by 27% as a reflection of drastically lower lithium prices to save operational costs across its North American Lithium (NAL) JV with Sayona Mining (ASX:SYA).

This didn’t stop PLL working across its NAL and Ghana lithium projects, expanding NAL’s mineral resource by 39% to 87.9Mt at 1.13% Li2O in late August and receiving an environmental permit for its Ewoyaa lithium project with JV partner Atlantic Lithium (ASX:A11). More news is expected from the global lithium developer in the coming weeks.

 

Tuesday 08 October, 2024

Panther Metals (ASX:PNT) jumped after announcing that numerous gold nuggets were discovered at the Comet Well and Comet Well South project areas, including a striking gold in quartz specimen. These initial finds occurred during drill preparations, and subsequent detecting activities near the upcoming drill sites revealed even more nuggets. Additional detecting is currently ongoing across both project areas.

Also, assays have now been submitted for Burtville East, following up on a previous 600m RC programme conducted in 2022, which yielded impressive results. One drill hole, BVE006, showed 15m at 53.94g/t Au from 27m, with a standout intercept of 1m at 478g/t from 28m.

Ark Mines (ASX:AHK) has submitted a mining lease application for its Sandy Mitchell rare earths and heavy minerals project in northern Queensland. The application covers the acreage that forms the basis of the recently reported high certainty measured resource of 71.8Mt grading 1732.7 parts per million monazite equivalent. This resource underpins the completion of a scoping study, supports the application for this Mining Licence, and accelerates ongoing strategic partnership and offtake discussion

Ballymore Resources (ASX:BMR) announced a promising new gold-copper target at its Dittmer Project, near Proserpine in north Queensland. A recent high-resolution magnetic and radiometric survey revealed significant anomalies, including a large 1200m x 800m magnetic body beneath the historic Dittmer mine. 3D magnetic modelling suggests that this area sits above a copper-gold system, supporting earlier findings of elevated copper in the soil. Preparations are now underway to drill and test this exciting new target.

Uranium play, Energy Metals (ASX:EME) , has reported impressive results from its drilling campaign at the Bigrlyi Project, with multiple drillholes hitting high-grade uranium in the A2, A4, and A15 sub-deposits. Notable findings include 5.1 metres at 4,500 ppm eU3O8 from the A2 sub-deposit, and 1.1 metres at 8,600 ppm eU3O8 from the A15 sub-deposit.

The 2024 drilling program has now wrapped up, with all samples sent to the lab for chemical assays. The Bigrlyi Project, located about 350 km northwest of Alice Springs, is a joint venture project that aims to expand its current resource of 6.32 million tonnes at an average grade of 1,530 ppm for a total of 9.66 kilotonnes of U3O8.

Black Canyon (ASX:BCA) has announced promising results from its W2 prospect in Wandanya, located 80 km south of the Woodie Woodie Manganese Mine. Significant assays include 5m at 33.2% Mn and notable higher-grade intervals of up to 48.7% Mn. The mineralisation shows impressive thickness and grade consistency over 240m and remains open for further exploration. The W2 area is thought to represent a new model for hydrothermal manganese enrichment in the Oakover Basin. Plans for metallurgical testing aim to produce a high-grade manganese concentrate.

Rimefire Pacific Mining (ASX:RIM), FY24’s top small cap gainer, surged as investors exercised over 60 million options at a cut-price 2c, dropping ~$1.2m of fresh funds in the scandium explorer’s coffers.

 

Wednesday 09 October, 2024

Polymetals Resources (ASX:POL) is growing increasingly confident in its decision to restart the prolific Endeavor mine near Cobar in NSW after it cropped up some exceptional results from geotechnical drilling at the Upper North Lode area of the project.

The junior believes the intercepts of up to 13.5g/t gold, 1410g/t silver, 12.5% zinc & 34.0% lead are evidence that a significant portion of Upper North Lode can support accelerated mining rates, especially after hitting into a nice thick 67m at 517g/t silver and 2.01g/t gold mineralised zone.

The Endeavor mine is on track for an imminent restart with first cashflows in H1 2025 after an optimised mine plan demonstrated the mine could produce 260,000t zinc, 90,000t lead and 10.6Moz silver to generate a whopping $1.85 billion in revenue over an initial 10-year Stage 1 mine life.

Junior explorer Patagonia Lithium (ASX:PL3) has announced it’s been granted exploration rights for three years on 830154/2024, which is one claim in a group of seven covering 12,032 hectares.

Exec chairman Phillip Thomas noted: “We now have a major component of our exploration concessions granted and are actively assessing the potential for other minerals in addition to lithium, such as antimony, niobium and gold where the granites and ultramafic rocks are present.”

Medicinal cannabis company Cann Group (ASX:CAN) is trading up on capital raising news. The company is seeking to raise, through a non-renounceable rights issue, approximately $6.25 million (before associated costs) in order to fund increased production at its Mildura facility.

Dreadnought Resources (ASX:DRE) is lighting the candle for carbonatite-hosted niobium (Nb) finds in WA’s Gascoyne. After a nine-hole drill program testing its Stinger discovery at Mangaroon, it’s popped up with what it says are exceptional hits into the Gifford Creek REE-Nb complex.

Reason? Because niobium’s properties are used to create high-strength, low-alloy steel that’s perfect for renewables, infrastructure and automobiles, reducing weight by up to 30%. The explorer has held the tenure since September 2022 and spent much of last year fingerprinting high-grade zones of Nb and rare earths carbonatites across the 17km-long Gifford Creek carbonatite zone.

In DRE’s latest round of digging it’s cropped up three zones of thick oxide Nb mineralisation with up to 1.3% NbO5 discovered at Stinger. The holes paint a picture of a 1.2km-long strike that’s open in all directions which DRE says has significant upside potential for Nb and other critical minerals such as rare earths (REE), scandium (Sc), titanium (Ti) and phosphorous (P).

Nova Minerals (ASX:NVA) has been digging into resource expansion of the RPM North pit area within its 500km2 Estelle gold project in Alaska’s prolific Tintina gold belt and the first eight holes of a 21-hole RC program have delivered multiple >5g/t gold from surface intersections.

Interval grades showed up to 39g/t in sections and a thick 43m at 4.4g/t gold mineralisation was discovered from the ground down. The drilling is targeting the near-surface mineralisation above the current high-grade core of RPM North and things are looking upbeat to add results of the program to an upcoming resource update that will incorporate two years’ worth of exploration and resource drilling.

It’ll all be jigsawed in to an upcoming pre-feasibility study of the RPM starter mine with an aim to commence a smaller-scale, low-capex, high-margin operation as soon as possible, which will provide cashflow to fund the expansion of the larger Estelle project organically.

And, Echo IQ (ASX:EIQ) has received FDA marketing approval for its aortic stenosis diagnostic, causing its shares to jump over 20% after emerging from a trading halt. The company is now preparing to seek approval for a heart failure indication and is confident about the process, having worked closely with the FDA for 18 months.

EchoSolv AS aims to enhance standard echocardiograms by automatically identifying patients at significant risk, addressing the underdiagnosis of aortic stenosis, which affects about 1.5 million people in the US. The company estimates a potential US revenue of $6.5 million annually with a 10% market penetration. Echo IQ is also gearing up for FDA submission for heart failure and has appointed a new US CEO to lead its commercial efforts.

 

Thursday 10 October, 2024

Strategic Elements (ASX:SOR) announced the launch of the Energy Ink “Cell to Sheet Program”, which the company says is “aimed at creating larger-scale prototypes and demonstrators with significantly increased energy generated from moisture”.

SOR MD Charles Murphy says as Energy Ink is a pioneering technology, much work was required to design the ‘Cell to Sheet’ program and prepare modified ink and materials for trial in automated machinery.

“While much of this foundational work has not been externally visible, achieving this progress in such a brief time is a credit to the entire team,” Murphy said.

“The next phase could revolutionise our ability to generate energy from moisture and enable us to attract global collaborators.”

News is coming hot and fast both directly and indirectly for Piedmont Lithium (ASX:PLL), this time it’s mine operating approval for its Ewoyaa lithium project which it shares in a JV with Atlantic Lithium (ASX:A11).

The development still hinges on the outcome of the mining lease ratification by the Ghanaian Parliament and ongoing design works, both of which are looking promising.

PLL is working across its NAL and Ghanaian lithium projects, recently expanding the NAL mineral resource by 51% to 87.9Mt at 1.13% Li2O in late August and has locked in an environmental permit for Ewoyaa.

A review of Viking Mines (ASX:VKA)’s first hit gold mine has uncovered substantial, historical and unmined drill intercepts that show some bonanza grades of up to 77.6g/t gold.

The explorer says the hits reflect the narrow vein, high-grade style of mineralisation present in the area and is mulling over getting the drill bit out to test the targets.

Hits include:

  • 4m at 26.1 g/t Au from 58m at hole BFH005
  • 3m at 77.6 g/t Au from 224m at hole BFH030; and
  • and 4.9m at 64.8 g/t Au from 62.1m FHU045

Antilles Gold (ASX:AAU) was up after issuing a retraction of its 08 October announcement, parts of which fell foul of ASX listing rules 5.16, 5.17, and 5.19 by including forecast financial information derived from a production target. The current announcement also contains new test work results for the proposed La Demajagua gold-silver-antimony open-pit mine in Cuba, claiming “it is expected that the production of 3,982tpa of a precipitate with 48% Sb (containing 1,911tpa antimony) will be realised from the 50,025 tpa gold-arsenopyrite concentrate containing 4.9% antimony.”

Tartana Minerals (ASX:TAT) has entered into a non-binding agreement to acquire Queensland Strategic Metals, which holds ten EPMs and one ML covering copper, tin, tungsten, antimony and silver and gold prospects. The key projects include Laheys Creek, Comeno, De Wett, Lady Agnes and Tap’n’Toe, Fluorspar in the which polymetallic (Sn, Pb, Cu, Ag, Au, REE, Indium) prospects relate to Carboniferous-Permian granites.

Vection Technologies (ASX:VR1) climbed on news of the execution of a binding $3.6m XR software licences distribution agreement with Cometa SpA, a leader in the education sector serving over 2,500 high schools.The companies expect to deliver immersive classroom solutions to 500 high schools in Italy by FY25.

Kingfisher Mining (ASX:KFM) was up on news that it has picked up high grade rockchip samples at Ring Well, with copper values of 20.2% and 21.6% in an outcropping surface zone with 44m of strike exposed.  Ring Well prospect has had no significant prior work and has not been drill tested or the subject of any surface Geophysics, and on-going investigations looking to increase strike extents of the Ring Well prospect and evaluation of other areas previously highlighted in recent field evaluation.

Earlier, Artemis Resources (ASX:ARV) announced recent rock chip sampling at the Titan prospect has yielded impressive high-grade gold and newly discovered silver, with results including 553,754 g/t Au and 1,305 g/t Ag from one sample. The area shows strong potential, covering over 63 hectares and remaining open for further exploration. The company said the results suggest that the mineralisation is linked to quartz-iron veining, reinforcing the potential for more exploration in the region.

And, assistive communication group Control Bionics (ASX:CBL) has flagged at least 20% revenue growth in the current year, on the back of a record sales backlog that is now being processed more expeditiously.

The company also says it is close to cash-flow even (excluding corporate costs) and expects to be “near term” EBITDA positive “in all key geographic markets” for its core assisted communication arm.

 

Friday 11 October, 2024

Nagambie Resources (ASX:NAG) was rising on news that diamond drilling of the shallow high-grade gold-antimony orebody at the 100%-owned Nagambie Mine will recommence in early November, 2024. The company has previously announced that the four shallow gold-antimony lode systems included in the maiden Resource announced earlier this year are open at depth, and along strike, within Nagambie’s freehold land and Mining Licence.

Iris Metals (ASX:IR1) rose sharply on news that the company has successfully converted its spodumene concentrate to 99.5% battery grade lithium carbonate, using ore entirely sourced from its Beecher Project in South Dakota, USA. The conversion to lithium carbonate was done in the US, using “a domestic process and IP, marking a significant new capability in America’s efforts to secure domestic supply chains of critical minerals and IRIS’ role in that,” the company says.

Energy World Corporation (ASX:EWC) was up on news that the company has entered into a share purchase agreement with PT EMP Energi Jaya – a party related to PT Energi Maju Abadi – with respect to selling EWC’s 51% participating interes t in the 2,925.2 km2 Sengkang Contract Area that EWC’s subsidiary Energy Equity Epic (Sengkang) holds, for US$35 million.

Alterity Therapeutics (ASX:ATH) was up on news that the company has announced promising new data related to ATH434 – its candidate in the fight against neurodegenerative diseases – which has been presented at the Society for Neuroscience 2024 in Chicago. The company says that the poster it presented “demonstrates that the neuroprotective and mitochondrial protectant properties of ATH434 include reducing lipid damage in two distinct and disease-relevant neuronal injury models”.

Greenwing Resources (ASX:GW1) climbed following an update on progress at its San Jorge Lithium Brine  Project in Argentina, with completion of further surface exploration work providing additional confirmation of likely resource extension. The company released the maiden Mineral Resource Estimate for the project in May 2024, containing 1.07 Mt of Lithium Carbonate Equivalent (LCE), made up of 0.67Mt of Indicated Resources and 0.4Mt of Inferred Resources.

At Stockhead, we tell it like it is. While Island Pharmaceuticals is a Stockhead advertiser, it did not sponsor this article.

This article does not constitute financial product advice. You should consider obtaining independent advice before making any financial decisions.

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