CLOSING BELL: Health Care has risen like a zombie to help lift market by 0.5%; Goldies climb 1.1%, too

ASX has finished 0.5% ahead, despite Wall Street’s flabby performance on Friday.
Health Care has taken a positive 1.8% step towards fixing last week’s -6.1% disaster.
Gold 50 has topped the charts after hitting stellar intercepts at its Arizona dig.

Local markets have eased a little since lunchtime, stepping down slightly from +0.6% highs to end the day at 0.5%.

A good chunk of the day’s solid performance has come via the Health Care sector’s return from the dead, lurching like a groaning zombie from last week’s 6.1% loss to post a much-needed 1.83% gain.

Oneview Healthcare (ASX:ONE) was one of the sector’s big gainers today, up 21.5% on news that it’s entered into a Value-Added Reselling Agreement with Baxter International, which will see the company’s Care Experience Platform (CXP) in the US market.

Consumer Staples is also up today, adding 1.53% with the likes of Skin Elements (ASX:SKN) up 14.3% and Tasfoods (ASX:TFL) up 9.5% helping to push the sector along.

The morning’s woes for Materials and Energy only deepened as the day progressed, leaving them lower by 0.6% apiece – despite the lion’s share of the top gains in Small Caps belonging to the diggers today, and the XGD All Ords Gold index leading the market on +1.09% as well.

In Large Cap Land, Weebit Nano (ASX:WBT) added 10% for no apparent reason, and lithium digger Lake Resources (ASX:LKE) had a shocker, dropping 20% on news that investors are going to have to wait a while longer for the company to hit its 50,000tpa production goal in Argentina.

It’s not terrible news – LKE says it’s likely to be at 25,000tpa by 2027, and the rest by 2030 – but the extra three years for the second half of the production is clearly no bueno for investors.

TODAY’S ASX SMALL CAP LEADERS

Here are the best performing ASX small cap stocks:

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

Code	Company	Price	%	Volume	Market Cap
TNC	True North Copper	0.26	391%	5,522,942	$13,771,597
AFW	Applyflow Limited	0.015	50%	1,019,428	$1,478,807
CCE	Carnegie Cln Energy	0.0015	50%	4,051,231	$15,642,574
CLE	Cyclone Metals	0.0015	50%	1,716,635	$10,264,505
BM8	Battery Age Minerals	0.45	32%	359,075	$25,234,175
G50	Gold50Limited	0.185	32%	140,957	$7,972,020
FTL	Firetail Resources	0.12	30%	283,773	$7,084,000
AQC	Auspaccoal Ltd	0.15	30%	793,931	$39,940,760
ONE	Oneview Healthcare	0.32	25%	4,213,796	$136,034,128
GTG	Genetic Technologies	0.0025	25%	95,571	$23,083,316
MRZ	Mont Royal Resources	0.11	25%	1,581,892	$6,026,475
COY	Coppermoly Limited	0.011	22%	349,246	$3,819,482
GRE	Greentechmetals	0.54	21%	10,609,276	$18,649,766
PBH	Pointsbet Holdings	1.65	21%	6,347,581	$418,860,685
FXG	Felix Gold Limited	0.09	20%	304,255	$8,235,480
PUA	Peak Minerals Ltd	0.003	20%	1,600,000	$2,603,442
RDN	Raiden Resources Ltd	0.006	20%	34,229,964	$10,276,345
YPB	YPB Group Ltd	0.003	20%	22,692,220	$1,548,122
DUB	Dubber Corp Ltd	0.185	19%	3,269,513	$47,979,905
BMO	Bastion Minerals	0.031	19%	24,053,805	$4,144,701
CNQ	Clean Teq Water	0.28	19%	43,487	$13,561,920
IXR	Ionic Rare Earths	0.025	19%	20,889,828	$82,868,203
MRI	Myrewardsinternation	0.02	18%	2,795,763	$5,237,669
PGY	Pilot Energy Ltd	0.02	18%	1,776,710	$16,531,270
GPR	Geopacific Resources	0.021	17%	341,566	$14,781,440

True North Copper (ASX:TNC) set the cat among the pigeons with what looked like a 370% gain this morning, but it’s not quite what it looked like on the data charts.

True North Copper was the subject of a reverse takeover by Duke Exploration that started late last year, and the whole thing has taken quite a while to get resolved.

As Stockhead’s very own Josh Chiat explains it, a reverse takeover is “kind of like the alien spawn growing inside of Sigourney Weaver, which then bursts out and becomes a (more friendly) xenomorph.”

That xenomorph has emerged from the chest of the ASX today, with the whole rebranded thing assuming the value of both DEX and TNC, which was well above TNC’s price when the reverse takeover began, and so that’s why it looks like such a huge gain.

So, the “real” winner was Gold 50 (ASX:G50) up 36% on surprisingly slender volume this morning and on news that the company has intersected high-grade gold-silver mineralisation within several broad mineralised zones at its Golconda project in Arizona.

The intersects include 35m at 5.2g/t gold and 5.9g/t silver from 176.8m including 9m at 19.5g/t gold and 17.8g/t silver, and 11m at 1.2g/t gold, 399g/t silver, 0.31% copper and 0.55% zinc from 61.0m and immediately below historic underground workings.

Bastion Minerals (ASX:BMO) locked in second on the ladder, up 31% after it reported staking a strategic 115km2 REE exploration tenure near Gyttorp in South Sweden.

BMO says that rock chip samples “greater than 2.86% (28,600 ppm) and 3.64% (36,400 ppm) Total Rare Earth Oxide (TREO) are recorded in historic sampling with some detection limits exceeding the actual result will be greater than these figures”.

And Mont Royal Resources (ASX:MRZ) packed on a very tidy 31% today, thanks to a mystery spike in trading volume on precisely zero news which has defied my ability to figure out this afternoon – but the moment I learn what’s behind it, I’ll be sure to write it down somewhere safe so that I can forget to fill everyone in about it tomorrow.

TODAY’S ASX SMALL CAP LAGGARDS

Here are the least best performing ASX small cap stocks:

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

Code	Company	Price	%	Volume	Market Cap
OPN	Oppenneg	0.01	-67%	1,983,540	$7,275,899
PKD	Parkd Ltd	0.02	-38%	208,365	$3,258,187
CCO	The Calmer Co Int	0.002	-33%	30,370	$1,334,333
DXN	DXN Limited	0.001	-33%	1,135,313	$2,581,972
INP	Incentiapay Ltd	0.01	-29%	196,123	$17,710,891
MCT	Metalicity Limited	0.0015	-25%	476,314	$7,472,172
MTL	Mantle Minerals Ltd	0.0015	-25%	1,602,799	$12,294,892
SIH	Sihayo Gold Limited	0.0015	-25%	250,000	$12,204,256
SFM	Santa Fe Minerals	0.046	-25%	100,000	$4,441,946
TGH	Terragen	0.021	-22%	257,167	$6,024,297
TOY	Toys R Us	0.011	-21%	9,557,587	$12,083,213
IMI	Infinitymining	0.12	-20%	175,556	$11,471,748
LKE	Lake Resources	0.38	-20%	57,108,351	$675,661,236
NNL	Nordicnickellimited	0.2	-20%	209,264	$14,615,001
DCX	Discovex Res Ltd	0.002	-20%	38,514,928	$8,256,420
ENT	Enterprise Metals	0.004	-20%	1,726,701	$3,525,403
RXH	Rewardle Holding Ltd	0.021	-19%	1,918,896	$13,684,359
OM1	Omnia Metals Group	0.225	-18%	1,491,649	$12,532,003
AVW	Avira Resources Ltd	0.0025	-17%	34,902,985	$6,401,370
CPT	Cipherpoint Limited	0.005	-17%	821,328	$6,955,450
IVX	Invion Ltd	0.005	-17%	8,344,716	$38,529,793
SPD	Southernpalladium	0.335	-16%	9,570	$17,231,331
OSX	Osteopore Limited	0.11	-15%	165,494	$18,749,706
PRM	Prominence Energy	0.017	-15%	63,742	$2,424,618
CI1	Credit Intelligence	0.115	-15%	467,029	$11,272,387

LAST ORDERS

Lithium Power International (ASX:LPI) is in the news today, after announcing that it’s entered into a binding agreement to sell its wholly owned Australian subsidiary Western Lithium to to Albemarle Lithium, a subsidiary of Albemarle Corporation.

The sale is notable for a couple of reasons – first of all, it’s set to put a cool $30 million in LPI’s pocket, which is no small chunk of change.

And secondly, the sale (I’m told) represents the first all-cash deal of its type in that region, and the sale of Western Lithium includes that company’s Greenbushes lithium project in southern WA, where a number of companies including the likes of recently-in-the-news Kula Gold (ASX:KGD) are reporting successful exploratory work as the region continues to heat up.

Thirdly, the sale of Western Lithium to Albemarle effectively ends the well-progressed plans for the company’s spin-off and public listing by LPI, with the board recognising that an immediate $30 million sale will save them a lot of time and effort, while delivering far more rapid return.

Elsewhere, Talon Energy (ASX:TPD) has provided the market with an update on how things are going on the Walyering gas field development JV, in which it holds a 45% ownership – the rest of it belongs to Strike Energy (ASX:STX).

Talon says that everything is progressing extremely well, with all processing equipment now secured in place, condensate tanks and offload facilities constructed, utilities installation complete and the Parmelia Gas Pipeline (PGP) connection constructed.

Barring any major hassles, Talon says that production rehearsals and other operational readiness exercises has the team set up to go completely operational, and the commissioning process had been prepared with the plan to send commissioning gas into the PGP for sale once permissions to introduce hydrocarbons has been granted by the regulator.

That’s estimated to take about a week, and once it’s done, the Walyering gas field development is off to the races.

And finally, Lanthanein Resources (ASX:LNR) has announced that it has completed drilling at the Lyons Rare Earths Project in Western Australia, targeting previously discovered high-grade rare earth mineralisation among outcropping ironstones and additional interpreted carbonatite intrusives and ironstones at the site.

“The finalisation of drilling on new outcropping ironstone trends is a very exciting time for Lanthanein,” technical director Brian Thomas, said.

“The drilling of these new discoveries is the result of the geological team’s growing understanding of the rare earth mineralisation controls within the Gifford Creek Carbonatite complex, and assays from this program could provide a breakthrough discovery that could potentially transform the Company.

“We look forward to moving to a mineral resource estimate on the high grade outcropping ironstones at Lyons 12 & 13, which are approximately 2km from Hastings Technology Metals (ASX:HAS) Frasers and Simons Find pits, and updating the market with results as drilling progresses.”