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Good morning everyone, and welcome to August 15, 2024 – an important date in the history of building projects that run late and over budget.

It was on this day in 1248 that construction of a new cathedral in Cologne began after the Church figured it needed a new building to house the Tomb of the Three Magi – which is a large stone monument said to contain the bones of the 3 Wise Men who followed a star to Bethlehem to give presents to a newborn baby Jesus.

Leaving aside the question of how someone managed to harvest the bones of one of the Wise Men, let alone complete the entire set with all three of them, the construction of the cathedral is a story of grand plans, blown budgets and an overrun of time that puts any dodgy builder or renovation horror story you have to shame.

Because the cathedral wasn’t finished until 1880 – 632 years after it began – with an eventual cost in today’s money of more than $2.1 billion, most of that spent on getting the gargoyles ugly enough and the 158m tall spires to stay upright in strong winds.

Luckily for you, you won’t have to wait 600 years to get your hands on good pre-market info today.

That’s because – as always – we’ve worked super-hard to gather together lots of fiddly little things below, so you don’t need to go ferreting all over the internet for your ASX info this morning.

 

COMMODITY/FOREX/CRYPTO MARKET PRICES

Gold: US$2,461.77/oz (-0.14%)

Silver: US$27.77/oz (-0.29%)

Nickel (3mth): US$16,059/t (+0.82%)

Copper (3mth): US$8,831/t (-0.86%)

Zinc: US$2,636/t (-2.84%)

Oil (WTI): US$78.85/bbl (+0.23%)

Oil (Brent): US$81.14/bbl (+0.21%)

Iron 62pc Fe: US$96.00/t (-2.60%)

AUD/USD: 0.6624 (-0.16%)

Bitcoin: US$$60,956.10 (+0.71%)

 

WHAT GOT YOU TALKING

If you missed this week’s instalment of Guy on Rocks, here’s the big man himself to school you on the exciting world of graphite, and all the mysteries that entails.

 

 

YESTERDAY’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:

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Yesterday’s Small Cap Winners included:

LiveHire (ASX:LVH) was leading the way on Monday after news broke that MA Moelis Australia, on behalf of Humanforce Holdings, has launched an on-market takeover of Livehire, offering $0.045 per share – a substantial premium to the stock’s overnight close of $0.024 per share. The offer to purchase shares at that price will remain open until September 30.

Noxopharm (ASX:NOX) jumped more than 40% on Monday morning after releasing promising new data about its CRO-67 drug, which targets pancreatic cancer. The drug is designed to overcome the challenge posed by the dense barrier of cells surrounding pancreatic tumours, which typically protects the tumours from both anti-cancer drugs and the body’s immune system. CRO-67 works by targeting and destroying both the cancerous cells and these protective barrier cells.

Estrella Resources (ASX:ESR) was rising on news that the company has applied for four additional highly prospective Exploration and Evaluation Licences in Baucau Municipality, Timor-Leste, covering 194.4km2 and valid for four years. Estrella says that manganese mineralisation has already been spotted from surface within the application area.

Gold Mountain (ASX:GMN) was up on news of high-grade results from channel samples from the Irajuba tenements in its Down Under Project area, with peak values of 1045 ppm TREO apparent in a strongly weathered profile, alongside magnet REE of up to 33.6% of TREO, and heavy REE of up to 19.1% of TREO. The company says that augur drilling is next on the list of activities at the site, to drill below the strongly leached zone into saprolite to test the boundaries of the find.

Forbidden Foods (ASX:FFF) was also climbing on news of an acquisition, this time via a share purchase agreement (SPA) that has been executed to purchase leading plant-based non-dairy business Oat Milk Goodness, under which Forbidden Foods will acquire 100% of the shares in OMG for a consideration of $3.42m via the issue of 285m ordinary shares priced at 1.2c per share, subject to conditions precedent and shareholder approval.

Evion Group (ASX:EVG) was up on news that the Madagascan government has confirmed a new Mining Code which includes granting of development and production licences for compliant graphite projects, and has set out a programme for the issuing of new mining permits.

Titomic (ASX:TTT) was up on news that it has received further purchase orders from a global U.S. aerospace and defence prime totalling $577,000, and says that the orders represent “a significant milestone in the Company’s relationship with this global US aerospace and defence prime reflecting a qualification period spanning several years with this order taking cumulative orders on this project to over $1.0 million”.

Nimy Resources (ASX:NIM) has hit into a 10m interval of volcanic massive sulphide, or VMS,  from its first RC drill hole at its Mons VMS project. Mons is in the Forrestania nickel belt west of Kalgoorlie where IGO’s (ASX:IGO) nickel operations are located. It raised just over $1m for exploration that’s currently running its finger over a previous 5m @ 0.73% nickel, 0.53% copper, 0.06 % cobalt and 0.55g/t PGE’s from 102m anomaly it discovered at the Masson prospect – and has a diamond drill ready to spin to drill beneath the two RC pre-collars it just completed.

One of Waratah Minerals (ASX:WTM)’s substantial holders, Farjoy, has increased its stake in the junior from 5.08% to 7.49%, injecting almost $1.5m – as a maiden RC drilling campaign continues at the Spur project. It put in $232,000 as part of a $5m placement that WTM is using to accelerate drilling at its Spur gold-copper project – and has just thrown in another $1.2m-odd purchase for 4 million shares. It’s been a good month for the stock price so far, with results from another six holes from the current drill program consistently hitting shallow, high-grade gold mineralisation – up to 9.33g/t Au with 0.38% Cu.

 

YESTERDAY’S ASX SMALL CAP LAGGARDS

Here are the worst performing ASX small cap stocks:

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

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TRADING HALTS 

Site Group International (ASX:SIT) – pending an announcement of the outcome of the High Court appeal against the decision of the Full Federal Court that its subsidiary, Productivity Partners Pty Ltd, engaged in conduct in breach of the Australian Consumer Law in proceedings commenced by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission.

 

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

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