Aussie juniors are covering themselves in gold at projects around the world. Pic via Getty Images.
Mining
It’s a fantastic time to be advancing gold projects. Hedges against inflation, general economic uncertainty and the Russia-Ukraine and Israel-Palestine-Iran conflicts have pushed gold up to record highs of US$2,431/oz – compound this with a weakened Aussie dollar and our own domestic prices are at an eye-whopping $3,705/oz.
Across the globe, sovereign wealth funds and other investors have shown a notable trend of increasing their gold holdings due to these macroeconomic and geopolitical environments.
An Invesco survey of 85 sovereign wealth funds and 57 central banks last year – which manage a ridiculous $21 trillion worth of assets around the globe – showed a 3% annual rise in their gold holdings in 2022 and across H1 2023, with no signs of abating.
“We find an increasing inclination towards gold as a safe-haven asset and a substantial percentage of central banks are concerned about the precedent set by the US freezing of Russian reserves, with the majority (58%) agreeing that the event has made gold more attractive,” Invesco says.
“Consequently, central banks now prefer to hold physical gold rather than gold ETFs or derivatives.”
Goldman Sachs is sounding the bull horn too and reckons the shiny stuff will trade even higher across 2024 and has a price target of US$2,700/oz by the end of the year, driven by the growing geopolitical tensions.
Those factors have culminated in ASX-listed gold companies becoming hot property for big private equity investors willing to pour larger amounts of capital into projects.
Interestingly, a bunch of ASX goldies are exploring and developing ex-Australia projects to put themselves in other shop windows at the moment – striking while the iron’s hot. Let’s take a gander at a few of them.
In Mali, Toubani Resources (ASX:TRE) has a low-cost gold development on its hands – its 2.4Moz Kobada deposit – a predominantly free-dig oxide project with the bulk of identified mineralisation within 100m of the surface.
A definitive feasibility study (DFS) update confirmed Kobada’s credentials, with high recovery rates underpinned by a 4.5km-long, shallow open pit deposit.
TRE has also almost wrapped up a 10,000m drill program to further upgrade Kobada’s resource confidence, recently turning up high-grade gold oxides with hits of up to 55.9g/t.
“Numerous results have now been received of significant width and tenor and these will be included in our mineral resource update this quarter,” CEO Phil Russo says.
And Mako Gold (ASX:MKG) is evaluating new high-grade gold zones at its Napié project where it’s discovered two parallel artisanal mining sites named the ‘Double Zone’ after intersecting massive gold hits from rock chip samples returned up to 22.46g/t gold.
Also jumping in on the latest West Africa gold rush is Many Peaks Minerals (ASX:MPK), which has raised $2m to explore its recently snapped up Ferké and Odienné gold projects.
These aim to complement its Oumé gold prize – all in Coté d’Ivoire and surrounded by some of the region’s biggest gold mines.
Gold Road Resources (ASX:GOR) is also looking overseas and has confirmed rumours on a move to snap up a stake in Canada’s +$1bn Greenstone Gold Mines, a 400,000ozpa JV between Equinox Gold and Orion Resource Partners.
The miner has a 50% non-operating stake in the Gruyere mine in WA and a 19.9% interest in De Grey Mining (ASX:DEG) which is looking to develop its massive 12.7Moz Mallina project – pegged to become Australia’s fifth-largest gold mining operation – and may decide to offload slices of its share in them to fund its move into Canada.
In Chile, Tesoro Gold (ASX:TSO) has defined 1.3Moz at its Ternera deposit and is punching on with exploration up a prospective 20km-long gold corridor at five high-priority targets currently being drilled.
Across to Argentina, Challenger Gold (ASX:CEL) is progressing with the advanced 2.8Moz Hualilan gold project, banking $9.6m to fast-track it into production at a low AISC of just $1,291/oz – less than a third of the current gold price.
Having already poured first gold, Besra Gold (ASX:BEZ) is advancing production rates of its Bau project in Borneo and over in California, Dateline Resources (ASX:DTR) is expanding its high-grade +800,000oz Colosseum gold project.
Drilling has so far returned numerous monster strikes including an 88m @ 4.18g/t gold hit intercepted in diamond hole CM24-16 with 22.8m @ 8.17g/t.
At Stockhead, we tell it like it is. While Toubani Resources, Dateline Resources, Besra Gold, Challenger Gold, De Grey Mining, Many Peaks Minerals, Tesoro Gold and Mako Gold are Stockhead advertisers, they did not sponsor this article.
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