ASX Resources Top 5: ‘Grade is King’ for these gold, tin and lithium explorers

Elementos hits ‘some of the highest tin grades’ from flagship Oropesa project
Resources & Energy Group hits 5 zones of gold in one hole at ‘Gigante Grande’ discovery
Galan’s lithium concentrate levels more than double the average concentrate grade of Aussie lithium spodumene producers

Here are the biggest small cap resources winners in morning trade, Monday March 22.

The tin price is going gangbusters.

It’s partly why a high grade drilling intercept at Elementos’ flagship Oropesa project in Spain saw the explorer charge out of the gates in early trade.

Recent assays reported a highlight 31.1m @ 1.49 per cent tin from 113.3m.

That including 6.1m @ 4.85 per cent tin from 133.6m (which includes 1m @ 12.9 per cent and 1.4m @ 8.02 per cent). That’s high grade.

“The latest drilling results from Oropesa represent some of the highest tin grades ever reported at the project and continue to support our great confidence in the asset,” Elementos chairman Andy Greig says.

The 498 hole, 5,000m drilling program — part of a wider program designed to increase the project’s overall resource, annual production rate and mine life – is halfway complete.

RESOURCES AND ENERGY GROUP (ASX:REZ)

The WA gold explorer is pulling up thick and high grade intercepts at the Gigante Grande discovery, which is now 1.4km long and up to 200m deep.

One hole hit five zones of mineralisation, including a high grade 1m at 9.36g/t from 14m and some thicker stuff like 17m at 2.79g/t, 57m from surface.

More drill results are due within a week.

‘Step out’ drilling has kicked off in attempts to find the edges of this thing.

GALAN LITHIUM (ASX:GLN)

At 6 per cent lithium, the low impurity lithium chloride (LiCl) concentrate from Galan’s Hombre Muerto West (HMW) brine project in Argentina is directly comparable to that produced by major miners SQM and Albemarle.

HMW’s LiCL concentrate level (12.9 per cent Li20) is also equivalent to more than double the average concentrate grade of Aussie lithium spodumene producers (6 per cent Li20), the company says.

This means it can send its lithium anywhere in the world “without the burden of high logistics costs, high CO2 footprint and/or waste management.”

“Grade is always king,” managing director Juan Pablo (JP) Vargas de la Vega says.

“These results are better than we envisaged and have more than solidified the serious potential of the Hombre Muerto West project.”

Galan forecasts early HMW brine evaporation pilot works – a smaller version of the full scale project — to kick off in Q2 2021.

The Galan share price, up 260 per cent over the last six months, is closing in on an early 2019 peak of 62c.

LEGACY IRON ORE (ASX:LCY)

(Up on no news)

The ambiguously named gold explorer is developing the ~170,000oz Mt Celia project in WA.

900m of drilling is planned to see how far the mineralisation goes at the ‘Blue Peter’ deposit as mine development studies get underway.

The company is also planning an IP survey designed to find new targets for drilling.

KORE POTASH (ASX:KP2)

(Up on no news)

Congo focussed fertiliser play Kore still has no idea why the stock keeps jumping around like a bull in a china shop.

The ~$10m market cap potash play is aiming to finalise Phase 1 of its project Definitive Feasibility Study (the most detailed of all the studies) in May this year.