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ASX Resources Top 5: High grade gold hits, new discoveries, and a cashed-up graphite mine developer
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- Walkabout scores $US20m loan to fund construction of its ‘Lindi Jumbo’ graphite mine
- Tesoro makes new gold discovery at the ‘Ternera East’ prospect
- North Stawell hits more high grade gold
Here are the biggest small cap resources winners in morning trade, Tuesday April 13.
This African graphite mine developer has scored a $US20m loan from Tanzanian Bank CRDB to fund construction of its ‘Lindi Jumbo’ mine.
This funding facility is 62.5% of the overall project construction cost of ~$US32m.
Lindi Jumbo will be the first non-Chinese graphite mine to receive debt funding, Walkabout says.
“We have persisted with negotiating this funding facility for more than a year,” managing director Allan Mulligan says.
“The relationship benefits Tanzania in growing its services sector and benefits our company, as the cost of funding reduces significantly in terms of sovereign risk premiums.
“The provision of this significant debt package for Lindi unlocks the final milestone in project development and construction efforts at the mine site can commence as soon as formal documents have been executed.”
(Up on no news)
What’s cooking over at Octanex? The sleepy WA explorer is now up 200% over the past month on no news.
Octanex is focussed on the almost completely untouched 2,587sqkm ‘Sefton’ gold project, which is surrounded on three sides by “emerging world class gold camps”.
The near-term objective is to “identify priority structural targets for early drill and geochemical evaluation”, the company said last month.
The explorer also holds a gas discovery called ‘Ascalon’ in the Bonaparte Basin offshore WA.
NORTH STAWELL MINERALS (ASX:NSM)
Recently listed explorer North Stawell announced even more thick, high grade gold results from the ‘Wildwood’ prospect in Victoria.
Highlights include 12m at 9.49g/t gold from 34m, including 1m at 46.9g/t gold. More drilling results are expected over the next 30 days.
North Stawell is undertaking a large, two-year 75,000m drilling blitz, starting with the 55,000oz Wildwood.
“Many prospects are already demonstrated to be gold mineralised and we look forward to commencing regional target exploration once the bulk of our first Wildwood drilling is completed,” North Stawell chief exec Steven Tambanis says.
“Our first exploratory drill hole is underway to the north of Wildwood to test the first of 16 additional basalt dome targets on our tenure – an exciting first step into our regional drill program.”
A new gold discovery has been made at the ‘Ternera East’ prospect, part of Tesoro’s ‘El Zorro’ project in Chile.
Trenching sample results – like 3m at 8g/t gold – have defined a new gold zone ~850m long and 300m wide, “outcropping at surface and open in all directions”.
Ternera East is adjacent to the Ternera gold deposit where the company continues to drill.
“This is a significant development at El Zorro,” Tesoro managing director Zeff Reeves says.
“The new Ternera East discovery at El Zorro provides a significant increase in size to the overall Ternera gold system.
“We are planning to drill at Ternera East in the coming weeks”.
(Up on no news)
The iron ore play is working on a pre-feasibility study (PFS) for its Razorback mine in South Australia.
This PFS – a proper look at whether a project is economic or not — is due out sometime in Q2-Q3 this year.
Iron ore prices have just surged back above $US171.03/t.
