Blaze picks up new gold ground as the price tests new heights

Gold M&A remains front and centre as companies move to increase their footprint and resources as gold futures pushed past the $US1,800 ($2,603) an ounce mark earlier this week.

While gold for August delivery has since slipped back down, it has not stopped a number of analysts polled by Stockhead from making bullish predictions with the majority expecting gold to hit $US2,000 an ounce before the end of this year.

Blaze International (ASX:BLZ) has entered into an option to acquire a 100 per cent interest in three exploration licences to the south of the renowned Mt Magnet mining province, Western Australia.

The licences contain large untested gold soil anomalies that the company plans to drill test in the coming months.

An initial program of 50 aircore holes totalling 3,000m is currently being planned.

Blaze noted that numerous gold anomalies coincided with prominent beaks in the magnetics of the area and may be related to basement mineralised structures.

The company is required to pay an option fee of $20,000 and spend at least $100,000 on exploration within nine months.

This then gives it the right to acquire the licences for $1m in cash and 7.5 million worth of shares to be issued to private explorer Eastern Goldfields Exploration.

Blaze will also grant Eastern Goldfields a 2 per cent net smelter royalty on any metals produced.

Black Cat to digest its latest meal

Meanwhile, Black Cat Syndicate (ASX:BC8) has completed the acquisition of the Fingals and Rowe’s Find gold projects from Silver Lake Resources (ASX:SLR) that will more than double its resources.

The two projects have a combined resource of 5.2 million tonnes (mt) grading 2.5 grams per tonne (g/t) gold, or 425,000 ounces of contained gold.

They are located on granted mining leases close to Black Cat’s existing Bulong gold project near Kalgoorlie.

Black Cat’s total resources now stand at 8.7mt at 2.6g/t gold for 719,000 ounces of contained gold.

The company had paid $50,000 in cash and issued more than 8.4 million shares to Silver Lake, which is now a substantial shareholder (8.7 per cent) of the company.

Comet Resources (ASX:CRL) is also progressing due diligence on the acquisition of the high-grade Santa Teresa project in Baja California, Mexico.

The project consists of two mineral claims covering 202 hectares in the gold rich El Alamo district that have existing non-JORC resources of 64,000 ounces of contained gold at an average grade of 8.7g/t gold — well above the 5g/t mark that is considered to be high-grade.

Comet will acquire an initial 50 per cent in the project on the successful completion of due diligence and can pick up the remaining 50 per cent upon a decision to mine.

The company is also considering the acquisition of two further claims covering an additional 378 hectares.