Gold play Cardinal Resources had good news for investors yesterday with a 400 per cent increase in resources at its flagship Namdini project.

The stock (ASX:CDV) gained 6c to 66c in intraday trade before cooling to 64c with close to 700,000 shares changing hands.

Namdini, in the Ghana’s northeast, now has an “indicated” mineral resource of 4.3 million ounces and “inferred” mineral resource of 3.1 million ounces at a 0.5 grams per tonne cut-off grade.

This compares to the previous estimate of 931,000 ounces in the “indicated” category and 3.63 million ounces in the “inferred” category.

Mineral resources are categorised in order of increasing geological confidence as inferred, indicated or measured.

Since its discovery in 2014, Cardinal has drilled 275 holes for a total of 69,291 metres.

Cardinal chief executiveArchie Koimtsidis said the company was happy so many ounces had been upgraded in the indicated category for the resource estimate published in April this year.

“With the majority of the Indicated Mineral Resource continuous from surface to approximately 350m vertical depth, we anticipate a simple, single, large scale pit, with a low strip ratio as the preferred mining method,” Mr Koimtsidis said.

At this point in time, the higher‐grade areas towards the northern part of the resource, close to surface, may be targeted in the early years of production.”

Additional drilling was in progress to further improve Mineral Resource classification and to further expand the resource.

Namdini lies in the Bolgatanga region, 6 km south east of the operating Shaanxi underground Gold Mine and 12 km from Cardinal’s Ndongo East Prospect.