Gold: Tietto is hunting a high-grade monster in Cote d’Ivoire. How big can it get?

For junior explorers (and their investors), a lot of value can be added during the project discovery phase. Especially if that project is an exciting one.

Cote d’Ivoire-based goldie Tietto Minerals (ASX:TIE) may have come off an early April peak, but the stock is still up over 100 per cent for the year so far.

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In February, Tietto told Stockhead it was aiming to double the 700,000oz Abujar project resource in an April resource update.

It exceeded that goal, significantly. Abujar is currently 1.7 million ounces and growing fast; the company says there’s gold mineralisation it hasn’t tested going out in all directions.

In fact, it’s only tested 10 per cent of a 70km long shear zone:

Did we mention it was super high grade?

Tietto has hit so many plus-100g/t gold intersections at Abujar’s AG and APG deposits (above) there’s a danger you could become desensitised to it all.

(As a rule of thumb, a 5g/t gold deposit = high grade).

The explorer is now targeting another resource update by the end of the year, driven by an aggressive three-rig, 30,000m drilling campaign.

For investors, that also means high grade drilling results are currently coming through thick and fast.

Today’s highlights included 2m at 101.67g/t gold from the AG deposit.

At AG, Tietto continues to hit broad high-grade gold mineralisation in drilling on section after section, says managing director Dr Caigen Wang.

“These these new results demonstrate significant potential for further growth of the current 1.06moz high‐grade core at the AG deposit,” he says.

“Our drill capacity on site continues to increase and we will soon have three of our own diamond rigs double shifting as we test the limits of the Abujar gold mineralisation, which remains open along strike and at depth.”

In other ASX gold news today:

Victorian explorer Navarre Minerals (ASX:NML) is testing a potential high-grade structural target with similarities to the nearby 9moz Fosterville mine. A shallow, 12-hole program at St Arnaud will follow up on initial hits like 8.6g/t gold and silver up to 81g/t, announced in February this year.

New ASX listing Mont Royal (ASX:MRZ) has defined multiple targets using geophysics at the Edujudina project in WA. These targets – where historic drilling was “sparse and largely ineffectual” – will be drilled in the next quarter.