• MinerDeck has compiled the 20 highest gram-metre gold intercepts posted to the ASX in the first quarter of 2025
  • Companies that ‘made the grade’ include Ivorian explorers, established producers and WA gold hunters
  • Individual rill hits must be considered in context, but width and grade can give a sense of a prospect’s promise

 

There are plenty of ways to look at a drill result and when it comes to comparing one drill hit from another there are so many things to consider.

Was the gold in question already known about, is it infilling a blind area of a known resource, finding an extension or striking the precious metal somewhere completely new.

Some gold is disseminated in sulphides and harder to process, others may contain visible gold – exciting for sure, but also commonly nuggety and difficult to place in a resource.

But there are two things that always stand out for resources investors: width and grade.

The nexus of those two variables is the gram-metre, a relatively imperfect attempt to quantify the gold accumulation within an intercept.

What it is good for is being able to hold one drill hit up to another and point to deposits that may have scale and grade potential.

Gold and silver investing influencer Don Durrett in his book How to Invest in Gold and Silver provided a crude taxonomy of what makes a “good” drill hit multiplying g/t with width.

Anything over 50 gram-metres is considered good, with 100-200 “really good” 200-500 “excellent” and anything beyond that “stellar”.

With gold sailing beyond A$5000/oz this week hitting US$3140/oz on Tuesday Aussie time, there’s been no better time to make a new discovery or build on an old one.

But how do you know which ones may have promise.

Handily, data visualiser MinerDeck is on hand this week, with its compilation of the top 20 gram-metre drilling highlights of the March quarter.

 

The breakdown

It’s worth noting that all results mentioned here need to be placed into context.

Some of them come from established miners looking for high-grade pockets or extensions in pre-existing orebodies.

The top hit from Pantoro (ASX:PNR), owner of the Norseman gold mine and a potential takeover target at current levels according to some market observers, came from an unmined section of the Mararoa Reef, a 1Moz historic producer in the ancient southern WA gold field.

At 3m at 485g/t from 185m for 1456 gram-metres, the hit fell well within Durrett’s definition of Stellar, as did a strike from Tanami Gold (ASX:TAM) in the NT of 3.8m at 268g/t from 317m for 1020 gram metres.

Others came from established firms like Bellevue Gold (ASX:BGL) or De Grey Mining (ASX:DEG), the latter of which has already secured barring a last minute hiccup a $5bn takeover from Northern Star Resources (ASX:NST) for its 11.2Moz Hemi discovery in the Pilbara.

But others, largely from junior explorers have been capable of drawing a market reaction in their own right.

Four of the 20 hits, notably, come from what is now being called the premier jurisdiction in West Africa, Cote d’Ivoire, where capital continues to flow from ASX investors and small caps.

Many Peaks Minerals (ASX:MPK) saw outsized gains on March 17 when it struck 45m at 8.58g/t from just 53m at its Ferké project in the African gold hotspot, followed up not long after by fellow Ivorian driller Caigen Wang’s Aurum Resources (ASX:AUE), which hit 83m at 4.87g/t at its 1.59Moz Boundiali project.

Broker’s favourite WIA Gold (ASX:WIA) and now Montage Gold Corp-backed African Gold (ASX:A1G) also cracked the 20 posted by MinerDeck.

Width did it for Gold Fields-backed Chilean gold hunter Tesoro Gold (ASX:TSO), which struck 154m at 1.61g/t from 83m (248 gram-metres) at the El Zorro gold project, in a hit within the boundary of its 1.3Moz deposit, with another 132m hit at 1.28g/t outside.

 

Back home in WA

Over in WA’s Murchison and Goldfields regions, which have become hotbeds of exploration and M&A activity amid sky-rocketing gold prices, a number of intercepts made the grade.

Caprice Resources (ASX:CRS) shares more than doubled on February 12 when it revealed a string of hits from its Island gold project, wedged between the dominions of Westgold and Ramelius Resources near Cue.

Seeking an analogue of Ramelius’ high grade Break of Day deposit 12km to the south, CRS has been both looking to establish a resource at the known New Orient gold mine and locate new large scale prospects like Vadrian’s Hill, where it struck 28m at 6.4g/t, clocking in at 179 gram metres.

A pullback yesterday came after a sharp run up in its shares, but $29m capped CRS remains 97% up in the past six months and delivered another two significant intercepts from Vadrians yesterday of 11m at 6.7g/t from 1m and 20m at 1.5g/t from 106m, respectively up and down dip of the Feb 12 intercept.

That’s extended the strike to 250m, with a potential repeat in a new discovery 250m to the south.

Astral Resources (ASX:AAR) delivered a 406 gram metre intercept in its ‘best ever’ diamond drill hit at the 1Moz-plus Mandilla gold project’s Theia deposit, while fellow gold developers Rox Resources (ASX:RXL) and Magnetic Resources (ASX:MAU) also caught the eye with strikes of 4.9m at 84.6g/t and 51m at 3.5g/t from 444m respectively at their Youanmi and Laverton gold projects.

Laverton region explorers Brightstar Resources (ASX:BTR) and Matsa Resources (ASX:MAT) also cracked the 20.

 

At Stockhead, we tell it like it is. While Many Peaks Minerals, Caprice Resources, Tesoro Gold, Magnetic Resources, Astral Resources and Brightstar Resources are Stockhead advertisers, they did not sponsor this article.

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