• Follow-up mapping and sampling by Nova Minerals has proven an extensive antimony rich zone at the Stibium deposit within its flagship Estelle project, with grades up to 56.7% antimony
  • The confirmation of a high-grade antimony zone came just days after major producer China announced a total ban of the critical mineral into the US, following restrictions introduced in September
  • The price of the antimony, used in defence and clean energy applications, has now soared more than 200 per cent this year

 

Special Report: Nova Minerals has made an eye-popping antimony discovery at its flagship 500km2-plus Estelle Project in Alaska just days after China banned exports of the critical mineral into the US and sent prices on a tear.

Follow-up mapping and rock sampling at the gold and critical mineral project’s Stibium deposit revealed high-grade antimony over an 800m long by 400m wide zone, which remains open. Results included grades up to 56.7% antimony and 11 samples of more than 30%, confirming the initial discovery in 2023 when results measured up to 60.5%.

Nova Minerals (ASX:NVA) is now looking forward to more antimony soil, and gold rock and soil sample assay results from the Stibium deposit.

Looking ahead to flowsheet work, the company also collected a 2500kg bulk sample for metallurgical tests.

Nova is additionally waiting on further regional exploration from the broader RPM and Stoney areas within the Estelle project, which is situated in the highly prolific Tintina Gold Belt.

 

Prices skyrocket

China’s complete ban on antimony exports to the US, which follow restrictions in September, have sent the price skyrocketing more than 200% from just US$12,000 per tonne at the beginning of the year to US$38,000 per tonne last week.

The US Department of Interior lists antimony as a mineral that’s critical and strategic to American economic and national security interests. The semi-metal is also on the European Union’s – and Australia’s – critical materials list.

China accounted last year for approximately 48% of globally mined antimony, which is used in a range of defence applications, batteries, fire retardants and photovoltaic equipment.

A miner in Tajikistan is the sole major supplier into the West outside the Chinese supply chain.

“Everyone will dig in their backyard to find antimony,” a metals trader told Reuters after the ban announcement.

 

High grade and drill ready

Nova CEO, Mr Christopher Gerteisen commented: “With these results we begin to appreciate the potential size and tenor of the impressive antimony discovery at the Stibium prospect.

We also await the 2024 gold results which have previously delivered up to 12.7 grams per tonne of gold.

“These results show Stibium to be an exceptional high-grade, antimony-gold, drill-ready prospect. The company will prioritise this prospect moving forward and advance towards resource definition to continue to increase and prove-up the total resource inventory across the Estelle gold and critical minerals project, which already includes the high-grade RPM gold deposit and the bulk tonnage Korbel gold deposit.”

“The company is also well advanced with its applications towards US government grant funding in pursuit of these efforts.”

Nova Head of Exploration, Mr Hans Hoffman said his team’s primary objective was to delineate the anomaly from 2023, and he believes they’ve delivered on this and more.

“I feel like we located the heart of it, but mineralization likely extends to the north and the south,” he said.

 

Grant application well underway

At the same time Nova, through its 100% owned subsidiary Alaska Range Resources, is a member of the Defense Industrial Base Consortium (DIBC) and is well advanced with a Department of Defense (DoD) grant application process.

The DIBC enables rapid research, access to commercial solutions and innovations from industry, academia and contractors.

With the US now more urgently seeking domestic sources of antimony, DoD funding could potentially kickstart production as soon as next year.

 

 

This article was developed in collaboration with Nova Minerals, a Stockhead advertiser at the time of publishing.

 

This article does not constitute financial product advice. You should consider obtaining independent advice before making any financial decisions.