Resources Top 5: Diablo wins crown on new copper project acquisition

Diablo’s new copper acquisition comes as BHP cheers its own copper operations
Galileo Mining sees promising platinum group element results in aircore drilling at Norseman
Early results from Phase 1 drilling at Golden Horse’s Hopes Hill project have returned encouraging gold intersections

Your standout small cap resources stocks for Tuesday, February 18, 2025.

Diablo Resources (ASX:DBO)

It might well be the devil’s own luck, but Diablo couldn’t have timed the announcement that it is acquiring the New Phoenix copper project in the world-class Lisbon Valley mining district, Utah, any better to coincide with BHP flagging optimism in its copper operations.

New Phoenix features >750m of outcropping mineralised strike that is open in all directions and where rock chip sampling has returned an average copper grade of 6.29% with a peak of 45.7%.

Despite this, little recent copper mineralisation has been completed

Adding further interest, the project is located along strike from the currently producing 740Mlb Lisbon Valley copper mine.

It was identified by DBO as a high-value, near-mine copper project with known high-grade copper and numerous other high priority targets to explore after spending 12 months looking for an opportunity.

“These near-mine opportunities in world-class mining districts are rare and the team has hit the ground running with exploration underway, designed to define zones of copper mineralisation for drill targeting,” chief executive officer Lyle Thorne said.

Sediment-hosted copper mineralisation has been located within the project and access is year-round using sealed and maintained gravel roads.

DBO will immediately embark on exploration consisting of geochemical sampling, geological mapping and sampling of prospective structural trends.

It will also carry out detailed structural interpretation aimed at locating favourable settings for copper mineralisation with the goal of drilling identified priority targets in 2025.

Galileo Mining (ASX:GAL)

Galileo’s 2024 aircore drilling at its Norseman project in WA has returned wide zones of platinum group elements including 11m grading 0.71g/t 3E from 20m (NAC470) and 18m at 0.48g/t 3E from surface (NAC471) as well as a peak result of 1m at 3.3g/t palladium (NAC501).

The results were returned from the Mission Sill prospect, which is about 8km from the 17.5Mt Callisto resource that shares the same prospective ultramafic host rocks.

“Initial assays from the aircore drill campaign at our Mission Sill prospect showed widespread palladium and platinum mineralisation,” managing director Brad Underwood said.

“Follow up assays of one metre samples using higher quality assaying techniques has now confirmed these findings and provided additional confidence in drill targeting at the prospect.

“Assay results have also verified the presence of rhodium, a precious metal related to palladium and platinum, which may be used as a vector to basement mineralisation.”

GAL plans to carry out follow-up aircore drilling next week with infill of these results as well as new drilling along strike within the 12km Mission Sill prospective trend.

Panther Metals (ASX:PNT)

(Up on no news)

WA gold explorer PNT is actively exploring its tenements at the Laverton gold project (LGP) with recent field work merging alongside available data to complete an advanced geochemical interrogation study.

That study successfully identified 36 highly anomalous gold geochemical targets and led to a 7,000m reverse circulation (RC) drilling program.

Eight wide intercepts hit high-grade mineralisation up to 28.66g/t gold within the Burtville East main lode, providing additional data for interpretation.

There is over 2,500m remaining in the budget as part of the original 7,000 metre program which is expected to be completed during the current quarter.

Golden Horse Minerals (ASX:GHM)

Impressive early results from Phase 1 drilling at Golden Horse’s Hopes Hill project in Southern Cross including a standout 61m at 2.5g/t gold.

Other assays also defined high-grade zones that confirm the strong potential of the area, which the company had acquired from Emerald Resources (ASX:EMR) as part of an extensive 360km2 tenement package which also included several other highly prospective target areas.

The historical Hopes Hill open pit mine is ~1300m long with a maximum depth of about 90m.

Phase 1 drilling is continuing for the next 3-4 weeks with the aim of further validating historical drilling and testing mineralisation and structural controls to extend known mineralisation.

Burgundy Diamond Mines (ASX:BDM)

(Up on no news)

Burgundy produced 1.02 million carats of diamonds in Q4 2024 and sold 1.1 million carats during the same quarter for total proceeds of US$101m, generating EBITDA of US$20.5m.

The company is on track to release the first mine plan for the extension of its Ekati project by the end of Q1 2025.

It will also l release the longer-term mine plan in the second half of the year that could extend the life of mine to the mid-2030s.

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