Resources Top 5: Lithium, more lithium, and a spicy copper hit

St George Mining uncovers numerous outcropping pegmatites (rock that hosts lithium)
Iris Metals has now six-bagged since picking up some early-stage lithium ground in South Dakota in June
Tennant Minerals is hitting up to 54.5% copper and 39g/t gold in latest drilling at the Bluebird discovery

Here are the biggest small cap resources winners in early trade, Wednesday September 7.

ST GEORGE MINING (ASX:SGQ)

Any mention of “lithium potential” from an ASX explorer is still enough to get the crowd amped up.

Traditionally a nickel explorer, SGQ has now uncovered numerous outcropping pegmatites (rock that hosts lithium) in swarms over 15km at the flagship Mt Alexander project in WA.

Mt Alexander, which has never been explored for lithium, is thought to be in the same regional corridor hosting the major lithium discovery announced by $180m-capped Red Dirt Metals (ASX:RDT) at its Mt Ida project.

SGQ will now advance lithium exploration in tandem with drill testing several very promising, recently identified nickel targets announced on 1 September 2022, says exec chair John Prineas.

“The pegmatites at Mt Alexander may be part of the same system that hosts the major lithium discovery announced by Red Dirt Metals at its Mt Ida Project to the southeast of our ground, which further underpins the lithium prospectivity at our project,” he says.

“The lithium opportunity at Mt Alexander is a perfect complement to our nickel sulphide discoveries at the project and expands our focus on EV and clean energy metals.”

The $18m market cap stock is still down 57% year-to-date. It had $4.1m in the bank at the end of June.

IRIS METALS (ASX:IR1)

(Up on no news)

This once-humble explorer has now six-bagged since picking up some early-stage lithium ground in South Dakota in June.

IR1 is now the largest holder of lithium mining claims in South Dakota, it says, after increasing its footprint at the Black Hills project by 290% to ~42,287 acres.

“The company now has a great mix of drill-ready targets and extensive prospective corridors over known lithium bearing LCT pegmatites,” executive technical director and head of exploration Chris Connell said August 18.

“I am currently on site, directing and supervising the staking and exploration activities over an area that is exhibiting regional scale lithium potential.”

The $90m market cap stock is up 130% year-to-date, and +600% on its September 2021 IPO price of 20c per share. It has $4.5m in the bank at the end of June.

LYKOS METALS (ASX:LYK)

(Up on no news)

LYK is now up ~30% in two days after uncovering a couple of polymetallic shear zones, Erak 1 and Erak 2, at the Sinjakovo project in Bosnia-Herzegovina.

At Erak-1 rock chip samples returned exceptional results of up to 12.61g/t gold equivalent, with 3.75g/t gold equivalent on average for 13 samples.

“Lykos is proceeding to commence a diamond drilling program in late September to follow up Erak 1 and Erak 2,” it says.

“The company expects more shear zones to emerge at Erak as trenching continues.”

Meanwhile, LYK is drilling dusters at the Gramusovici prospect – part of the nearby Cajnice project — with results received to date not adequately explaining the grades of copper mineralisation in the discovery outcrop (1-10% copper).

“The mineralised system could improve to the west,” the company says.

The $11m market cap stock is down 46% year-to-date. It had $7m in the bank at the end of June.

MC MINING (ASX:MCM)

(Up on no news)

After battling against weak sentiment for years, the tide has finally turned for this tiny South African coal miner and project developer.

It’s a great time to be in coal, and MCM is hoping to reap the benefits of historically high prices.

MCM recently completed a Bankable Feasibility Study – the most advanced of all project studies – on its flagship 296Mt ‘Makhado’ hard coking coal project in South Africa (68% interest).

The BFS envisages a production of 13.7Mt (coking) and 11.9Mt (thermal) over a 22-year mine life. Post-tax IIR and NPV were estimated at 38.2% and $268m, respectively.

The project would use existing infrastructure to minimise upfront costs, which have been estimated at $41m.

MCM plans to start certain early-works activities at Makhado later in CY2022 and funding dependent, construction is planned to commence in early CY2023.

Meanwhile, a recently entered coal sales and marketing agreement will see coal exported from MCM’s small Uitkomst operation “ensuring the colliery benefits from the prevailing international coal prices”.

That means potentially bigger profits going forward, starting in the current quarter.

The $70m market cap stock is up 289% year to date. It had $3.4m in the bank at the end of June.

TENNANT MINERALS (ASX:TMS)

TMS is hitting up to 54.5% copper and 39g/t gold in latest drilling at the Bluebird discovery in the NT.

In March, the small cap rerated after pulling up a “spectacular” close-to-true-width 50m at 2.7% copper intersection at ‘Bluebird’, part of the ‘Barkly’ project in the NT.

The true width is always the width of the vein etc at its narrowest point.

These latest results – including a highlight 40m @ 2.6% Cu and 1.34g/t Au and 9.5m @ 6.0 % Cu and 0.48g/t Au from 278m — extend the discovery to more than 250m depth.

But it could get a lot bigger from here, it says.

“The recognition that the majority of the high-grade copper mineralisation is in sulphides has given impetus to our downhole EM program, to detect extensions to this high-grade copper-gold discovery,” chairman Matt Driscoll says.

“We have also commenced an IP geophysical survey over Bluebird to fingerprint the copper sulphide mineralisation, which will help us prioritise the up to 12 geophysical targets within the Bluebird Perseverance Target Zone for drill-testing.

“This will give us even more confidence that Bluebird is just one of several high-grade copper and gold deposits awaiting discovery within the company’s broader Barkly project.”

The copper-gold explorer, which previously went by Blina Minerals, was suspended from the ASX in March 2020 on concerns over its financial condition.

TMS undertook a recap and acquired the remaining 50 per cent stake in Barkly before relisting in April last year.

The $22m market cap stock is up 12% year-to-date. It had $4.7m in the bank at the end of June.