- Old AVZ boss Klaus Eckhof acquires ground next door to Manono via his new company, AJN Resources
- 367 TSX and TSXV resources stocks went up last week, 431 went down, 337 didn’t move
- Standout winner was coal-copper major Teck, up 12%
Our Canada Unearthed column wraps the news driving mining and exploration stocks listed in Canada, mostly on the TSX and TSX.V.
Would you risk investing in another AVZ?
Klaus Eckhof – the man who spearheaded AVZ Minerals’ (ASX:AVZ) Manono lithium project acquisition in 2017 — is acquiring ground next door via his new company, AJN Resources.
Former market darling AVZ is now a cautionary tale of the dangers of developing projects in the Third World.
But it was once an emerging lithium behemoth thanks to its world class Manono project in the DRC, which contains the biggest and second highest grade undeveloped deposit in the world — 401Mt (132Mt reserves) at (1.65%).
Monstrous. No wonder everyone wants a piece.
Now Eckhof’s CSE-listed AJN Resources is a neighbour.
The CSE, or Canadian Securities Exchange, is an alternative to the TSXV for microcaps and emerging companies.
The ground is ~7km northeast of the northern extension of the Manono pegmatites and 15km northeast of Manono centre.
AJN reckons the 13km-long Manono peggie swarm continues under cover into its new ground.
Field work is expected to commence within the coming weeks.
“We are extremely excited about this latest acquisition which potentially covers 10km of highly prospective ground with good potential to host lithium bearing pegmatites under surficial cover,” Eckhof says.
“Historically, mining and exploration was concentrated on the exposed spodumene bearing pegmatites around Manono which cover a strike length of approximately 13km and little focus was placed on following the extension of these pegmatites under cover to the northeast.”
Interesting fact: current AVZ MD Nige Ferguson was a director at AJN until mid 2022, which is about the time all that drama for AVZ kicked off.
AJN will give $50,000 to vendor Palm to conduct six months of due diligence. If it decides to go ahead with the deal, AJN can acquire a 51% indirect interest for $250,000 and a 10.5% company stake.
AJN can acquire another 19% for $5.25m cash and 4m shares.
How did the TSX/TSX.V perform last week?
S&P/TSX Composite Index eked out a small 0.48% win, giving it a 2.99% year-to-date gain.
Unlike the TSX.V, the index – which measures the overall health of the bourse — is heavily weighted towards the major banks.
The S&P/TSX Global Mining Index did a lot better, up 2.65% last week to claw back a chunk of those YTD losses (currently just 2.33%).
The S&P/TSX Venture Composite Index – repped heavily by big lithium project developers like Sigma Lithium, Standard Lithium and Patriot Battery Metals — was up 0.66% over the past five days.
That leaves it with a 7.39% year-to-date gain.
TSX and TSX.V Winners & Losers
Here’s how TSX and TSX.V-listed mining and exploration stocks performed last week:
Scroll or swipe to reveal table. Click headings to sort. Best viewed on a laptop.
Stocks missing from this list? Email reuben@stockhead.com.au
367 resources stocks went up last week, 431 went down, and 337 didn’t move.
A better week for the big boys of the TSX, with uranium major Cameco (TSX:CCO) adding another 8%, Robert Friedland’s copper play Ivanhoe Mines (TSX:IVN) putting on 4%, and Teck Resources (TSX:TECK) adding 12%.
Ivanhoe is scheduled to release production results for the month of May from the world class Kamoa-Kakula copper complex in the DRC today.
Multicommodity behemoth Teck is exposed to movements in the coal (24-26Mt), copper (390-445,000tpa), and zinc (645-685,000tpa) price.
It made $930 million adjusted profit in Q1.
The company has $2.3bn in the bank, and liquidity of $8bn. It returned $321m to shareholders through dividends in Q1 2023.