Public Company News

After getting a long-awaited green light last week to start exploring its Stansmore niobium-rare earths project in Western Australia’s West Arunta region, Lycaon Resources is now building a war chest to fuel its mission. The company today revealed it had completed a $2.5 million capital raise and also secured a $180,000 State Government grant to drill two holes to test its Stansmore and Volt prospects.

A recent drone aeromagnetics survey by Buxton Resources has unveiled a north-east-trending cluster of magnetic anomalies in the south-central part of the company’s 100 per cent-owned Wolverine prospect in Arizona. The cluster coincides with the orientation of copper-molybdenum mineralised porphyry dykes, with rock chip sampling yielding 1.2 per cent copper and 383ppm moly next to Buxton’s permitted drill site.

Aurum Resources has reassembled part of the management team that helped establish Tietto Minerals’ Abujar gold mine in West Africa to drive the development of its new Boundiali operation in Côte d’Ivoire. The company has named Yao N’Kanza as country manager, reuniting him with former Tietto workmates Caigen Wang and Yaya Ouattara in a bid to expedite Aurum’s project and business development initiatives.

Triangle Energy Group has capped off a solid quarter, raking in $6.54 million courtesy of oil sales associated with its Cliff Head JV partnership with Pilot Energy. The proceeds are earmarked for high-impact exploration drilling near Geraldton in Western Australia’s Mid West region, with the company set to kick off its hunt for hydrocarbons at the Booth-1 well by July.

Horizon Minerals has tipped $2.93 million into its till after selling a share package it received from Vox Royalty late last year following a royalties divestment deal relating to gold projects in WA’s Goldfields region. Horizon also collected an initial $4 million when the agreement was struck and Vox later decided to complete the deal via the share package instead of a further cash consideration.

Mining software provider K2fly has recorded a remarkable 15 straight quarters of annual recurring revenue (ARR) growth, which it says has been driven by contract renewals from two major clients. According to its March quarterly report, the company delivered an ARR of $8.3 million in the first three months of the calendar year, representing a 19 per cent increase compared to the previous corresponding period.

Larvotto Resources says engineering studies have shown it can double the process plant throughput at its Hillgrove gold-antimony operation in NSW up to 500,000 tonnes per annum, with only minimal upgrade and modification required. The company says its capacity to produce gold concentrate and doré in conjunction with antimony concentrate can easily be increased by expanding the crusher feed rate from 220,000 tonnes per year.

A giant Japanese consortium has committed to backing the development of Ardea Resources’ Goongarrie Hub project in Western Australia’s Goldfields region – a major milestone for the nickel-cobalt operation billed by the Federal Government as “globally significant”. Sumitomo Metal Mining and Mitsubishi Corporation have agreed to join Ardea to form an incorporated joint venture to be known as Kalgoorlie Nickel.

Buxton Resources is poised to launch a drilling campaign to pump up the 2014 mineral resource at its Graphite Bull project in Western Australia’s Gascoyne region after securing clearance from a recent Aboriginal heritage survey. The company can now complete infill drilling along a 2.1km potential strike zone where drilling last year confirmed further high-grade graphite mineralisation at the project.

Galan Lithium says it already has a contained inventory of 1000 tonnes of lithium carbonate equivalent at its Hombre Muerto West project in Argentina as the initial evaporation process at the site builds steam. The company says about a third of the overall project has been completed, with total pond construction at 45 per cent and the first two evaporation ponds operating.

Strickland Metals says it has delivered samples from its first three diamond drillholes in Western Australia’s Yandal gold belt to the laboratory for assay, while reverse-circulation and diamond drilling is continuing. The company says it expects assay results to be returned in June. All three holes were drilled at Palomino, with two being put into the existing mineral resource for structural information.

DiscovEx Resources is on the cusp of a major transformation after its bid to snare Finland-based private Australian company Latitude 66 Cobalt was given a unanimous tick of approval from that firm’s board of directors. Latitude owns several projects in Finland, with its most advanced project containing Europe’s second-biggest undeveloped cobalt-gold resource that features 5800 tonnes of cobalt and 650,000 ounces of gold.