Public Company News

Venus Metals’ hunt for lithium at its Penny East project in Western Australia’s Mid West region – within ground initially secured for gold and base metals prospectivity – has revealed encouraging soil geochemical results. The company says it identified an anomalous area measuring about 800m by 600m, while a second 800m-wide anomaly is open to the north. Further soil sampling and shallow drilling is planned.

Estrella Resources is off and running at its Lautém manganese, copper and gold project in Timor-Leste (formally East Timor), with preliminary geological reconnaissance works identifying a 27 km manganese trend with serious grades up to almost 61 per cent. The company is undergoing systematic geological mapping and sampling at its newly granted 504 square kilometre land package after managing to lock down one of the first ever exploration licences in the mineral rich province.

Empire Energy will pay down its US debt to Macquarie and put a bit over A$3m in the tin to chase gas in the Northern Territory’s Beetaloo basin after offloading its US oil and gas assets for about A$14 million. The company is poised to take on the Australian east coast gas supply dilemma with its Beetaloo ground modelled to generate a project net present value for phase two of $2.5 billion and $14.5 billion for phase three.

The world’s largest iron ore and nickel producer, Brazilian powerhouse Vale, has contracted Perth based ASX-listed company K2fly to supply its unique mining software across 69 of its sites for at least three years. The deal will add almost half a million dollars a year to K2fly’s all important “annual recuring revenue” figure that many software as a service companies are judged on.

Everest Metals is aiming to sure up the resource at its Revere gold project in WA’s Mid West with a 36,000 tonne bulk sampling campaign however the sample will be put through a mobile plant to produce gold. The program has been designed to convert the current exploration target of between 2.5 and 4.1 million tonnes grading between 1 and 2.5 grams per tonne gold into a JORC resource.

ASX-listed Toro Energy has revealed proposals to spin out its portfolio of non-core nickel, gold, and base metal assets in Western Australia to focus solely on uranium. Projects flagged for the spin out into a new IPO include Toro’s wholly owned Dusty Nickel Project 50km east of the town of Wiluna and the Yandal Gold and Base Metal Project.

Middle Island Resources is onto several new iron-oxide-copper-gold and sediment-hosted base metals targets from gravity survey data at its Barkly project close to Tennant Creek in the Northern Territory. Modelling of detailed geophysical data collected in 2023 over eight priority targets has detected several density anomalies with shapes and sizes that may represent sizeable mineral deposits.

Lindian Resources has rolled out another round of dazzling wide, high-grade rare earth hits at its giant Kangankunde rare earths project in Malawi with a resource upgrade due by the end of the month. The African operation already hosts a massive 261 million tonnes at an impressive grade of 2.19 per cent total rare earth oxides, including 5.7 million tonnes of contained TREO in the inferred category.

Image Resources has taken a key step towards the development of its Atlas mineral sands project in Western Australia after no formal objections were lodged for the implementation of the company’s development proposal. The outcome could speed up the group’s return to mining by several months, with the process now moving towards final ministerial approval.

White Cliff Minerals is gearing up for a bumper 2024 as its hunt for a smorgasbord of metals builds up steam. Planned works include diamond drilling at its recently acquired Radium Point uranium, gold and copper project in Canada where rock chip results from historical works include an eye-catching 14.15 per cent uranium, 22.72 per cent copper and 8.28 grams per tonne gold.

This week’s Bulls N’ Bears ASX Runners of the Week is dominated by biotechs, with two showing big gains for punters. Line honours go to… Regeneus Ltd. Its share price surged 220 per cent after completing a merger deal with Cambium Medical Technologies. Regeneus joins fellow biotech Acrux Ltd and Perpetual Resources, both of which also kicked the ball out of the park this week.

Bulls N’ Bears takes a look at the listed companies that have enjoyed share price explosions on the back of 16-year high uranium prices. With lithium taking a breather, the uranium renaissance has filled a gap as demand for uranium to power a clean-energy future pushed the commodity’s fortunes and propelled it to US$106 per pound earlier this year.