Amur Minerals set their sights firmly on nickel production at Kun-Manie

Interim results from Amur Minerals, out this morning, make clear the company’s change of emphasis from exploration to mining. Chairman Robert Shafer stated, in his opening address: “We have now focused the Company toward a single objective.  We believe that the Kun-Manie deposit and the adjoining Kustak licence contain a nickel district. Possession of such key ground together with the results that we have attained to date are the necessary ingredients to take us from being a junior explorer to a mid tier mining company.”

To this end, Amur have relinquished their exploration licence at Anadjakan, where results had been unexciting, in order to focus their energies on Kun-Manie and Kustak, their two contiguous nickel projects on the Kumkron Trend in Amur Province in Far East Russia.

During the period, reserve statements for the Ikenskoe and Vodorazdelny deposits at Kun-Manie were submitted, approved and certified by the State Committee on Reserves. A reserve statement for Maly Kumkron has also been submitted since the period ended, and will result in due course in a Certificate of Discovery. Once this certification is received, Amur will be able to make a formal submission for a mining licence for the three reserves at Kun-Manie: Ikenskoe, Vodorazdelny and Maly Kumkron.

During the half year, Amur continued their cash conservation efforts, and reported savings of 37% in administration expenses. Exploration expenditure was also reduced substantially during the period, as the company has been focused on the attainment of key project licensing milestones rather than further fieldwork. However, the relinquishing of Anadjakan required a write-down of capitalised expenditure of US$233,000, and share issue to satisfy a “ratchet” clause associated with one of last year’s fundraisings caused a non-cash expense of US$179,000. In spite of these one-off expenses, the loss for the period was comparable with the same period last year, at US$1.100 million (2008: US$1.059 million).

In a very difficult market, Amur have also been successful in raising US$3 million in cash and marketable securities through a series of transactions, and now have sufficient cash to keep them in funds until the Spring of 2010, with US$927,000-worth of shares in Grafton Resources Investments held in reserve for sale if required.

On the outlook for 2010, Robert Shafer commented: “I am enthusiastic about Amur’s prospects going forward.  We will continue to dedicate our efforts throughout the autumn and early winter in the preparation of the mining licence application for Kun-Manie. Composed of several incremental steps, the final package will be submitted to Rosnedra, the Russian subsoil agency.”  

CEO Robin Young added: “We have made excellent progress on all fronts.  We have successfully raised enough funds to secure the near term future of the Company, despite the very difficult market conditions and we have made significant progress at our flagship project Kun-Manie, where we have identified a significant discovery and last month we submitted the reserve estimate which is a precursor to filing for a mining licence.   We continue to search for an appropriate Russian partner, while also examining the potential for obtaining a waiver that would obviate the need for such a partner.”

Ian Mclelland, Editor of Proactiveinvestors, is a shareholder in Amur Minerals.