There were a lot of gold miners in the news today.
Starting with Xtract Resources (LON:XTR), which found another small but “significant" concentration of gold near the surface at its Chepica mine in Chile.
Jan Nelson, chief executive, said a mining contractor has been appointed to start planning the extraction of the ore zone from surface to level two.
Meanwhile, Caledonia Mining (LON:CMCL) expects that expanding the Blanket gold mine in Zimbabwe will lead to higher production and earnings from 2016.
Gold and silver miner Mandalay Resources (TSE:MND) increased revenues and profits by more than 50% helped by lower fuel costs, currency movements and much higher sales volumes, which offset lower precious metal prices.
Fellow gold miner Orosur Mining (LON:OMI, TSE:OMI) says a new resource estimate for the San Gregorio Deeps development project improves previous figures and it has already started planning for an initial underground operation.
To metals that aren’t gold and nickel developer Horizonte Minerals (LON:HZM, TSE:HZM) outlined several positives in its first quarter as it made "strong progress" advancing the Araguaia project in north central Brazil.
Metminco (LON:MNC) has received 45% backing for its recent rights issue, raising a gross A$1.27mln for the South American copper explorer. Directors chipped in A$151,000 by taking up of 30mln new shares
Meanwhile, Kalimantan Gold (LON:KLG) said three of the four drill holes on the Beruang Kanan copper project in Indonesia had unearthed high-grades of the metal, some of it near surface. The results from one of the holes revealed three distinct mineralised sections.
A group that has requisitioned a general meeting to be held on June 9 this year has called for four Mwana Africa (LON:MWA) non-executive directors to be removed and replaced.
Mwana has urged shareholders to reject all ten of the requisitioners' resolutions.
In oil news, the start of drilling at the Lalla Mimouna prospect in Morocco can put Circle Oil (LON:COP) on the path to a re-rating.
The Lalla Mimouna project follows the oil and gas junior’s achievements at the Sebou field, where it successfully discovered and tested discrete gas pockets.
Meanwhile, MX Oil (LON:MXO) told investors that its Mexican joint venture is set to apply to pre-qualify for the licensing of mature onshore conventional fields after Mexico’s National Hydrocarbons Commission (CNH) made public the pre-qualification criteria for the process.
Oilex (LON:OEX) has confirmed it intends to terminate contracts for an exploration project in the Timor sea. The AIM junior is the operator of the project and has a 10% stake in the joint venture.
Elsewhere, Range Resources (LON:RRL) told investors that production rates in Trinidad have increased to 650 barrels per day this month, compared to 617 bopd last month.
The company finalised the work programme for the remainder of this year, and it plans to drill thirteen new wells with a further nine wells potentially following later.
President Energy (LON:PPC) is confident 2015 will be another year of progress in Argentina and Paraguay after the firm reported a US$14.5mln profit for 2014, compared with a US$1.7mln loss the year before.
In other news, Constellation Healthcare Technologies (LON:CHT) is raising £12.9mln that will be used to tap into a ‘pipeline’ of acquisition opportunities.
The company will sell shares to new and prospective investors for 140p each –a 25% discount to last night’s closing price.
Finally, life sciences company Abzena (LON:ABZA) confirmed that US giant Gilead plans to move its anti-MMP9 antibody GS-5745 directly into a Phase III clinical study in the third quarter of 2015 after efficacy and safety results came back with very promising data.