Alecto Minerals PLC (LON:ALO), the Africa-focused gold and base metal exploration and development company, has raised £600,000 through a share placing.
The shares were placed at 0.075p, a discount to last night’s mid-market closing price of 0.1p. The shares declined to 0.077p in the wake of the announcement.
Funds from the share issue will finance pre-development activities at its Matala gold project in Zambia, where the company said it continues to make progress towards its goal of bringing the 400,000 tonnes per annum project into low-cost production in the near to mid-term.
The newly issued shares represent around 15.2% of the company’s enlarged share capital.
"We are making steady progress towards the conclusion of a funding package for the Matala gold mine,” said Alecto’s chief executive officer, Mark Jones.
“We have every confidence that we will complete this financing and bring Matala into production in 2017; however, we are obliged to progress at the speed dictated by our counter-parties and other external factors,” Jones noted.
“The current fund-raising will strengthen Alecto's position and enable us to complete essential pre-development activities on the ground in Zambia on a timeline within our control,” Jones said.
News of the placing accompanied the company’s interim results, which revealed loss before tax holding relatively steady at £287,155 versus a loss in the first half of last year of £264,320.
Revenue rose to £105,369 from £44,663 the year before.
Chairman Gerald Chapman said he believed the company is poised for significant growth in the next 12 months.
“We have delivered on a number of our stated objectives for our African gold portfolio during the period,” he said, looking back at the first half of 2016.
“We are also evaluating larger projects with a view to building Alecto to become a profitable African metals producer. We are also pleased to have secured value accretive paths for the rest of our portfolio via joint ventures,” Chapman said.