Galileo Resources PLC (LON:GLR) revealed drilling was set to kick off on Wednesday at its Concordia copper project in the Northern Cape Province of South Africa.
The drilling programme will initially comprise up to six reverse circulation drill holes down to 300 metres depth.
The drilling programme is exclusively focused on testing the reliability of geophysics anomalism in identifying mineralisation targets, Galileo said.
Chaarat Gold Holdings Ltd (LON:CGH), an exploration and development company operating in the Kyrgyz Republic with a large resource that grades at over 3 grams per tonne gold, plans to build a low cost gold mine. It will begin with a smaller operation and then scale up.
The Chaarat project currently boasts a gold resource of over 7 mln ounces, with a reserve of nearly 5 mln ounces.
Anglo American’s (LON:AAL) platinum business has sold an 85% interest in its Union mine in South Africa to Siyanda Resources following a lengthy delay to the disposal.
The sale of the platinum mine in Rustenburg began in 2013 but was delayed while the company offloaded unprofitable parts of the business.
Anglo American Platinum, known as Amplats, has also agreed to sell a 50.1% interest in Masa Chrome Company to Siyanda. Siyanda already owned 49.9% of the chromite recovery business.
Thor Mining PLC (LON:THR, ASX:THR) has completed the sales of its residual interest in the Spring Hill gold project.
The company announced the sale of Spring Hill in February for A$3.5mln, with the payments to come in stages.
It has now received the final A$1.5mln payment, though it remains entitled to receive a royalty from the project.
European Metals Holdings (LON:EMH) has announced an increased resource at the Cinovec lithium deposit in the Czech Republic.The company recently completed an extensive seven-month drilling campaign at Cinovec, consisting of 17 holes for 6,081 metres.
The total resource now amounts to seven mln tonnes lithium carbonate equivalent, contained in 656.5 mln tonnes of ore grading 0.43% Li2O and 0.04% tin at a 0.1% lithium cut-off.
Landore Resources Limited (LON:LND) has announced a 301,000 ounce maiden gold resource for its BAM East project in Ontario.
The resource has been verified by well-known mining industry consultants Roscoe Postle Associates and follows on from a lightning-quick discovery process and series of drill campaigns.
Shares in ECR Minerals PLC (LON:ECR) have nearly doubled since the start of the year and the reason isn’t too hard to find - new chief executive Craig Brown has been on the road, banging the drum for a suite of assets that many investors had lost touch with.
Indeed, it had come to something as on his move up from part time finance director to full time chief executive, offers for reversals came flooding in.
But ECR remained a mining company, with assets in Australia, the Philippines, and Argentina and Brown resolved to do something of an internal audit before making any hasty decisions on the portfolio.
Eurasia Mining plc (LON:EUA) is a Russia-focussed explorer and developer with exposure to platinum and other metals across a broad portfolio. The company’s major projects are the Montechundra gold project in the Kola Peninsula north European Russia and the West Kytlim alluvial platinum project situated in the Ural Mountains.
At Montechundra, a Chinese partner has signed an engineering, procurement and construction contract for a 130,000 ounce plant.
Meanwhile, at West Kytlim, a Russian joint venture partner has agreed to put up the capital to start and fund an ongoing mining operation that’s scheduled to last for at least 12 years, following a successful first season’s mining in 2016.
All work for the environmental and social impact assessment (ESIA) has been completed at Kibo Mining PLC’s (LON:KIBO) Mbeya coal-to-power project (MCPP) in Tanzania.
The company is now awaiting certification.
Multi-commodity mineral exploration and development company IronRidge Resources Ltd (LON:IRR) is certainly living up to the “multi-commodity” part of its description.
Its operational report covering the second half of 2016 gave shareholders a quick run-through of the irons the company has in the fire.
The company said that through an intensive review and targeting process, it has successfully secured an extensive gold portfolio in Chad, Central Africa; extensive gold and lithium opportunities in Ivory Coast, West Africa; historical lithium opportunities in Ghana; and uncovered an historical gold project at its wholly-owned bauxite portfolio in Queensland, Australia.
Metal Tiger PLC (LON:MTR) has flagged up an announcement by its joint venture partner on the Kalahari copper belt in Botswana, MOD Resources. Three diamond drill holes have been completed. Two of these holes were terminated at a depth significantly below the current T3 resource and have identified a new mineralised zone, MOD revealed.
Ferrum Crescent Limited (LON:FCR) is reconsidering its options at its Moonlight iron project in South Africa after parting ways with its joint venture (JV) partner Business Venture Investments.
The farm-in and JV agreement was terminated after BVI failed to complete phase one of a bankable feasibility study (BFS).
One of the world’s biggest recyclers of scrap metals has agreed to help finance Macarthur Minerals’ (CVE:MMS) Ularring hematite iron ore project in Western Australia.
According to Rare Earth Minerals (LON:REM, OTCMKTS:REMMY), which owns 16.56% of Toronto-listed Macarthur, Singapore-based Tulshyan Group has agreed to stump up A$200mln, kicking off with an initial A$50mln tranche.
Mariana Resources (LON:MARL) has drilled three of seven proposed holes at Ergama gold-copper project in Balikesir province, western Turkey, and already the signs are that it’s onto something big.
Assays have been received for the first two holes, and among the better intercepts was 626.4 metres at 0.18 grams per tonne gold, a hole which terminated in the highest-grade interval to date, 56.4 metres at 0.33 grams gold and 0.12% copper.
Minerals explorer Sunrise Resources Plc (LON:SRES) is exploring new ways to commercialise its diatomite claims in Nevada after receiving notice from EP Minerals, LLC that it was terminating its lease of the County Line project.
Ariana Resources plc (LON:AAU) has completed the interim tailings storage facility that it will use to store mine waste from its Kiziltepe gold project in Turkey.
Kiziltepe is part of the Red Rabbit Joint Venture with Proccea Construction Co. and is 50% owned by Ariana.
Southern Africa-focused miner Diamondcorp Plc (LON:DCP) has pushed back the deadline for its recent placing, the conditions of which have still yet to be met.
Discussions with the state-owned Industrial Development of South Africa (IDC) are continuing but the agreement in principle reached last week with the Association of Mining & Construction Union (AMCU) has been thrown into doubt.
Metals explorer URU Metals Ltd (LON:URU) has raised £535,000 at a signifcant premium as it looks to identify and assess various opportunities in the lithium sector
URU raised the cash through a placing of 11.9mln shares at 4.5p each; sharply higher than Friday’s closing price of 2.5p.
Sula Iron & Gold PLC (LON:SULA) has increased the number of drills it will use at its Ferensola gold project in Sierra Leone. One drill was originally planned, for the 2,400m drilling programme but its contractor Equity Drilling will now use two to speed up the process.
The bankable feasibility currently underway at the Tulkubash project owned by Chaarat Gold Holdings Ltd (LON:CGH) is scheduled for completion by the end of the first half of this year.
Oro Verde (ASX:OVL) is commencing a diamond drill program funded by Newcrest Mining (ASX:NCM) at the Topacio Gold Project, located in southeastern Nicaragua.
Acacia Mining PLC (LON:ACA) more doubled its dividend payout as revenues jumped back above US$1bn.
The 64% owned subsidiary of Canada’s Barrick Mining doubled underlying earnings [EBITDA] to US$415mln in 2016 as the higher revenues combined with lower costs.
Meanwhile, Peter Hambro, chairman of London-listed gold miner Petropavlovsk PLC (LON:POG), said “the banks are supportive”.
It’s an important statement to make because at one point Petropavlovsk appeared to be carrying an unsustainable debt burden.
But no longer. “We’ve now completed the two year reorganisation of the company,” says Hambro. “It has been a truly transformational time.”
KEFI Minerals plc (LON:KEFI) is raising £5.62mln to fund its significant work programme this year.
This includes more exploration on its asset in Saudi Arabia and, most importantly, the finalisation of the financing of Tulu Kapi, its gold development in Ethiopia.
The bulk of the new money will be provided via a sharing agreement with Lanstead Capital. Brandon Hill Capital has raised £600,000 and the directors and employees are putting in £400,000.
Kolar Gold Ltd (LON:KGLD) is undergoing a name change that will be more reflective of its future direction.
As Lionsgold it will have three plausible shots on goal – a mining partnership that draws on its historic ties to the sub-continent; a joint-venture in Finland; and a fintech opportunity that allows people to invest in precious metals.
Glencore (LON:GLEN) has increased its presence in the Democratic Republic of Congo’s copper and cobalt resources with the acquisition of stakes in two mines for $960mln.
The mining giant will buy the remaining 31% holding in the Mutanda mine from resource group Fleurette, owned by controversial business partner, Israeli billionaire Dan Gertler, in a deal valued at $922mln. The company will also purchase a 0.8% minority stake in the Katanga mine from Gertler, valued at $38mln.
The essential idea behind the latest transaction from Xtract Resources PLC (LON:XTR) is to provide short-term cash-flow, according to executive chairman Colin Bird.
It’s a plan he’s had in the pipeline ever since he resumed a more active role in the day –do-day running of the company following the departure of former chief executive Jan Nelson last year.