Shares in ECR Minerals PLC (LON:ECR) edged higher on Wednesday morning as the junior explorer received some positive news with regards to its gold projects in Victoria, Australia.
Firstly, ECR has been granted a gold exploration licence for EL6278 – the Timor project – which historical data suggests is host to “numerous” hard rock and alluvial gold deposits.
“We are pleased to have expanded ECR’s footprint in Victoria with EL6278, the Timor project, and look forward to outlining what we consider to be the exciting prospectivity of this licence area in more detail following our initial work,” said chief executive Craig Brown.
“The historical production figures from the area are impressive, and we hope to demonstrate that significant potential remains.”
The Timor licence covers around 228 sq. km and is believed to have produced more than 640,000 oz of gold in the past. The main priority will be to identify the primary drill targets, ECR added.
The licence is valid for five years, during which ECR must spend a minimum of A$314,400 in exploration expenditures.
On top of that, the transfer of EL5433 – the Bailieston project – to ECR’s Australian subsidiary, Mercator Gold, has finally been approved and registered.
ECR said it is working to get all the regulatory requirements sorted so it can start drilling in the Byron area of the project.
Approval of the transfer had been expected back in January.
Shares were up 3% to 2.17p in late morning trading.