West African Resources (WAF.AX) has released a production update on its Sanbrado gold mine in Burkina Faso earlier this month. The company produced just under 56,600 ounces of gold and sold just over 49,500 ounces at an average sales price of US$2,078 per ounce. During the first quarter of this year, we saw the amount of ounces sourced from the open pit decrease while the contribution from the underground mine increased (this was/is all part of the mine plan). This resulted in an average head grade of 2.2 g/t gold and a recovery rate of just under 94% as the average grade from the underground ..read more

Canterra Minerals (CTM.V) has released the assay results of all seven holes it drilled on the Lemarchant project in Newfoundland. While four holes did not encounter mineralization and one hole had to be abandoned prematurely due to the early start of the Spring thaw, two holes contained mineralization, hole LM-24-164 clearly was the best one as it encountered 28 meters of 1.19 g/t gold, almost 68 g/t silver, 5.42% zinc, 1.33% lead 0.48% copper. Within that wider interval, there was a higher grade section with 9.5 meters containing 1.56 g/t gold, 52.3 g/t silver (which is lower than the averag ..read more

EMX Royalty Corp. (EMX, EMX.V) has released its FY 2023 results wherein it generated a total revenue of almost $27M but a net loss of $4.6M but more importantly, the company also provided its guidance for the current financial year. EMX plans to report an attributable production of 11,000-14,000 ounces of gold-equivalent resulting in an adjusted revenue of $22-27.5M based on a gold price of $1939 per ounce and a copper price of $3.89 per pound. As both the gold price and copper price are currently trading at substantially higher levels, it would be realistic to aim for the higher end of the f ..read more

Aztec Minerals (AZT.V) has provided an exploration update on its Tombstone project in Arizona (where documented historical production totalled 32 million ounces of silver and 250,000 ounces of gold). The company has now reviewed the previous drilling and surface exploration data and is now in the final stages to develop new drill targets on the project. The low-hanging fruit would be to continue to expand the gold-silver oxide mineralization near the historical Contention Pit and get the company (and project) in a position to consider to start working on a resource calculation. Previous drill ..read more

Pacific Ridge Exploration (PEX.V) has confirmed earlier this week it closed the final tranche of its previously announced financing. In this final tranche, a total of 1.06 million non-flow-through units were issued at C$0.08 per unit for total proceeds of just under C$85,000. This brings the total financing to C$1.76M with the majority of the funds raised (C$966,000) hard dollar funds while the flow-through portion brought in C$710,000. These flow-through funds will have to be spent before the end of the year. The hard dollar portion was priced at C$0.08 while the flow-through units were pric ..read more

Orla Mining (ORLA, OLA.TO) released its Q4 an FY 2023 results in March, confirming it produced a total of just under 122,000 ounces of gold in 2023 at an AISC of just $736 per ounce. This means the full-year AISC came in at the lower end of the guidance while the gold production exceeded the upper end of the full-year production guidance. The net income in the fourth quarter was approximately US$0.05 per share on an adjusted basis although the company reported a net loss of US$58M due to a $72M impairment charge on the company’s Panama-based project. That impairment charge is the direct resul ..read more

Riley Gold (RLYG.V) has confirmed it has entered into an exploration and venture agreement with Kinross Gold (K.TO, KGC) whereby the latter can earn an interest of up to 75% in Riley’s Pipeline West/Clipper Gold project in Nevada. Kinross Gold can earn an initial 60% stake in the PWC property by spending at least US$10M on exploration within the first five years after signing the agreement with a firm guarantee to spend US$1.5M within 18 months which must include at least 2,200 meters of drilling at three separate targets. And before any work gets done, Kinross must reimburse Riley Gold for t ..read more

It’s been almost six months since Oroco Resource Corp (OCO.V) released the outcome of the Preliminary Economic Assessment on the Santo Tomas project in Mexico’s Sinaloa state. The outcome of the economic study was weaker than we’d expected (a 17.3% after-tax IRR was below our hurdle) but it also confirmed the tremendous upside potential of the project if/when the copper price would go up. And copper is back in favor these days. Whereas the base case scenario of the PEA was using $3.85 per pound as copper price, the copper price is now trading more than 10% higher at in excess of $3.20 per pou ..read more

NevGold (NAU.V) has decided to leverage its local know-how and experience in Idaho to stake claims for a total of approximately 20 square kilometers (2,000 hectares) in Idaho’s Washington County. Hercules Silver (BIG.V) made a major copper discovery in the region which immediately attracted gold senior (and copper aficionado) Barrick Gold (GOLD, ABX.TO) invest approximately C$24M in Hercules Silver at a price of $1.10. While NevGold’s property is located approximately 20 kilometers southwest of the new discoveries made by Hercules Silver, the Zeus property (NevGold elected to remain in the G ..read more

Western Exploration (WEX.V) has completed a financing, raising a total of just over C$6.5M. The company issued approximately 9.35 million units at C$0.70 per unit with each unit consisting of one common share and a full warrant. Each warrant allows the warrant holder to acquire an additional share of Western Exploration at C$1.00 within three years after closing the financing. Agnico Eagle Mines (AEM, AEM.TO) participated in this offering as it  acquired 857,000 additional units for a total investment of C$600,000 which brings its total position to approximately 6.3 million shares. Two ..read more