New York spot gold fell $15.90 to $1,930.10 on Thursday. The TSX-V lost 1.48 points to 621.14 while the TSX gold slid 5.88 points to 310.55. Most Canadian gold miners lost ground today, with the retreat led by Novagold Resources Inc. (NG), which lost 68 cents to $8.63 on 395,000 shares, and by Torex Gold Resources Inc. (TXG), which fell 38 cents to $18.57 on 496,000 shares. Justin Reid's Troilus Gold Corp. (TLG) fell one cent to 71 cents on 564,000 shares on word it has drilled a 29-metre interval averaging 3.9 grams of gold and 2.9 grams of silver per tonne, plus 0.32 per cent copper, in the Connector zone at its Troilus project in north-central Quebec. The zone, which averaged 4.33 grams of gold equivalent per tonne, got a boost from an 18-metre interval averaging 6.37 grams of gold equivalent per tonne. The second of the two new holes yielded lower grades over narrower intervals, but they also occurred at shallower depths. Mr. Reid, chief executive officer, cheered his new assays from "this new and exciting target" as further demonstrating the continuity of high-grade mineralized structures between two old open-pit mines at the project -- hence the Connector zone moniker. The shallow high-grade zones, he says, exist within and near the pit shells proposed in the company's preliminary economic assessment, and so, he enthuses, they could be brought into the mine plan to improve the stripping ratio and the bottom line. Expect more improvements, he concludes, as the company focuses on delineating the high-grade zones for inclusion in a feasibility study later this year. The Troilus dream sheet, revealed in the summer of 2020, was based on 177 million tonnes indicated at 0.75 gram of gold and 1.17 grams of silver per tonne, plus 0.08 per cent copper. Another 117 million tonnes were inferred at comparable grades, yielding a total of seven million ounces of gold, 10.5 million ounces of silver and 512 million pounds of copper. The initial open-pit plan called for a $333-million mine running at up to 35,000 tonnes per day, once a $240-million underground expansion kicks in. The bottom line showed an encouraging rate of return of 23 per cent and a discounted net present value of $576-million after taxes. Dr. Ewan Webster's Thesis Gold Inc. (TAU) rose one cent to 91 cents on 359,000 shares. The company has drilled a 95.7-metre interval averaging 1.6 grams of gold and 1.74 grams of silver per tonne at the Thesis III zone at its Ranch project in the Toodoggone district of northwestern British Columbia. The 10 other holes with assays today also revealed gold, with a second test yielding 2.16 grams per tonne over 48.73 metres and a third delivering 1.38 grams per tonne over 34.9 metres. Dr. Webster, president and CEO, was "very excited with the excellent recent results" from Bonanza-Ridge, as well as the new discovery at Steve. Steve was the site of encouragement two weeks ago, when the company revealed a discovery hole into the target had produced 0.97 gram of gold per tonne over 119.2 metres. As for Dr. Webster's newfound excitement, the results from Bonanza-Ridge last week were more excellent than were today's, with a hit returning 4.69 grams of gold per tonne over 20.3 metres. No matter: Dr. Webster enthuses that with today's assays in hand, "it is great to see mineralization continuing to expand at Thesis III." This, he says, is keeping with the company's hypothesis -- the term "thesis" already doing double duty -- that the structural corridor will prove to be one large, interconnected system. More assays are pending from last year's drilling, and more will follow, as a week ago, Dr. Webster said a 2023 drill program was "imminent." That work will include more drilling at Thesis III, as well as Thesis II. As well, the Bingo target is deemed promising as it has not seen any drilling in many years. Collin Kettell's Nevada King Gold Corp. (NKG) lost one cent to 41 cents on 569,000 shares. The company has drilled a 45.7-metre interval averaging 55.5 grams of silver per tonne at its Atlanta project in southeastern Nevada, with a 29-metre portion of that hit also returning 1.1 grams of gold per tonne. The nine other holes returned precious metals with comparable intervals but lesser grades, with a 30.5-metre hit in a second hole managing 54.1 grams of silver and 1.39 grams of gold per tonne. Mr. Kettell, co-founder and CEO, and Paul Matysek, co-founder and executive chairman, are undoubtedly busy elsewhere, so they again handed the promotional pompons over to Cal Herron, their exploration manager. As is usual, the geologist spoke geologese -- and lots of it -- drooling over the silver within the "silica breccia zone developed on top of massive dolomite and quartzite." Investors who plodded through the discussion of high-angle faults and such did discover that a 2020 resource model calculated an average silver grade of 11 grams per tonne in the measured and indicated category. That should send shivers of worry up one's back but rest easy: The entire estimate listed 11 million tonnes measured and indicated at -- yes, just 11.9 grams of silver per tonne -- but also with 1.3 grams of gold per tonne, a pit-constrained total of 460,000 ounces of gold and 4.2 million ounces of silver. (Another 5.3 million tonnes were inferred at lesser grades, supplying another 142,000 ounces of gold and 1.24 million ounces of silver.) And so, with the new assays showing markedly higher silver grades in the silica breccia, Mr. Herron sees the need for deeper holes west of the West Atlanta fault. As more assays come in, he says, the company will have a much better picture of the silver distribution and the potential for boosting the overall resource grade -- and hence its ounce counts. Brian Testo's Grizzly Discoveries Inc. (GZD) lost one-half cent to 8.5 cents on 510,000 shares on word it has received grab sample assays of up to 2,700 grams of silver per tonne and 2.83 grams of gold per tonne -- just not in the same place -- from its Greenwood project in south-central British Columbia. The best of the silver hits came from the Midway area, while the two plus-one-gram-per-tonne gold samples came from the Copper Mountain area. (The latter area also yielded the best copper assay, at 1,465 parts per million.) Mr. Testo, president and CEO, was "excited at the high-grade gold and silver values" obtained from the area near the old Midway mine, and therefore for the potential of finding additional mineralization. "We had our eyes on the historical mine for several years," he cheered, adding that it was "a good-quality strategic acquisition" to Grizzly's holdings. He then reminded the market of earlier grab sampling, which, he exclaimed, yielded assays of "up to 70.8 grams per tonne gold!" |
