Equinox Breaking Ground at Greenstone
Welcome to Mining Stock Daily. I’m Trevor Hall
And I’m Paul Harris.
Today is Wednesday October 27th.
On Tuesday, angry that gold closed over $1800 on Monday, the price management team bombed the price in the paper market starting 5 mins before the Comex floor operation opened. Gold was slammed for $22 down to $1783 before it managed to claw its way back to $1794, where it settled for the day. The Mining Stock Journal noted that gold did manage to close right on top of its 200 day moving average. It will be technically bullish if the yellow dog can bounce up from there on a sustained basis.
Silver suffered the same fate as gold, as it was rammed down in the paper market from $24.50 to as low as $23.95 before rebounding and settling at $24.20. On a percentage decline basis, silver was punked nearly three times as hard as gold. It seems that, for now, $1800 and $24 are the Maginot lines for gold and silver respectively, though silver won its battle on Tuesday.
The mining stocks seemed to sense the artificiality of the price action in gold and silver, as the GDX lost just 20 cents and many junior mining stocks were green. The Mining Stock Journal said that sentiment was rising a little more in temperature than it likes to see this early in what appears to be a valid bull move coming and believes a brief pullback, regardless of the source of selling pressure, will prove to be healthy.
We’ll get to the news out of the miners and explorers in a moment, but first a quick mention of today’s sponsor.
This episode of Mining Stock Daily is brought to you by… Western Copper and Gold.
Western Copper and Gold is focused on developing the world-class Casino project in Canada's Yukon Territory. The Casino project consists of an impressive 11 billion pounds of copper and 21 million ounces of gold in an overall resource. Western Copper and Gold trades on the TSX and the NYSE American with WRN. Be sure to follow the company via their website, www.westerncopperandgold.com.
And here’s what you need to know this morning.
Equinox Gold will break ground today for construction of the Greenstone gold mine in Ontario, Canada which will be developed as a 60/40 partnership with Orion Mine Finance Group and produce more than 400,000 ounces of gold a year for the first five years of its initial 14-year life, with a life of mine average production of 360,000oz per year. The development will cost US$1.23 billion including $125 million for the mining fleet of which about $100 million could be leased to reduce the upfront cash spend, with first gold pour targeted for the first semester of 2024. Early works began in March, with more than $50 million of the total budget spent to date. Equinox’s 60% will be funded from the company's existing treasury, cash flow and a $400 million revolving credit facility, from which it has $200 million available to draw. Equinox also has a portfolio of liquid investments with a current value of more than $400 million and will consider opportunistically hedging a portion of the budgeted Canadian dollar spend. Equinox Gold trades on the TSX under EQX and on the NYSE American under EQX. News release
Meridian Mining provided an update on results from the ongoing drilling at the Cabaçal Copper-Gold VMS Project in Mato Grosso, Brazil. CD-063 was drilled to test a small geophysical anomaly between the Cabaçal West target and the Cabaçal Northwest Extension's zone. CD-063 intersected VMS type Cu-Au mineralisation and an internal structural zone with visible gold was intercepted at 128.8m and returned 4.8m @ 0.2% Cu, 2.4g/t Au & 0.8g/t Ag from 128.8m with individual gold assays of 7.2 and 22.9 g/t Au1. The higher-grade Au structure is consistent in appearance to those reported within the Cabaçal Mine and Cabacal Northwest Extension. Other results from the Cabaçal Mine area returned 7.0m @ 0.1% Cu and 4.1g/t Au, and 8.2m @ 1.7% Cu, 0.5g/t Au. The company says this new gold trend is entirely open, untested by angled drilling, and provides further future upside. Meridian trades on the TSX V with MNO and on the OTCQB with MRRDF. News Release
Northwest Copper says drilhole 217 has returned the highest-grade copper and gold interval ever intersected at the Kwanika project in British Columbia. The interval consists of massive to semi-massive copper and gold mineralization at moderate depth in the western half of the deposit. It expands the high-grade portion of the deposit, introducing a new style of mineralization. The drill intercept returned the following mineralized intervals: 235.45 metres of 2.92% copper equivalent, within that, there were 153.25 metres of 4.13% CuEQ and 9.4 meters of 33.6% copper equivalent. President and CEO, Peter Bell, called the drillhole a game change for the Kwanika deposit. NorthWest Copper trades on the TSX Venture with NWST and on the OTCQX with NWCCF. News Release
Marathon Gold reported assay results from 20 infill drilling holes from the Berry deposit at its Valentine gold project in Newfoundland. The company continues to see lengthy intercepts of resource-grade mineralization throughout with mineralization outside the scope of the 200m-deep conceptual pit shells used in the April 2021 resource estimate, with drilling highlights of 23m grading 2.74 grams per tonne gold in hole 1057. The company aims to have a minimum 120,000m of assayed drill coverage at Berry by the middle of 2022. Valentine hosts proven reserves of 1.40Moz and probable reserves of 650,000oz and a March feasibility study detailed production of 173,000 ounces a year for 10 years within a 13-year mine life starting in 2024 following an initial capital cost of C$305 million. Marathon Gold trades on the TSX under MOZ. News release
Liberty Gold reported results from phase 3 variability composite metallurgical column testing on large-diameter drill core from its Black Pine oxide gold project in southeastern Idaho, USA. The objective of the program was to expand the geographical and ore type distribution of earlier testing. As such, phase 3 testing included 45 new variability composites testing the full range of rock types, gold grades and ore types encountered across Black Pine. Gold recovery are consistent with previous metallurgical programs, with >80% of the leachable gold extracted within 10 days and final column leach gold extractions ranging up to 94.8%. The company said the results support a simple, low capital, low operating cost, run-of-mine heap leach processing route for Black Pine ores. The next phases of test work are to confirm gold recoveries at lower operating cut-off grades and to expand sampling coverage into the Rangefront D-4 discovery area to provide an extensive metallurgical database across the deposit, which could support a feasibility-level evaluation at Black Pine. Liberty Gold trades on the TSX under LGD and on the OTCQX under LGDTF. News release
That concludes today’s morning briefing. We’ll be back later today with more market commentary and corporate updates.
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