The following are our 10 most popular stories from our comprehensive coverage. You can click on the headline to read the full story.
Reporters were caught off-guard on Monday when Metals X is called a trading halt ahead of a major restructuring and raising just half an hour after CEO Peter Cook fronted the media.
Cook said a decision on a demerger would be made “soon”, but few people realised just how soon he meant.
Cook said there was still a desire to grow on both sides, though not through acquisitions.
“We’re in this phase where there’s plenty to buy, but they’re all additions to the capital infrastructure we’ve got.”
Gold miners in the danger zone: Klein
Evolution Mining executive chairman Jake Klein said gold miners were currently the “rock stars” of the mining industry, but warned the sector not to become complacent.
Klein said while gold miners were the toast of the mining sector, a voice in the back of his head constantly reminds him that it may not last.
He told reporters at Diggers & Dealers that gold was only in the “wilderness” a few years back, which should be recent enough for miners not to repeat past mistakes.
What do road rules have to do with productivity improvements at the Tropicana gold mine? Plenty, according to AngloGold Ashanti senior vice president Australia Mike Erickson.
Erickson told journalists that some surprising initiatives had lowered costs at Tropicana and Sunrise Dam after teams from others AngloGold mines visited different operations.
“Bring some fresh eyes in, and look at opportunities for projects that teams could work on, and bring in external people if need be to either increase production or drive down costs,” he said.
M&A too pricey for Gold Fields
South African major Gold Fields is spending up to $A500 million on exploration in Western Australia over the next five years after external opportunities became too costly.
Regional boss Richard Weston said the $90-100 million annual budget for exploration over the next 3-5 years came after the company was unable to find a suitable external opportunity.
It had been speculated the company would make a play for its Granny Smith neighbour Dacian.
“Actually, if you look at the share price last year, it’s a ridiculous price – great for them – but from an M&A point of view it’s a ridiculous price,” Weston told reporters.
Pilbara the cream of the burgeoning lithium sector
Ken Brinsden believes Pilbara Minerals’ “damn good” Pilgangoora project will emerge as one of the success stories of the hyped up lithium sector.
The past few months have seen companies flocking to the lithium space, which has led to scepticism in some areas of the market.
Brinsden said it was a “bit of a shame”.
“Because it creates a lot of noise, but I have some faith that the market, more broadly, will become discerning and they will focus on where the value really lies,” he told reporters on the sidelines of Diggers & Dealers.
Northern Star staying on home soil
Northern Star Resources boss Bill Beament says the company “flirted” with opportunities offshore, but will instead focus on its own portfolio.
There have been rumours that the company was very actively looking at opportunities in North America, and it is understood it may have been looking at Barrick Gold’s stake in Acacia Mining, a London-listed African gold producer run by fellow WASM graduate Brad Gordon.
“We were flirting with [offshore opportunities] at the end of last year, early this year, but once we started really getting this big exploration spend last financial year on our own assets and started looking internally, we saw all that growth in our own portfolio,” Beament said on Wednesday.
Dacian ride a dream for Williams
Dacian Gold’s Rohan Williams says the 800%-plus rise in the company’s share price has been beyond his “wildest dreams”.
Shares in the current market darling were A44c this time last year and hit an all-time high of $4 on Monday.
“We raised money at 69c last year November, December, and the battle we had with the brokers,” Williams said.
“Because I was thinking ‘c’mon, it should be low 70s really, the stock’s been 80, it’s come back to 78c, so let’s price the issue at low 70s’…‘oh no its too expensive’, so 69c and once we priced it the stock went straight up.”
Neometals defends lithium plant cost
Neometals got a bit beaten up by the market a few weeks back with release of a feasibility study for its planned downstream lithium processing project, though as MD Chris Reed described it, it was a Mercedes versus Hyundai scenario.
For while investors weren’t overly impressed with the project’s IRR falling from the 94% estimated in the pre-feasibility to 51% in the feasibility – and while they ignored the NPV of the proposed lithium hydroxide venture rising 50% to $US481 million – that, according to Reed, is what happens when the capital cost doubles to $158 million.
Speaking at Diggers, Reed compared the project conceived and scoped internally by Neometals in the prefeasibility to the one resulting from the feasibility carried out by German EPCM contractor M+W Group, as akin to the difference between a quality German conveyance and a Korean runabout.
Canada’s Newmarket Gold is actively looking for acquisition opportunities in Australia, but won’t rule out being the hunted.
Newmarket chief financial reporter Robert Dufour told reporters that the company was actively looking in Australia, as well as the Americas.
“A lot of the companies in Australia are very well-valued. I think a lot of people forget, particularly in North America, that Australia has been in a gold bull run for quite some time now, and this is not a new phenomenon,” he said.
“I think there’s still some opportunity though. Buying companies or emerging companies might be difficult but I think there’s potentially other opportunities – looking at specific assets or JVs.”
Dacian, Gold Road drilling big gold targets
The two big ticket items in the Australian gold sector shopfront, Dacian Gold and Gold Road, will both have results later this month from drill programs that could add a further hefty premium to their price tags.
Dacian is drilling the Callisto target that has is seen as having geophysical similarities to the 8 million ounce Wallaby deposit, and which Dacian’s managing director Rohan Williams described at Diggers & Dealers as the best prospect he has seen in 30 years in the resources industry.
For its part Gold Road is drilling below the planned open put at Gruyere, targeting a thick, relatively high grade zone of mineralisation that could be mined via a big underground operation.
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Keep an eye out next week for a look back at the gossip from Diggers, as well as a photo gallery from the week.
