Holmer Gold, Acadian to merge

Juniors Holmer Gold Mines (HGM-V) and Acadian Gold (ADA-V) (formerly Tempus Corp.) are merging.

Under the proposed deal, shares of Acadian and Holmer would be turned in for shares in the combined entity on a 1-for-1 basis. Each of the companies’ outstanding options and warrants would be replaced by rights for the new company.

In the end, Holmer shareholders would own 62.7% of the new company; Acadian shareholders would hold the remaining 37.3% stake.

Holmer Gold’s President and CEO Sethu Raman would retain his positions under the new banner while Acadian’s CEO William Felderhof will take the title of vice-president. The merged company’s board will comprise four members representing Holmer and two from Acadia.

Holmer brings to the table its Timmins high-grade gold property, which is home to an indicated resource of 422,000 tonnes grading an uncut 17.78 grams gold per tonne. When high grades are cut to 50 grams, the resource totals 422,000 tonnes running 13.7 grams. Both estimates employ a lower cutoff grade of 6 grams gold.

A 5,000-metre drill program aimed at confirming and expanding the resource is underway. The holes are being funded by Aurora Platinum (ARP-T) subsidiary Lake Shore Gold (LSG-V), which recently inked an option deal to take a half-interest in the project. To do so, it must spend at least $2.5 million on exploration, pay $250,000 in cash, issue 150,000 shares, and confirm a mineral resource of at least 500,000 oz. of gold.

Acadian’s portfolio includes 6 gold exploration properties in Nova Scotia, of which the Forest Hill and Beaver Dam properties are the most advanced. At Forest Hill, the company is in the midst of a 5,000-metre drilling campaign that is testing a proposed ribbon model similar to that at Australian-listed Bendigo Mining‘s New Bendigo project in Victoria Australia (T.N.M., Aug. 25-31/03). The model suggests that gold mineralization occurs in shoots hosted by horizontal to sub-horizontal ribbons that repeat at regular, predictable intervals at depth, and laterally in adjacent structures.

A total of 104,000 tonnes of bulk-sampling by previous operators in the 1980s yielded a recovered grade exceeding 6 grams gold per tonne, sourced from various veins. Mine-calculated grades for the last three months of test mining ranged from 9.2 to 13.8 grams gold per tonne.

Following the amalgamation, the merged company would have nearly 64 million shares issued. Major shareholders would include Dennis MacLeod, Raman and the private, Felderhof-controlled Votix Corp.

The deal is subject to due diligence, execution of a definitive agreement by Sept. 28, and shareholder and regulatory approvals.