The S&P/TSX Venture Composite Index shed 6.99 points to an 803.6-point close, as spot gold prices gained US$14.31, or 1.2%, to US$1,243.57 per oz., and Comex copper prices fell 6¢, or 2.2%, to US$2.63 per pound.
Arak Resources led the value-added category, gaining 33¢ to 50¢ per share after completing a $650,020 private placement. The company issued 4.6 million units at 14¢ per unit, whereby each unit consists of a share and a warrant that’s exercisable within five years at 18¢ per share. Arak holds the Kayla gold property in Quebec’s Abitibi region, and the Perron uranium claims in Saskatchewan’s northeastern Athabasca basin. The company acquired Perron in 2015 on the expectation that the area could become a hot spot for uranium exploration. The region contains elevated uranium within lake sediments and several outcropping uranium prospects, as identified by previous explorers, Saskatchewan Mining and Development and CanAlaska Uranium. At Kayla, little to no exploration work has been completed since 2012.
Los Andes Copper saw 8 million shares traded before closing up 5¢ to 21¢ per share on news of starting a work program at its Vizcachitas porphyry copper-molybdenum project in central Chile. The company plans to drill 10,000 metres into the deposit’s high-grade core for an optimized preliminary economic assessment. The drilling will test extensions of a new geological model and convert part of the deposit’s inferred resource to indicated, in addition to more metallurgical test work. The Vizcachitas project has 1 billion indicated tonnes of 0.37% copper and 0.012% molybdenum, and 318 million inferred tonnes of 0.35% copper and 0.013% molybdenum.
Shares of Standard Lithium rose 16¢ to $1.05, after the appointment of Robert Mintak, one of the founders of Pure Energy Minerals, as the company’s director and interim CEO. The company, formerly known as Patriot Petroleum, has undergone corporate restructuring since emerging late last year as a lithium-focused explorer. The company is focused on its 16.1 sq. km Bristol Lake lithium brine project in the Mojave region of San Bernardino County, Calif., and its newly acquired 161.9 sq. km Paradox basin lithium project in Grand County, Utah.
Shares of Atlantic Gold had upwards momentum during trading, gaining 15¢ to $1.20 per share, after a March 16 news release that announced drill results from its Fifteen Mile Stream gold project in Nova Scotia. The company reported intercepts up to 20 metres of 3.35 grams gold per tonne from 68 metres deep, and 45 metres of 1.12 grams gold from 64 metres deep. Atlantic Gold is almost halfway through its 25,000-metre drill program, which aims to upgrade the project’s resources into the measured and indicated categories.
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