TSX Venture down, Aug. 5-9: SilverCrest; Chesapeake Gold; Garibaldi Resources; Barksdale Capital

The S&P/TSX Venture Composite Index fell 0.49% to 592.82 during the trading week.

SilverCrest Metals recorded the biggest value gain, rising $1.08, or 15.3%, to $8.16 per share. The company announced a bought-deal financing by underwriters National Bank Financial and Desjardines Capital Markets that will raise $22 million through the issuance of 3.76 million shares at $5.85 per share. To keep its 9.9% interest in SilverCrest, SSR Mining Inc. will buy a minimum of 718,000 shares up to a maximum of 780,000 shares in a separate, non-brokered private placement at a price of $5.85, for proceeds of $4.2 million (maximum $4.6 million). Proceeds from the offerings will be used for advancing SilverCrest’s Las Chispas project in Mexico’s Sonora state.

Chesapeake Gold’s shares were up 36.8%, or $1.04, to close at $3.87. On Aug. 9, Chesapeake exercised an option to repurchase a 1% net smelter return royalty on its wholly owned Metates gold-silver-zinc project in Mexico’s Durango state from Wheaton Precious Metals for US$9 million. Chesapeake sold a 1.5% net smelter return to Wheaton Precious Metals in August 2014, and had the right to repurchase two-thirds of it over a period of five years.

Drill results from Garibaldi Resources’ Nickel Mountain project in northwestern B.C. drove up the company’s shares 45¢ to $1.75. The first hole of the 2019 season, 19-47, intersected 6.1% nickel and 2.8% copper (plus cobalt, platinum, palladium, gold and silver) over 9 metres, within a broader near-surface interval of 51 metres containing 1.5% nickel and 0.94% copper. The Nickel Mountain gabbroic complex strikes northeast for at least 12 km and extends across strike for at least 1 km. Garibaldi discovered Nickel Mountain near Eskay Creek in mid-2017, intersecting 8.3% nickel and 4.2% copper over 17 metres, within a broader 40-metre intercept assaying 3.9% nickel and 2.4% copper, in drill hole 17-14.

Barksdale Capital dropped 13¢, or 20%, to 52¢. On Aug. 6, Barksdale closed the acquisition of the San Antonio property, 5 km southeast of the company’s flagship Sunnyside project in the Patagonia Mountains of southern Arizona. San Antonio comprises 315 mineral claims totalling 25.5 sq. km, and exploration focuses on the untested, shallow Cosmos porphyry copper target. As part of the acquisition, Barksdale issued 898,809 common shares to Teck Resources, which increases its equity stake in Barksdale from 8% to 9.9%. At Sunnyside, the main exploration target is a skarn on the northeast margin of the intrusive complex that the company says likely hosts copper-zinc-lead-silver mineralization. TNM