Ecuador Gold and Copper Corp. Announces Los Cuyes Drill Results of 149.0m @0.84g/t Gold and 9.0 G/t Silver Including 14.1m @...

        






Ecuador Gold and Copper Corp.  Announces Los Cuyes Drill Results of 149.0m @0.84g/t Gold and 9.0 G/t Silver Including 14.1m @ 5.00 g/t Gold and 39.0 g/t Silver at the Condor Gold Project in Southeast Ecuador

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VANCOUVER, Jan. 30, 2013 /CNW/ - Ecuador Gold & Copper Corp. (TSX-V: EGX), (the "Company" or "EGX") is pleased to announce assay results from drill hole DCU-41 at the advanced Los Cuyes gold project located within the Company's 8,300 hectare Condor gold and copper concessions in Southeast Ecuador.  Within the 149.0 m @0.84g/t Au and 9.0 g/t Ag there are numerous intercepts highlighted by a 14.1m interval with 5.00 g/t Au and 39.0 g/t Ag including 4.8m at 10.55 Au and 80.8 g/t Ag.

This is the first EGX drill hole at Los Cuyes, part of the previously announced 10,000 meter Phase 1 drill program on the Company's extensive Condor Gold property. DCU-41 encountered a number of significant intervals that confirm the potential for expansion of the known NI 43-101 compliant indicated resource at Los Cuyes of 47 million tonnes at 0.82 g/t Au and 6.2 g/t Ag (1.235 million oz Au and 9.323 million oz Ag).  For further details see the Company's resource table at www.ecuadorgoldandcopper.com or the June 14, 2012 Technical Report at www.sedar.com .

DCU-41 was collared approximately 50 meters west of the previously defined resource and was drilled to the north to a depth of 638.5m and extends the known mineralized zone to the north and west.  Table 1 summarizes results.

Table 1:  Summary Results from Los Cuyes Drill Hole DCU-41 (length weighted average assays, uncapped)

Drill Hole	From (m)	To (m)	Interval (m)	Au (g/t)	Ag (g/t)	AuEq (g/t)
DCU-41	132.0	281.0	149.0	0.84	9.0	0.93
including	145.0	228.0	83.0	0.57	7.6	0.65
and	260.7	274.8	14.1	5.00	39.0	5.42
DCU-41	350.0	353.0	3.0	1.46	10.0	1.57
DCU-41	446.3	447.1	0.8	4.76	26.1	5.04
DCU-41	477.8	481.2	3.4	0.57	8.6	0.66
DCU-41	524.0	524.5	0.5	1.02	6.8	1.09
DCU-41	565.0	567.0	2.0	1.27	2.3	1.297

• g/t = grams per metric tonne.
• Gold equivalent grade is calculated assuming 60% recovery of silver, $25 per ounce long term price of silver and $1,400 per ounce long term price for gold.
• The true width of down hole interval lengths are estimated to be approximately 50% to 60%.

Commentary

Drill hole DCU-41 intersected relatively continuous gold mineralization over 149m from 132m to 281m to the north and east of the previously defined NI43-101 compliant indicated resource at Los Cuyes, suggesting possible expansion of the deposit and signaling that further drilling is required to define new resources in this area.  Grade is distributed in 2 longer intercepts separated by a 30m low grade stretch with sub economic grades (<0.1 g/t Au).  Best grades are in granodiorite with common quartz-pyrite +/- sphalerite veinlets and occasional sulfide veins up to 2 cm thick carrying pyrite plus or minus sphalerite and rare chalcopyrite.  The interval is cut by several minor faults and bounded by two major faults that have been mapped at surface. There are further encouraging gold intersections down the hole where drilling intercepted similar east-west structures.

Table 2 shows assays over the interval 260.7m to 281.0m where highest gold grades were encountered.

Table 2:  Detail of Highest Grade Section, Los Cuyes Drill Hole DCU-41

Drill Hole	From (m)	To (m)	Interval (m)	Au (g/t)	Ag (g/t)	AuEq (g/t)
DCU-41	260.7	262.0	1.3	1.928	14.8	2.087
DCU-41	262.0	263.0	1.0	2.097	14.8	2.256
DCU-41	263.0	264.0	1.0	1.015	19.2	1.221
DCU-41	264.0	265.0	1.0	1.373	13.7	1.520
DCU-41	265.0	266.0	1.0	9.181	58.9	9.812
DCU-41	266.0	267.0	1.0	0.616	9.7	0.720
DCU-41	267.0	268.0	1.0	0.173	5.0	0.227
DCU-41	268.0	270.0	2.0	1.452	10.9	1.569
DCU-41	270.0	271.0	1.0	22.200	131.8	23.612
DCU-41	271.0	272.0	1.0	2.459	20.2	2.675
DCU-41	272.0	273.0	1.0	6.165	53.8	6.741
DCU-41	273.0	274.0	1.0	2.070	22.2	2.308
DCU-41	274.0	274.8	0.8	22.200	200.0	24.343
DCU-41	274.8	277.0	2.2	0.279	5.0	0.333
DCU-41	277.0	279.0	2.0	0.197	2.4	0.223
DCU-41	279.0	281.0	2.0	0.286	3.3	0.321

• g/t = grams per metric tonne.  See notes below Table 1 above for AuEq parameters and true width estimates.

10,000 Meter Phase I Drill Program

The Los Cuyes gold deposit is one of four targets including the Soledad gold deposit in the northern part of the Condor gold and copper concessions, and Santa Barbara, a gold-copper porphyry to the south.  In addition the Company is currently drilling the promising El Hito copper-molybdenum porphyry target located 5km east of Santa Barbara.

Three drill holes have been completed at Soledad with assays pending, and EGX is currently drilling five holes at the El Hito copper-molybdenum porphyry target. An additional hole has been drilled at the  Santa Barbara porphyry Au-Cu target and assays are awaited. A further five holes are planned at Santa Barbara.

Drilling completed to the end of December 2012 is approximately 4,600 meters.

Existing Resources

The Condor Gold Project contains a Measured & Indicated Mineral Resource of 1.52 million ounces gold (within 50.4 Mt grading 0.94 g/t gold). Additional Inferred Mineral Resources contain 1.28 million ounces gold (within 28.4 Mt grading 1.4 g/t gold). The measured resource consists of 54,000 ounces of gold (within 147,000 tonnes grading 1.0 g/t gold) and the indicated resources consist of 1.47 million ounces gold (within 50.3 Mt grading 0.94 g/t). For more information, please see the Company's resource table at www.ecuadorgoldandcopper.com or its Technical Report dated June 14, 2012 which is available under the Company's profile on SEDAR at www.sedar.com.

Quality Assurance

The Company has implemented a quality assurance and quality control program to ensure that the transport, sampling and analysis of all samples is conducted in accordance with the best possible practices. Drill core is transported from the drill by employees to the Company's secure core logging facility at its camp where, after geotechnical and geological logging, it is marked for sampling.  The entire hole is sampled and core samples are generally 2m in length, varying at geological contacts to between 1.5m and 2.5m and are split in half by EGX employees.  One half is retained in a secure storage facility and the other half is transported by EGX employees or a bonded courier to ACME Labs' sample preparation facility in Cuenca, Ecuador where the core sample is crushed so that 80% passes a 10 mesh screen and a 250g split is pulverized so that 85% passes a 200 mesh screen.  From Cuenca ACME Labs ships the samples to their laboratory in Santiago, Chile for analysis. The lab is ISO/IEC 17025:2005 (CAN-P-4E) certified.  Samples are analyzed for gold by 30-gm fire assay with an AA finish and by gravimetric methods for assays over 10 ppm.  Samples are analyzed for silver by ICP-ES after a four acid digestion.  For silver assays over 200 ppm samples, are analyzed using ACME Labs 7AR method consisting of hot aqua regia digestion and ICP-ES analysis. ACME Labs are independent from the Company.

Under the Company's QA-QC procedures, samples are submitted for re-analysis based on their proximity to a certified reference standard that returns a value greater than three standard deviations higher or lower than the mean value for that standard. In addition, any two consecutive reference standards falling outside the two standard deviation threshold will be considered to have failed. Since every twentieth sample is a reference standard, ten samples above and below a failed standard will be re-analyzed. The same protocol will be applied to duplicate samples considered to have unacceptably divergent gold values. Periodically, random samples will be submitted to another laboratory as an external check on the results provided by the primary lab.

Qualified Person

Mit Tilkov, P.Geo., Vice-President Exploration of Ecuador Gold and Copper Corp. is the qualified person, as defined by National Instrument 43-101, supervised the project field work, and is responsible for the preparation of the technical information in this release.

Cautionary Note

The Company has not completed a preliminary economic assessment or feasibility study of the Condor Gold Project under National Instrument 43-101, and there is no assurance that the exploration and subsequent development operations of the Condor Gold Project will be economically or technically viable.

Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. 

SOURCE Ecuador Gold and Copper Corp.

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