Georgian Min. Share Discussion Threads

[pauladrew] 24/2/2016 10:37

Noricum aims for near-term production in Georgia
09:46 19 Feb 2016
www.proactiveinvestors.co.uk/companies/news/122745/noricum-aims-for-near-term-production-in-georgia-122745.html

Highlight of the report is :
'While Noricum has historically been well supported in the market, it’s long been a preference in London’s mining finance community that large scale exploration be supported by smaller scale cash flow.
"That way a junior miner isn’t constantly distracted by a need to come back to the market for financing. To put it even more crudely, it’s less vulnerable to being held to ransom by bottom-feeding equity sharks bent on making a quick turn on heavily dilutive and discounted fund-raisings.'
With its move into Georgia, Noricum has effectively neutralised that threat.'

Noricum aims for near-term production in Georgia
09:46 19 Feb 2016
The arrival of the Bolnisi gold project into the company’s portfolio certainly marked a radical departure away from the previous focus
Noricum aims for near-term production in Georgia
Bolnisi is demonstrably big

In the summer of 2015 Noricum Gold (LON:NMG) made what it called a “transformational acquisition” in Georgia.

The arrival of the Bolnisi gold project into the company’s portfolio certainly marked a radical departure away from the previous focus, which had centred on old Austrian gold mines.

As a result, the company was able to demonstrate a controlling interest in a project with a major resource base and real potential upside, because whereas the Austrian projects are prospective but speculative, Bolnisi is demonstrably big.

It comprises 861 square kilometres of ground in the south west of Georgia, and is by no means virgin territory.

On the contrary, previous work has identified 980,000 tonnes of contained copper on the project, as well as 6.6mln ounces of gold and 22mln ounces of silver, as well as associated silver, lead, zinc and barite.

That’s a resource inventory that would make many a junior miner weep with envy, although given the ongoing bear market in the mining sector it’s probably too much to bite off in one go.

Rather, Noricum plans a piecemeal approach and recently raised £1mln with a view to advancing what it calls “early stage production opportunities” that could come on stream as early as the third quarter of 2016.

The thinking is clear.

While Noricum has historically been well supported in the market, it’s long been a preference in London’s mining finance community that large scale exploration be supported by smaller scale cash flow.

That way a junior miner isn’t constantly distracted by a need to come back to the market for financing. To put it even more crudely, it’s less vulnerable to being held to ransom by bottom-feeding equity sharks bent on making a quick turn on heavily dilutive and discounted fund-raisings.

With its move into Georgia, Noricum has effectively neutralised that threat.

It’s identified two potential starter pits at Tsitel Sopeli and Kvemo Bolnisi, which should be able to provide cash flow in the near term. Both these areas benefit from a combination of outcropping gold mineralisation and proximity to two nearby operating mines owned by Noricum’s local partner.

The latest drill results continue to confirm the potential of these two operations, with Noricum chief Greg Kuenzel talking of “leveraging off existing infrastructure”; and of “the near term transformation of Noricum Gold into a low cost producer generating material cash flows.”

These, he says, “can be reinvested into the multiple development opportunities we have already identified at Bolnisi.”

Meanwhile, work on the Austrian assets continues. Back in March 2015, the company showed its faith in the prospectivity of its Austrian ground by adding a new project, Walchen, to the portfolio.

This project has historically delivered strong copper, zinc, lead, silver and gold grades, and initial reconnaissance work by Noricum has confirmed the potential of this ground.

Nevertheless, the main Austrian asset remains the 37 square kilometre Schonberg licence in the southern part of the country.

Here, Noricum has confirmed the presence of eight mineralised veins across a three kilometre strike in a district replete with former mining operations.

Current thinking is that the mineralisation that’s already been established continues to the east into another known mining district called Tremmelberg.

But the most recent drilling, while returning promising results in terms of grade, also highlighted that Noricum hasn’t yet got a full understanding of the mineralogy of the ore. This has led the company to call a temporary moratorium on drilling while it reviews the data it’s already gathered and tries to build a working model.

[yorgi] 24/2/2016 10:32

Thanks for posting Pauladrew. I don't think the market is attributing anywhere near a fair valuation to NMG at present.

[pauladrew] 24/2/2016 10:26

Noricum Gold's new address is up and coming fast
15:45 04 Feb 2016
www.proactiveinvestors.co.uk/companies/news/122176/noricum-gold-s-new-address-is-up-and-coming-fast-122176.html

Noricum Gold (LON:NMG) acquisition last year of a 50% stake in the 861sq km Bolnisi licence has seemingly given it a new lease of life as well as a change of address.

Having originally focused on Austria, the new project is in the former Soviet Republic of Georgia.

While the skiing might not be as good, the historical data suggests its move to a new neighbourhood may have got Noricum a cracking deal.

The Bolnisi VMS district forms part of the larger Tethyan belt.

Mines nearby include Murgul with 14.5Mt (million tonnes) at 3% copper and Ceratepe with 4Mt at 5% copper and 1 grams per tonne (g/t) gold.

It is the latter that Noricum will focus on initially, but the existing infrastructure in the area adds another angle to what management believe is a turning point for the company.

Most of the exploration work undertaken on the licence was carried out during the Soviet era.

Noricum is revising the historical data using modern western mining benchmarks and so far says the accuracy and reliability has been robust.

It paid a consideration of £2.61mln in shares that also gave it operational control.

Noricum has used its cash to convert the historical non-JORC resources and to help select the best places to start open pit production.

The licence's resource consists of 980,000 tonnes of contained copper, 6.6 mln oz of gold and 22 mln ounces of silver, but within that were three high priority drill-ready targets.

Noricum’s first holes from the Kvemo Bolnisi prospect had confirmed its potential as an easily mined starter gold pit.

Surface grades included 4.2m at 5.91g/t gold and 4.8m at 1.05 g/t, consistent with best historical grades of between 3.4g/t and 7.7 g/t.

Kvemo Bolnisi’s current non-JORC resource is 530,000oz at an average grade of 1.02%.

The low stripping rates make the prospect a unique opportunity said Greg Kuenzel, Noricum’s managing director, as it can use the nearby facilities of its partner Caucasian Mining (CMG) to process any ore produced.

The deposit is less than 7km from the currently operating Madneuli mine and processing plant, owned by CMG.

Drilling will be followed by pit design and mine planning with first production targeted by the end of June, 2016.

"These excellent initial results from our ongoing drill programme at Kvemo Bolnisi continue to highlight the potential for early stage low cost production at the first of our starter pit targets,” said Kuenzel.

He added it is also looking at turning the newly discovered near surface copper mineralisation at Kvemo Bolnisi into a high grade copper mine.

“With recently assayed historic drilling including intercepts of up to 40m at 2.11% Cu this represents an exciting high grade copper production target,” said Kuenzel.

The other ‘drill ready’ gold target is Tsitel Sopeli, where resource conversion is ongoing.

The current non-JORC resource is 368,000 ounces at grades of around 0.56g/t.

House broker share price Angel said the drilling at Bolnisi had confirmed there were economically mineable gold grades at surface and gives a good indication of the ability to start mining ore this year if the authorities allow.

In a tough sector for junior miners access to funding is a bugbear for many, but the potential at Bolnisi has meant this has not been a problem so far for Noricum.

In January 2016, it raised £1mln with shares issued to directors, new and existing shareholders at 0.08p. The money was to fund the drilling at Kvemo Bolnisi and later Tsitel Sopeli.

At the time, Kuenzel said : “With these funds now in hand we are on track to realise this in the near term.“

[pauladrew] 24/2/2016 00:22

Noricum aims for near-term production in Georgia
09:46 19 Feb 2016 proactiveinvestors.co.uk companies

[noirua] 22/2/2016 21:51

Zinc soars, copper also gains - 2016-02-23

[fairlight] 21/2/2016 07:24

Interesting views from a gold analyst - looks good for small gold producers especially if they have other ore to mine

[liquid millionaire] 19/2/2016 17:20

Dear Proactive Investor

Cluff Natural Resources can still ‘phone a friend’ after it extended an arrangement with Halliburton, which provides in the oil and gas minnow with access to expertise and insight that would otherwise be out of reach.

An existing memorandum of understanding has now been extended for two years.

“It allows us to us that expertise as a sounding board and a peer review, which is great for a small company because you wouldn’t normally have that resource,” chief operating officer Andrew Nunn explained to Proactive Investors.

Our Stocktube channel, meanwhile, spoke to Algy Cluff who aside from discussing the Halliburton arrangements also gave us his views on Scotland’s moratorium on unconventional gas, ‘broken assurances’ from the SNP and told us what he thinks of the possibility of a BREXIT.

In other small cap news, aircraft leasing firm Avation (LON:AVAP) is predicting a “significant” increase in second-half revenues as it delivers additional planes.

Gold and silver miner Mandalay Resources posted record sales in 2015 despite lower metal prices hitting revenues in the final quarter.

And, AFC Energy signed a strategic engineering partnership and services agreement with a consultancy to “support the optimisation and roll-out” of AFC’s alkaline fuel cell system.

We also had in depth looks at immunotherapies, an emerging treatment, with the help of Scancell’s Dr Richard Goodfellow.

Mining expert Alastair Ford put the spotlight on Noricum Gold, which is bringing on the newly acquired Bolnisi gold project, in Georgia.

Meanwhile in the oil and gas sector, Jamie Ashcroft underlined the reasons behind investors recent excitement in Providence Resources and AIM’s other Ireland focussed explorers.

[yorgi] 19/2/2016 15:28

Well done 4STA, as each month moves by we can expect any time further new of how the planning is going towards starting production in the second half of the year. All the while the POG is steadily moving in the right direction for us.

[4sta] 19/2/2016 13:42

I'm in for some more. Been here with a small holding for years but just added. Think we are finally onto something good here.At this price I just couldn't resist. Think the grades for both Gold and copper are excellent.

[noirua] 19/2/2016 13:34

Total mineral resources (non-JORC, C1, C2 & P1 Soviet Reserves & Resources) for the overall project area are both significant and scalable, comprising 980,000 tonnes of contained copper; 6.6 million ounces of gold; and 22 million ounces of silver. The Project also boasts a 30 year mining licence and is in close proximity to a producing mine operated by the Company's Joint Venture Partner, which has processing capacity and can be utilised to rapidly deliver cash flow.


[All drilling results for gold have been at or near surface. A case of hiring a giant digger and half a dozen trucks to take it just 7 kilometres or so.]

[noirua] 19/2/2016 13:21

Yes, one of many trades that go through on the ISDX trading platform edged it up. Holding quite a lot of shares and wondering whether to add more or not. Kinda guess they are worth 1p to 4p but lack of interest from punters is making me think on - probably wrong to wait.

[yorgi] 19/2/2016 12:32

I agree it is Noirua, well we are ahead of the rush......but MM's just nudged the bid up I notice.

[noirua] 19/2/2016 11:49

Market surprisingly quiet in NMG despite gold reserves likely to be declared in the very short term. Anyway, this may turn out to be amongst the few that rocket suddenly and I remember REM at 0.05p and zero interest, suddenly everyone and their dog wanted a holding all at once - hoping for the same here.

[noirua] 15/2/2016 12:07

With drilling results near surface due anytime, it's your call whether to build a good holding in Noricum.

[yorgi] 12/2/2016 15:22

You make a fair point Megan :-)

Good Afternoon to you to Loverat, and welcome :-) Yes I do and as Megan comments while under the radar prior to production or other eye catching news it gives a chance to build our holdings prior to a move up.

[loverat] 12/2/2016 15:15

Afternoon Yorgi

Nice to see you here. I took some of these recently.

I like these near term potential producers and I guess you do too.

[megan fox] 12/2/2016 15:14

I'm happy for this to stay under the radar for now tbh. If gold holds up, when this announces first production it will fly in a big way so just keep adding.

[yorgi] 12/2/2016 14:54

It appears to be mainly sells but MM's not dropping the bid so I can only assume they have an eager buyer who understands the value here.

[yorgi] 12/2/2016 09:54

We still seem to be under the radar with all this sudden interest in gold stocks as gold has now turned from being in a bear market to a strong bull market now.

We have a lot of gold and should be producing in the 2nd half of the year.

[noirua] 11/2/2016 11:00

Probably getting over the recent cash raising and markets may factor in the ever increasing value of gold. The $10m - $20m pre-tax estimate of revenue over two years already needs a revisit.

[noirua] 11/2/2016 10:54

Typical heap leach recoveries for quartzite-hosted gold are of the order of 70-80%, with cash costs of the order of US$500/oz. Taking these broad-strokes estimates into account and using $1,000/oz. gold price, an attributable margin of between $100-200 per contained oz. of gold in ore seems a reasonable earnings estimate. So revenue from each of these starter pits might be $10-20m pre-tax over two years. Not enough to provide substantial shareholder returns as cash dividends, but certainly enough to see significant capital growth and protect against dilution.

View of Shard Market Eye late January. Gold has now breached $1,200 per ounce.

[yorgi] 11/2/2016 10:30

Buying now at the full offer.......will we start to move up at last.

[yorgi] 10/2/2016 13:58

I would think it fair to assume that someone making that sort of investment in NMG will understand clearly the potential for upside.

We are no longer a pure explorer but now a near term producer and looking forwards at the right time the way the POG is looking.

[yorgi] 10/2/2016 13:47

Mr Fahad Al Tamimi who already holds a large holding believes in the investment case clearly :-)

[yorgi] 10/2/2016 10:58

Surprising what publications we are reaching Noirua :-)

All good which we already know of course.