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Gold investment demand fell early this year, largely attributed to outflows in gold-backed ETFs as growing expectations of higher interest rates influenced investor attitude, according to the most recent World Gold Council (WGC) report (Gold outlook for 2021 positive, despite uncertainty – World Gold Council (miningweekly.com). When analysing this trend more closely, it has been noted that investment demand actually saw positive growth in the retail market with ETF outflows negatively impacting the overall picture. The WGC market intelligence manager Krishan Gopaul notes that the “The overall picture of investment falling in the quarter really hides two different stories – we see the ETF outflows but there is still the more positive growth story on the bar and coin side”.There has also been an increase in consumer demand which has been further enhanced by low gold prices, one of the major buyers of such commodities being China and other emerging markets. The catalysed global economic recovery, bolstered by swift vaccination efforts, has also boosted consumer confidence in the technology sector raising demand by 11% year on year.

The cyclical elements of gold demand have been heightened by the 10% decrease in gold price in the first quarter, in combination with the global economic recovery in response to positive Covid-19 outlooks. Senior Market Analyst Louise Street at WGC has observed that “having seen investors take shelter in gold from the initial impacts of Covid-19, the first quarter saw a sell-off in the gold price as confidence in economic recovery grew and US interest rates rose sharply,”adding that, notwithstanding this, gold holds a strong position in the most well-balanced portfolios. This is particularly so given the repeatedly reported fears of inflation. In previous years where records show inflation rates of over 3%, the price of gold increased 15% on average (https://www.gold.org/goldhub/research/outlook-2021). When looking ahead to the next few less-tumultuous years, Louise sees “reasons to be optimistic about the gold market”due to the resilience of the markets main drivers, low interest rates and increasing yields.

History ready to repeat itself?

The only certain thing to come from the past year is uncertainty in abundance. That said, when it comes to gold mining, we can remain confident in the fact that the Victoria goldfields, southern Australia, continues to stand as a reputable and reliable source of precious metals. This follows decades of mining in the region, in the wake of a glimmering spotlight launched by the 19^thcentury gold rush. Testament to this fact is the nugget of gold rested assertively on my mantel, panned by myself during a trip to the Sovereign Hill attraction at the Ballarat Gold Mine.

AIM listed ECR Minerals (AIM: ECR) is a company on the brink of a gold fest from current drilling in the territory, focused on delivering the next multi-million ounce gold resource. ECR outright owns the Bailieston and Creswick projects located in Central Victoria, Australia, and with an operational HQ at Bendigo, is able to process and fast track core samples and assay results.

As well as holding financial interests in the Avoca, Moormbool and Timor projects, following the sale of those licenses to TSX-V listed Fosterville South Exploration Ltd for up to £1.3 million. Further retaining a 25% interest in the Danglay epithermal gold project located in Northern Philippines and a net smelter royalty agreement from the sale of the SLM gold project in Argentina.

Creswick

The Dimocks Main Shale, a geological feature believed to be have great gold potential, is home to Creswick and extends some 15km from the aforementioned mining centre of Ballarat.

Drill sites for the current programme are 2.2km south from those used in the previous drill programme in 2019, individual samples of which returned assays as high as 80.97 g/t gold over one metre. A study by pre-eminent consulting geochemist Dr Dennis Arne, whose experience includes extensive consultancy at the exceedingly successful Fosterville gold mine in Central Victoria, emphasized the significant gold exploration potential at Creswick, and ‘nuggety gold mineralisation’.

Bailieston

Also located in the sought-after central Victoria region, Bailieston is not far from the renowned Fosterville mine owned by Kirkland Lake Gold. Bailieston is base to ongoing drilling in the HR3 area, undertaken using ECR’s own diamond drill rig, with prospects also including Cherry Tree, Red Moon and Yellow Moon. Assay results have been announced for four holes in the HR3 area, with a further four holes awaiting final geological interpretation. What has been reported is that BH3DD005 holes 6 and 7 indicate the hypothesized central anticline does exist and represents a favourable target for gold mineralisation. Quality samples have been recorded from drilling by ECR at the Blue Moon prospect in 2019, including a 17.8g/t sample from a 2 metre interval. Making Blue Moon a noteworthy new discovery.

Through previously selling three Victoria licences (Avoca, Moormbool and Timor gold exploration projects) for cash and royalties to TSX-V listed Fosterville South Exploration Ltd, and a number of warrant exercises, the company is fully funded to continue drilling at its 100% owned Creswick and Bailieston projects through to into 2022. This strong cash position has given the company desirable footing moving forward, enabling them to push for the launch of further drilling programmes across existing property and acquire new opportunities.

In the recent Proactive Investors interview, ECR Minerals CEO Craig Brown spoke to Andrew Scott, highlighting the recent news of application for three new licenses in north-east Queensland, Australia. These permits are to cover a total of 900sq km of highly prospective ground within the Lolworth Range. Historical mining in the region totals 24.4mil ounces, equivalent to $48 billion worth of gold. Despite this, the area is relatively unexplored, offering “huge potential” according to Craig. As well as emphasising that he expects the gold price to only gain strength, with the precious metal being the hedge against inflation concerns.

Despite the recent retreat in share price, dropping from 4.25p in January, to 1.89p in May 2021, ECR’s strong cash position attributed to the aforementioned license sales and warrant exercises puts the company in an enviable industry spot. This, in combination with the fact the company owns a diamond drilling rig, currently operational at Bailieston while a contractor’s rig is active at Creswick, means ECR Minerals is set for a prosperous 2021/22 as demand for gold remains bullish. Making the current share price a bargain investment.

Junior Gold Explorers Continue to Shine Amid Global Market Volatility

8th April 2020 / Leave a comment

The year 2020 has already delivered what HM Queen Elizabeth would refer to in her end of year speech as an Annus Horribilis. It is still only April 2020, and Covid-19 continues to wreak almost biblical levels of havoc and human tragedy across the globe. In our previous article on junior gold explorers, we stated that it seemed trite to discuss investment opportunities in the midst of the ongoing battle against CoronaVirus. But life does go on, and so does mining exploration, even with the movement restrictions currently in place.

Gold Set To Rebound Following Monetary Stimulus Measures

Although gold has retreated from the late March highs of $1700 oz, at $1646 the yellow metal still sits close to year highs, well above the 2019 highs of $1277 last August.

Kitco, a website dedicated to gold and metals believes a major rebound in gold is just around the corner as prices look ready to surge on massive global monetary policy stimulus and unprecedented fiscal policies. United Overseas Bank (UOB) head of markets strategy Heng Koon said their forecast is “for gold to rebound significantly in the quarters ahead to USD $1,650 in 2Q20, $1,700 in 3Q20, $1,750 in 4Q20 and $1,800 in 1Q21.”

Image courtesy of BP Trends

“Once the USD funding crunch potentially dissipates across 2Q20, massive global monetary policy easing coupled with unprecedented fiscal policy stimulus will light the fuel for further gold strength.”

Heng also added that global central banks “have not only floored rates near zero but many have also entered into large Quantitative Easing programs. These significant stimuli bode well for gold and will be the fuel for gold’s rally once the USD funding crunch abates across 2Q.”

This compelling backdrop continues to drive healthy levels of investor interest in junior gold explorers. Across the globe, the focus on gold is manifesting itself in investor speculation into small cap explorers with quality projects. Most small explorers however only have one or two key project in their asset arsenal, leaving little room for any disappointment. However, there are a handful of micro-cap gold exploration plays offering a broad spread of assets, and consequentially an attractive risk profile with significant upside potential.

Once such company is AIM listed ECR Minerals (AIM: ECR), which has 100% ownership of five gold exploration projects in Central Victoria, Australia, and four exploration licences in the north-eastern Yilgarn region of Western Australia.

ECR’s Bailieston at the Centre of the Current Gold Exploration Boom

ECR’s Victoria projects include Bailieston, Avoca, Timor, Creswick and Moormbool. Indeed Bailieston, which targets epizonal / epithermal gold mineralisation of the Melbourne Zone, is at the epicentre of the current gold exploration boom in Victoria, being located close to the highly successful Fosterville mine owned by Kirkland Lake Gold. Recently, Australian mining giant Newmont arrived in the district with an application for ground immediately to the north of the Black Cat prospect.

Study Data Endorses Creswick Potential

During Q4 2019, ECR reported ‘nuggety gold mineralisation’ in the Dimocks Main Shale prospect at Creswick, some of which proved to be exceptionally high grade. Creswick has long been viewed as a potential pivot project for ECR after the highest grade duplicate result of 80.97 g/t gold came from a 1 metre interval that originally assayed 44.63 g/t, confirming the original findings announced on 8 May 2019.

On March 27th, ECR announced the results of a study carried out by Dr Dennis Arne, a pre-eminent consulting geochemist in Victoria, whose experience includes extensive consultancy at the highly successful Fosterville gold mine in Central Victoria owned by Kirkland Lake Gold.

The well-regarded Dr Arne’s involvement was seen as a solid endorsement of Creswick’s potential, and indeed the results did not disappoint, as ECR CEO Craig Brown pointed out.

“We are very pleased with the results of this study, which show good indications of hydrothermal fluid flow related to gold mineralisation in a number of drill holes at Creswick. Importantly, the variation in the results, with some areas ‘lighting up’ and others not, is potentially useful for identifying gold-bearing shoots.”

Brown added that the results “underline the significant gold exploration potential that we believe exists at Creswick, where our tenement position covers approximately seven kilometres of the Dimocks Main Shale (DMS) trend, of which our 2019 drilling tested only approximately 300 metres.”

Windidda Progress

ECR’s Windidda Gold Project, based in the Yilgarn region of Western Australia originally consisted of a package of nine exploration licence applications covering a 1,600 square kilometre area with the potential to host komatiite hosted nickel-copper-PGE (platinum group element) mineralisation, as well as orogenic gold. Five exploration licences have been granted, and in its full year results statement at the end of March 2020, ECR said the remaining four licence applications had been withdrawn, in light of objections to the expedited grant procedure from native title parties and the findings of preliminary desktop work to assess the prospectivity of the licence areas.

Consolidation, R&D Cash Refund and Focus

A micro-cap gold explorer can only operate so many projects and licenses, and indeed with the burgeoning potential of Creswick now at front and centre, the board took the decision to sell its wholly owned Argentine subsidiary Ochre Mining SA, which holds the SLM gold project in La Rioja, Argentina. The sale to Hanaq Argentina SA still sees ECR retain a Net Smelter Royalty of up to 2% to a maximum of US$2.7m in respect of future production from the SLM gold project, while removing ongoing costs associated with acquiring and running an exploration license.

There has been further good news on the funding front too, as the group also received a significant cash refund under the Australian government’s R&D Tax Incentive scheme. A$318,972 (approximately £171,000) was received in relation to the financial year ended 30 June 2018, and received a further refund of A$555,212 (approximately £295,515) in relation to the fifteen month period ended 30 September 2019.

The qualifying R&D activities relate to research into turbidite-hosted gold deposits within the Company’s exploration licences in Victoria. It goes without saying that these two refunds have also provided a significant boost to ECR’s cash position.

The biggest boost however came on Monday 6 April 2020, when, in the midst of the upheaval and disruption caused by COVID-19, ECR announced that it had raised a further GB£500,000 in a placing at 0.5p. That ECR was able raise funds in some of the most challenging stock market conditions in living memory more than anything else underscores the quality of the asset portfolio.

Still trading on a miserly GB£2.5m capitalisation, the market has ascribed little more than the value of the administrative work undertaken to secure the licenses, with no premium whatsoever for the results from Creswick or any of the other work undertaken to ascertain the prospectivity and value of ECR’s projects.

Selected Junior Gold Explorers Offer Great Value

Amid unprecedented efforts to limit the spread of CoronaVirus, the fiscal and monetary stimulus measures announced by the world’s major economies over the past month are global policy events without precedent in peacetime. Gavyn Davies of the FT pointed out that the increase in fiscal spending and loans in the US this year alone “will reach more than 10 percent of GDP, larger than the rise in the federal deficit through 2008 and 2009.”

This wholly supports the UOB / Kitco view that the gold price is set for a major rebound in the months ahead. As such, this rebound is likely to be reflected in the valuations of junior gold mining explorers with strong project portfolios. Fully funded for the coming year, and with nine projects and licenses in key territories across Australia, ECR Minerals should be integral to any junior gold explorer portfolio as the world grapples with the challenges and uncertainties of the Covid-19 pandemic.

References:

Kitco – Here’s how gold prices will get to $1800 in the next three quarters – https://www.kitco.com/news/2020-04-01/Here-s-how-gold-prices-are-going-to-1-800-in-the-next-three-quarters-UOB.html

FT – Gavyn Davies: Can the world afford fiscal and monetary stimulus on this scale? – https://www.ft.com/content/0f289d20-6e97-11ea-89df-41bea055720b

ECR Minerals #ECR – Positive Results of Alteration Study – Creswick Gold Project, Victoria, Australia

27th March 2020 / Leave a comment

ECR Minerals plc (LON: ECR), the gold exploration and development company focussed on Australia, is pleased to provide the following update on the Creswick gold project in Victoria, Australia, which is 100%-held by ECR’s wholly owned Australian subsidiary Mercator Gold Australia Pty Ltd (“MGA”).

As announced by ECR on 20 February 2020, Dr Dennis Arne, through his consultancy Telemark Geosciences, was retained to stain reverse circulation (RC) drill cuttings (chips) from MGA’s 2019 drilling at Creswick to test for the presence of ferroan carbonates. The results of the study have now been received.

HIGHLIGHTS:

Ferroan dolomite in wallrock and as quartz-carbonate composite chips has been identified in five drill holes from MGA’s 2019 RC drilling programme at the Creswick gold project;
Ferroan dolomite is characteristic of alteration around central Victorian gold deposits and indicative of gold-related hydrothermal fluid flow;
The strong development of ferroan dolomite in some holes can further assist to delineate auriferous shoots in those areas.

Craig Brown, Chief Executive Officer, commented:

This underlines the significant gold exploration potential we believe exists at Creswick, where our tenement position covers approximately seven kilometres of the Dimocks Main Shale (DMS) trend, of which our 2019 drilling tested only approximately 300 metres.”

DISCUSSION OF RESULTS

Ferroan dolomite in wallrock and as quartz-carbonate composite chips was identified in five drill holes from MGA’s 2019 reverse circulation (RC) drilling programme at the Creswick gold project: CSR008, 010, 012, 013 and 014.

The presence of ferroan dolomite is a positive indicator of hydrothermal fluid pathways, particularly where associated with quartz vein material, and allows metamorphic quartz to be distinguished from hydrothermal quartz veins.

As only a small proportion of the total samples from drilling at RC Creswick were reviewed for this study, the presence of ferroan carbonate elsewhere cannot be ruled out, particularly in oxide material where the staining is not effective but in which oxidised ferroan carbonates may be observed.

Given the nuggety nature of gold distribution in most typical central Victorian goldfields, reliance solely on gold assays for exploration may be misleading. While any anomalous gold will be significant in conventional assays, the presence of low values may represent false negatives that might lead to the premature downgrade of prospective structures.

Recognition of wallrock alteration independently of gold assays can be used to map the hydrothermal conduits that have potentially carried gold and provide support for mineralised structures in which gold assays are erratic. Accordingly, routine staining of RC chips to identify ferroan carbonates during logging has been recommended by Dr Arne for any future RC drilling at Creswick.

Dr Arne has also observed that if the stratigraphy is consistently dipping moderately to the west there is hydrothermal alteration and associated quartz veining stratigraphically below the Dimocks Main Shale, roughly below the historical surface workings at vertical depths between approximately 50 and 120 metres. Quartz-carbonate veining appears to be associated with sandstone units in the deeper intercepts where ferroan dolomite has been recognised through staining, and so is compatible with many other central Victorian deposits where sandstones adjacent to thick shale units behave in a brittle manner during deformation to create a host for gold mineralisation. Therefore mineralisation may not be restricted to the Dimocks Main Shale as the Company initially believed.

ALTERATION STUDY METHOD

The approach used involved staining washed RC chips with a mixture of potassium ferricyanide and Alizarin Red mixed with dilute (2%) hydrochloric acid. Ferroan dolomite and ankerite turn dark blue upon staining and ferroan calcite turns purple. Non-ferroan calcite will turn pink or red.

Siderite and magnesite do not react to this stain, so the mixed Fe-Mg carbonates observed at some Victorian gold deposits, such as Fosterville, will not react to the stain. Consequently, the amount of ferroan carbonate observed in RC chips following staining should be considered a minimum amount. The stain also does not work once the ferroan carbonates are oxidised, so samples above the logged base of oxidation were not selected.

Material from 34 one-metre intervals was tested in the study. These intervals were prioritized by MGA’s geological consultant Dr Rod Boucher based on known mineralised areas and logging of quartz-carbonate vein material in the RC chips. RC chips were sampled either from reject poly sample bags or duplicate split calico bags stored near Creswick. There was no material remaining for some samples from which elevated gold values had been obtained. Samples were washed to remove fines and then stained. After approximately a minute the RC chips were rinsed and photographed to document the staining reaction.

Review of Announcement by Qualified Person

This announcement has been reviewed by Dr Rodney Boucher of Linex Pty Ltd. Linex Pty Ltd provides geological services to Mercator Gold Australia Pty Ltd, including the services of Dr Boucher, who has a PhD in geology, is a Member and RPGeo of the Australian Institute of Geoscientists and is a Member of the Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy. Dr Boucher is a Qualified Person as that term is defined by the AIM Note for Mining, Oil and Gas Companies.

MARKET ABUSE REGULATIONS (EU) No. 596/2014

The information contained within this announcement is deemed by the Company to constitute inside information as stipulated under the Market Abuse Regulations (EU) No. 596/2014 (MAR). Upon the publication of this announcement via Regulatory Information Service (RIS), this inside information is now considered to be in the public domain.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION, PLEASE CONTACT:

ECR Minerals plc	Tel: +44 (0)20 7929 1010
David Tang, Non-Executive Chairman
Craig Brown, Director & CEO
Email: info@ecrminerals.com
Website: www.ecrminerals.com

WH Ireland Ltd	Tel: +44 (0)161 832 2174
Nominated Adviser
Katy Mitchell/James Sinclair-Ford

SI Capital Ltd	Tel: +44 (0)1483 413500
Broker
Nick Emerson

ABOUT ECR MINERALS PLC

ECR is a mineral exploration and development company. ECR’s wholly owned Australian subsidiary Mercator Gold Australia Pty Ltd has 100% ownership of the Avoca, Bailieston, Creswick, Moormbool and Timor gold exploration projects in central Victoria, Australia and the Windidda project in the Yilgarn region, Western Australia.

ECR has earned a 25% interest in the Danglay epithermal gold project, an advanced exploration project located in a prolific gold and copper mining district in the north of the Philippines. An NI43-101 technical report was completed in respect of the Danglay project in December 2015 and is available for download from ECR’s website.

PBOC Easing Boosts Gold Price & Investment Case for Junior Gold Explorers

27th February 2020 / Leave a comment

Investors seeking to capitalise on a bullish gold market in 2020, and in particular the next raft of discoveries, will no doubt be aware of the impact that the easing in monetary policy by the Peoples Bank of China (PBOC) has had across markets in China, still reeling from the CoronaVirus.

With the yellow metal long viewed as the definitive safe haven investment, markets have also seen a surge in interest at the more speculative end of the gold spectrum, most specifically across junior gold explorers. AIM listed ECR Minerals (AIM: ECR) is one such company currently in focus.

Creswick Potentially Transformational for ECR

Prior to the recent surge in the gold price, ECR had already seen a transformational 2019 in regard to developments across it’s six flagship projects.The final quarter saw developments across the explorer’s key Creswick project in Victoria, Australia, with ‘nuggety gold mineralisation’ confirmed in the Dimocks Main Shale (DMS) prospect at Creswick, some of which proved to be exceptionally high grade.

Creswick is viewed as a potentially transformational project for the company, particularly given that the highest grade duplicate result of 80.97 g/t gold came from a 1 metre interval that originally assayed 44.63 g/t, confirming the original findings announced on 8 May 2019.

On February 20th, ECR announced it had appointed Dr Dennis Arne to carry out a lithogeochemical study of cuttings (chips) generated by reverse circulation (RC) drilling at Creswick in 2019. Dr Arne is a preeminent consulting geochemist in Victoria, whose experience includes extensive consultancy at the highly successful Fosterville gold mine in Central Victoria owned by Kirkland Lake Gold. Bringing someone of this calibre in to review the drilling samples is a solid endorsement of Creswick’s potential, and has set tongues wagging amongst the investing cognoscenti across social media channels. In typical understated fashion, ECR said the results of the study “are anticipated to be valuable for the purposes of future exploration at the Creswick.”

Elsewhere in Central Victoria

Activity continues across ECR’s other projects in Central Victoria, with a number of potential exploration programmes for the Bailieston project, (including further drilling at the Blue Moon prospect), are under consideration, along with soil and stream sediment sampling in the Cherry Tree South and Ponting’s areas.

ECR Interests Realigned

With six key projects across Australia, a country estimated to have the largest gold reserves globally, ECR’s CEO Craig Brown and the board have taken the decision to realign the group’s many interests to focus on Victoria Gold Projects, (Creswick, Bailieston, Avoca, Timor & Moormbool) and the Western Australia Windidda Project.

In this regard, on February 5th the group announced the sale of the SLM Gold Project in Argentina to Hanaq Argentina SA, a Chinese-owned company engaged in lithium, base and precious metals exploration.

The move sees ECR retain an NSR (Net Smelter) royalty of up to 2% to a maximum of US$2.7 million in respect of future production from the SLM gold project. Craig Brown stated that he was.. pleased to retain exposure to potential upside from the SLM gold project in the form of a royalty on future production..we believe that Hanaq has the operational capabilities and access to Chinese investment capital necessary to put the SLM project into production. And more importantly, it aligns the group’s operational activities exclusively across the six key Australian projects.

Windidda Progress

While activities across the Victoria projects are well documented, (not least because of the the Bailieston project is adjacent to a prospect territory acquired in 2018 by global mining giant Newmont), ECR has been pushing ahead its Windidda Gold Project based in the Yilgarn region of Western Australia. This consists of a package of nine exploration licence applications covering a 1,600 square kilometre area with the potential to host orogenic gold deposits. At the end of January ECR published an update on Windidda, stating that four exploration licences had been granted in the north-eastern Yilgarn, and announced a further license award on February 20th.

Aside from Gold, the region is also highly prospective for nickel-copper-PGE (platinum group element) mineralisation, so consequently ECR has commissioned a consultant to complete additional geophysical modelling and a review of historical activity reports for areas to the south of Windidda to better understand the potential prospectivity of the project.

Undervalued

The sale of the SLM Gold project has certainly saved ECR from the ongoing costs associated with acquiring and running an exploration license. There was further good news on the funding front too, as the group also received a cash refund for research and development (R&D) expenditure of AU$555,212 (approx GB£295,515), added to which for the year to 30 September 2019, the group carried forward corporate income tax losses of AU$ 66,341,587 (approximately GB£35.3 million) which are expected to be available for offset against future taxable gains.

Despite this, the current market capitalisation of GB£3.6 million reflects little more than the value of the administrative work undertaken to secure the licenses, with no premium whatsoever for the results from Creswick or any of the other work undertaken to ascertain the prospectivity and value of ECR’s projects.

Safe haven

While it seems trite to discuss investment opportunities in the midst of the shock, havoc and terrible human cost wrought on China and the world by CoronaVirus, the event has already significantly impacted on many of the larger resource and energy groups who provide raw materials to satisfy China’s enormous burgeoning economy.

As already highlighted, the impact on the China stock market (and global markets) has to some degree been mitigated by quantitative easing measures by the PBOC, but the consequential weakness in resource and energy stocks has inevitably driven investors to seek returns elsewhere, i.e. gold. So on February 20th, Beijing cut the one-year loan prime rate to 4.05% from 4.15%, prompting China’s banks to further lower the benchmark borrowing costs for new corporate and household loans.

On the subject of rate cuts and easing, Neils Christensen, a journalist at leading bullion website Kitco stated on February 17th that analysts “remain optimistic that (gold) prices can push higher as easing from the People’s Bank of China could ignite a further drop in global interest rates.”

This view is backed by other pundits too. Ole Hansen, head of commodity strategy at Saxo Bank, said that economists are still trying to estimate the full impact the spreading virus will have on the global economy. He added that this uncertainty will continue to support gold prices. “We have seen monumental demand destruction this past month and that won’t be resolved anytime soon,” he said. “Central banks will be forced to ease again, but the question is just how much impact further easing will have.”

As China and the world struggles to get to grips with limiting the spread of CoronaVirus, the strength in the gold price looks likely to be sustained throughout the year. This strength is likely to be reflected in across junior gold mining explorers with strong project portfolios. With the raft of project developments and drilling updates scheduled for early 2020, ECR is likely to benefit from this continued focus.

by Alan Green

ECR Minerals (ECR) – Update on Australian Gold Exploration

20th February 2020 / Leave a comment

ECR Minerals plc (LON: ECR), the gold exploration and development company focussed on Australia, is pleased to provide the following update on its activities, which are carried out through its wholly owned Australian subsidiary Mercator Gold Australia Pty Ltd (“MGA”).

HIGHLIGHTS:

Lithogeochemical study by preeminent consulting geochemist commissioned for Creswick gold project in Victoria;
Exploration options for Bailieston project in Victoria being reviewed with the MGA technical team – programme to be announced shortly;
Additional exploration licence granted at the Windidda project in Western Australia;
Business development – the Company continues to review its commercial options for MGA’s Victorian gold projects following expressions of interest from third parties.

Creswick Gold Project, Central Victoria

MGA has commissioned Dr Dennis Arne to carry out a lithogeochemical study of cuttings (chips) generated by reverse circulation (RC) drilling at the Creswick project in 2019. Dr Arne is a preeminent consulting geochemist in Victoria, whose experience includes extensive consultancy at the highly successful Fosterville gold mine in Central Victoria owned by Kirkland Lake Gold.

Dr Arne will be working with fresh (unoxidised) RC chips from Creswick to determine whether the observed quartz veining is associated with the presence of ferroan carbonate. Ferroan carbonate is intimately associated with all Central Victorian gold deposits that have not been contact metamorphosed.

The amount of ferroan carbonate generally increases as mineralised structures are approached. It can therefore be used for vectoring within alteration systems associated with gold mineralisation, particularly when integrated with geochemical data, and can be used to distinguish between mineralised and non-mineralised quartz veins. The results of the study are anticipated to be valuable for the purposes of future exploration at the Creswick project. Further updates will be provided in due course.

Windidda Gold Project, Western Australia

Further to the Company’s announcement dated 27 January 2020, MGA has been granted an additional exploration licence comprising part of the Windidda project in the north-eastern Yilgarn region of Western Australia. MGA has withdrawn three exploration licence applications over areas now considered to be less prospective, and one further application remains in process.

Bailieston Gold Project, Central Victoria

The westernmost part of the Bailieston licence is approximately 30km east of Kirkland Lake Gold’s Fosterville gold mine, and abuts an exploration licence applied for by Newmont Exploration Pty Ltd to the north.

ECR is considering a number of potential exploration programmes for the Bailieston project, including further drilling at the Blue Moon prospect, where 2019 reverse circulation (RC) drilling by MGA returned an intercept of 2 metres at 17.87 g/t gold within a zone of 15 metres at 3.81 g/t gold from 51 metres in BBM007 (see announcement dated 14 March 2019 for full details of this drilling programme and its results), and soil and stream sediment sampling in the Cherry Tree South and Ponting’s areas.

Craig Brown, Chief Executive Officer, commented: “With the gold price having recently exceeded USD 1,600, the equivalent of almost AUD 2,400 in Australian dollar terms, there is currently a very high level of interest in gold exploration and mining in Australia, including in Victoria and Western Australia.

As well as seeking to add value through our own exploration activities, ECR is considering potential transactions which may create value for the Company and its shareholders. Although there can be no guarantee that any transaction will be progressed, the board are encouraged by the number of opportunities that are available. Further updates will be provided as appropriate”