Deals in brief

Fosterville South acquires three gold projects from ECR Minerals

Fosterville South Exploration is set to acquire a 100% stake in three high-grade gold projects after entering into a purchase agreement with Mercator Gold Australia, a subsidiary of ECR Minerals, in a deal worth up to AUD2.5m ($1.57m). Under the terms of the agreement, Mercator will receive a cash consideration of AUD500,000 ($313,665), and will receive AUD1 for every ounce of gold or gold equivalent of measured resource, indicated resource or inferred resource within the tenements, up to a maximum of AUD1m.

If Fosterville South carries out commercial production at the projects, Mercator will receive AUD1 for every ounce of gold or gold equivalent ounces produced, up to a maximum of AUD1m.

Fosterville South will take ownership of the Timor Project, the Avoca Project and the Moormbool Project. All three are in the Lachlan Fold Belt within Central Victoria, Australia.

Understanding the acquisition

Fosterville South has acquired three gold-focused tenements, increasing the company’s land package by 271km2. The Avoca and Timor sites have seen historical mining of 1,390,000 ounces of gold, and all three sites have considerable exploration upside with numerous drill-ready prospects, based on earlier work.

The Moormbool project area is a largely-unexplored region that has nonetheless shown potential signs of gold, and other sites around the project area have been successfully mined. The Moormbool licence compliments the Moormbool East Exploration Licence application held by Fosterville South’s subsidiary Currawong Resources. That licence is immediately east of the newly-acquired Moormbool project.

The Avoca project is located approximately 183km from Victoria state capital Melbourne, with good road access.  Having previously been mined with a significant amount of gold production from both alluvial and hard rock high-grade sources, Fosterville South believes the site is highly prospective for hard rock structurally-controlled gold deposits.

The Timor project is immediately east of the Avoca project and has seen significant historical gold production. Around 20 hard rock workings can be considered to have been significant producers. These include the Leviathan group of mines, with recorded gold production of 56,474 ounces of gold from 189,085 tonnes, equating to a recovered grade of approximately 9.14 g/t gold.

Executives respond to the deal

​​​​​​​Commenting on the acquisition, ECR Minerals CEO Craig Brown said: “We are delighted to sell these non-core but high-potential licences to Fosterville South while maintaining exposure to upside from the Licences as a result of future resource estimation or production.

“We believe Fosterville South is well placed to advance the Licences with its strong local exploration team and backing from North American high-net-worth and institutional investors, while ECR will continue to concentrate its resources on our core projects in Victoria, Bailieston and Creswick.

“The initial cash to be received from this disposal… puts ECR in a robust working capital position which we can apply toward development of our core projects.”

Russian bank VTB invests $71m for 40.6% stake in Veduga gold deposit

Russian investment bank VTB has today announced it will invest $71m in exchange for a 40.6% stake in Veduga, a high-grade refractory gold deposit located in the Northern Yenisey gold belt in the Krasnoyarsk region of Russia. Krasnoyarsk is Russia’s top gold-producing region.

Barrick to acquire 70% of Precipitate Gold’s Pueblo Grande project

Barrick Gold has signed an earn-in agreement with precious and base metals explorer Precipitate Gold to acquire a 70% stake in the company’s Pueblo Grande project.

The Pueblo Grande project is located next to Barrick’s Pueblo Viejo mine in the Dominican Republic. Pueblo Viejo is a joint venture between Barrick Gold (60%) and Newmont Goldcorp (40%).

Yamana agrees to sell Equinox Gold shares for $144m

Canadian miner Yamana Gold has signed an agreement to sell shares and warrants in Vancouver-headquartered Equinox Gold for C$201m (approximately $144m).

The company agreed the deal with Stifel GMP and Cormark Securities to sell 12 million units priced at C$10 ($7.17) each. Each unit consists of one common share of Equinox Gold owned by Yamana and one-half of a purchase warrant of Yamana.

Centaurus acquires Brazilian nickel sulphide mine from Vale

Exploration firm Centaurus Metals has acquired Jaguar nickel sulphide project in Brazil from Vale after receiving financial approvals.

The Jaguar nickel sulphide project is located in the western portion of the Carajás mineral province of Brazil.

Polymetal signs gold concentrate offtake deal with Blackham Resources

Gold and silver producing firm Polymetal International has signed a refractory gold concentrate offtake agreement and formed a strategic alliance with Australian gold miner Blackham Resources (BLK).

The two firms signed the agreement covering either 70% of refractory sulphide gold concentrate from BLK’s Wiluna Stage 1 expansion project or 122,500t of concentrate of gold – whichever is greater – during its first three years of operation.

Resolute Mining completes sale of Ravenswood gold mine

Australian miner Resolute Mining has completed the sale of the Ravenswood gold mine in Queensland, Australia to a consortium comprising a fund managed by resources private equity manager EMR Capital Management and Singapore-listed mining and energy company Golden Energy and Resources.