It is a tough time to be an investor as interest rate hikes, cost inflation, supply chain issues and geopolitical rows can stifle growth across stocks in equity portfolios. But St George Mining and Lykos Metals have shown there is still plenty of appetite for good exploration stories.
St George’s lithium pegmatite eye-opener this week at the Mt Alexander project in WA’s Goldfields rewarded patient investors, as did Lykos’ identification of two polymetallic shear zones at its Sinjakovo project in Bosnia-Herzegovina.
St George (ASX: SGQ) announced that a meaningful lithium find could be around the corner at Mt Alexander, its flagship battery minerals project where it has already made four high-grade nickel-copper sulphide discoveries, after rock chip samples confirmed numerous outcropping pegmatite dykes.
The John Prineas-led explorer said the pegmatites showed signs of being connected with Red Dirt Metals’ (ASX: RDT) Mt Ida discovery just a few kilometres away.
Adding a lithium discovery to the existing nickel finds at Mt Alexander would perfectly complement St George’s ambitions. Mt Alexander JV partner IGO (ASX: IGO) is no doubt keeping a keen eye on progress.
While lithium exploration is still in its early days, St George said rubidium values – a key indicator element for potential lithium mineralisation in weathered environments such as Mt Alexander – were as high as 0.6%.
St George said the width at surface of the pegmatites mapped to date was up to 15m though the true thickness was not yet known because of the uncertainty of the dip angle. Importantly, the prospective pegmatite outcrops have the width and strike that could provide scale to any potential discovery.
Mr Prineas said there was a very compelling case to step up exploration in tandem with drill-testing several promising, newly identified nickel targets.
Drilling of lithium targets at Mt Alexander is planned to kick off in coming months.
“We are particularly excited by the strong rubidium values in sample assays received to date – this is an excellent indicator of pegmatites favourable for lithium mineralisation,” Mr Prineas said.
“Mt Alexander has never been explored for lithium, providing St George with an outstanding opportunity to make a greenfields discovery in what has become a lithium exploration hotspot.”
St George shares closed the week up 27 per cent at 3.3¢ a share, having traded at 3.45¢ on Thursday.
Investor interest in lithium remains incredibly strong – just witness the 14 per cent jump in Mineral Resources’ (ASX: MIN) share price yesterday to a record $71.51 on markets talk it was preparing to spin off its ASX-leading lithium business into a stand-alone, listed entity to capture full value. MinRes hosed down the speculation of an imminent deal though has made clear over the past year that the option to demerge lithium was on the cards.
For Bosnia-Herzegovina-focused explorer Lykos (ASX: LYK), the Sinjakovo project is emerging as a standout project by delivering a pipeline of battery and precious metals targets for the company’s round-the-clock drilling programs.
Lykos said this week the identification of two polymetallic shears from a trenching program at the Zekil-Erak prospect had returned gold-equivalent grades of up to 12.61 grams per tonne. The company is confident of finding more good news as trenching continues.
Investors lapped up the news. Lykos’ shares gained almost 30 per cent over the week to close at 18.5¢ last night.
Just last month, the Stephen Allen-chaired explorer reported a gold-bearing diatreme breccia in the first trench with results of up to 5.78gpt.
The Sinjakovo project lies within the Tethyan metallogenic belt – Europe’s most prospective exploration zone and where fellow Balkans play Adriatic Metals (ASX: ADT) is working on its base metals story.
Lykos is continuing with trenching at Zekil-Erak while it prepares a follow-up drilling program. The company is also drilling at the RDK prospect, which encompasses the historic Sinjakovo mine and where it has intersected high-grade cobalt mineralisation.
And drilling at the Berkovici prospect, within the Cajnice project – the second of Lykos’ three flagship assets – continues to confirm the historical observations of lead shears.
Lykos managing director Mladen Stevanovic said both Sinjakovo and Cajnice were shaping as exciting prospects for meaningful discoveries and had presented the company with a pipeline of targets for an aggressive drilling push in FY23.
“The identification of two polymetallic shears at the Zekil-Erak prospect is highly encouraging and confident that more shear zones will emerge as trenching continues,” he said.
“The emergence of cobalt targets at the RDK prospect is also an exciting development. There is no historical record of cobalt within the locality, warranting further investigation.
“With the aggressive soil sampling campaign across the entire Cajnice project area completed, Lykos is now focused on preparing for drilling programs to test targets at the Majdan, Bandiera, Berkovici Northwest, Braha and Krapov prospects.”
There should be newsflow aplenty in the wings for Lykos shareholders.
