Aguia Resources has locked in $1.5 million in fresh capital after completing a placement of 40 million shares at 3.8 cents per share, setting the stage for an aggressive drilling campaign at its high-grade Santa Barbara gold project in Colombia.
The new cash will also support expansion of the company’s gold processing plant to 50 tonnes per day (tpd) and cover general working capital needs.
A tranche of one million shares has been ringfenced for director applications, pending shareholder approval.
Aguia expects to launch a 25-hole diamond drilling program at the start of the June quarter for 2500 metres. The campaign is designed to test extensions of the high-grade mineralised strike and dip at its main Santa Barbara and Mariana workings.
The company will use the drilling results to pinpoint the rig’s next target and progressively test additional extensive gold-bearing veins that have been mapped but not yet drilled.
Management says the real speculative prize lies with the potential to prove a series of big high-grade gold orebodies and unlock a significant gold resource in the high-grade mineralised vein system.
Aguia Resources executive chairman Warwick Grigor said: “This diamond drilling program will initially test extensions of veins above and below the existing workings. We know where the veins are, we know the orientation and the grades. In the context of the Lassonde Curve, the company is entering the phase that potentially has the greatest impact on the share price.”
More than 7 kilometres of mapped mineralised veins run through the Santa Barbara project, with previous hits returning uber-high grades of 38.91 grams per tonne (g/t) and 31 g/t in two key vein structures.
The company says the geological setting at site bears striking similarities to other high-grade mesothermal vein systems in Colombia, including the Buriticá mine. The Chinese-backed deposit has a resource of 3.86 million ounces of gold grading a massive 8.4g/t and 13.7m ounces of silver running at 24.3g/t.
More impressively, the nearby Segovia gold mine - operated by Toronto-listed Aris Mining – contains a resource of 3.4m ounces grading 16g/t with a further 2.5m ounces in inferred resources at similar remarkable grades.
Given the prospective scale and high-grade potential of Aguia’s project -especially considering the size of neighbouring mines – the company is setting its sights high.
The company is chasing an ambitious exploration target of 2 million to 4 million tonnes at gold grades ranging from 20g/t to 30g/t. If realised, this has the potential to put Santa Barbara among the region’s most significant gold discoveries.
Aguia has already completed substantial underground rehabilitation work at the mine’s main vein systems and restarted the plant, which is currently running at a throughput of 30tpd.
The company also celebrated its first gold pour five weeks ago, delivering much needed cash flow for the project.
Key upgrades, including a new Merrill Crowe gold recovery circuit and an 80t thickener, were completed to improve the efficiency of the plant and pump up its capacity from 30tpd to 50tpd in the near term.
Aguia’s expansion into high-grade gold exploration comes as the company is in the pre-production phase of monetising another of its near-term mining opportunities.
It plans to use Santa Barbara’s cash flow to fund the capital requirements of its Tres Estradas organic phosphate mine in southern Brazil.
The company has full approvals in place and by mid-year expects to start processing 100,000t of rock phosphate annually, before increasing its capacity to 300,000 tonnes per annum (tpa).
In a key move, Aguia has ditched plans to build a processing plant, choosing to take out a long-term lease on a nearby plant that requires minor capital to get it up and running.
The cost-saving decision should significantly improve the project’s economics considering a 2023 feasibility study estimated a standalone 300,000tpa plant would have cost about $26m to build. The study also projected $22m in annual EBITDA over an 18-year mine life, with a 2.9-year payback period.
Aguia has a well-funded exploration program and an experienced technical team on board, ensuring it is now well-positioned to advance Santa Barbara toward a maiden JORC-compliant resource estimate.
Is your ASX-listed company doing something interesting? Contact: matt.birney@businessnews.com.au
By James Pearson
