Shares in nickel miner Sally Malay Mining Ltd closed up 7.3 per cent to $5.27 after the company announced a significant upgrade in reserves for its Lanfranchi joint venture project, south of Kambalda.
Shares in nickel miner Sally Malay Mining Ltd closed up 7.3 per cent to $5.27 after the company announced a significant upgrade in reserves for its Lanfranchi joint venture project, south of Kambalda.
The company announced a 210 per cent increase in nickel reserves on the site, from 19, 846 tonnes to 61, 300 tonnes.
Sally Malay attributed the increase to the discovery of an orebody in late 2006 and the upgrade of another resource in early 2007.
The full text of a company announcement is pasted below
- Lanfranchi Reserves increase by 210% from 19,846t Ni to 61,300t Ni
- Measure & Indicated Resources increase by 85% from 53,350t Ni to 98,700t Ni
- Total Resources at Lanfranchi now exceeds 125,000t Ni
- The growing production profile extends the Mine Life beyond 2012
Sally Malay Mining Limited (ASX Code: SMY) is pleased to announce a significant upgrade in Resources and Reserves for the Lanfranchi Nickel Project.
This increase is attributed to the discovery of the Deacon orebody in late 2006 and the upgrade of the Winner Resource in early 2007.
The initial Deacon Resource of 58,100t contained Ni is already 2.5 times the Helmut South resource of 22,000 t contained Ni that underpinned the original purchase of the Lanfranchi Project.
As at 30 June 2007 the Lanfranchi Nickel Project Resource has increased from 73,000t contained Ni to 125,000t contained Ni (see Table 2 & 3) and the Reserves have increased from 20,000t contained Ni to 61,300t contained Ni.
Commentary
The indicative production profile announced soon after the Lanfranchi JV purchased the Project in February 2005 included ore largely from Helmut South and the Lanfranchi remnant resource.
Together these orebodies were estimated to contain approximately 13,100t Ni and had production scheduled to finish in 2007/08. Due to a combination of exploration success down-plunge of existing orebodies and the new Deacon discovery the current production profile for the Lanfranchi Nickel Project could extend to at least 2012/13 on current reserves (subject to favorable economics) and combines multiple ore sources including Helmut South, Winner, Deacon, Lanfranchi and Schmitz.
The three main nickel channels of Lanfranchi, Schmitz (includes Winner) and Helmut (includes Deacon) will be the focus of future exploration (Figure 1).
The mine life of the project is likely to extend with further drilling success down-plunge at Deacon, Lanfranchi and Schmitz.
