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MELBOURNE (Dow Jones--OZ Minerals Ltd. (OZL.AU) Tuesday issued its annual resource update showing a 19% increase in its gold resource and a 22.1% increase in copper for the year ended June 30.

The Melbourne-based miner said its gold resource as at June 30 had risen 19% on year to 19 million ounces, copper resources had climbed 22.1% to 5.9 million metric tons while zinc rose 2.3% to 18.2 million tons.

OZ Minerals' silver resources dropped 2.7% on year to 396.7 million ounces, lead fell 3.4% to 2.6 million tons and nickel fell 78% due to the exclusion of the Wiluna nickel laterite resource.

OZ Minerals Executive Group Manager Exploration, Tony Manini, said the growth in copper and gold resources was largely due to new discoveries at the Prominent Hill project in South Australia and Sepon in Laos, but that these discoveries required extensive drilling before they could be converted to reserves.


-By Alex Wilson, Dow Jones Newswires; 61-3-9671-4313; [email protected]


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