Ardea advancing fashionable quinella
BOOM junior company spin-out Ardea Resources has begun the current quarter apace, drilling cobalt targets near Kalgoorlie and initiating metallurgical testwork for a bulk tonnage zinc and gold development in New South Wales.
Ardea, which was spun out from Heron Resources, believes it has a large zinc and gold mineralised system on its hands at Lewis Ponds, with one of the four metallurgical diamond core holes drilled at the project hitting 61 metres grading 3% zinc-equivalent.
Lewis Pond is the bountiful Lachlan Fold Belt of NSW and was previously assessed as an underground opportunity with a historic resource of 6.6 million tonnes at 1.5 grams per tonne gold, 69gpt silver and 2.4% zinc.
Ardea believes an exploration target of 15-25Mt grading 2.2-3.7% zinc equivalent could be outlined, and could be exploitable with an open cut to 200m depth.
Meanwhile in Western Australia, the first diamond core hole has been drilled into the cobalt zone at Goongarrie South, with four holes planned to between 70-170m depth.
Goongarrie South is part of the KNP Cobalt Zone, with the KNP (Kalgoorlie nickel project) being Heron’s long standing laterite nickel focus prior to its acquisition of the Woodlawn zinc project near Sydney.
Ardea is estimating a cobalt resource as prefeasibility work is undertaken.
The company started the current quarter with A$4.2 million cash, having listed earlier this year after a $5 million IPO that issued new shares at 20c.
The stock subsequently hit a high of 93c, at which time it was valued significantly more than the company from where its assets came.
At a price late this week of 61c, Ardea was capitalised at about $40 million, giving it an enterprise value that remains comfortably above that of Heron.
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