The West Australian today The owners of the advanced...

The West Australian today

The owners of the advanced Ravensthorpe gold project will raise $30 million to $40m in an initial public offering of their private entity ACH Minerals as local listings in the junior gold sector heat up.
ACH will be renamed Medallion Metals as part of the transaction, which aims to put the company in a position to make a final investment decision on the 673,000oz Ravensthorpe project by the end of next year.
Backed by business associates Ian Junk, Darren Hedley and Tao Li along, ACH was set up to acquire the Great Southern Project from Silver Lake Resources for $5m in August 2016.

ACH, which also has backing from Chinese interests, has since split the project into the Ravensthorpe gold project and the Jerdacuttup polymetallic project.
Medallion managing director Paul Bennett, pictured, said ACH had never considered the two projects compatible and decided early on to develop them separately with an initial focus on Ravensthorpe.
The project, which lies 17km south-east of the town, is expected to cost $85m as a standalone operation.
It is forecast to produce an average 61,000oz a year for a minimum 5.5 years with production peaking at 80,000oz in year three.
The private entity has already completed a definitive feasibility study on the project and in May secured conditional approval from the Environmental Protection Authority for its development.
Mr Bennett said the company would use the funds raised in the IPO for another round of drilling ahead of an optimisation of the definitive feasibility study. “The existing deposits are open at depth and along strike and then there’s the near-mine and regional opportunities that we’re quite excited about,” he said.
“The objective of this round of drilling is to demonstrate that the 80,000ozpa peak rate of production can be continued well into the future.”
It is not the first time the ACH backers and former Western Mining colleagues have developed a project together.
Mr Junk, Mr Hedley and Mr Li previously combined on the Ridges iron ore mine in the Kimberley, which was sold to private Chinese interests for an undisclosed sum in 2012.
Northern Star director John Fitzgerald will be Medallion’s chairman and WA mining veteran Tony James will be a non-executive director along with Ed Ainscough.
ACH aims to lodge its prospectus for Medallion’s listing on the ASX by end of the month. About 33-40 per cent of the company will be in free float post raising.
Gold IPOs expected in the next few months
Former Doray Minerals boss Allan Kelly is eyeing a $5m-$8m IPO of Miramar Resources. The focus will be the Gidji project about 15km north of Kalgoorlie and the Glandore project 40km east of Kalgoorlie, previously held by AngloGold Ashanti.
Argosy Minerals MD Jerko Zuvela will chair the refloat of SIV Asset Management as Ragusa Minerals via a $5m raising. Ragusa will hold the historic Lonely Mine gold project in Zimbabwe.