Tiger's $42m raising promising for juniors by: PAUL GARVEY From:...

Tiger's $42m raising promising for juniors
by: PAUL GARVEY From:
The Australian November 01, 2013 12:00AM Increase

COPPER miner Tiger Resources will announce today that it has collected more than $42 million through an equity raising, in another sign that the fundraising freeze that has crippled the junior resources sector is starting to ease. Tiger, which operates the Kipoi copper mine in the Democratic Republic of Congo, will also launch an $8m share purchase plan.

The placements were carried out through Cannacord Genuity at 34c a share, a 14 per cent discount to Tiger's last closing price.

The new funding will bolster Tiger's balance sheet while it continues to work on a new plant at Kipoi, which should start producing copper cathode in mid-2014.Tiger's share price has risen by 146 per cent since late June on the back of Kipoi's performance, with the company recently boosting its production forecast for next year from 21,000 tonnes of copper to 39,000 tonnes.

The imminent announcement of Tiger's capital raising comes just a day after exploration success story Sirius Resources said it had resolved to raise $83.5m through a placement. Sirius's discovery of nickel and copper at its Nova project saw the company transformed almost overnight from an unknown explorer into the best-performing stock on the Australian Securities Exchange last year.

The latest fundraising will leave Sirius with $110m in cash with which to "aggressively" explore its flagship project and move into project development.

The Sirius raising was priced at $2.44 a share, a less than 5 per cent discount to the company's volume weighted average price in the past five days, with Hartleys acting as broker to the offer.

Separately, Atrum Coal is understood to be raising $10m at $1.40 a share through Blackwood Capital, with the funds to go towards the pre-feasibility study under way at its Groundhog anthracite deposit in Canada.

Shares in Atrum have risen tenfold since last December, and were trading at $1.61 before entering a trading halt yesterday. - See more at: http://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/mining-energy/tigers-42m-raising-promising-for-juniors/story-e6frg9df-1226750841952#sthash.Qq6wcOvS.dpuf