** wrxsti-toneo research.......interesting u.k. ar

toneO, three key things to note when reading this article as follows:
1) Trading Patterns on initial Thor AIM listing.
2) Common Directorship initially on all Companies involved.
3) Thor's view (or percieved lack of) on possibility of future breakthrough in the Uranium Mining Industry in Australia. All the while noting specific timeline!
wrxsti
********************


Minews Story
Date: July 27, 2005

Thor Mining Arrives On AIM With Prospects For Molybdenum And Tungsten

In Scandinavian mythology, Thor was the god of thunder, wind and weather. At Minesite we are used to thundering at shells and vacuums and putting the wind up apparent transgressors of trading norms. At first we thought Aussie miner Thor Mining which floated on the AIM at the end of last month qualified for some criticism on these scores but we have now discovered it has genuine deposits to explore and develop in Northern Territory.

We also feel that the rightful place for Australian juniors to list is the ASX but we note that two of Thor’s directors, Andrew Bell and Mark Smyth, are also non-execs at Ormonde Mining and Palladex respectively. Thor says its listing on the AIM “will provide future access to capital for the long term development of its business” and “enhance the liquidity of the Company’s share capital by attracting UK high net worth and institutional investors”. This doesn’t exactly square with clearing out 10 million shares to small private investors immediately after the launch date through City Equities but at least the share price rose 50 per cent on the first day of trading and is still almost double the flotation price. We’ll give Thor the benefit of the doubt for now but it still has a number of questions to answer..

The company is focusing on its three project areas to develop their resources of molybdenum and tungsten. It acquired the deposits and the relevant exploration licences on 20th May this year for £0.7 million by acquiring Sunsphere, formerly a wholly owned subsidiary of Tennant Creek Gold, which was incorporated in Australia in February 2005. Thor’s chairman, John Barr, is also chairman of Tennant Creek which had owned the tenements since 2003.

The Molyhil project comprises a group of four mineral tenements. Molyhil is located 220 kilometres north east of Alice Springs within the prospective polymetallic province of the Proterozoic Eastern Arunta Block, Northern Territory. The granted exploration licence covers in excess of 800 square kilometres and the three mineral lease applications cover an area in excess of 100 square kilometres. The most advanced area had extensive exploration activities during 2004. The project is located 28 kilometres north of the Plenty Highway that provides access to the major transport routes of the recently completed Adelaide-Darwin railway and the Stuart Highway. A JORC Code compliant resource has been estimated for the Molyhil deposit of 2.03 million tonnes grading 0.30% wolframite (WO3) and 0.18% molybdenite (MoS2) to 150 metres vertical depth.

Molyhil has had much historic exploration since it was discovered in 1973; it produced over 100,000 tonnes of ore by open pit before it was closed in 1981 due to low metal prices. In the last month of mining 12,400 tonnes grading 0.78%WO3 and 0.51% MoS2 were mined and milled. Thor has good reason to believe the historic drill-indicated figures understate the grade and it will spend £750,000 in 2005 on verification including the sinking of three shafts and three cross-cuts to produce bulk samples from which a headgrade to JORC standards will be determined. A feasibility study should be completed by the end of this year.

Thring Creek represents an aeromagnetic anomaly and is situated approximately 24 kilometres east of the Molyhil deposit. The feature is 7 kilometres long and up to 1.5 kilometres wide, and is composed of magnetite bearing rocks with identical response to the Molyhil deposit. The zone has not been previously prospected or explored as it also coincides with surficial alluvial sediments of the Thring Creek system and as the aeromagnetic high, which is easily identified on recently available aeromagnetic data, was not obvious on earlier data.

The final project is the Hatches Creek group of three mineral tenements, located in the central portion of the Northern Territory. The project is comprised of one granted exploration licence and two exploration licence applications. The tenements cover 815 square kilometres and contain the historical Hatches Creek mining field, which was known as the Wolfram Field, within which numerous mines exploited quartz veins containing wolframite, a tungsten mineral. Mining of eluvial deposits containing wolframite and gold and copper also occurred. The project is located about 325 kilometres northeast of Alice Springs and 160 kilometres southeast of Tennant Creek. Access from the sealed Stuart Highway is over 165kilometres of formed and unformed dirt roads.

Thor proposes to carry out a geological interpretation at Hatches Creek utilising air photographs, satellite image interpretation and data synthesis; carry out a data compilation of information relating to the historical Wolfram Field mines, complete a detailed airborne magnetic-radiometric survey, and carry out a first-pass Rotary Air Blast programme. If the results from the initial drilling are positive Thor intends to follow them up by means of a more extensive drilling programme.

Thor’s AIM Prospectus gave no details of uranium that may be found on its properties. Shareholders were no doubt surprised therefore to see the company announce on 20 July that it was going to dispose of rights owned by Thor to explore for uranium to Batavia Mining, a ASX-quoted miner where John Barr had until recently also been chairman. Batavia is paying A$20,000 in its ASX-quoted shares and if it enjoys exploration success in locating uranium, it must pay Thor another A$250,000 and give it a 2.5% net smelter royalty. Interestingly, unlike many would-be yellowcake hopefuls in the country, Thor’s independent directors who approved the transaction believe it is doubtful that any new uranium mine in Australia will be approved in the near future. Even so it would appear to be a promotional tool that has gone begging.





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