Shares in Panther Metals (PALM ) rose by more than 10% in early trade after the company released its final batch of assay results from vibracore sampling at the Winston tailings project in Ontario.
This is the sixth batch of vibracore results, and as with the other five, they show consistent mineralisation across Winston, particularly for gold, gallium, silver, zinc, copper, indium and cobalt.
Panther is working towards a resource estimate at Winston, as well as permitting.
The company also reported on supplementary samples from material collected by hand auger from the top 30cm of tailings at the hole collar, in cases where vibracore recovery at the top of the hole was unsatisfactory, duplicate samples collected within the hole, and sample material collected from the bottom section of the vibracore hole as rods were pulled and cleaned.
Assayed vibracore intersections were taken from total tailings thicknesses varying between two metres and 16.8 metres.
The maximum vertical thickness of tailings below ice and water intersected is 16.8 metres, with an average vertical thickness of 8.7 metres.
"These final, remarkably consistent and exciting assay results mark the completion of the on-the-ground tailings sampling work at Winston and the vibracore results are feeding into the mineral resource modelling and estimation, and metallurgical recovery work streams,” said Darren Hazelwood, chief executive of Panther Metals.
“Given the significant power, transport and water infrastructure existing on-site, and the highly professional ongoing site management by First Quantum, we anticipate our major costs at Winston, pre-processing plant, are behind us. The next phase of groundwork will be relatively low-cost, and will concern the engineering design for the exploitation and reprocessing of the tailings, in support of our Mining Recovery Permit application.”
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It’s beginning to look like Winston could end up contributing significantly to the future of Panther. The company plans to put Winston into production and to use the subsequent cashflow to fund further exploration across its broad portfolio of tenements in Canada. Panther’s shares are now not far off a two-year high, and the momentum is clearly up.