Resources Top 5: Panther’s golden nuggets draw a hungry crowd

Panther Metals has a golden glow following the identification of gold nuggets during drill prep at Comet Well and Comet Well South in WA.

Panther Metals has discovered juicy golden nuggets at its Comet Well and Comet South projects. Pic: Getty Images

• Panther Metals finds golden nuggs weighing just over 1 ounce (33.62 grams) at Comet Well and Comet Well South

• RIM, FY24's biggest gainer, is up some +47% for the exercise of over 60 million 2c options

• Ballymore Resources climbs 20% on the identification of anomalies at the Dittmer project

Here are the biggest small cap resources winners in morning trade, Tuesday, October 8. Prices accurate at time of writing.

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Panther Metals (ASX:PNT)

Shares are flying in this little $6.35m junior explorer after the discovery of some juicy golden nuggets at the Comet Well and Comet Well South project, part of the broader Laverton gold project (LGP) in WA.

The nugget finds, made during drill preparations where metal detectors were deployed over cleared drill lines and adjacent areas, were situated within surficial cover to depths ranging between 0.1 – 0.4m.

Alluvial gold nuggets. Pic: Panther Metals.

To date, just over 1 ounce (33.62g) of alluvial gold nuggets have been recovered, the majority of which were as fine gold

PNT believes the golden nuggs underscore the highly underexplored gold-rich potential of the greater Laverton Gold Project (LGP) area and the effectiveness of the company’s exploration strategies just under three years since its ASX debut.

“This is a very positive beginning to the start of our 7000m drill program,” PNT managing director and CEO Daniel Tuffin said.

“With nine further targets remaining to drill at the LGP, we look forward to updating the market of our progress as exploration continues.”

Rimefire Pacific Mining (ASX:RIM)

RIM was FY24’s top small cap gainer, surging some 700 per cent over the past 12 months following its pivot to critical minerals about two and a half years ago.

Its sudden rise has put a bunch of options into the money by a long, long way, with the company collecting $1.2 million in funds for the exercise of over 60 million 2c options, due to expire at the end of February next year, according to a filing on the ASX on Tuesday.

The company’s focus has been on some special Alaskan-style’ ultramafic rocks across its NSW projects, which RIM found had several advantages as a source rock for historical alluvial platinum deposits.

Scandium hits at its Fifield project, 70km north-west of Parkes, were one cause of the jump.

The delineation of a handy scandium resource theoretically puts RIM under the microscope of $170b market giant RIO, which paid what was in Rio terms a handful of pennies ($14m) Platina Resources (ASX:PGM) for a scandium project near Condobolin in NSW.

RIM unveiled maiden resource estimates for its Melrose and Murga North scandium prospects, within Fifield, in early September as it continues to build towards a globally significant scandium resource inventory at the asset.

But there are a few strange happenings on the market around it. The company issued a termination notice over an earn-in agreement with its partner on the project, Golden Plains Resources. An interlocutory injunction was granted in the Supreme Court of Victoria last week preventing the notice being exercised ahead of a hearing on October 16.

"The company now advises that GPR has issued a dispute notice under the Fifield Project Earn-in Agreement, asserting that Rimfire’s notice of termination was invalid," RIM said a in statement last week.

"The company intends to actively engage with GPR and use all reasonable efforts to resolve the dispute in accordance with the Fifield Project Earn-in Agreement. Separately, GPR has applied for an urgent interlocutory injunction in the Supreme Court of Victoria, seeking an order (among others) that Rimfire be prevented from acting on its termination of the Fifield Project Earn-in Agreement.

"The company is defending GPR’s application. A procedural hearing took place on the afternoon of 2 October 2024, with the parties agreeing that the substantive hearing of GPR’s injunction application will take place on 16 October 2024."

Ballymore Resources (ASX:BMR)

A magnetic survey at BMR’s Dittmer project has turned up significant anomalies, including a 1200m x 800m pipe-like magnetic body beneath the historic Dittmer mine.

BMR said this structure is analogous with several significant copper-gold porphyry deposits in Eastern Australia including Northparkes (3.3Moz gold / 2.9Mt copper) and Ridgeway (1.9Moz gold / 0.31Mt copper).

“The possibility that this structure is the source for the high-grade gold discoveries that we have made in the area is extremely significant,” BMR managing director David A-Izzeddin said.

Follow-up drilling is planned to take place as soon as possible to test not only the Dittmer intrusive but other significant targets identified across the project as well.

Trigg Minerals (ASX:TMG)

TMG is moving quickly to restate and expand its Wild Cattle Creek antimony resource, NSW’s second largest antimony deposit.

Wattle Cattle Creek, within the wider Achilles asset, contains 15,600t of the critical mineral used in high-tech application such as lithium-ion batteries, solar panels and wind turbines, and is also enriched in tungsten and gold.

Trigg says it hopes to restate the existing resource for several reasons including the 150 per cent uplift in antimony prices since the 2013 resource announcement, the existing model only accounting for high-grade core (not the lower-grade alteration assemblage), and the exclusion of tungsten and gold content.

Peel Mining (ASX:PEX)

PEX has a pep in its step following the encounter of oxide and supergene copper, gold, and silver mineralisation during recent drilling at the Wagga Tank-Southern Nights deposit in the south-central part of Cobar, NSW.

Stand out oxide results include 24m at 5.09g/t gold, 89g/t silver from 15m while sulphide assays include 66m at 6.01 per cent lead, 3.73 per cent zinc, 0.26 per cent copper, 32g/t silver and 0.47g/t gold from 100m.

The good thing is nearly all mineralised intercepts sit outside the existing 6.83Mt indicated and inferred resource, which remains open along strike.

PEX reckons the results pave the way for further drilling, which is set to take place later this quarter.

At Stockhead, we tell it like it is. While Trigg Mining is a Stockhead advertiser, it did not sponsor this article.

Originally published as Resources Top 5: Panther’s golden nuggets draw a hungry crowd