‘Diamond Joe’ Gutnick turns Tassie digger to restore fortunes: ‘God sent me’

Mining entrepreneur Joseph Gutnick has moved to Tasmania, where he’s hoping to restore his reputation and fortune – and help the state secure an AFL team.

Joseph Gutnick, CEO of Mazel Resources, at a drilling site on the company’s mine exploration lease at Moina, Tasmania. Picture: Peter Mathew

Mining entrepreneur Joseph Gutnick has quietly moved to Tasmania, where he hopes his ­latest project will restore his reputation and fortune – and help his adopted state secure an AFL team.

The former rich-lister and ex-Melbourne AFL Club president, known as “Diamond Joe” for his knack of finding outback gold and diamond deposits, has fallen from grace in recent years.

Also a rabbi, Mr Gutnick endured bankruptcy in 2016, a highly critical 2019 Federal Court decision and an ongoing ASIC probe into past company loans.

However, he told The Australian he was confident that a mining exploration lease at Moina in Tasmania’s northwest would lead to a multibillion-dollar, 20-plus year fluorspar, tungsten and magnetite mine.

“The original indicated and inferred (resource) was 26 million tonnes, (but) we are in the strong belief – and recent drilling is confirming – that we’ll get to 50Mt, and hopefully 100Mt,” he said.

“It’s already the largest fluorite deposit in Australia. There also used to be a tungsten tin mine called Shepherd and Murphy that really wasn’t followed up with … so we’ve drilled some holes about 500m away and discovered the veins again.

Joseph Gutnick, left, examines ore samples with senior geologist Mike Blake at Mazel Resources’ mining lease at Moina in Tasmania. Picture: Peter Mathew

“We are quite exciting about that. If it continues for 500m, it will be a world-class tungsten mine, beside the amount we have in the main deposit.”

A scoping study for Mr Gutnick’s privately owned Mazel Resources estimates that if confirmed by drilling and feasibility studies, the deposits are worth $383m to $1.04bn, with payback on the venture within three to four years.

Mr Gutnick has his eye on other tenements nearby, although one proposed joint venture with a local partner has soured to the point of legal action.

If the $350m-plus Moina mine, promising to employ at least 300 people becomes a reality, he is promising to give back to Tasmania by investing in its long-held dream of an AFL side.

“I don’t know about (putting up) the same amount of money I put into the Melbourne Football Club but I’m certainly happy, depending on how successful I am, to give,” he said.

Then Melbourne president Joseph Gutnick, right, celebrates a Demons win over Collingwood with, from left, Travis Johnstone, Shaun Smith and Shane Woewodin.

“I don’t ever want to be a club president again – I’ve had enough of that – but I’m happy to be a ­patron. I may then have two teams to follow: Tasmania and Melbourne.

“God sent me here – I’m very grateful to Tasmania … I was here at the right time.

“Tasmania is very under-­explored due to the history of the Greenies, because of Beaconsfield (mining tragedy) and because you have to drill under the basalt, which is costly.”

The Australian Securities and Investments Commission said its investigations were “ongoing” into transactions involving a company associated with Mr Gutnick, Merlin Diamonds Ltd.

It was declared insolvent in 2020 with liabilities of $13m, a Federal Court judge saying other entitles linked to Mr Gutnick had received loans from Merlin that had “the appearance of uncommercial, dishonest transactions”.

Mr Gutnick, discharged from his bankruptcy, denies any wrongdoing.

“That’s the mining industry – you have ups and downs,” he said.

“When BHP and Rio have bad times, they can write off $3bn and it doesn’t affect them, but Joseph is not BHP or Rio Tinto.

“I really don’t want to comment on Merlin because I really didn’t defend myself in the case.

“It was a case we thought was just interlocutory and suddenly the judge made all these comments. Whatever they (ASIC) come up with, I will vigorously defend myself.

“I do have a good track record as well – I was the second-largest gold producer in Australia.”