TIDMSOLG
RNS Number : 7081T
SolGold PLC
05 July 2018
5 July 2018
SolGold plc
("SolGold" or the "Company")
Grant of Share Options
The Board of SolGold plc (SolGold or the Company) wishes to
advise of the grant of a combined total of 21,500,000 unlisted
share options over ordinary shares of the Company including:
-- 21,250,000 share options to the Company's key employees
exercisable at 40 Pence expiring on 4 July 2020;
-- 250,000 share options to a third party as part of their
services contract exercisable at 60 pence expiring on 4 July
2021.
Following the allotment of these share options, the Company has
on issue a total of 1,696,245,686 fully-paid ordinary shares,
9,795,884 share options exercisable at 14p; 31,795,884 share
options exercisable at 28p; 21,250,000 share options exercisable at
40p and 47,012,000 share options exercisable at 60p.
CONTACTS
Mr Nicholas Mather Tel: +61 (0) 7 3303 0665
SolGold Plc (Chief Executive Officer) +61 (0) 417 880 448
nmather@solgold.com.au
Mr Karl Schlobohm Tel: +61 (0) 7 3303 0661
SolGold Plc (Company Secretary)
kschlobohm@solgold.com.au
Ms Anna Legge Tel: +44 (0) 20 3823 2131
SolGold Plc (UK Market IR / PR)
alegge@solgold.com.au
Follow us on twitter @SolGold_plc
NOTES TO EDITORS
SolGold is a Brisbane, Australia based, dual LSE and TSX--listed
(SOLG on both exchanges) copper gold exploration and future
development company with assets in Ecuador, Solomon Islands and
Australia. SolGold's primary objective is to discover and define
world--class copper--gold deposits. The Board and Management Team
have substantial vested interests in the success of the Company as
shareholders as well as strong track records in the areas of
exploration, mine appraisal and development, investment, finance
and law. SolGold's experience is augmented by state of the art
geophysical and modelling techniques and the guidance of porphyry
copper and gold expert Dr Steve Garwin.
In October 2017, at the Mines and Money Americas Conference in
Toronto, SolGold's Nicholas Mather won the award for the CEO of the
Year - Exploration, Latin America. SolGold won the Exploration
Award for Latin America, and Ecuador won the Country Award for
Latin America. Each party then duly won the 2017 award for each
respective category on a global basis at London Mines and Money on
30 November 2017.
The Company announced USD54m in capital raisings in September
2016 involving Maxit Capital LP, Newcrest International Ltd and DGR
Global Ltd, and a USD41.2m raising in June of 2017 largely from
Newcrest International with USD1.2m raised from Ecuadorean
investors. All of these raisings were undertaken at substantial
premiums to previous raisings. In November 2017 SolGold raised a
further GBP45m at 25p per share, placed with institutions and
Newcrest pursuant to their anti-dilution rights. SolGold currently
has circa USD90m in available cash to continue the exploration and
appraisal of its flagship Cascabel Project, and with which to
conduct regional exploration programs on its 73 other 100%-owned
projects in its wholly owned subsidiary companies.
Mr Craig Jones joined the SolGold Board on 3 March 2017,
nominated to the Board of SolGold by Newcrest Mining, now a 14.54%
shareholder in SolGold. Mr Jones is a Mechanical Engineer and is
currently the Executive General Manager Wafi-Golpu
(Newcrest-Harmony Joint Venture). He has held various senior
management and executive roles within the Newcrest Group, including
General Manager Projects, General Manager Cadia Valley Operations,
Executive General Manager Projects and Asset Management, Executive
General Manager Australian and Indonesian Operations, Executive
General Manager Australian Operations and Projects, and Executive
General Manager Cadia and Morobe Mining Joint Venture. Prior to
joining Newcrest, Mr Jones worked for Rio Tinto.
Cascabel, SolGold's 85% owned "World Class" (refer
www.solgold.com.au/cautionary-notice/) flagship copper--gold
porphyry project, is located in northern Ecuador on the
under--explored northern section of the richly endowed Andean
Copper Belt. Having fulfilled its earn-in requirements, SolGold is
a registered shareholder with an unencumbered legal and beneficial
85% interest in ENSA (Exploraciones Novomining S.A.) and
approximately 5% of TSX--V--listed Cornerstone Capital Resources
("Cornerstone"), which holds the remaining 15% of ENSA, the
Ecuadorian registered company which holds 100% of the Cascabel
concession. Subject to the terms of existing agreements,
Cornerstone is debt financed by SolGold for its share of costs to
completion of a Feasibility Study.
In terms of repayment, SolGold shall receive 90% of
Cornerstone's share of earnings or dividends from ENSA or the
Tenement to which Cornerstone would otherwise be entitled until
such time as the amounts so received equal the aggregate amount of
expenditures incurred by SolGold that would have otherwise been
payable by Cornerstone, plus interest thereon from the dates such
expenditures were incurred at a rate per annum equal to LIBOR plus
2 per cent until such time as SolGold is fully reimbursed.
The investments by Newcrest for 14.54% of SolGold endorses
Ecuador as an exploration and mining destination, the management
team at SolGold, the dimension, size and scale of the growing
Alpala deposit, and the prospectivity of Cascabel and its multiple
targets. The gold endowment, location, infrastructure, and
logistics are important competitive advantages offered by the
project. Cascabel is characterised by fifteen (15) identified
targets, "World Class" drilling intersections over 1km in length at
potentially economic grades, and high copper and gold grades in
richer sections, as well as logistic advantages in location,
elevation, water supply, proximity to roads, port and power
services; and a progressive legislative approach to resource
development in Ecuador.
To date SolGold has completed geological mapping, soil sampling,
rock saw channel sampling, geochemical and spectral alteration
mapping over 25km(2) , along with an additional 9km(2) of Induced
Polarisation and 14km(2) Magnetotelluric "Orion" surveys over the
Alpala cluster and other targets at Aguinaga, Parambas,
Tandayama-America, Moran and Chinambicito.
SolGold has completed over 114,000m of drilling and expended
over USD100M in Ecuador, which includes Cascabel exploration,
regional exploration, corporate costs and investments into
Cornerstone. This has been accomplished with a workforce of up to
260 Ecuadorean workers and geoscientists, and 6 expatriate
Australian geoscientists. The results of all holes drilled and
assayed to date have produced some of the greatest drill hole
intercepts in porphyry copper-gold exploration history, as
indicated by Hole 12 (CSD-16-012) returning 1560m grading 0.59%
copper and 0.54 g/t gold including, 1044m grading 0.74% copper and
0.54 g/t gold. Intensive diamond drilling is planned for the next
12 months with up to 12 drill rigs operational.
SolGold has drill tested 9 of 15 copper-gold targets delineated
in the 50km(2) tenement with a focus on Alpala and Aguinaga.
The Company and its external consultants prepared an initial
mineral resource estimate at the Cascabel Project in December 2017.
Results are summarised in Table B within the Cautionary Statement.
The Mineral Resource Estimate was completed from 53,616m of
drilling, approximately 54% of 100,000m metres drilled as of
mid-December 2017, the cut-off date for the maiden resource
calculation. There remains strong potential for further growth from
more recent drilling results, and continued rapid growth of the
deposit.
The Company is currently planning further metallurgical testing
and completion of an independent Preliminary Economic Assessment
and Pre-Feasibility Studies at Cascabel. SolGold is investigating
both high tonnage open cut and underground block caving operations,
as well as a high grade / low tonnage initial underground
development towards the economic development of the copper gold
deposit/s at Cascabel.
Drill hole intercepts have been updated to reflect current
commodity prices, using a data aggregation method, defined by
copper equivalent cut-off grades and reported with up to 10m
internal dilution, excluding bridging to a single sample. Copper
equivalent grades are calculated using a gold conversion factor of
0.63, determined using an updated copper price of USD3.00/pound and
an updated gold price of USD1300/ounce. True widths of down hole
intersections are estimated to be approximately 25-50%.
Following a comprehensive review of the geology and
prospectivity of Ecuador, SolGold and its subsidiaries have several
applications for additional exploration licences in Ecuador over a
number of promising porphyry copper gold targets throughout the
Country.
SolGold, through its 4 subsidiary companies, has 100% ownership
of extensive concession areas throughout Ecuador. Each subsidiary
company has technical teams, led by experienced senior geologists,
on the ground prospecting granted tenements and collecting baseline
data, whilst regional geophysics surveys are being planned.
Significant copper occurrences have been identified at numerous
projects to date, including La Hueca, Machos, Rio Armarillo,
Sharug, Porvenir and Timbara.
In Queensland, Australia the Company is evaluating the future
exploration plans for the Mt Perry, Rannes and Normanby projects,
with drill testing of the Normanby project planned for the coming
quarter. Joint venture agreements are being investigated for a
joint venture partner to commit funds and carry out exploration to
earn an interest in the tenements.
SolGold retains interests in its original theatre of operations,
Solomon Islands in the South West Pacific, where the Kuma prospect
on the island of Guadalcanal exhibits surface lithocap
characteristics which are traditionally indicative of a large metal
rich copper gold intrusive porphyry system.
SolGold intends to apply its intellectual property and
experience developed at Cascabel to target additional "World Class"
copper gold porphyries within Ecuador and at Kuma in the Solomon
Islands.
SolGold is based in Brisbane, Queensland, Australia. The Company
is listed on the LSE and TSX, with both exchanges using the ticker
code: SOLG, and currently has on issue a total of 1,696,245,686
fully-paid ordinary shares, 9,795,884 share options exercisable at
14p; 31,795,884 share options exercisable at 28p; 21,250,000 share
options exercisable at 40p and 47,012,000 share options exercisable
at 60p.
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END
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