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LONDON (Alliance News) - Tertiary Minerals PLC Thursday reported a widened pretax loss for its first half, hit by an impairment of an available for sale investment, and Executive Chairman Patrick Cheetham said the "worst may be behind" the company.
The firm also raised funds via a share placing to back further exploration work.
For the half year to end-March the company reported a pretax loss of GBP300,136, widened from a pretax loss of GBP221,576 the year before, on revenue of GBP84,568, up slightly from GBP85,937, mostly as a result of a GBP81,142 impairment of an available for sale investment.
During the period the company completed its phase 4 drilling programme at its MB fluorspar project in Nevada, with 4 holes drilled for a total of 1,553 metres.
Elsewhere, it received its exploitation mining permit for its Storuman fluorspar project in Sweden, however, two appeals have been lodged agaisnt this permit by the Sami Reindeer Husbandry Community and Urbergsgruppen, a Swedish environmental action group who oppose all mining activities throughout Sweden.
"Because of the overwhelming local stakeholder support, the potential economic benefits and the 'National Interest' status given to the project by the government, we expect the appeals to be rejected but it is nevertheless frustrating that the time frame in which the Swedish government must deal with the appeals is not fixed," Cheetham said in a statement.
Whilst fluorspar markets and prices continued to be hit by slow demand in the half year, the company said it does not consider the current low prices to be sustainable in the medium-term. It highlighted increased demand and prices for acid-grade fluorspar in China recently.
"My personal view is that the worst may be behind us and we look forward to reporting on progress at our fluorspar projects as we advance these towards production," Cheetham said.
In a separate statement on Thursday, Tertiary said it has raised GBP500,000 through the placing of 50 million shares at 1.00 pence each with a single institutional investor. Shares in Tertiary Minerals were up 1.8% at 1.40 pence Thursday.
It will use the majority of the funds to carry out metallurgical testwork, economic modelling, scoping study and mine permit planning at the MB project in Nevada, US, and to handle the appeal process for the exploitation mine permit at the Storuman project in Sweden.
By Hana Stewart-Smith; hanassmith@alliancenews.com; @HanaSSAllNews and Karolina Kaminska; karolinakaminska@alliancenews.com @KarolinaAllNews
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