GoldStone Resources looks to save cash after losses widen

AIM-listed GoldStone Resources will concentrate on conserving its cash in coming months after full year losses widened.The group tapped the market for £359,477 in July and members of the management team have since March agreed to defer 50% of their pay to save money.Given the financial constraints, the company said it had also decided to seek to sell its interest in the Homase/Akrokerri project in GhanaChief Executive Jurie Wessels said: "In the coming months we will continue with cash conservation measures in order to stretch the funds raised in the recent placing and will be doing only essential exploration work at our permits. "By leaving major exploration to joint venture partners such as Randgold and Ferrex and potentially by selling Homase/Akrokerri, we are seeking to add significant value to GoldStone with minimum expenditure."It comes after a challenging period for gold explorers like GoldStone Resources amid the decline in the price of gold.But the company said despite the difficult market conditions it had managed to make significant progress at all of its projects and yielded encouraging drilling results at Sangola, Oyem and Ngoutou.Its losses widened to $6.5m in the year to the end of February from $5.7m in the year previously. Paul Smith at WH Ireland said: "With cash resources limited and a change in market sentiment towards junior gold explorers we have changed our recommendation to Speculative Buy for GoldStone and reduce our target price to 5.0p from 9.7p."Shares in GoldStone were down 11.43% at 1.55p. TB