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Not Richard Grey, Christopher Sangster, former MD of precursor company Caledonian, now an NED of Scotgold.
"More recently, Mr Sangster was employed as General Manager for AIM – listed company European Diamonds Plc."
https://www.scotgoldresources.com/corporate-directory/
https://www.scotsman.com/business/management/interview-chris-sangster-chief-executive-of-scotgold-resources-1-1914264
Compare and contrast to Scotgold. A 30,000 oz per year small mine in a National Park, on a 0.5Moz resource for under ÂŁ20M total investnent in under nine years (not 24)!
AIM listed 2010, resource 2012, planning 2015, trial mining 2016, production 2018.
Incidentally the CEO used to be in charge of European Diamonds (Laktojoki Project).
Meanwhile back in the day job of exploration, are we any closer to knowing whether the Riihivaara Kimberlite (discovery announced March 2015, i.e. four years ago) actually contains any diamonds?
"kimberlite core has provided material as part of a bigger programme to test for micro-diamonds". RNS of 6th December 2018.
I think the chatter (none of it me) on:
https://uk.advfn.com/stock-market/london/conroy-gold-CGNR/share-chat
https://uk.advfn.com/stock-market/london/karelian-KDR/share-chat
Says it all!
GOING CONCERN issues with both companies.
KDR paying CGNR €150,000 a year for office space (for accommodating the same i.e. CGNR staff ).
Management flying to PDAC (as they do every year). 2 × business class (€5000), 2x economy (€2000), 5 nights 5* for two (€3000), 5 nights 3* for two more (€1,500), PDAC fees for four (€2000), Cost of a booth (€3000). Everything else? Priceless!
How much Canadian money has been raised or JVs signed in years of attending PDAC?
Babysham: "why would further exploration... take priority over testing?"
They have a saying at Anglo American that "many a great prospect has been ruined by drilling it"
It is Schrödinger's Cat. It is both dead and alive until you open the box and take a look. Similarly, this is a "wonderful discovery" until you sample and test it. At the moment it is a 100% prospect. Why take a 50:50 chance that it is no good? Why not go look for some more instead? Because if you test it and it is no good, then it diminishes the chances any further ones will be, so removes the rationale to look for them. Then what? This way you can have your cake and eat it too.
RNS 11th April 2016 (2 years, 10 months, 12 days)
Professor Richard Conroy, Chairman commented:
“The news that the Riihivaara kimberlite which we have discovered is likely to be diamondiferous is
exciting news. It is very encouraging for our diamond exploration programme in Finland, which we
believe has the potential to become a new diamond province – the first in Europe outside Russia”
Still waiting....
robemy: "Lahtojoki is exactly what Rio needs to replace the coloured pink diamonds that Argyll is running out of"
Argyll: 248Mt in 1989 @ 5Mt/year at 400cpht at 1% of carats pink diamonds
Lahtojoki: 5.6Mt* in 2016 @ 0.5Mt/year at 40cpht at 1%????? of pink diamonds
I don't think so! Lahtojoki would substitute only 1% of Argyll's production, and then for only a decade.
* 2018 AGM presentation
$32M valuation of WHAT?????The $100 per carat is just an assumption at the moment. Go up by $10 and the project really flies but go down by $10 and it crashes.
"Over the past six months, the Company has spent considerable time in relation to regulatory issues as it prepares to develop a mine... the issuance of a mining permit which is of course essential before the Company can proceed with developing a mine."
NOBODY is going to develop a mine unless there is a RESOURCE, because NOBODY is going to fund the 10's of ÂŁM development costs until they reliably know the value in the ground. Given that the last Lahtojoki diamonds (a few carats) were last seen decades ago, and are now lost to posterity and that KDR has never extracted a single diamond from this kimberlite, then $100 a carat is just an educated guess. Could be more, could be less? NOBODY doubts there are diamonds there, or even that the grade is around 40cpht, but unless a value from several thousand carats is established, everything else is wishfull thinking.
Talk about putting the cart before the horse! Quote "There is no point in your Company proceeding with extensive, and expensive, technical programmes before regulatory matters are satisfactorily completed... compensation for land use, an essential part of the regulatory processes in Finland which lead to the issuance of a mining permit."
What is the point of buying the land and getting a mining permit until you know you have an economically viable project? That is not how mining works, i.e. Let's not explore in case we don't get permission to develop anything we find? Let's buy the land and get a permit and then see if there is anything worth mining?
They pull the same stunt over at CGNR! Look! we have 500,000 oz of gold, Look! we hit gold in every tenth drillhole, Look! we drill ten holes per acre, Look! we have drilled 100 holes, so if we drilled 2000 holes on 200 acres we would have 10 million ounces!!!!!
JMO DYOR
Mmmm... I came across this 2015 interview recently.
https://masterinvestor.co.uk/commodities/karelian-diamonds-latest-discovery-opens-up-the-prospect-of-finding-a-cluster-of-kimberlites-in-eastern-finland/
Richard Conroy: “They’re certainly not all coming from this one pipe. There could be a cluster...". and further expounds how it's "difficult to believe that the major Russian discoveries weren’t replicated on the Finnish side"
The RNS of 20th March 2015 (one month shy four years ago) announced the discovery of the "potential new diamond source" by pitting and that it will be "assessed for extent and tested for diamond content."
The Brandon Hill note of 16th January 2019 (exhibit 9, p14) shows a photo of the presumed discovery pit and notes: "5 Pits/trenches have intersected kimberlite. The kimberlite is interpreted to be a dyke...consists of a dyke 1-2m wide. No Microdiamond test work has been undertaken on the kimberlite yet".
1) Why was a dyke, readily apparent as such in the discovery photo, described in an interview as "a pipe, possibly a cluster"? For the record a dyke is a thin steeply inclined sheet. A 1.5m wide dike extending one kilometre in length would hold around 375,000 tonnes to 100m depth. A "pipe" is a vertical cylindrical or steep sided conical body. A 200 m diameter pipe (~3 hectares) would hold around 7,500,000 tonnes to 100m depth i.e. 20 times as much. The (Russian) Grib and Arkangekskaya (Lomonosov) pipes are around 15 Ha, or around 35Mt in the top 100m. If Professor Conroy cannot tell the difference he should not be giving interviews which are potentially misleading.
2) Why was drilling on the discovery only initiated after a delay of three years and four months? The RNS of 21.6.18 announced "drilling will also provide additional kimberlite for geological studies and micro diamond test work", and why has no promised (since 2015) microdiamond test work been conducted even 7 months later? To quote the Brokers note: "No Microdiamond test work has been undertaken on the kimberlite yet".
GLTA, DYOR.
@diamondhunter: KDR has not carried out any drilling! That was done by EPD and Mantle. IIRC they did not discover the boulders either. GTK did and provided the info to them (its what national geological surveys do - public info). Read the RNS of 9/11/16. GTK discovered boulders, KDR commissioned an evaluation, then applied for a reservation. KDR cannot go digging around in Finland without a reservation (the reservation was only granted in June 2017) but GTK can. Ergo: GTK found these boulders some while back doing what they do.When KDR acquired Lahtojoki the GTK probably said "btw, there is some interesting stuff nearby" and KDR paid them for a report, then applied for a reservation. It's all in the RNS'. What KDR has done since April 16 (3 years) is undertake a PEA (basically an in-house desktop study on all the data that came with the project, i.e. a first step to see if the project is any good) and analysed 93 kg of existing core (a few 10's of meters) from the thousands previously drilled by EPD and MD to see if they came up with the same results (which they did, so at least something there). GLTA, DYOR
@Robemy: 10t x 40cpht = 4 cts. A minimum bulk sample parcel to fully evaluate a kimberlite is 2,000-5,000 carats so 5,000 to 12,000 tonnes required. Typical cost is ÂŁ2-3M, or over 2 times the current MC = 65% dilution or equivalent to a 1.5p SP for existing investors.
To put this in context, Peltonen et al 2002 analysed several eclogite nodules from Lahtojoki. The diamonds, of all sizes, come either from these nodules, intact in the kimberlite, or from nodules broken up and dispersed. There is no other source of the diamonds. So if a 1" eclogite fragment, weighing maybe 25g yielded a couple of diamonds weighing 2-1/4 carats in total (and as said the diamonds had to have come from somewhere) and 40,000 such fragments make up one tonne, which may be distributed throughout 200,000 tonnes of kimberlite. The grade in the eclogite is 2-1/4 carats x 40,000 or 90,000cpt. The grade in the kimberlite containing these eclogite fragments is 90,000 carats in 200,000 tonnes or 45cpht or the approximate known grade, so nothing astounding here.