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Without going into long-winded terminology it is confirmed that the known licences fall strongly within the Roan group sediments of the Katanga-Zambia basin. In sum CuO deposits of similar grading to the giant Sentinel mine can be found on two of our prospects. One of them is a mere 40 km from Sentinel.

Unless deeper drilling reveals deposits are open at depth (unlikely) the sediments will release strong traces of copper. As my terminology is in layman's jargon I borrow from an official source -

"Leaching, in geology, loss of soluble substances and colloids from the top layer of soil by percolating precipitation. The materials lost are carried downward (eluviated) and are generally redeposited (illuviated) in a lower layer. This transport results in a porous and open top layer and a dense, compact lower layer."

So it's pretty clear. The objective now is to establish commerciality. If economic someone is going to be busy with an open pit operation . . . it would be a huge bonus if a find is on the scale of Sentinel. Remote, yes . . . impossible, no. These things can happen.

Thereafter NvS can turn his hand to transforming the fortunes of Jangada (JAN).

Furthermore I understand (saw it somewhere) that the region includes dolomitic deposition. [Jeremiah99, having been in CRND, will know all about porosity and properties of dolomite.]

Diverted for the moment. Thought his name was familiar. He's an ex-UCT graduate and will have a strong association with AngloAmerican. Don't know where he lives these days. Has his work cut out as well with EDL, Rukwa, Mbeya (Tanz), and OMI. I am not at all conversant with the latter but have stuck with EDL for years. Perhaps as a NED he can change their fortunes and cut a furrow with Eric Zurrin, SHG. Wheels-within-wheels, they say.

As you were . . . I was in the right place west of Solwezi. Next exercise is to brush up on the Zambia roan sediments which are very much in the target area.

Unlike our pathetic performance TAL/TSX is roaring ahead. From an early slump it's gone back to a very recent 33.5c high. Perhaps things will be better on our side in the morning. It certainly wasn't good today.

I need to check Muswema when I have a chance later this evening. It is one of the Anglo interests and I begin to wonder if it is in the Mafinga province which is closer to an old haunt (Mbeya, Tanz). Not much point being way out on the geography. There are over a dozen targets and it's not much good being out of synch on all of them.

From the few I have checked it appears all sectors are taking a pounding today. Time to see to other tasks.

Any gains are going to be hard won. With Brent not being far off $67 at one point today, and bearing PTAL's margins in mind, there is little relationship to price performance. It would be fair to expect an SP considerably higher than it is. Perhaps there will be a nudge later in the day.

Although there is little meat in comments I keep an eye on -
https://stockhouse.com/companies/bullboard/v.tal/petrotal-corp

Correct trade interpretation is awkward and has hardly indicated any direction of where the price is going.
The forum does have the odd morsel that is informative.

Erratic throughput notifications present the odd question. And it is noted that CNPC daily figures are always steady. The discrepancy is an unknown. I start to wonder if it has to do with faulty pump station equipment.

Heavy continuing thunderstorms for the next fortnight probably mostly around 4pm in the rising humidity. I don't know where things are at on drilling plans but the company should point out they can't get rigs onsite at present. Unless they are tracked vehicles capable of drilling to 50 metres there is no way of negotiating those dirt roads. Anyone here who has been bogged down in Africa will know the difficulties.

Quite content to ride out any lull in news . . . should remember that it does not stop Anglo from proceeding with any plan of action.

Have retained a small stake here but gone big in ARCM. Have written quite a lot about it.
They will be well on their way within 12 months.
SP has gone walkabout on Cangai, dilly-dallying on Big One and slow on Zambia.

As someone has rightly said something about sticking to the subject, here goes:

https://i-mine.co.uk/listing/sentinel-copper-mine/

The above besides undertaking a laborious study of the craton and formations to Kalahari in the south - a massive exercise on its own - is a starting point for a very complex geological region. I doubt many will be able to get to grips with it. The Sentinel mine is your starting point in order to find your bearings for ARCM tenements. By pursuing every facet it will be possible to have fair knowledge within a week. As previously stated there are CuO traces at shallow depths almost everywhere. And I seem to recall that nearly all discoveries have seams running at 20 - 30 degrees, making life relatively easy for open pit mining.

Enlarge/zoom the satellite map for Sentinel which I seem to remember has ~20 years' mine life, having commenced extraction in 2016. A very big mine which in reality is outside the zonal footprint. Maybe the team will find a Tier 1 deposit.

https://www.nsenergybusiness.com/projects/sentinel-copper-mine-kalumbila/

Bonne chance.

@ 17:10 - Very unlikely although Hal's instruction was to have required funds in the trading account by 23/02. I made sure of it this afternoon. On the other hand I understand the resolution is not passed until 01/03.

@ 17:26 - Your point deserves an answer.
There have been so many Mozambican wars in my 30+ years working in southern Africa that one easily forgets most of them. I had to look it up. But what fantastic places the old Lorenzo Marques and Beira were under the Portuguese. The Cabo Delgado trouble spot is yet another one of the sagas. Regrettably its tentacles are at the behest of Islam.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_wars_involving_Mozambique

@ 14:41 - We are all prone to mistakes at some point but may I ask if you took rising AMD into account plus all the research conducted by Mariette Liefferink and others on the dire situation along the Witwatersrand, Stilfontein, Germiston, Vereeniging and the Vaal Triangle as a whole?

https://pubs.usgs.gov/sir/2010/5090/t/pdf/sir2010-5090T.pdf

I would if I could invest a great deal more here. My knowledge of Katanga Province and northern Zambia goes back to 1962 at which time Patrice Lumumba et al. sent everyone packing. The Belgians disappeared without ado and the region, including the Zambian cross-border became something of a wasteland.

Copper together with cobalt to a lesser extent was taken for granted. We knew it was there in abundance. Interest was confined to the low hanging fruit. I repeat the stuff can be found all over ARCM's tenements. With a serious shortage predicted, rising copper price, miners are going to be falling over one another to get at the marginal deposits. It's likely to be an absorbing time for those of us who stay long enough.

Nice buy . . . we need more of them. More institutional support would help, of course.

Main point of the note is to comment on Malcy's coverage. He reminded me of GTE and Remus in the background. The former of course has its Canadian office down the road from PTAL. The other is naturally a constant presence always on the lookout. It's hard to tell what role either will play. Mention of them leaves the question on whether it was padding for the interview or did MZ say something off the record?

Offhand I feel GTE won't do anything ambitious as finance and shareholder relations are probably still dire.

Whilst I have not tampered any further on stock depletion there is an important point to make. And I generally support the sentiments @ 10:45. My biggest grumble has been the inability of management to get things moving and they have had more than enough time for a start-up. All the employees at Cascabel and elsewhere are twiddling their thumbs to little purpose: drain on finances on this count alone must be heavy.

Whereas - and this is where a comparison is drawn as time passes - I have gone quite heavily into ARCM because a lean 'n mean team are getting on with the job. They will have a testbed pilot plant in operation in next to no time and AngloAmerican have to make a decision by end-May, I think.

SOLG just drifts along. They should have some of their staff gainfully employed by now. If bright spark NM knew his onions, he would have seen commonsense and had a small scale op going by now. There is too much fat in the boardroom and the apathy symptom filters throughout.

Yes, his office is in Sandton. Don't bank on any stuff of course. Incidentally, I am breaking a golden rule of never again investing in SA, Zim and Zambia. Reading Barrick's recent troubles in Lusaka might indicate how difficult things were in Zambia until recently.

I'd like to think big shipments of copper are again going through Durban and Beira en route to China, etc but am out of touch on current tonnage. Someone else may have a handle on it.

[Interesting to see the current bid is @ 7.101p . . . could be quite a decent day.]

Would like to think the overhang is just about clear. Don't have L2 but there must have been a fair amount of stock that needed shifting from Friday. A S African colleague tells me that Anglo are keen to get more traction in Zambia. If so, can we dare wish for an affirmative from them?

Took up a few more on opening as a return to sub7p is unlikely.
Had considered persevering with CCZ until their last news but there was too much dithering.

https://en.climate-data.org/africa/zambia/north-western-province/solwezi-46472/

Gets quite wet until end-March from what I can remember. No rush here although A-A could make a move as they (and Bristow, Barrick) are on the lookout for more action in Zambia.