Last checked at 23 Apr 2024 07:02
ECR MINERALS plc
("ECR Minerals", "ECR" or the "Company")
AGM Statement
ECR Minerals plc (LON: ECR), the gold exploration and development company focussed on Australia, announces that at the Company's annual general meeting (AGM) at 11:00 am today the chairman will make the following statement:
"Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to the 2024 Annual General Meeting of ECR Minerals plc.
Firstly, my thanks and appreciation to David Tang, our former chairman. It was an honour to take over from him in February and I thank him for the work he's done for ECR.
Since Mike and I joined the company in September last year, it's been pleasing to see a significant acceleration in the pace of operations alongside more stringent financial controls.
I'd like firstly to take this opportunity to provide shareholders with an update on our exploration plans in Australia across our projects in Queensland and Victoria.
With improving weather conditions, our field teams are preparing to return to Lolworth in Queensland. Initial assessments have revealed numerous gold-bearing streams as well as indications of rare earths mineralisation. The best indicators appear to be at our Oak Creek prospect.
Our upcoming trenching campaign aims to provide us with a better understanding of the subsurface geology which will be a key step towards identifying and then ranking drill targets. We remain optimistic about the potential for significant mineralisation at Lolworth.
Also in Queensland, our Chief Geologist is preparing for ECR's inaugural exploration campaign at Blue Mountain. Our preliminary analysis suggests that the historical work conducted by the previous operator presents compelling opportunities - especially for its alluvial gold potential. It currently includes an alluvial resource reported to contain at least 100,000 ounces. Subject to the necessary permissions, we're looking forward to advancing the project potentially towards production-readiness. Encouragingly, the landowners have expressed their willingness to work with us on the project which has further increased our confidence that the project could well exceed our initial expectations.
In Victoria, building upon the success of our recent drill campaign at Creswick, we have now re-established contact with the landowners at Tambo where we expect to deploy our team in the coming weeks. Rock samples taken from the project back in 2022 yielded highly encouraging results of up to 22 g/t, and we'll be looking to undertake a brief follow-up work programme before identifying optimal sites for drilling in due course.
Investors will be aware that last month we raised £585,000 - notably at a 71% premium to our last raise 6 months ago when Mike and I first joined ECR. That brings the total capital raised during our time with the company to £1.16 million. Along with the existing directors' salary sacrifice arrangements, as well as Mike and I accepting shares in lieu of salary, we are well funded and have the necessary working capital to undertake our upcoming work programs in both Queensland and Victoria.
I'm very much looking forward to keeping our shareholders up to date on what we expect to be exciting developments over the coming weeks and months as we work to unlock the potential we see in our projects."
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION, PLEASE CONTACT:
ECR Minerals plc | Tel: +44 (0) 20 7929 1010 | ||
Nick Tulloch, Chairman Andrew Scott, Director | |||
Email: info@ecrminerals.com | |||
Website: www.ecrminerals.com | |||
WH Ireland Ltd |
| Tel: +44 (0) 207 220 1666 | |
Nominated Adviser Katy Mitchell / Andrew de Andrade | |||
Axis Capital Markets Limited | Tel: +44 (0) 203 026 0320 | ||
Broker | |||
Ben Tadd/Lewis Jones | |||
| |||
SI Capital Ltd | Tel: +44 (0) 1483 413500 | ||
Broker | |||
Nick Emerson | |||
Novum Securities Limited | Tel: +44 (0) 20 7399 9425 | ||
Broker Jon Belliss | |||
Brand Communications | Tel: +44 (0) 7976 431608 | ||
Public & Investor Relations | |||
Alan Green | |||
ABOUT ECR MINERALS PLC
ECR Minerals is a mineral exploration and development company. ECR's wholly owned Australian subsidiary Mercator Gold Australia Pty Ltd ("MGA") has 100% ownership of the Bailieston and Creswick gold projects in central Victoria, Australia, has six licence applications outstanding which includes one licence application lodged in eastern Victoria (Tambo gold project).
ECR also owns 100% of an Australian subsidiary LUX Exploration Pty Ltd ("LUX") which has three approved exploration permits covering 946 km2 over a relatively unexplored area in Lolworth Range, Queensland, Australia. The Company has also submitted a license application at Kondaparinga which is approximately 120km2 in area and located within the Hodgkinson Gold Province, 80km NW of Mareeba, North Queensland.
Following the sale of the Avoca, Moormbool and Timor gold projects in Victoria, Australia to Fosterville South Exploration Ltd (TSX-V: FSX) and the subsequent spin-out of the Avoca and Timor projects to Leviathan Gold Ltd (TSX-V: LVX), MGA has the right to receive up to A$2 million in payments subject to future resource estimation or production from projects sold to Fosterville South Exploration Limited. MGA also has approximately A$75 million of unutilised tax losses incurred during previous operations.
ECR holds a royalty on the SLM gold project in La Rioja Province, Argentina which could potentially receive up to US$2.7 million in aggregate across all licences.