Larvotto Resources shares surged 100 per cent on Tuesday after the company announced it had discovered bonanza rare earths grades at its Eyre project in WA.
The company’s share price jumped from $0.135 to as high as $0.27 after recent aircore (AC) drilling at Eyre’s Merivale South prospect intersected up to 1.26 per cent total rare earth oxides (TREO). This highlighted the potential of a 3km-long TREO anomaly that sits within a broader 8km-long anomaly.
Larvotto completed two drill lines 500m apart along the 3km-long anomaly, with the zone remaining open in all directions, particularly to the west.
Maiden composites led to the discovery of 3466 parts per million (ppm) TREO over 6m, before Larvotto undertook 1m resamples and discovered results as high as 1.26 per cent TREO (12,611ppm).
“Today’s results are exceptionally high-grade intervals for ionic-clay mineralisation and come from shallow depth,” Larvotto managing director Ron Heeks said.
“The potential for significant amounts of TREO here is excellent, with Larvotto having identified two further proximate geochemical anomalies for further testing.
“We’ve just commenced and already our high-grade results compare favourably to those being delivered by leading companies globally, demonstrating excellent heavy TREO and NdPr (neodymium-praseodymium) ratios.
“Based on first pass drilling, we have identified a potentially significant project.”
With the belief that TREO mineralisation is hosted within ionic clays, this would make the project suitable for simple, cost-effective extraction, and Larvotto is conducting metallurgical testing to further understand Merivale South’s amenability for extraction.
Once the company has received results from metallurgical testwork it will strategise its next drill programs, where a much larger drill program would be warranted given the size of anomaly at Merivale South.
The Eyre project is one of three assets Larvotto is currently advancing, with the Mt Isa and Ohakuri projects also priorities for the company.
The Mt Isa copper project spans approximately 900 square kilometres and is located in one of Australia’s – if not the world’s – most prospective regions for copper, gold and cobalt.
Located in New Zealand, the Ohakuri gold project has scale on its side, with Heeks suggesting it is the largest epithermal system he’s seen, which is significant given Heeks has more than 35 years’ experience in the mining industry, much of which has been in the gold and copper sector.
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