Tethyan Resources is sitting on promising mineralisation in a prime location in Europe.
Suva Ruda copper option the central proposition
Tethyan Resources PLC holds an option over the Suva Ruda copper project in Serbia, under the terms of which it can take 100% ownership via a €6 mln payment that can be made at any time with in an eight year period.
Along the way, Tethyan will have to meet certain exploration and payment milestones, but at the moment there doesn’t look to be any difficulty about that.
Suva Ruda setting is highly prospective
In fact, Tethyan has set about its exploration activities at Suva Ruda with gusto, because it’s already caught a whiff of success.
Suva Rudia covers an 87 square kilometre area and lies approximately 240 kilometres south of Belgrade. Projects on the same mineralised belt, the Vardar Metallogenic, include Dundee’s Tulare porphyry and Eldorado’s Skouries porphyry.
On the whole, however, exploration in Serbia has been hindered by a complicated political context that’s only now beginning to recede in importance.
Previous drilling confirmed potential
Back in 2004, when the previous mining boom was just getting underway US major Phelps Dodge stuck a few holes into the Rudnitza porphyry stock over an area of 1.2 kilometres by 800 metres. Not all holes hit, but among the better ones that did was an intercept of 144 metres at 0.4% copper, 0.4 grams per tonne gold that ended in mineralisation.
With Tethyan in charge, more mineralisation is being revealed
The latest drilling at Rudnitz undertaken by Tethyan has delivered 460 metres at 0.21% copper and 0.2 grams gold from surface, including 1.04% copper and 0.2 grams gold from 92 metres, and 260 metres at 0.22% copper and 0.2 grams gold from six metres, including 12 metres at 0.78% copper and 01.3 grams gold from 116 metres.
The company has also undertaken soil sampling and mapping programmes at additional exploration targets within the wider Suva Ruda exploration permit.
Gokcanica project provides additional upside
Tethyan is also exploring on the Gokcanica project in Serbia, ground which covers 110 square kilometres in southern Seriba, five kilometres to the north of the town of Josaniska Banja.
This area has been explored before, amongst others by Euromax Resources, and among the better intercepts reported in work conducted during the previous decade was 12.4 metres at 1.5% copper, 1.4% lead, 0.8% zinc, 63 grams per tonne silver and 1.6 grams gold.
More recent work has located arsenopyrite bodies and pyrite-rich veins, which Tethyan plans to investigate further to see if there’s potential for a high-grade gold target.
Geophysics now complete on both projects
Geophysical work at Rudnitza and Gokcanica has now been completed. In a recent press release the company referred to the Rudnitza mineralisation as “very extensive”
Canadian listing now the focus
Subject to shareholder approval, the company’s shares will cease to trade on Aim shortly, and the new Venture Exchange listing will become the primary way to trade. The shares spike in early 2017, but subsequently weakened in London on low volumes. It will be interesting to see how they trade in Canada.
Source: proactiveinvestors
