Beaufort Securities view On Mariana Resources: The receipt of the aforementioned funds would facilitate the commencement of exploration at Doña Ines and Exploradora East. The company has entered an interesting phase as the Doña Ines Project is located within an underexplored epithermal gold-silver belt and may lead to some interesting discoveries. Moreover, the optionality attached to the two prospects allows Mariana to optimise the use of funds even as drilling continues at its Hot Maden project in Turkey. The main benefit of this deal is that exploration funding received would not dilute shareholders at the equity level but rather at the project level, with Mariana retaining the role of operator during the option period. Additionally, the company possesses other promising prospects in Peru, Argentina, Suriname and Chile. Its other successful gold-silver discovery campaigns include Las Calandrias Project and Sierra Blanca Project. The company’s strategy focuses on acquiring prospective land packages offering the high probability for economic returns. Thus, in view of the company’s promising asset base and its track record for previous explorations, we maintain a Speculative Buy rating on the stock
Yesterday, Mariana Resources announced that its subsidiary AMG Chile SpA had received the first round of funding commitment worth US$450,000 from Asset Chile Exploración Minera Fondo de Inversión Privado. The amount represent’s a part of Asset’s total funding commitment of US$1.65m, for the Phase I work program at Doña Ines epithermal Gold-Silver and Exploradora East porphyry Copper projects in northern Chile. Mariana has already identified an initial program of ground geophysics (IP) over the priority geochemical and alteration anomalies. If the weather conditions remain favourable, the company aims to complete the ground geophysics by Q3 2015 and the pass drill testing during the Q4 2015.
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