Admission to AIM
Chaarat Gold Holdings Ltd
08 November 2007
Chaarat Gold Holdings Ltd
8 November 2007
Chaarat Gold Holdings Ltd - Admission to AIM
('Chaarat Gold' or the 'Company', AIM:CGH), a junior exploration and mining
company established for the purpose of exploring and developing the licence
which is currently held by its Kyrgyz wholly-owned subsidiary Chaarat Zaav CJSC
in the western part of the Kyrgyz Republic, today announces its first day of
dealings of its Ordinary Shares on AIM.
Canaccord Adams Limited is acting as both Nominated Adviser and Broker to the
Company.
The Company has raised £8.8m via a Placing at 60p per share, giving the Company
a market capitalisation of £43.1m. The funds raised will be used for future
exploration work, which will be focused on increasing the resource delineated by
the Company, as well as on a pre-feasibility study, which is scheduled to be
undertaken in 2008.
Overview of the Company
Chaarat Gold Holdings Ltd was incorporated in the BVI on 20 July 2007 and became
the holding company of the Group. The Chaarat Group was founded for the purposes
of exploring and developing the Licence currently held by Chaarat K in the
western part of the Kyrgyz Republic.
The Licence grants Chaarat K the exclusive rights to conduct geological
prospecting and exploration for gold and other metals, in the Licence Area, as
well as the exclusive right to apply for a mining licence for the same metals.
The Licence Area is 604.6 km2 in extent and hosts many highly prospective gold
occurrences over a strike length of some 28 kilometres. To date, extensive
prospecting has only been conducted on a small number of higher priority
targets.
The Company has focused its exploration on an area that the Directors considered
to be the most prospective and readily accessible part of the Licence Area,
based on historical information. Advanced stage prospecting, including the
ongoing resource drilling programme, on seven priority targets, has delineated
wide zones of gold mineralisation. By the end of the 2006 exploration season, an
Indicated and Inferred Resource of 1.9 million ounces at a gold grade of 4.1g/t
had been delineated on these targets. Subsidiary amounts of silver and antimony
occur within the mineralised zones. Additional targets are being explored but
had not been drilled during the 2006 season.
The Licence has been granted to 31 December 2008 and the terms of the Licence
allow for the Company to extend the period of licence up to 10 years for
successive periods of, generally, two years until 2012.
Growth Strategy
The Directors' intention for the Group is to continue the intensive
exploration programme to test the priority targets which were identified in its
recent work programmes and to increase the mineral resource base within the
Licence Area. At the same time, the Group intends to undertake a series of
studies which are expected to lead to the completion of a feasibility study
conducted to bankable standards, on the most advanced part of the Mineral
Resource, which, it is intended, will allow for the design, finance,
construction and commissioning of a mine within the next five years. It is
further intended to establish a Mineral Resource on the priority targets which
will support a mining operation with a production rate of 200,000 oz of gold a
year in a proposed 10-year first phase of mining.
The Licence Area hosts many highly prospective gold occurrences and gold soil
sample anomalies which may prove to represent economically viable gold deposits.
The Directors believe the Mineral Resources in the Licence Area may be extended,
through further exploration, and thereby allow for an expansion of the
anticipated first phase mining operation.
Furthermore it is the intention to expand the exploration programme to other
parts of the Licence Area.
The Company also intends to work actively to identify other gold occurrences
with potential, in the vicinity of the Licence Area, where it will seek to
acquire the rights to prospect in order to expand the gold resource base of the
Company.
Key strengths
The Directors believe there are a number of reasons why the Company represents
an attractive investment proposition:
• the Licence Area is within the highly prospective Tien Shan gold belt,
which hosts numerous large gold deposits and mining operations, which have a
similar geological setting to that encountered within the Licence Area;
• the Kyrgyz Republic has a well established mining industry and
infrastructure and the Directors believe that the government is supportive of
the mining industry;
• exploration results, particularly those received by the Company during
the 2005 and 2006 exploration seasons, have extended the zones of mineralisation
in the known gold occurrences, and have discovered new gold occurrences. These
results also have increased the probability that the Licence Area may host
significant gold mineralisation, which has the potential to be developed into
economically viable gold deposits and mining operations;
• exploration results to date have confirmed significant additional gold
occurrences and soil geochemical anomalies within the Licence Area;
• within the Company's Board of Directors and Senior Management
there is appropriate expertise and experience to develop the Company's
operations; and
• the Company's future prospects offer further attractive growth
potential in the expansion of Mineral Resources on its current priority targets,
as well as in advancing prospecting on the gold occurrences within the Licence
Area that have not yet been intensively prospected. In addition, further growth
may be realised if the Company is able to acquire any other gold occurrences
with potential within the area surrounding the Licence Area.
For further Information:
Dekel Golan - Chaarat Gold Holdings Ltd Tel: +44 (0)20 7499 2612
Dekel@chaarat.com
Canaccord Adams Limited Tel: +44 (0) 20 7050 6500
Mike Jones
Robin Birchall
Alex Glover/Tim Weller Fin Public Relations Tel: 020 7608 2280 or
Mob: +44 7887 610 335
alex.glover@fininternational.com
NOTES TO EDITORS
Placing Statistics
Placing Price: 60p
Number of Ordinary Shares being issued pursuant to the Placing: 14,669,833
Number of Ordinary Shares in issue following Admission: 71,883,433
Number of Options in issue following Admission: 8,160,00
Number of Existing Shares: 57,213,600
Existing Shares as a percentage of Enlarged Share Capital: 79.6 per cent.
Placing Shares as a percentage of Enlarged Share Capital: 20.4 per cent.
Estimated gross proceeds of the Placing receivable by the Company: £8,801,900
Estimated net proceeds of the Placing receivable by the Company (exclusive of
applicable VAT): £7,673,533
Market capitalisation of the Company at the Placing Price on Admission (assuming
that no Options are exercised): £43,130,059
Key Management
Mr Dekel Golan (Chief Executive Officer) (Age 51)
Mr Golan is a graduate of Tel Aviv University. Mr Golan, formerly president of
Apex Asia LDC, a subsidiary of Apex Silver Mines Limited, has extensive
experience in promoting and developing businesses both in emerging economies as
well as the developed world. Mr Golan was the founder and Executive Chairman of
African Plantations Corporation Limited. In addition, Mr Golan has advised a
number of international and Israeli companies on business development and
competitive intelligence.
Prior to those activities Mr Golan was Vice President of Business Development of
Supersol, the largest retail operator in Israel and established and managed the
unit for competitive intelligence for Dead Sea Bromine Group, the world's
largest bromine producer. Mr Golan is an Israeli national.
Mr Terence Arthur Cross (Finance Director) (Age 59)
Mr Cross is an MBA graduate of the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg
and is a member of the South African Institute of Professional Accountants. His
working experience has been gained primarily in mining and related industries.
Since immigrating to the UK in 1996, Mr Cross worked for eighteen months as an
independent consultant then for four years as a Projects and Financial Control
Manager for Barclays Bank. During the most recent six years he has worked as
Group Financial Controller for a number of AIM listed mining exploration
companies. Prior to moving to the UK he was, for six years, General Manager of a
specialist equipment and consumables supplier to the mining industry in South
Africa. Mr Cross was a director of Johannesburg Stock Exchange listed companies,
Consolidated
Modderfontein Mines Ltd and South Roodepoort Main Reef Areas Ltd, from 1988 to
1992 and was Group Financial Controller and subsequently a director of the
mining management company, Golden Dumps (Pty) Ltd, through the period from 1986
until 1989.
Mr Cross was previously employed in financial management positions for eleven
years with Celanese Corporation of New York and for seven years with the Barlow
Rand Group, of South Africa. Mr Cross holds dual British and South African
nationality.
Mr Alexander Novak (Executive Director) (Age 51)
Mr Novak is a graduate of the Kazakh Polytechnic Institute (M.Sc). Mr. Novak has
assisted several companies investing in Kyrgyzstan in various aspects of
finance, administration and representation vis a vis the local authorities since
2000 Mr Novak has more than 25 years experience in various aspects of business
management in Central Asia including negotiations with governmental
institutions, contractors, preparation of development plans, monitoring of
operations and public relations. Mr
Novak was instrumental in drafting and signing investment agreements between the
government of the Kyrgyz Republic and two extraction companies, Textonic and
Kumushtak, a subsidiary of Apex Silver Mines Limited. From 1992 to 1995, Mr
Novak was a founding partner and a director of Maya Elev Diamond Limited, a
diamond processing plant in Russia. From 1978 through to 1990, Mr Novak held
several positions at numerous construction companies in Kazakhstan, including
Director of KazStroiMontajAvtomatika. Mr. Novak is also the sole director of
Chaarat K. Mr Novak is an Israeli national.
Mr Christopher David Palmer-Tomkinson (Non-Executive Chairman) (Age 65)
Mr Palmer-Tomkinson graduated from Oxford University with a degree in
jurisprudence and joined Cazenove in 1963. He served as a partner from 1972
until 2001 and as managing director international corporate finance until May
2002. He was responsible at various times for Cazenove's African and
Australian business which enabled him to focus on the resource sector. Mr
Palmer-Tomkinson is a director of Highland Gold Mining Limited. Mr
Palmer-Tomkinson is a British national.
Mr Stuart Robert Comline (Non-Executive Director) (Age 58)
Mr Comline is a graduate of the University of Natal South Africa (B.Sc
Hons.Geology) and University of Western Ontario (M.Sc Geology). Mr Comline was
Chairman, and formerly President and Chief Operating Officer, of AfriOre
Limited, a TSX and AIM listed company until January 2007, when the company was
purchased by Lonmin Plc. Mr Comline has 35 years of experience in the
international exploration and mining industry mostly in Africa and Canada. He
spent 20 years with JCI Limited, in a number of senior management positions
including General Manager of Exploration. In the mid-nineties he was an
independent consultant and worked with merchant banks and major and junior
exploration companies within the mining and exploration field until joining
AfriOre Limited in 1997. Mr Comline has experience in various commodities
including gold, platinum, base metals, diamonds and coal. Mr
Comline is currently an independent advisor to several mineral exploration
companies and serves Talon Metals Corporation, a TSX listed mining and mineral
exploration company, as a non-executive director. Mr Comline is a British
national.
Mr Oliver Raymond Greene (Non-Executive Director) (Age 64)
Oliver Greene is a graduate in Politics, Philosophy and Economics from Oxford
University. A career banker, he has over thirty five years experience as a
practitioner in international corporate finance, credit and corporate recovery
in the US and Europe.
Mr Greene joined Citibank in 1965 holding various assignments in New York and
London with experience in Petroleum and Chemicals financing, leasing and
structured finance, and exposure to Scandinavian and Eastern European markets.
In 1980 Mr Greene moved to Bankers Trust Company to head their UK World
Corporate Department in London. He joined Chase Manhattan Bank in 1988 as
Managing Director, Head of UK Corporate Finance followed in 1990 by the
management of impaired assets in the UK. In 1996 Mr Greene moved to UBS as a
Managing Director in Corporate Finance before accepting an invitation to join
the European Bank for Reconstruction & Development in 1998 as Director of
Corporate Recovery.
On Mr Greene's retirement from the EBRD in 2003 he became a consultant to the
bank, an appointment that continues. Mr Greene served as a member of the
Supervisory Board and Chairman of the Remuneration Committee of Banca Comerciala
Romana S.A. in Bucharest from 2004 to 2006. Since 2004 Mr Greene has been a
member of the Supervisory Board and Chairman of the Audit Committee of Bank
Pekao S.A Warsaw (a publicly listed Unicredito Group subsidiary) and, since
2006, a member of the Supervisory Board of Korado AS in the Czech Republic. Mr
Greene is a US/UK dual national.
This information is provided by RNS
The company news service from the London Stock Exchange