Appointment of Director

RNS Number : 4536Y

SolGold PLC

03 March 2017

 

3 March2017

SolGold Plc

("SolGold" or the "Company")

Appointment of Director

The Board of Directors of SolGold Plc (SolGold; AIM:SOLG) is pleased to advise of the appointment of Mr Craig Jones as a Non-Executive Director of the Company.

Mr Jones has been nominated to the Board of SolGold by 10% shareholder in SolGold Newcrest International Pty Ltd (Newcrest), pursuant to rights held by Newcrest under the Share Subscription Agreement with SolGold, executed on 30 August 2016. 

Pursuant to the Agreement, Newcrest have anti-dilution rights, and are obligated to follow the direction of the Board of SolGold in an independently recommended change of control transaction supported by 60% of SolGold shareholders.

Mr Jones joined Newcrest Mining in 2008 and has held various senior management and executive roles within the Newcrest group, including General Manager  Projects, General Manager Cadia Valley Operations, Executive General Manager Projects and Asset Management, Executive General Manager Australian and Indonesian Operations, Executive General Manager Australian Operations and Projects, and Executive General Manager Cadia and Morobe Mining Joint Venture.  Mr Jones is currently the Executive General Manager Wafi-Golpu (Newcrest / Harmony).  Prior to joining Newcrest, Mr Jones worked for Rio Tinto.

Mr Jones holds a Bachelor of Mechanical Engineering from the University of Newcastle, Australia. 

SolGold Chairman Brian Moller said "The Board is delighted to welcome Mr Craig Jones as a Director of SolGold.  With his operational and block cave mining expertise, particularly relevant in the context of SolGold's exciting Alpala deposit at Cascabel in Northern Ecuador, this is another critical appointment at a pivotal time in SolGold's development.  The Board looks forward to working with Mr Jones and the Company is sure to benefit from his experience."

The following information is disclosed pursuant to Schedule 2(g) of the AIM Rules for Companies.

Craig Antony Jones (known as "Craig"), aged 45, currently holds or has held the following directorships and partnerships in the last five years:

Current directorships and partnerships: Morobe Exploration Services Limited Morobe Mining JV Services (Australia) Pty Ltd Newcrest PNG 2 Limited Wafi Golpu Services Limited

Previous directorships and partnerships: Cadia Holdings Pty Limited Newcrest PNG 1 Limited (renamed Harmony PNG 20 Limited) Hidden Valley Services Limited Newcrest Operations Limited Newgen Pty Ltd

Craig Jones does not hold any ordinary shares in SolGold.  Save as disclosed above, there are no other disclosures in relation to Rule 17 or paragraph (g) of Schedule 2 of the AIM Rules for Companies.

By order of the Board

Karl Schlobohm

Company Secretary

Market Abuse Regulation (MAR) Disclosure

Certain information contained in this announcement would have been deemed inside information for the purposes of Article 7 of Regulation (EU) No 596/2014 until the release of this announcement.

Contacts:

Mr Nicholas Mather                                                                                       Tel: [phone]

SolGold Plc (Executive Director)                                                                           [phone]

[e-mail] 

Mr Karl Schlobohm                                                                                         Tel: [phone]

SolGold Plc (Company Secretary)

[e-mail] 

Mr Ewan Leggat / Richard Morrison                                                        Tel: [phone]

SP Angel Corporate Finance LLP (NOMAD and Broker)

[e-mail] / [e-mail] 

Follow us on twitter @SolGold_plc

NOTES TO EDITORS

SolGold is a Brisbane, Australia based, AIM‐listed (SOLG) copper gold exploration and future development company with assets in Ecuador, Solomon Islands and Australia.  SolGold's primary objective is to discover and define world‐class copper‐gold deposits.  The Board and Management Team have substantial vested interests in the success of Company, as shareholders as well as strong track records in the areas of exploration, mine appraisal and development, investment, finance and law.  SolGold's experience is augmented by state of the art geophysical and modelling techniques and the guidance of Newmont trained porphyry expert Dr Steve Garwin.

SolGold was shortlisted as a nominee for the Mining Journal Explorer Achievement Award for 2016.  The Company announced USD54m in capital raisings in September 2016 involving Maxit Capital LP, Newcrest International Ltd and DGR Global Ltd, all undertaken at substantial premiums to previous raisings and SolGold has, at February 2017, approximately USD40 million in available cash to continue the exploration and development of its flagship Cascabel Project. 

Coincident with those capital raisings, Mr Scott Caldwell (CEO of TSX-listed Guyana Goldfields Inc) joined the SolGold Board on 9 September 2016.  Mr Caldwell is a mining engineer with over 30 years of experience building and operating gold and base metal mines worldwide, including USA, Canada, Russia, Zimbabwe, Chile and Indonesia and was in 2016 recognised as CEO of the year for South-American resource companies.

Cascabel, SolGold's 85% owned world class flagship copper‐gold porphyry project, is located in northern Ecuador on the under‐explored northern section of the richly endowed Andean Copper Belt.  SolGold owns 85% of Exploraciones Novomining S.A. ("ENSA") and approximately 11% of TSX‐V‐listed Cornerstone Capital Resources, which holds the remaining 15% of ENSA, the Ecuadorian registered company which holds 100% of the Cascabel concession.

The investment by Newcrest into 10% of SolGold and investment into SolGold by Guyana Goldfields, Maxit Capital and its clients, endorses Ecuador as a mining destination, the management team at SolGold, the dimension, size and scale of Alpala, the general prospectivity of Cascabel and its multiple targets.  The gold endowment, location, infrastructure, and logistics are all important competitive advantages offered by the project.

To date SolGold has expended approximately USD39m, completing geological mapping and soil sampling over 25km², along with an additional 9km² of Induced Polarisation and 14km² Magnetotelluric "Orion" surveys over the Alpala cluster and Aguinaga targets.  SolGold has to date completed approximately 29,000m of drilling and expended over USD 39M on the program, corporate costs and investments into Cornerstone.  This has been completed without lost time injury or environmental incident, employing a workforce of up to 176 Ecuadoreans workers and geoscientists and 6 expatriate Australian geoscientists.  Intensive diamond drilling is planned for the next 12 months with multiple drill rigs.

Cascabel is characterised by fourteen (14) identified targets, world class drilling intersections over 1km in length at potentially economic grades, and high copper and gold grades in richer sections, as well as logistic advantages in location, elevation, water supply, proximity to roads, port and power services; and a progressive legislative approach to resource development in Ecuador.  To date, SolGold has drill tested only one of the 14 targets, being Alpala.

The Alpala deposit is open at depth and in the upper extensions, as well as to the north, north-east, south-east and south-west.  The mineralised zones at Alpala, and Moran some 700 m to the north, and Aguinaga some 2km north east, are closely modelled by magnetic signatures and currently encompass over 10Bt of magnetic rock, anticipated on the basis of a strong relationship between copper sulphides and magnetite, to be mineralised with copper and gold.

SolGold is focussing on extending the dimensions of Alpala before completing a resource statement and drill testing of the other key targets within the Cascabel concession at Alpala South East, Aguinaga, Trivino, Moran, Alpala Northwest, Hematite Hill, Cristal, Parambas, Carmen, Tandayama-America and Chinambicito.  The Company is planning further metallurgical testing and completion of a conceptual early stage mine and plant design and a scoping study for an economic development at Cascabel.  SolGold is investigating both high tonnage / low-medium grade open cut and underground block caving operations, and a high grade / low tonnage initial underground development.

Drill hole intercepts are calculated using a data aggregation method, defined by copper equivalent cut-off grades and reported with up to 10m internal dilution, excluding bridging to a single sample.  Copper equivalent grades are calculated using a gold conversion factor of 0.89, determined using copper price of USD2.20/pound and gold price of USD1350/ounce.

Following a comprehensive review of the geology and prospectivity of Ecuador, SolGold and its subsidiaries have also applied for additional exploration licences in Ecuador over a number of additional promising porphyry copper gold targets elsewhere in the Country.  SolGold is negotiating external funding options which could provide the Company with the ability to have these projects fully funded by a third party while focussing on Cascabel.

In Queensland, Australia the Company is evaluating the future exploration plans for the Mt Perry, Rannes and Normanby projects.  Joint venture agreements are being investigated for a joint venture partner to commit funds and carry out exploration to earn an interest in the tenements.

SolGold retains interests in its original theatre of operations, Solomon Islands in the South West Pacific, where the 100% owned, as yet undrilled, Kuma prospect on the island of Kuma exhibits surface geological characteristics which are traditionally indicative of a large metal rich copper gold intrusive porphyry system.  SolGold intends in the future to apply intellectual property and experience developed in Ecuador to target additional world class copper gold porphyries at Kuma and other targets in Ecuador and Argentina.

SolGold is based in Brisbane, Queensland, Australia.  The Company listed on London's AIM Market in 2006, under the AIM code 'SOLG' and currently has a total of 1,432,306,605 ordinary shares issued, together with 33,975,884 options exercisable at 28p and 11,975,884 options exercisable at 14p.

CAUTIONARY NOTICE

The news release may contain certain statements and expressions of belief, expectation or opinion which are forward looking statements, and which relate, inter alia, to the Company's proposed strategy, plans and objectives or to the expectations or intentions of the Company's Directors. Such forward-looking statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other important factors beyond the control of the Company that could cause the actual performance or achievements of the Company to be materially different from such forward-looking statements. Accordingly, you should not rely on any forward-looking statements and save as required by the AIM Rules for Companies or by law, the Company does not accept any obligation to disseminate any updates or revisions to such forward-looking statements.

 

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