Each one in plain English, with the numbers worked through for a shareholder.
10 Sept 2024drilling result▲ GoodMajor
Kingfisher now has a drill-defined strike of more than 2 kilometres and is still open at depth, with 14.2 grams of gold a tonne over 16.8 metres true width. Depth extension drilling at Sunbird, 8.8 grams over 6.3 metres at 301 metres, continued to support underground mining beneath the Séguéla pits.
First strong results from Senegal: 31.3 grams of gold a tonne over 12.0 metres true width at the Karakara prospect at Diamba Sud, with early holes at satellite targets returning 8.9 grams over 27.7 metres at Western Splay and 2.9 grams over 15.3 metres at Kassasoko. This is the first release under the company's new name, Fortuna Mining Corp.
Kingfisher delivered 23.7 grams of gold a tonne over 17.9 metres true width from 113 metres, with the Badior prospect returning a string of intersections between 15 and 38 grams over 3.5 to 11.9 metres and the Ancien deposit 27.4 and 12.3 grams at depth. Three separate prospects around one mine were all returning ore-grade widths.
Renewed the buyback for a third year from May 2024, up to 15,287,201 shares, 5% of the 305,744,039 then outstanding - a higher count than a year earlier because of the shares issued for Chesser.
Eight months of drilling turned the Yessi discovery at San Jose into a defined system, with 1,327 grams a tonne silver-equivalent over 3.0 metres true width and 1,036 grams over 8.1 metres marking high-grade shoots, and 179 grams over 17.5 metres showing the vein can also be wide.
Found a fourth new prospect at Séguéla, Kingfisher, after Barana, Badior and Kestrel in 2022 and 2023 - an unusual run of discoveries around a mine only a year into production. Drilling below the Koula pit returned 68.0 grams of gold a tonne over 2.1 metres inside a 22.5 gram intersection over 9.8 metres, opening the possibility of underground mining, and confirmatory drilling at Diamba Sud in Senegal was wrapping up.
More high grade around Séguéla: 17.3 grams of gold a tonne over 6.3 metres true width at the newly found Badior prospect, and 27.1 grams over 7.7 metres at 239 metres depth in the Ancien deposit, which points to mineralisation below the pits. The update also covered first work on the newly acquired Diamba Sud ground in Senegal and San Jose in Mexico.
Completed the Chesser Resources purchase, issuing 15,545,368 shares - about 5.1% of the company - so Chesser holders' equity carried into Fortuna rather than being cashed out, and Chesser was delisted from the ASX. Fortuna now holds the Diamba Sud gold project in Senegal.
Mine geologists at San Jose in Mexico drilled into a previously unknown blind structure, now called the Yessi vein, returning 1,299 grams a tonne silver-equivalent over 9.9 metres true width and 621 grams over 5.0 metres, about 200 metres east of the known Victoria zone. It is a real discovery inside an eighteen-year-old mine whose reserves had been shrinking. The release carries a typographical date of September 5, 2021 in its body; the filing is from 2023.
Infill drilling at Sunbird finished and moved into reserve estimation and mine design intended to extend Séguéla's life. Attention shifted to new ground, with 90.9 grams of gold a tonne over 1.8 metres true width near surface at the Barana prospect, while at Yaramoko in Burkina Faso high grade was found at least 130 metres west of the Zone 55 resource - 32.8 grams over 3.1 metres - and confirmed by underground development.
Poured first gold at Séguéla on 24 May 2023, on time and on budget and within two years of buying the project with Roxgold, making it Fortuna's fifth operating mine. Nominal production rates were targeted for the third quarter, with 60,000 to 75,000 ounces expected in 2023 at all-in sustaining costs of US$880 to US$1,080 an ounce.
Agreed to buy ASX-listed Chesser Resources for 0.0248 Fortuna shares each, about A$0.142 a share and A$89.0 million (C$80.6 million), issuing up to 15,545,682 shares or roughly 5.1% of the company. It adds the Diamba Sud gold project in Senegal, at preliminary economic assessment stage, extending Fortuna's West African ground to a third country.
Renewed the buyback for another year from May 2023, again up to 5% of shares - 14,534,581 of 290,691,634 outstanding. The share count had fallen by about 1.5 million over the year of the first program.
Technical report covering both the Lindero mine and the adjacent Arizaro project in Salta, Argentina, effective 31 December 2022 - the first to treat Arizaro alongside the operating mine.
Infill drilling at Sunbird found high grade in ground the model had called low grade inside the planned pit - 10.6 grams of gold a tonne over 21.7 metres true width, 14.9 grams over 14 metres - and extension holes north of the pit shell returned 12.0 grams over 5.6 metres. The aim is to convert Sunbird into reserves and lengthen Séguéla's 1.1 million ounce, nine-year mine plan.
An update on reserve and resource work at Yaramoko in Burkina Faso after a year of grade-control and step-out drilling and a rebuild of the estimation method, following the 2022 technical report that first described the 55 Zone open pit.
Raised the committed size of its senior secured revolver by US$50 million to US$250 million with BNP Paribas, Scotiabank, Société Générale and others, maturity unchanged at November 2025, and lifted the November 2024 step-down from US$150 million to US$175 million. A further US$50 million accordion to US$300 million is uncommitted. Pricing moved off LIBOR to SOFR and got slightly dearer - 25 basis points on the margin and 9 to 12 on the commitment fee.
Expansion drilling kept growing Sunbird beyond the March resource envelope, with 18.3 grams of gold a tonne over 11.9 metres true width, 28.2 grams over 3.5 metres and 12.6 grams over 7.7 metres, and visible gold in a hole 100 metres further down-plunge. The deposit is still open.
Started a buyback of up to 14,608,820 shares, 5% of the 292,176,418 then outstanding, running from May 2022 for a year, with repurchased shares cancelled. The board's stated reason is that the shares trade below what it thinks they are worth - the first return of capital in this record, a year after a US$69 million equity raise at US$3.00.
First technical report on the Yaramoko gold mine in Burkina Faso under Fortuna ownership, effective 31 December 2021, replacing Roxgold's 2017 report and describing the planned open pit at the 55 Zone.
Filed Roxgold's Séguéla feasibility study technical report, effective 19 April 2021 - the study underlying the mine Fortuna decided to build in September 2021, now filed under its own name after the takeover.
A first resource for Sunbird put 3.4 million tonnes at 3.16 grams of gold a tonne for 350,000 inferred ounces - found after the decision to build Séguéla was already taken, and not yet counted in the mine plan. Fortuna said it would not materially change the project's existing resource or its construction plan, and the deposit remains open along strike and at depth.
Sunbird kept delivering ahead of a first resource estimate - 20.2 grams of gold a tonne over 18.2 metres true width and 13.4 grams over 18.9 metres - with coarse visible gold in core and a high-grade core traced over more than 250 metres of strike, still open along strike and at depth. Séguéla was already under construction as a 3,750 tonne a day mine for first gold in mid-2023.
Twelve rigs turning across the portfolio: 17.5 grams of gold a tonne over 6.3 metres true width at the Sunbird prospect at Séguéla, 0.6 grams of gold with 0.18% copper over 68 metres from surface next to the Arizaro project in Argentina, and, nearly 900 metres below surface at Caylloma, 93 grams of silver with 4.83% lead and 7.81% zinc over 20.48 metres true width in one of the deepest holes yet drilled there, still open at depth.
Three months after buying Roxgold, the board approved building Séguéla, a 3,750 tonne a day open pit in Côte d'Ivoire with a nine-year reserve life and about 130,000 ounces of gold a year in the first six years, for a remaining US$162 million of initial capital funded from existing resources. First gold was targeted for mid-2023, making it Fortuna's fifth mine.
Sold 515,365 shares of Keon Capital, formerly Prospero Silver, to two private buyers at C$0.10 each for C$51,536 - an early warning disclosure on a legacy exploration equity stake, immaterial in itself.
First drill results from the West African ground two months after closing Roxgold, and they were strong: 17.2 grams of gold a tonne over 30 metres at Sunbird and 28.8 grams over 7 metres at Koula, both at Séguéla in Côte d'Ivoire, and 17.9 grams over 5.4 metres at Galgouli on the Boussoura project in Burkina Faso.