ECR Minerals buys key property on Creswick licence

Australia-focussed gold exploration and development company ECR Minerals announced on Thursday that its wholly-owned Australian subsidiary Mercator Gold (MGA) has purchased a property at 35 Brewing Lane in Springmount, subject only to the payment of completion funds.

The AIM-traded firm said the property is located within its existing 100%-owned Creswick licence area.

It said it expected that monies would be paid, and completion would occur, on or around 27 September.

The property consists of 16 acres within the 45 square kilometre Creswick area in the state of Victoria, and is held over three titles.

ECR said the property would provide a base for activities across the licence area as ECR advances its drilling programmes and, when appropriate, would be the site for development for the mine decline.

The purchase price was AUD 0.5m, which would be settled in two tranches, consisting of an AUD 50,000 deposit which was already paid, and the balance to be paid on 27 September.

It said the purchase would be funded from the firm’s existing cash resources, with the group having £4.22m in cash after paying the deposit.

“Following the positive progress of the drilling programme at Creswick, we are pleased to announce the purchase of the Brewing Lane property which sits in our existing licence area,” said chief executive officer Craig Brown.

“Following completion, we intend that the property will provide the company with an operational base and, in future, can be developed as a site for the decline access to existing, and potential, vein mineralisation.

“Earlier this year, we reported strong results from the drilling programme at the Creswick licence which has continued to delineate gold mineralisation along strike, with all assayed holes returning gold.”

Brown said that of “particular significance” were holes CSD003 and CSD004, which returned 9.93 grams and 23.58 grams of gold per tonne, respectively.

“I remain enthused by the pace of developments at Creswick, Bailieston and our other assets, and look forward to receiving the remaining assay results at Creswick and reporting on progress.”

At 1231 BST, shares in ECR Minerals were up 1.49% at 1.7p.