Ivanhoe veteran Hornor ventures into gold with Aurvista

VANCOUVER — Matthew Hornor, protégé of mining mogul Robert Friedland and veteran of Ivanhoe Mines (TSX: IVN; US-OTC: IVPAF), has taken the helm of Aurvista Gold (TSXV: AVA) as president and CEO to lead development of the junior’s 2.8 million oz. Douay gold project in Quebec’s Abitibi region.

Hornor, who most recently served as president and CEO of Kaizen Discovery (TSXV: KZD) and served as a vice-president at Ivanhoe for eight years, says he’s been “waiting for the right company with the right asset” since he resigned from Kaizen and Ivanhoe in April and June last year.

Matthew Hornor,  president and CEO of Aurvista Gold.

“I wanted to get involved with a project where I felt strongly about its potential upside,” Hornor tells The Northern Miner during a phone interview. “And from a geological and risk perspective, Douay ticks all the right boxes — it has the components of turning into another Canadian Malartic gold mine.”

Douay falls along a 40 km segment of the Casa Berardi deformation zone, one of the many regionally trending structures known to control gold mineralization in the Abitibi. Agnico Eagle Mines (TSX: AEM; NYSE: AEM) and Yamana Gold’s (TSX: YRI; NYSE: AUY) 10.7 million oz. Canadian Malartic gold mine is 160 km south of Douay, within a similar trending structure called the Larder Lake-Cadillac.

Aurvista is in the midst of a 30,000-metre drill program to  expand Douay’s open-pittable inferred resource of 83.3 million tonnes grading 1.05 grams gold per tonne, assuming a cut-off of 0.5 gram gold.

Much like Canadian Malartic, mineralization at Douay is structurally controlled and focused along the flanks of porphyry intrusions.

“We’re looking to identify the high-grade ore shoots and develop a new block model for Douay based on those findings,” Hornor says, noting that a resource update is expected by year-end. “For example, at Canadian Malartic, they cherry-picked many of the high-grade zones before they developed it … so they’ve given us the blueprint on how we can expect our project to evolve and what it could look like in the future.”

Hornor says drilling could expand Douay’s 7 km long mineralized strike length to over 10 km, making it three times longer than Canadian Malartic.

“We’ve never tested Douay below 250 metres, and if you look next door at Canadian Malartic, they’re mining down to 650 metres,” he says. “It’s open in all directions and at depth, which is one of the many reasons why Douay is so attractive.”

Aurvista Gold’s Douay gold property falls along a 40-km segment of the Casa Berardi fault zone – one of the many regionally-trending structures known to control gold mineralization in the Abitibi. Credit: Aurvista Gold.

Recent drilling at the northwest end of the project’s Porphyry zone delivered intervals of 2.46 grams gold over 4.5 metres, 0.72 gram gold over 9 metres and 0.44 gram gold over 3 metres, building on previous assay results of 0.79 gram gold over 34.5 metres farther uphole.

Another hole returned 2.19 grams gold over 3 metres, 0.64 gram gold over 7.5 metres and 0.55 gram gold over 4.5 metres.

Aurvista Gold’s Douay project in Quebec. Credit: Aurvista Gold.

“The world is waiting for the next big Canadian gold story, and Quebec is ranked one of the top places in the world where you want to mine it. I’d take 3 million oz. in Quebec over 10 million oz. anywhere else,” he says.Visible gold in drill core from 

Hornor is a lawyer by training and fluent in Japanese, and is known in the mining industry for keeping ties with prominent Japanese trading houses.

He was instrumental in Itochu’s US$280-million investment in Ivanhoe’s Platreef platinum-palladium-gold-nickel-copper project in South Africa in 2011, and orchestrated multiple project acquisitions and equity financings for Kaizen during his two-and-half-year tenure.

Hornor, 45, has known Robert Friedland for the past 38 years, having been classmates in elementary school with Friedland’s children.

“I just got back from a trip to Tokyo. I go there every six weeks to stay in contact with friends and high-level relationships, and they’re extremely keen to get more exposure to Canadian gold projects,” he says. “So you better watch the space.”

Shares of Aurvista have traded within a 52-week range between 11¢ and 46¢ and closed at 28¢ at press time. The company has 142.9 million shares outstanding for a $35.2-million market capitalization.