Marathon infills Berry zone ahead of resource estimate

With a resource estimate for the Berry zone at Marathon Gold’s (TSX: MOZ) Valentine gold project underway, the company recently released assay results from its 2021 drilling for seven holes drilled within the 1.5-km target.

The latest results included a deeper drillhole assay from the less-explored central portion of Berry that returned 22 metres of 6.57 grams gold per tonne starting at 232 metres. Additional drill highlights included 21 metres of 3.93 grams gold per tonne; 3 metres of 14.93 grams gold per tonne; and 12 metres of 1.75 grams gold per tonne.

An initial resource for Berry, based on the 42,000 metres of drilling completed through to the end of last year, is being prepared. An additional 30,000 metres is scheduled for this year at Berry with exploration also planned for the Sprite and Victory deposits and for earlier-stage targets along Marathon’s 20-km stretch of the Valentine Lake shear zone.

Since starting its $10.5 million 2021 exploration program at Valentine in January, the company has drilled 37 holes, for a total of 10,335 metres.

“All of our drilling currently is within the 1.5-km long Berry zone, and these latest results again demonstrate strong quartz-tourmaline-pyrite-gold mineralization at this location with high grades,” Matt Manson, the company’s president and CEO, stated in a release.

Valentine Lake drill site. Credit: Marathon Gold.

Gold mineralization at Valentine is mainly found in the dipping stacked quartz-tourmaline-pyrite veins. Each of the seven holes reported in the release returned drill intercepts over 0.7 gram gold per tonne.

The Valentine project features four shear-zone hosted gold deposits within a 20-km-long trend. Measured and indicated resources stand at 54.9 million tonnes at 1.75 grams gold for a total of 3.1 million oz. with additional inferred resources of 16.8 million tonnes at 1.78 grams gold for a further 1 million ounces.

In April 2020, the company released a prefeasibility study for Valentine, which outlined a 12-year open pit and conventional milling operation producing an average of 175,000 oz. of gold annually in the first nine years.

In a research note, Craig Stanley of Raymond James, noted that the initial resource for the Berry Zone will not be incorporated into the feasibility study, “but could eventually push back the lower-grade material that the 2020 prefeasibility study forecast to start being processed in year nine of the mine life.”

Stanley has an Outperform 2 rating on the company and a target price of $3.50 per share.

Mining analyst Barry Allan of Laurentian Bank Securities, has a buy rating on Marathon and a price target of $5.75 per share. He pointed out in a research note after news of the drill results from the Berry Zone that the company remains his top pick for 2021.

Over the last year, Marathon Gold has traded in a range of $0.71 and $3.35 per share. At presstime the company was trading at $2.59 per share. The company has about 213.4 million common shares outstanding for a market cap of about $552.8 million.