Site visit: Wildcat Resources fast-tracks ‘eye-watering’ Tabba Tabba lithium project to prefeasibility stage

Wildcat Resources (ASX: WC8) is already mapping a path to production at the Tabba Tabba lithium discovery in Western Australia’s Pilbara region it made only last year — even without an initial resource estimate.

The project, which has drawn comparisons to another 2023 Pilbara lithium find — Azure Minerals’ Andover — pushed Wildcat’s market capitalization from less than A$20 million ($18.2 million) last September to over A$1 billion in November, a rarity for a pre-resource explorer.

Due to the lithium price slump, the stock has pulled back to below A30¢ giving Wildcat a market cap of A$236 million. But it still had A$77.2 million cash in the bank at mid-year.

Azure was acquired for A$1.7 billion by Gina Rinehart’s Hancock Prospecting and SQM in May.

Wildcat executive director Matthew Banks points out that Tabba Tabba has one thing Andover doesn’t: a granted mining lease.

“Potentially we’re going to be selling material in the market three years earlier than Azure has that potential, just because it’s already been permitted,” he said.

New discovery

Wildcat reported its first drill results from Tabba Tabba in September 2023. Highlights included 85 metres at 1.1% lithium oxide from surface, including 59 metres at 1.5% lithium oxide; and 218 metres at 0.8% lithium oxide from 16 metres, including 51 metres at 1.5% lithium oxide.

That discovery, which was later named Leia, has continued to grow. The single pegmatite outcrops at surface over 1 km and is up to 180 metres wide over a 2.2-km strike.

Banks described its scale as “eye-watering,” while mining engineer AJ Saverimutto, who joined Wildcat at the start of the year as managing director, says Leia is the backbone of Tabba Tabba.

“It’s going to be an open pit, in my opinion, and that’s what attracted me to this project,” Saverimutto said.

Wildcat, which has drilled more than 105,000 metres at Tabba Tabba since last July, followed up Leia with multiple Star Wars-themed pegmatite discoveries, including Chewy, Boba, Han and Hutt.

In April 2024, Wildcat reported the discovery of the Luke pegmatite, a blind discovery below Leia.

Luke has already grown to be at least 800 metres long with intercepts including 43 metres at 1.4% lithium oxide.

On the fast track

Despite not having a published mineral resource estimate, Wildcat is already doing a prefeasibility study at Tabba Tabba.

“A lot of companies sit there and want to discover more and they might spend two years defining the resource,” said Saverimutto.

“Because we had that three-year advantage on the mining lease, we can’t lose that advantage.”

Wildcat is aiming to wrap up the prefeasibility study in next year’s first quarter.

“Typically, a company will take a year to do a PFS. We’re hoping to get it done in six months,” Saverimutto said.

“The reason I came on this project is it’s got large tonnage. It’s potentially a 20-plus-year mine life, it’s going to be low cost and it’s going to be pretty simple processing.”

Despite weak market conditions, Wildcat has received plenty of interest from potential customers.

“The amount of inbound [enquiries] we have, you’d think the lithium market is red hot,” Saverimutto said.

Tantalum deposit

Wildcat acquired Tabba Tabba tantalum project in May 2023 from Resource Capital Funds-backed Global Advanced Metals (GAM).

Then a gold junior, Wildcat theorized that Tabba Tabba, which is the world’s highest grade tantalum deposit and was previously mined in 2015, could be prospective for lithium.

Banks recalls that the company’s exploration manager Torrin Rowe was looking through reports from the 1990s when he noticed known occurrences of lithium-caesium-tantalum mineralized pegmatites and several historical high-grade lithium hits.

“We believe that potentially that data point of information had been lost in the industry and very quickly after we started drilling, we made a discovery,” he said during a site visit to Tabba Tabba, 47 km north of Pilgangoora, in August.

“And the rest is history.”

Wildcat paid A$6.5 million in shares to GAM for the asset, plus 62.2 million performance rights that will vest once it outlines an inferred resource of more than 100,000 tonnes of contained lithium.

GAM has already sold off the shares it was issued for A$158.6 million tolithium producer Mineral Resources. MinRes, which spent A$14 million buying an initial stake on market, now holds 19.85% of Wildcat.

And Wildcat took advantage of the buzz created by its entry onto the register by raising A$100 million at A76¢ per share in November 2023.

Other assets previously sold off by GAM included Greenbushes, Pilgangoora and Wodgina, which went on to become the world’s largest hard rock lithium mines under respective owners Talison Lithium, Pilbara Minerals and Mineral Resources.

‘Silicon Valley of mining’

Another advantage the project has is its close proximity to Port Hedland, just 80 km by road.

Port Hedland, 1,600 km north of Perth, is a town of more than 15,000 people, built on mining, and is also home to the world’s largest bulk-tonnage port that exports a significant portion of the world’s iron ore supply, as well as lithium and salt.

“It is the Silicon Valley of mining,” Saverimutto said. “Nearly 20% of the world’s lithium comes from here.”

The project’s location allowed Wildcat to build a 60-person accommodation camp on site in just three weeks.

Wildcat recently released the first metallurgical test work results from Leia, using 288 kg of samples from nine drill holes.

“Most market competitors would do half a kilo or a kilo at three times their grade,” Saverimutto said.

Whole-of-ore flotation test work at head grades of 1-1.4% lithium oxide returned recoveries of 79-84% to produce a 5.5% lithium concentrate and 72-84% to produce a 6% concentrate.

“Today, we’ve had nearly 700 kg in the lab and that’s moving very quickly to 1.2 tonnes,” Banks said.The next milestone for Wildcat is an initial resource for Tabba Tabba.

Argonaut mining analyst George Ross forecasts a resource of 65 million tonnes grading 1% lithium oxide for 650,000 tonnes of contained lithium oxide, while Canaccord Genuity’s Paul Howard sees the potential for an 80 million tonne resource.

By comparison, Pilbara Minerals’ first resource for Pilgangoora in 2014 was 8.6 million tonnes at 1.01% lithium oxide. It’s grown to 413.8 million tonnes at 1.15% lithium in the decade since.

“We think we’re going to have a very high confidence resource, which is measured and indicated so that we can move it very quickly into that PFS and reserve and we can come out with financial metrics,” Saverimutto said.

In the meantime, exploration drilling will continue with at least three rigs.

Regionally, the company has a target called Pilgangoora North, which is only 10km from Pilbara Minerals’ Pilgangoora mine, the world’s second-largest hard rock lithium operation.

“Certainly a good place to go exploring is next to the biggest producing asset in the world,” Rowe said.

The most recent results from Leia, including 67 metres at 1.9% lithium oxide from 338 metres, including 46 metres at 2.5% lithium oxide, indicate the deposit will continue to grow.

“The size and scale of Tabba Tabba is second to none,” Saverimutto said.