TNM Drill Down: AbraSilver’s Diablillos tops silver assays for June-July

The Northern Miner has compiled the top 10 drill results for silver for the June 17-July 15 period. Drill holes are ranked by grade x width.

Latin America topped all other regions, logging the seven highest scores. AbraSilver Resource’s (TSX: ABRA) Diablillos project in Argentina fared best, followed by Argenta Silver’s (TSXV: AGAG) El Quevar property, also in Argentina, and Silverco Mining’s (TSXV: SICO) Cusi project in Mexico.

Diablillos

Standout hole DDH-26-036, drilled into a previously untested gap in the Oculto West zone, cut 109 metres grading 221.2 grams silver per tonne, AbraSilver said July 13. Its width x grade value was 24,111.

Located in northwestern Argentina, about 160 km south of the city of Salta, Diablillos is AbraSilver’s main asset and one of the country’s largest undeveloped precious-metals projects. The property hosts the Oculto silver-gold deposit, a high-sulphidation epithermal system that has been the focus of extensive drilling and resource growth over the past several years. AbraSilver has now drilled more than 170,000 metres at Diablillos.

In May, AbraSilver reported a substantially expanded mineral resource estimate for the project. Diablillos holds about 232 million measured and indicated tonnes grading 33 grams silver and 0.34 gram gold for contained metal of 248.1 million oz. silver and 2.5 million oz. gold.

Inferred resources were pegged at 49.3 million tonnes grading 12 grams silver and 0.26 gram gold for contained metal of 18.4 million oz. silver and 420,000 oz. gold.

Diablillos is expected to generate an after-tax net present value (NPV) of about US$3 billion ($4.3 billion) and a 42% internal rate of return with a 1.7-year payback period, AbraSilver has said.

El Quevar

Drill hole QVD-469 cut 28 metres of 446 grams silver from 334 metres downhole, including 6 metres of 1,195 grams silver in a 120-meter step out to the northwest of the Yaxtché deposit’s current resource boundary, also from 334 metres depth.

The property remains underexplored, with less than 3% of its area covered by comprehensive exploration work.

El Quevar holds 2.93 million indicated tonnes grading 482 grams silver for contained metal of 45.3 million oz., according to a September 2024 resource. It also holds 310,000 inferred tonnes at 417 grams silver for contained metal of 4.1 million ounces.

Cusi

Hole UGCU26-08 at the past-producing mine cut 10 metres of 1,100 grams silver from 46 metres depth, including 0.7 metres of 6,350 grams silver from 52 metres downhole. The results are part of a 30,000-metre diamond drill program that’s focused on infill, expansion, and exploration at high potential targets across the property.

Argenta is looking to restart operations at Cusi in this year’s second half. The restart is supported by results from an April 2026 preliminary economic assessment that gave the project an after-tax NPV of US$104.1 million with an internal rate of return of 94.8% and a payback period of about 11 months. It would help Silverco to move closer to its goal of becoming a 10-million-oz. per year silver equivalent producer within three years