TSX Venture Exchange falls, Apr. 18-22

The S&P/TSX Venture Composite Index tumbled by 51.58 points or 5.8% over the Apr. 18-22 trading session to end at 836.63. 

The week’s most actively traded stock was Alphamin Resources, which advanced 24¢ or 21.2% to end at $1.37 per share, on trading volume of 22.1 million shares. The company operates the world’s highest-grade tin mine, Mpapa North, in the Democratic Republic of the Congo’s North Kivu province. The company reported tin production of 3,061 tonnes in its most recent quarter, and an estimated EBIDTA of US$98 million – up 32% from the previous quarter. Average run-of-mine grades at Mpapa North are 4.5% tin.

At the end of March, Alphamin released an updated resource for its Mpapa South tin deposit, and announced it would go ahead with development at a cost of US$116 million. First production from Mpapa South, which contains 850,000 tonnes grading 2.55% tin for 21,500 tonnes in the indicated category and 3.4 million tonnes at 2.45% tin for 83,700 tonnes in the inferred category, is expected at the end of 2023. Alphamin expects the project to increase its production by 65% to 20,000 tonnes of tin per year. 

York Harbour Metals, which is exploring its copper-zinc project of the same name in Newfoundland, climbed 41¢, or 39% higher, to end the week at $1.46 per share. The company reported it had completed 28 holes totalling 4,980 metres as part of phase 3 drilling at its project. The latest drill campaign is meant to infill drill the Main Mine Zone and expand its 400-metre strike length. Based on visually observed VMS mineralization in the drillcore, the company believes the drilling will confirm earlier results that encountered multiple zones of copper and zinc-rich mineralization with attendant silver and cobalt in the Main Mine area, and extend mineralization. Assays for the have not yet been reported, with York Harbour noting long wait times at assay labs. Assays from previous drilling have returned highlights including 25 metres of 2.7% copper, 9% zinc, 164 grams cobalt per tonne, 17.8 grams silver and 0.2 gram gold from 93 metres depth in hole YH21-18.

Shares in Nevada Sunrise Gold closed at 12¢, up 5¢ or 71.4% for the week on drill results from its inaugural two-hole drilling program at its Gemini lithium project in Nevada. Highlights of the drilling, which began last month, included 61 metres grading 950.57 parts per million (ppm) lithium starting from 97.6 metres depth in drillhole GEM22-01; and 39.6 metres grading 775.9 ppm lithium starting from 118.9 metres. Gemini, which the company acquired in 2015, is located in the Lida Valley basin in Esmeralda County, about 10 km east of the town of Lida. “This initial result represents a new discovery of lithium-bearing sediments in the western Lida Valley, which has not been historically drill tested for lithium mineralization,” the company said in a release.