Petratherm to fast-track Muckanippie titanium project after raising $8m
Petratherm (ASX: PTR) has received strong market backing for its plans to accelerate development of its Muckanippie titanium-heavy mineral sands (HMS) project in South Australia.
Existing and new investors including several funds and institutions have strongly supported a new capital raising that will add $8 million through a placement at an issue price of $0.22 per share.
Directors and management also committed to a total of $272,000, with director participation of $220,000 subject to shareholder approval.
Exploration plans
“We are extremely pleased with the strong support for the placement, which places Petratherm in a well-funded position to advance the exciting, potentially world-class Muckanippie project,” chief executive officer Peter Reid said.
Petratherm will use proceeds from the placement for exploration drilling operations at Muckanippie, advancing metallurgical test work and general working capital.
“The Rosewood prospect at Muckanippie has successfully demonstrated high-grade mineralisation over a continuous area of 15 square kilometres, which remains open for expansion in multiple directions.”
“We have also received excellent results from first-pass mineralogy and particle sizing, indicating the presence of high-value minerals with potential for conventional processing.”
Rapid Muckanippie progress
Petratherm has rapidly advanced Muckanippie over the past six months, with recent exploration identifying significant concentrations of titanium-rich HMS at Muckanippie.
In addition to titanium, the samples from Muckanippie have been found to be highly prospective for critical minerals including platinum group elements and vanadium.
Petratherm plans to begin Phase 2 drilling this month and will be rapidly pushing forward on all aspects of exploration and mineral and metallurgical analysis to continue advancing the project quickly.
Aircore drilling
The company also plans to resume aircore drilling, with a rig currently booked to commence a program of approximately 6,000 metres on 16 March.
Drilling operations will test extensions of the mineralisation, conduct infill drilling to better characterise the grade and thickness of the mineralisation at Rosewood and obtain bulk samples for metallurgical test work from Rosewood.
New titanium targets elsewhere on the Muckanippie project will also be tested.