Collective make Olympus Deeps discovery
Another pophyry discovery as exploration drilling continues
Collective Mining has discovered a new gold system named Olympus Deeps at its Guayabales gold-copper project in Caldas, Colombia, interpreted to be the initial intercept into a gold-related brecciated porphyry intrusion system located about 500m from its flagship Apollo porphyry system.
A directional drill hole returned 202.35m grading 2.16gpt gold equivalent at the end of a 958.35m directional drill hole, which was preceded by 497.35m grading 1.8gpt in the Apollo system, the original target for the hole. The Olympus Deeps discovery has grown the Olympus target area to 600m by 400m by more than 1km vertical.
"Once we exited Apollo, we stayed in favourable rocks and decided to continue the hole. After almost 200m of a dead zone, we went into another porphyry unit, which we're calling Olympus Deeps. [The intercept] was almost all gold, it doesn't have copper like at Apollo, and the silver was very low. The mineralisation is quite different than what we see at Apollo, with about four times the amount of molybdenum. We are going to get back and start drilling Olympus, which we haven't done since 2022," executive chair Ari Sussman told Mining Journal.
Collective believes the Olympus target is similar to the multi-million-ounce Marmato mine 2.5km to the southeast, which spans more than a vertical kilometre. "Marmato has an upper-level sheeted vein system with a deeper gold-rich porphyry below. We are with something similar although geologically our porphyry is different and at a different elevation, but it is an upper-level sheeted vein system with a porphyry below," said Sussman.
Collective plans to dedicate more of its 40,000m drilling budget this year to further define Olympus Deeps, and continues to drill at its recent Trap discovery, some 3.5km away, with the next round of results due in March.
"With ongoing exploration success and discoveries supportive of NAV (net asset value) accretion through the drill bit, we highlight the Olympus Deeps and recently announced Trap discovery remain unaccounted for in our valuation, therefore presenting upside and optionality to our base case outlook for the project," said PI Financial analyst Phil Ker in a research note. Ker has a BUY rating with a C$8.30 target price on Collective.
Shares in Collective Mining opened 6% higher at C$4.15, valuing the company at C$252 million.
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