Latest news with #BrokenHillMines
News.com.au
21-07-2025
- Business
- News.com.au
Resources Top 5: Broken Hill Mines debut sees 120-year-old mining operation back on the ASX
BHM has the drill spinning in a bid to increase silver, lead and zinc resources at the Pinnacles mine What could be a very significant Channel Iron Deposit discovery has been made by PGD AIV has declared a maiden inferred resource of 8.5Mt at 1.13g/t gold for 310,000 ounces at Mt Hogan deposit Your standout small cap resources stocks for Monday, July 21, 2025 Broken Hill Mines (ASX:BHM) After 120 years of mining silver, lead and zinc, and being the birthplace of mining giant BHP, Broken Hill is again directly represented on the stock exchange after producer and explorer Broken Hill Mines made its debut. And it turned heads, opening at 47.5c and reaching 51.5c in early trade, a 454% increase on the previous close of predecessor Coolabah Metals with more than 8m shares exchanged. BHM has quickly got to work, with the drill spinning in a bid to increase silver, lead and zinc resources at the Pinnacles mine west of the mining stronghold of Broken Hill and its existing Rasp underground mine. A 4000m program is aimed at growing the size and grade of its current 6Mt resource at the Pinnacles, which runs at an impressive 10.9% ZnEq. As well as 4.7% zinc, the resource includes 153g/t silver, 3.3% lead and 0.5g/t gold. BHM also has another 3000m of earlier drill core from Pinnacles in the queue for assays, with first results expected in the next month or so. This new drilling follows results released earlier this year including 8.9m at 927g/t Ag, 12.2% Pb and 1.3% Zn from 11 metres. Broken Hill Mines (ASX:BHM) listed on the ASX after a reverse takeover of Coolabah Metals, which consolidated two of three mining companies that control the silver, lead and zinc operations at Broken Hill. The reverse float included the injection of $20m in fresh capital from investors. While Pinnacles is set to play a role in future growth, the Rasp underground mine with access and surface facilities on the town's Line of Lode is the flagship. The mine produces around 25,000tpa of zinc equivalent metal, but there are plenty of opportunities to improve the outlook. Despite the Rasp plant's 750,000tpa capacity, the project has been campaign milled since 2020 and ore feed grades are around 6% ZnEq. 'We bought an operating mine, a going concern, we've got 120 staff on day one and a hungry plant,' executive chairman Patrick Walta told Stockhead recently. 'The whole philosophy is about utilisation of sunk capital. We have this beautiful plant that's really had 500 million bucks spent on it over the years and it's only about 12 years old. ' It is only fed by one orebody and it's a relatively low-grade ore body by Broken Hill standards.' That source – Western Mineralisation – runs at around 8.2% ZnEq, including 4.8% zinc, 3.1% lead and 38g/t silver. Yet the Main Lode grades 17.7% ZnEq, including 870,000t of ore at 7.8% zinc, 7.6% lead and 151.7g/t silver. Walta said the mine made $20 million in operating cashflow last year with a plant running at around 40% of total capacity. When the Main Lode is online it will introduce not just more ore but ore running at 2.5x the grade. Peregrine Gold (ASX:PGD) While chasing gold in the Pilbara region of WA, Peregrine Gold has made what could be a very significant Channel Iron Deposit discovery just 2km from BHP's Western Ridge asset, close to the town of Newman. This has seen securities increase 70.28% to a 12-month high of 31.5c. Stream sediment sampling followed by further sampling and mapping by Peregrine geologists has resulted in the CID being mapped over a total strike length of 6.4km and widths of up to 200m with a further 1.3km of strike interpreted in magnetics. Peregrine Gold (ASX:PGD) believes the discovery was missed by previous exploration programs and GSWA mapping due to its low topographical position. Historical CID work focused on the mesas in the area to the northeast but PGD said the recent discovery represented a better preserved and far larger scale CID system than historical mesa-style CIDs and could represent a 'Valley Type' system. Geochemical data of the CID samples has shown the material is of a consistently high grade – peaking above 61% Fe – with all CID samples taken averaging ~57% Fe. Levels of deleterious elements are also low and considered within the parameters for high quality iron ore deposits. It is anticipated that subject to drill testing, the depth of the CID channel may be substantially thicker in the central parts of the channel which are up to 200m wide. Recent corporate movements have drawn attention to CZR Resources' (ASX:CZR) sale of its 85% holding in the Robe River Mesa Channel Iron Deposit for ~$75m. Positioned next to Rio Tinto's Robe Valley operations and near major infrastructure, Peregrine believes Robe Mesa provides a useful point of reference. Early indications suggest Peregrine's CID discovery has a scale that compares favourably to Robe Mesa. 'Our objective moving forward will be to advance the Coopers CID prospect as quickly as possible,' PGD technical director George Merhi said. ActivEX (ASX:AIV) A maiden JORC-compliant inferred resource of 8.5Mt at 1.13g/t gold for 310,000oz at Mt Hogan deposit resulted in ActivEX (ASX:AIV) soaring to a two-year high of 3.2c, a staggering 358% increase on the pre-trading halt close. The historic Mt Hogan mine forms part of the Gilberton gold joint venture with Gilberton Gold Pty Ltd. The project is in northeast Queensland, about 300km from Townsville. 'The journey towards our maiden gold resource commenced in 2022 when the company made the decision to focus exploration efforts in the vicinity of the Mt Hogan gold mine,' AIV MD Mark Derriman said. 'Three phases of RC/core drilling culminated with the most recent RC drilling program in November 2023. 'Incoming JV partner Gilberton Gold Pty Ltd have been crucial to funding the project and will take over management of operations going forward with the next round of drilling planned to commence late in Q3 2025 and will comprise both RC and core drilling.' Caprice Resources (ASX:CRS) An 11m intersection grading 17.3g/t gold from 170m at Vadrian's deposit of the Island gold project in WA's Murchison region has seen Caprice Resources (ASX:CRS) lift 37.5% to 6.6c with more than 45m shares changing hands. As well as this being the company's best intercept to date at Vadrian's, the first batch of assays from phase 3 drilling confirmed the recent discovery of the Evening Star high-grade lode. Other results include 10m at 11.7g/t Au from 175m and 9m at 8.3g/t from 94m. These have doubled the strike of the high-grade system to at least 350m and extended mineralisation at depth where it remains open in multiple directions. Drilling to follow-up the strike extent and grade potential of historical anomalous gold mineralisation about 80m west of the main New Orient lode has also returned notable intersections such as 21m at 1.3g/t gold from 29m. Tivan (ASX:TVN) A second collaboration between Tivan (ASX:TVN) and Sumitomo Corporation covering TVN's Australian fluorite projects has seen shares increase 31% to 11c. The leading Japanese trading house and Fortune Global 500 company has signed agreements for the Sandover Fluorite Project in the NT and Speewah Fluorite Project in WA. An MoU for Sandover, a high-grade fluorite project acquired by Tivan in November 2024, will see the companies discuss the collaborative development, financing and operation of the project to be formalised through negotiating commercial agreements following delivery of a pre-feasibility study. Tivan is working to define a deposit supportive of fluorite mining and processing at Sandover, focused on an expedited pathway to produce metspar and a traditional acid-grade fluorspar production pathway. At Speewah the parties have established an incorporated joint venture, including Japan Fluorite Corporation (JFC), a special purpose subsidiary incorporated by Sumitomo, making an initial $5.3m equity investment for a 7.5% interest. In parallel, Sumitomo has agreed to the Japan Organization for Metals and Energy Security (JOGMEC) becoming a partner in Speewah through acquiring a 49% equity interest in JFC. This article does not constitute financial product advice. You should consider obtaining independent financial advice before making any financial decisions. While Broken Hill Mines, Peregrine Gold and Caprice Resources are Stockhead advertisers, they did not sponsor this article.
News.com.au
21-07-2025
- Business
- News.com.au
Break it Down: Broken Hill Mines quick to move after ASX debut
Stockhead's Break it Down brings you today's leading market news in under 90 seconds. In this episode, host Tylah Tully looks at the latest from Broken Hill Mines (ASX:BHM), which has made its ASX debut and hit the ground running with exploration at Pinnacles West, targeting silver, lead and zinc. Watch the video to learn more. While Broken Hill Mines is a Stockhead advertiser, it did not sponsor this content. Originally published as Break it Down: Broken Hill Mines quick to move after ASX debut
News.com.au
10-06-2025
- Business
- News.com.au
Broken Hill is being put back on the map by this emerging miner
Broken Hill Mines is planning a listing next month via a reverse takeover of Coolabah Metals It will bring the asset on which BHP was founded back to Australian retail investors for the first time in decades BHM head honcho Partick Walta says Broken Hill has years of life still in it On September 5, 1883, a German-born boundary rider known as Charles Rasp pegged the first block on what became known as the Broken Hill. Originally thought to be a mountain of tin, the intuition of the enterprising Kraut finally crystallised into revelation with the discovery of a rich vein of silver two years later. The result was the formation of BHP (ASX:BHP), now the world's richest mining company after trading in its New South Wales roots for iron ore in the Pilbara and copper in Chile. Yet what became of that original line of lode? It may surprise many investors to know it continues to be tapped to this day at the aptly named Rasp mine. But the project has been hidden in the bowels of Japanese zinc refiner Toho Zinc since 2010. As Toho sought to exit the Aussie mining business, with the 200 miners still working the operation facing the bread line, a white knight emerged. The reimagined Broken Hill Mines, led by Patrick Walta – a metallurgist who almost a decade ago breathed new life into the Century zinc mine in Queensland – acquired the distressed assets in October 2024. It plans to relist through the shell of Coolabah Metals in a reverse float that will include the injection of $15-20 million in fresh capital from investors. Following the launch of a replacement prospectus last Monday chasing that quantum at 35c per share, Walta says the miner has been swamped with interest. Much of it has come from investors drawn to the romance of Broken Hill. " It's pretty cool being able to say you're operating the mine that started BHP. We've literally got the first shaft that was sunk," Walta told Stockhead after the launch of the replacement prospectus this month. " Every single person you talk to says, 'my granddad worked there', or 'my auntie or my uncle was associated with Broken Hill'. " Everyone in the mining community has a history with Broken Hill. "It's such a revered mining town, and the mines there are so well known." The other major producer in the region is the Broken Hill operations mined by Chinese-owned Perilya. " Broken Hill as an orebody has been effectively owned by private Asian interests for a good couple of decades," Walta said. "And there's a lot of patriotism there where they see this as really a story of national significance as much as anything else, about Broken Hill getting back into Aussie hands, being publicly listed, being transparent." Multi-generational Broken Hill has many of the hallmarks of other great mining hubs that have been consolidated by Australian miners in recent decades. The Super Pit at one point had a potential three years in front of it under North American majors Newmont Corporation (ASX:NEM) and Barrick before its acquisition by Northern Star Resources (ASX:NST). Now they are talking about Kalgoorlie's Golden Mile running well beyond the lifespan of anyone prospecting its workings. Cobar's CSA copper mine is heading back into international hands, being acquired by Harmony Gold in a $1.6bn deal after MAC Copper (ASX:MAC) pried it from the labyrinthine portfolio of Glencore. Now BHM is looking revitalise an underinvested asset by not just keeping the operations going but consolidating some of the key deposits around the region. "People are able to actually see what's going on there and it's drawing people back to the town as well," Walta said. "They're not seeing it as a mine that's about to shut down, they're seeing as a potential generational asset that can run for multiple decades. "There's a great saying in Broken Hill that the Broken Hill orebody has had an eight-year mine life since 1885," he added. "It's one of those classic, super orebodies where you keep drilling it, you keep investing, you keep giving it the love and it keeps returning." " The orebody currently stands (historically) at 300 million tonnes at 15% zinc and lead and 300g/t silver. " When Charles Rasp came across it as a rocky outcrop in 1883, it obviously wasn't a 300 million tonne orebody. " So it's had consistent discovery and growth over that 140-year life and there's no reason why that doesn't continue on." Scaling up Currently, the mine produces in the order of 25,000tpa of zinc equivalent metal. But it doesn't take long to figure out that there's plenty of opportunities to improve the outlook. Despite the Rasp plant's 750,000tpa capacity, the project has been campaign milled since 2020 and ore feed grades are currently around 6% ZnEq. There are immediate opportunities to upgrade that. "We bought an operating mine, a going concern, we've got 120 staff on day one and a hungry plant," Walta said. "The whole philosophy here is about utilisation of sunk capital. We have this beautiful plant that's really had 500 million bucks spent on it over the years and it's only about 12 years old. " It is only fed by one orebody and it's a relatively low-grade ore body by Broken Hill standards." That ore source – Western Mineralisation – runs at around 8.2% ZnEq, including 4.8% zinc, 3.1% lead and 38g/t silver. Yet the Main Lode grades an impressive 17.7% ZnEq, including some 870,000t of ore at 7.8% zinc, 7.6% lead and 151.7g/t silver. Walta says the mine still made $20 million in operating cashflow last year with a plant running at around 40% of its total capacity. When the Main Lode comes online it will introduce not just more ore, but ore running at 2.5x the grade. Not resting on its laurels, BHM has also struck a deal to share 70% of the profits by exploring and developing the Pinnacles mine some 15km to the southwest. Pinnacles is a true artefact, one of the last major operations in Australia to be run by a local family. First pegged in 1884, the Williams clan has mined the deposit since 1954, aided by a 30,000tpa processing plant. It hosts close to 6Mt of ore in its open pit and underground deposits at a 10.88% ZnEq grade. Drilling is expected to take place over the next two years to bring the mine up to commercial standards before tapping the rich stuff underground in 2027, though an open pit could be expanded to complement production from Rasp before then. "What they've done is nothing short of amazing. They've built up their own operation just through the sweat off their own back," Walta said. " They have a 40m deep open pit, four underground levels down to about 100m. They built their own processing plant. " No engineers, no consultants. This is hand-built stuff. It's very small by corporate standards, it's about 30,000 tonnes per annum. " We've managed to team up with the Williams family, we've got a 70-30 profit share JV over the Pinnacles mine with them, so ultimately we want to get Pinnacles back up and running." Opportunity beckons The company is aiming to return to listing under its new name next month, with demand for the IPO said to have run as much as three times the available shares on offer. Once listed the market cap will run at a pro forma $89-94 million. That's potentially bargain barrel material when similar base metals producers are taken into account. Polymetals Resources (ASX:POL), for instance, which is in the process of commissioning the Endeavor silver and zinc near Cobar has run ~150% higher over the past year to a market cap of ~$210m. Endeavor is an interesting comparison to Broken Hill, being the other NSW mine Toho Zinc acquired in its 2010 takeover of CBH Resources. "When you look at our value proposition, we're at $95m as a comp, Poly's at $200m, Aurelia Metals (ASX:AMI) is at $500, Develop Global's (ASX:DVP) at $1bn. "They've all got very good reasons why they're at those levels. (But) you don't have to do a lot more research to go, there's a bit of value here. "And we deliberately priced it that way. We wanted early stage investors to capture value and we obviously want it to perform well." There's a lot to like in the company's markets as well. Silver recently broke the back of long-term resistance at US$35/oz and is now worth US$36.50/oz, powered by investment demand and close to five years of deficits due to stagnant mine supply and its increasing use in solar panels. Zinc and lead may not have accelerated like copper, lithium, cobalt and rare earths did during the battery metals boom. But they remain large stable markets trading at levels that offer solid and predictable returns for operators of BHM's scale. Walta says the mix of industrial and precious metals also means the mine naturally hedges against different market conditions. "Zinc is a 70 or 80 billion dollar a year industry, lead's a 60 billion dollar a year industry," he said. " These are established industries of commodities that are essentially part of the makeup of every single person's life every day."
ABC News
24-04-2025
- Business
- ABC News
High-grade silver, lead and zinc found at Pinnacles Mine near Broken Hill
A partnership between a Broken Hill family and an Australian mining company is attempting to re-inject life into an old mine. Recent sampling has shown mineral deposits 15 kilometres outside Broken Hill that could potentially support a new open cut or underground development. Drilling results released last month from the 140-year-old Pinnacles Mine showed high grade deposits of silver, lead and zinc close to the surface. Coolabah Metals — soon to be renamed Broken Hill Mines Limited after becoming publicly listed — took 27 samples to be lab tested to determine the levels of metal in the soil. Drilling samples were showcased to analysts and potential investors last month. ( ABC Broken Hill: Bill Ormonde ) Independent testing Pinnacles Mine has been privately owned by Craig Williams and his family since 1952. Last year, Broken Hill Mines and the Williams family entered into a 70/30 profit share agreement. Broken Hill Mines head of corporate sustainability Shane Goodwin said before the agreement, not all of the material from the mine was tested independently. "The minute we get results back from the lab now, because we are going to be publicly listed, that material must be released to the public," he said. "So that work involves doing quality assurance and quality control on the drilling that the Williams family has done at Pinnacles to date, sending [material] off to a lab, patiently awaiting results from the lab, and then being able to publish these exciting results. "What this data indicates to us is that there is an opportunity for us to do further drilling and so get a better understanding of the possibilities out at Pinnacles and to expand that resource going forward." Patrick Walta is the chairperson of Broken Hill Mines. ( ABC Broken Hill: Bill Ormonde ) Strong mining potential Resources analyst Gavin Wendt said the results showed the mineralisation was close enough to the surface to be extracted at a "very cheap, low cost". "That's the fundamental positive in it all," he said. " The grades are very, very good, so when you put mineralisation that's near the surface, is fairly consistent, and is also of good grade, that ticks all of the boxes that you want in terms of commerciality. " Mr Wendt believes there will be a lot of re-investment in exploration, which has been the key thing missing at Pinnacles until now. "We don't really know how big this thing [the ore deposit] is going to get and how long it might continue as a fully functioning mine," he said. "I think we're only scraping the surface, literally, so it will be very exciting for the company to get their teeth into some serious exploration work."
