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Greatland Gold tumbles after Newmont backs out of Western Australian project
AIM-listed mineral exploration and development firm Greatland Gold was informed by the potential operator of its Ernest Giles project in Western Australia that it would not be going ahead with the project, an announcement that sent the group's shares into freefall early on Monday.
Newmont Exploration advised Greatland that its "current corporate priorities" were "largely focussed in other districts" and that consequently, it would not be pursuing the project "at this time".
However, a deep sensing geochemistry survey conducted by Newmont was successful in defining a new large gold anomaly untested by previous drilling that covered an area of approximately 5km by 1.5km.
Newmont's survey was also successful in identifying overall basement lithological trends and recognised a belt parallel alteration signature commonly associated with large-scale mineralised systems.
Greatland, which held a 100% stake in the project, said it was "well-financed to proceed with its alternative plans" for progressing with an exploration programme at the asset.
Gervaise Heddle, Greatland's chief executive officer, said, "The collaboration between Newmont and Greatland has successfully defined several additional gold anomalies, and we would like to thank Newmont for their efforts. The results of their survey have enhanced our understanding of the project and identified multiple new targets for further exploration work, reinforcing our view that the Ernest Giles project has the potential to host several multi-million-ounce gold deposits."
"We are well financed to actively progress exploration at Ernest Giles and look forward to reporting progress through the year," he concluded.
As of 0850 GMT, shares had crashed 62.96% to 0.800p.