Highlights

• Cooper Metals kicked off the year 2023 with identification of a compelling Cu-Au drill target on its new Ardmore tenement.
• The company focussed on field work at the Ardmore tenement at its Mt Isa East Project during the March 2023 quarter.
• During the quarter, the company was granted a huge tenement EPM28087 situated 2km to the northeast of CPM’s existing tenure.
• Cooper inked a Binding Term Sheet to acquire tenement E59/2584 from DiscovEx Resources, expanding the Gooroo Project within the Gullewa Greenstone Belt. 

ASX-listed explorer Cooper Metals Limited  (ASX:CPM) has been engaged in exploring copper and gold in proven mineralised provinces, which have not been explored or remain underexplored. Also, its focus areas are based in proximity to key infrastructure, allowing CPM to build on a great discovery opportunity and establish a profitable business.

The ongoing year started with identification of a compelling copper-gold drill target on its new Ardmore tenement. Moving ahead, CPM completed the March quarter with some significant developments at project locations.

In this article, we will have a look at the company’s journey through the March quarter into the June quarter building its pipeline of quality copper-gold targets at Mt Isa East.

Mt Isa East Cu-Au Project

At CPM’s flagship Mt Isa East Cu-Au Project, the company focussed on field work at the Ardmore tenement just north of Carnaby Resources (ASX:CNB) Mt Hope deposit during the quarter. Work included mapping, sampling and an induced polarisation survey.

Many anomalous rock chip samples with grades up to 26.2% Cu and 2.0g/t Au (MER107) and 14.9g/t Au (MER168) were returned from rock chip sampling along two shear zones within the prospective Corella Formation in the southern part of EPM19125.

The company has received assays for 39 rock chips, which highlight that Cu grades are typically high with the Cu mineralisation malachite in two subparallel shear zones within the Corella Formation and associated with strong quartz carbonate and iron oxide alteration typical of iron oxide copper-gold (IOCG) mineralisation in the area. The mineralised shear zones have been traced for over 1.1km along strike.

Image source: CPM website

Results for the southern grid reflect a major chargeability feature on the eastern side of the grid. The north-eastern portion of the grid holds the strongest part of the IP anomaly which is ~500m long with a peak chargeability of 22mV/V, or around 5x background. These samples MER115 and MER116 contain Cu and Au including, 21.9% Cu & 1.1g/t Au (MER116) and 21.3% Cu & 0.5g/t Au (MER115).

New Tenement EPM28087

During the March 2023 quarter, the company was granted a huge tenement EPM28087 situated 2km to the northeast of CPM’s existing tenure.

Notably, EPM28087 covers part of the Mary Kathleen Domain, a highly prospective structural Domain for Cu-Au deposits.

Also, the company has been granted AU$137,500 under a Collaborative Exploration Initiative (CEI) to acquire detailed Versatile Time Domain electromagnetic (VTEM) data on the new tenement.

Gooroo Copper-Gold Project WA
During the quarter, the company received the results of 100m infill soil sampling, which identified five gold anomalies in potentially favourable structural trap sites such as the nose of the Gullewa syncline and significant regional faults traversing the greenstone belt, known to be important for the formation of gold deposits elsewhere in the belt. Encouragingly gold (Au) assays up to 24.7ppb Au were returned from infill sampling,

Also, Cooper inked a Binding Term Sheet (BTS) to acquire tenement E59/2584 from DiscovEx Resources (DiscovEx) (ASX:DCX), expanding the Gooroo Project within the highly prospective Gullewa Greenstone Belt. The company has begun an aeromagnetic survey over part of the Gooroo tenure to define the geological model for drill targeting.

Image source: CPM presentation

 A look at June quarter developments

The June Quarter has the potential to be transformational for Cooper Metals, says the company.

In May, CPM commenced a drilling campaign at the Ardmore South prospect to test geophysical as well as geochemical targets. Also, the company has initiated a Versatile Time-Domain Electromagnetic (VTEM) airborne survey over the tenement EPM28087 (Barbara East) of the Mt Isa Project, to test the site for new Cu-Au targets.

Stock price information  

The company shares were trading more than 8% higher on the Australian Securities Exchange (ASX) at AU$0.265, on 30 May 2023. Also, the stock has soared by over 8% on a year-to-date basis.