Summit Minerals (ASX: SUM) jumps 27% on positive drilling results

Highlights:

• Summit Minerals Limited (ASX: SUM) saw an uptick in its share price on Wednesday morning.
• The company announced that it had obtained excellent results from its proof-of-concept drilling at the Stallion REE project.
• A stage 2 programme of works has received consent for further drilling to additionally expand on the intersected mineralisation at the Stallion REE project.

Battery mineral exploration company Summit Minerals Limited (ASX: SUM) saw an uptick in its share price by a whopping 26.923% and was trading at AU$0.165 on Wednesday, 8 March 2023, at 1:00 pm AEDT.

Let’s find out the driving factor behind SUM’s rise on ASX today.

On Wednesday, the company announced obtaining excellent results from its proof-of-concept drilling at the Stallion REE project. These results further validate and considerably enhance upon the past drilling activity results of Manhattan Corporation (ASX: MHC). The step-out drilling, primarily west of the palaeochannel, has defined a kilometre-square zone of potential REE mineralisation that stays open in all directions. 

The exceptional assay results are as follows:

1. STRC014: 23 metre @ 2,162.45 ppm TREO from 24 metre
2. STRC012: 15 metre @ 3,088.84 ppm TREO from 39 metre
3. STRC011: 17 metre @ 3,783.4 ppm TREO from 61 metre including 1 metre @ 1.52% TREO from 73 metre

Summit Minerals assay results review

The company’s drilling activity has defined a wide mineralised area of rare earth oxides, measuring 1km X 1.25 km. It has a thickness of roughly 18 metre and a grade of around 1,750ppm TREO (utilising a 450 ppm TREO cut-off).

The area stays open in all directions, with the intersected mineralisation offering a wide wedge that shallows westward away from palaeochannel in the direction of SUM’s nearby tenement application and thickens to the south. The clay-rich upper portions of the weathering profile, where IADs mainly form, are primarily nonexistent at Stallion.    

Stallion’s weak enrichment in phosphorous, uranium, thorium, scandium, iron, and aluminium accompany TREO enrichment. The tenor of the elements like uranium and thorium is trivial.

The critical permanent magnet metals like neodymium (Nd) and praseodymium (Pr), or NdPr, averages 23.63%. It is significantly above the industry average of around 16%. Also, Dysprosium (Dy) and terbium (Tb), or DyTb averages 1.32%. The combined ratio of the highest value critical magnet metals are as follows: NdPr, DyTb, +Sm, Gd and Ho, averages 29.68%.

Summit Minerals’ next steps

SUM will utilise the present coarse reject from the latest drilling work to carry out fast-tracked metallurgical and mineralogical programs to progress towards a geometallurgical model for Stallion. It will further use the existing POW-approved drilling to develop additional certainty and definition in the known zone as a precursor to progress its prospective initial resource.

Further, a stage 2 programme of works has received consent for further drilling to additionally expand on the intersected mineralisation at the Stallion REE project.