Panther builds further momentum as gold, nickel markets strengthen

Panther plans to continue the success of 2022 – a year in which the junior achieved a great deal, with even more on the agenda planned for the new year as gold and nickel capture the market’s attention.

Panther Metals (ASX:PNT) has started 2023 they way they ended 2022 with plenty going on as it continues to build on the successes of last year.

News on the assays from diamond drilling at the Ironstone gold project are expected to roll in over the coming months, with MD and CEO Daniel Tuffin saying he also expects to finalise drill plans for 2023 next month.

Speaking further he said, “We’ve got additional untested walk-up targets to drill at Coglia with the potential to substantially increase the size of the existing nickel-cobalt resource, along with new areas targeting high-grade gold lode extensions at the Burtville East project.

“If that wasn’t exciting enough, 2023 will see Panther get started on exploration at our Red Flag nickel sulphide and 40 Mile Camp gold prospects. Both are currently untested, and both have the potential for huge upside as new discoveries.”

The company celebrated its first year as a publicly listed company last month reflecting on its multiple achievements that included a massive maiden resource discovery for Coglia and multiple bonanza-grade gold hits and new gold lodes discovered at Burtville East.

Tuffin said, “Timing, planning and a dash of luck is everything. The team worked extremely hard last year to get the drill bit spinning to make these discoveries and position Panther with runs on the board to take advantage of buoyant battery and precious metal prices.

“As a result, we’ve since banked away a nickel-cobalt resource that’s within the top 10 largest for juniors in Western Australia and have discovered new, shallow, high-grade gold lodes at Burtville East.”

2023 is looking like a better year for commodities, particularly gold and nickel.

After a year of ups and downs, nickel rang in the new year at over $US31,000 ($44,514) a tonne and although it has retraced some of those gains, the price of the high-demand battery metal is on its way up again and still well above where it was at the start of 2022.

Gold, meanwhile, is heading towards the $US2,000-an-ounce mark as market watchers predict the safe-haven metal will hit record highs above that point this year on expectations the US plans to back off on its aggressive interest rate hikes.

Quickly ticking the boxes

Panther spent 2022 swiftly carrying out exploration plans as outlined in their prospectus, with all signs pointing to another busy year ahead. While many explorers come to the ASX long before they’re even remotely close to drilling, Panther was ready to spin the drill bit from the minute it lit up the boards.

The company was prepared with an aggressive exploration plan in place to hit its first two years hard, including its first three primary targets of the Coglia nickel-cobalt project and the Burtville East and Ironstone gold projects, all located in the Tier 1 mining district of Laverton in the Western Australian gold fields.

First up on the agenda for 2023 will be the first batch of results of drilling at the Ironstone project in the first quarter of the year. Panther then plans to outline its next drill program at Coglia for the coming year.

Panther completed 1,200m of diamond drilling at Ironstone in the latter half of last year to test and verify historic mineralisation and modelling for the existing Main Lode, which has a peak historic gold intercept of 9m at 22.27 grams per tonne (g/t) gold, including 4m at 46.20g/t from 112m.

Just before the end of last year, Panther also uncovered new gold-rich zones at greater depths than previously seen at its Burtville East project.

This will give the explorer plenty to follow up this year, with Panther previously flagging its plan to test the extent of the gold mineralisation along strike and at depth at the project.

Ironstone and Burtville East are both part of the Merolia project, which spans 90sq.km of some of Laverton’s most prospective and underexplored ground, which includes the untested 2sq.km x 5sq.km 40 Mile Camp and historically nugget-rich Comet Well gold prospects.

This story was developed in collaboration with Panther Metals, a Stockhead advertiser at the time of publishing.

This story does not constitute financial product advice. You should consider obtaining independent advice before making any financial decisions.