TLRS, IAUX, PYCMF
Looking anew at Eureka District Deposits
i-80 Gold Expands High-Grade Mineralization in the Hilltop Zones at Ruby Hill
The Ruby Hill a well known past producer that, under i-80 Gold, is finding more there...
I think I wasn't a huge fan of the spin out, from Premier, at the time (April 2021)... at around $2 then, has ranged from $1.50 to $3... Yahoo says earning $0.65 a share with PE 3.62... which seems it isn't enough to keep the machines running:
i-80 Convertible Debenture Private Placement Upsized to US$65 Million on Strong Demand
At Ruby Hill, though, they're finding:
Feb 23: i-80 Gold Expands High-Grade Mineralization in the Hilltop Zones at Ruby Hill
Feb 8: i-80 Gold Intersects 12.3 g/t Au Over 10.7 m in New Target at Ruby Hill
More interesting here, in context:
Feb 21: i-80 Gold Announces Ruby Hill Technical Teach-In
The presentation will highlight the multiple new discoveries that have been made on the Property since mid-2022 including the Upper and Lower Hilltop Zones which host highlight intercepts of up to 515.3 g/t Ag, 28.9 % Pb, 10.5 % Zn & 0.9 g/t Au over 28.3 m in hole iRH22-43 (Upper Hilltop). It will also detail the significance of the skarn and CRD mineralization, recently discovered in the East Hilltop Zone as well as the Carlin-type gold mineralization intersected in the 428 Zone target.
So, after long neglect, it appears the Eureka District as a whole is on track for some serious effort in expanding the understanding of what's there, and where it came from... and where else it might be useful to spend some time and $ looking...
I've been following Timberline here on SI for a long time... through its various ups and downs...
It's long been obvious that the Eureka Project property they control is a gem... or that, at least, somewhere within it, it is likely that it contains a gem or two. But, its been enormously frustrating watching them avoiding doing the things that seem most obvious in looking for it... repeatedly... over and over... ad infinitum... They've always assiduously avoided looking at those spots where there are known outcrops of high grade... rolling their eyes if you suggest it worth a few holes to test it and perhaps find out what it is and where it came from...
With less than inspiring successes... loss of confidence became a lack of funding, a reverse split, multiple management changes, convertible note financing... and a once spectacular list of projects in the portfolio, now down to only three... but, at least, that short list still includes the far too long ignored Seven Troughs.
Still, the crew they have are experienced and competent enough in the small picture stuff, and survived for a while, recently, doing work for others, as they landed a then mysterious job doing the field work for someone (Barrick), at what is now TLRS's Paiute project: "Timberline explores the property as the operator of an earn-in Joint Venture (JV) agreement with a subsidiary of Barrick Gold. Currently, Timberline owns approximately 75% of the project". But, that, was really reconnaissance work being done by the major, both "on the cheap" and "on the down low" by tasking it to TLRS, while less hoping to "find the big one" than to better understand the regional geology and its fault related offsets relative to the bigger deposits known just across the way at the north end of the trend... so, probably, testing out theories in a pet project of Quinton Hennigh's and his speculations about that...
That work looked like it was finally set to pay off and change things for TLRS , recently... after Quinton Hennigh (et al) took control of the company, and redirected their efforts back into "start with the basics, work on understanding the big picture"... and finally got TLRS to quit plinking at and expanding known low grade deposits... and re-focused them on understanding structure, structural controls, and deposit origins. But, then, after a burst or two of excitement, Hennigh left to join Crescat... in August of 2021. But, he succeeded in getting them to shift focus, if not in getting them to sustain his own intensity in focus.
Around the same time as that change of focus occurred... another operator moved in up to their north, and started making a bit of noise re "likely connected up to" and poking at the same "new potential" as was being "suggested as possible" if not outlined by TLRS, then. That effort looks now like its recently morphed through acquisition to become a subsidiary and the core project of PYCMF - Paycore Minerals who have an impressive team, have just raised a bit of money... and are going to drill a few holes in a second round effort...
When they started, I figured they were a group of amateurs planning on staking around what TLRS's shift in focus was showing, hoping to ride TLRS's coattails, on the chance TLRS were to succeed in proving up something interesting. But, now, its pretty clearly the opposite... as others seem they are learning more, faster, from TLRS's efforts than TLRS has... Now looks far more likely that TLRS is about to be outclassed in "finding" what's been there all along in their own backyard... only after they let others sneak in and take positions ? But, at least... TLRS finally stepping up now to play "me too"... hoping to ride their coattails, now, instead ? Only, we know well enough from experience what TLRS means when saying, about this "NEW" target (with a long known history in high grade)... that they "plan to aggressively explore."
Worth noting, too, that the money Paycore just raised to fund a second round drilling effort... is a couple of million more than the market cap of TLRS.
That their property package isn't green fields, either, but... a known... with prior work done by Hecla, ownership passing to Homestake, and then Barrick (again) who appear to have spun it out into Paycore... perhaps only after the addition extending claims to the south ? Their first effort has proven "more" of what they already knew was there... in the northern portion.
PAYCORE MINERALS INTERSECTS 27.4 METERS OF 10% ZINC, 1% LEAD, 79 g/t SILVER and 8.0 g/t GOLD, INCLUDING 13 METERS OF 16% ZINC, 1% LEAD, 110 g/t SILVER and 11.1 g/t GOLD FROM THE POLY-METALLIC FAD PROJECT
Not at all certain, from that, that there is immediate hope for TLRS that is justified based on that "known" in Paycore's FAD... but, the PR on that prior work expanding that "known" notes, cryptically, that there are other high grade holes that occurred too far outside the resource being developed to include reporting them, and: "Upcoming drill programs will also target the under-explored Jackson Fault where i-80 Gold made their recent discovery of high grade CRD at their Hilltop Project". It being the Jackson Fault, rather than the Ruby Hill, that extends south and connects the historically successful projects to the north into the potential in the "near" brownfield, historically interesting, and "moose pasture" parts of TLRS's huge Eureka Project ground. Plus... need to poke at any of that "similar" in any potential offset faults, like that displacement you see occurring along the Ruby Hill Fault.
So, while its not remotely close to how (or, when) you'd like to have seen it happen... perhaps, now, if Paycore and i-80 can do the work in developing the geological picture that TLRS has not... and link that picture in to locating the probable occurrence of CRD, and Carlin-type rocks... which TLRS's own drilling has already been finding bits of...perhaps TLRS is finally on the verge of succeeding "big" at Eureka... even if only in spite of themselves... ?
And, at $0.10 now... even without any of that "new" potential becoming more real... even only as a function of the timing in relation to the cycle, if all TLRS did was 'more of the same" ?
Probably not the most enthusiastic update I've ever done... but, I've always been a fan of their rocks... if not the other aspects... which.. are hardly unique in the shallow end of the junior mining pool... which currently has TLRS suffering a bit in comparison with the new neighbors deep pocketed approach...
More potential leverage in TLRS... along with more risk... if not so much in price risk, from here.
But, the market cap... also means a risk that "finding"... might not let you hold on for the big ride that long ?
Who owns TLRS, now ? How much is Barrick... related associates... or others who might sell you out rather than preserve your ownership interest... if there were a success ? For now, at TLRS, those are still the sorts of problems you only wish you had...
If I'm right... that we're at or "nearing" a bottom in the miners... "soon" ?
Could likely do worse than snagging a few here... |
