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DIGGERS & DEALERS PREVIEW

Tesoro’s darling

El Zorro

by Mark Andrews

xpecting the unexpected has been a theme many have
Ehad to run with in 2020 and the adjustments Tesoro
Resources Ltd has made are certainly favouring upside for
the company.
Original designs had a resource from the El Zorro gold
project, near Copiapo in Chile, being delivered by the
company by the end of this year.
However, the flawless strike rate of drilling is far exceeding
Tesoro’s expectations. Tesoro reports that drilling has doubled the size of the drilled
“Every drill hole drilled has delivered mineralisation; it looks mineralised footprint at El Zorro
like something special coming together. I can’t see us
stopping drilling from now until the end of the year and at
mineralisation continues in earnest with two diamond rigs
this stage everything keeps growing. Realistically, we are
operating 24/7 at Ternera.
going to stretch ourselves to release a resource this year
At the time of print, 26 holes for 6,910m had been completed
considering the size of what we have drilled to date,” Tesoro
with assays from 17 holes pending, while additional holes
managing director Zeff Reeves told GMJ.
are planned to further test the northern and southern extents
“We have tripled the footprint since the beginning of the year,
of Ternera as well as complete infill drilling for resource
and it will take some more time to drill it out. There is a step
definition.
change in the size of resource and something we aspire to
Reeves said results would determine whether to send more
is to change the economics of it as a mining operation and
rigs to site at El Zorro in Chile’s Region III, 10km from both
change the valuation of the company significantly. If there
the Pan American Highway and Pacific Ocean. A port at
was 500,000oz gold and we can easily see it becoming 1
Caldera is also 55km by road away.
moz we will continue pushing drilling.”
In addition to its 10,744ha at El Zorro, Tesoro has another
An intercept of 231m @ 0.83 g/t gold from 72m, including
400sq km of ground under application, while cash of $7
54m @ 1.69 g/t from 72m, 25m @ 3.36 g/t from 100m, 6.7m
million sees the company well-funded during what is a
@ 11.57 g/t from 118.3m, 24.3m @ 2.43 g/t from 193.3m,
modern-day gold boom.
13.26m @ 3.25 g/t from 204.34m, 3.66m @ 10.76 g/t from
204.34m and 15.9m @ 1.04 g/t from 248m confirmed the “We have seen some gold booms, but this seems like it is
large scale potential Tesoro is faced with at El Zorro. going to be fairly long winded. From our perspective we’ve
had some good luck and good management in terms of
Following that announcement, visible gold was reported
listing because we only just got the initial RTO transaction
over 61m of drill core within a wider zone of 117m “of strong
done at the beginning of the year and stepped straight into a
veining and sulphide mineralisation”, which is typical of the
big gold bull market,” Reeves said. “The De Grey’s [Mining
gold-bearing zone at the Ternera prospect.
Ltd] and Musgraves [Minerals Ltd] of the world are getting
The result –15m @ 0.68 g/t gold from 115m, including 1m
institutional support and that institutional money points to
@ 5.64 g/t from 126m – was from the northern step-out hole
their long-term view, which seems pretty positive at this
ZDDH00042 within the El Zorro tonalite.
stage. Between the emerging project that is El Zorro and the
Importantly, the step-out holes are proving Tesoro’s medium-term outlook for the gold price, it is going to be a
exploration model is on-song with gold mineralisation pretty exciting 6-12 months for us.”
correlating well to IP geophysical anomaly and remains
At the time of print, Tesoro was trading at 26c/share with a
open both to the north and south.
market cap of $121 million. The company started the year
Although mining may have existed at one time at El Zorro, at 3c/share.
Reeves believes the company is unearthing a totally new
Visit PaydirtTV on YouTube for more on Tesoro’s
gold style – intrusive-related gold (IRG) – for Chile.
Chilean campaign.
Identification of causes of the intrusion and subsequent
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