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ReGIonAL RoUnDUP

Gloves off, Xanadu punches on

at Kharmagtai

or the first time in a decade the Tier 1 work Hill and Copper Hill,” Moorhead said. out return.
Fcopper-gold porphyry potential at Khar- An interim resource of 600mt contain- Strong support for the placement indi-
magtai, one-hour drive from Oyu Tolgoi, ing 1.9mt copper and 4.3 moz gold (2.6mt cates an acceptance of the reset Xanadu
Mongolia, could be given a fighting chance copper equivalent), including shallow, high- has embarked on, which has included
of being fully realised. grade mineralisation of 54mt @ 0.86% cop- Stewart moving back to Australia from
Kharmagtai is the flagship asset of per equivalent for 317,000t copper and 1.13 Mongolia and culminated with the newly
Xanadu Mines Ltd, which had pivoted moz gold is the base at Kharmagtai ahead developed chief operating officer role for
towards bringing a low-cost, high-value of upcoming exploration and resource drill- Munkhsaikhan Dambiinyam in-country and
small oxide gold development into fruition ing. the appointment of chief financial officer
by capitalising on the gold cap identified at “For us it is about getting back to drill- Spencer Cole mid-year.
Stockwork Hill. ing and progressing to that next resource. Xanadu’s executive team is vastly differ-
The company has come to understand We will start a very aggressive 3-4 rig ent to last year, with the crew of Stewart,
that while there is oxide gold at Kharmagtai, programme soon. We get to really take Cole, Dambiinyam, Ganbayar Lkhagvas-
it is supergene in nature and therefore “this the gloves off with the project and give it uren (executive director) and Mat Brown
limits the potential size of the oxide gold de- the drilling it deserves; it has had that stop (chief geologist) eager to embrace the fu-
posits there, with only small oc-
currences identified to date”.
A desktop study is underway
to determine the oxide gold
possibilities at Kharmagtai, but
meanwhile Xanadu has revert-
ed to demonstrating the project
could be regarded in the same
class as Oyu Tolgoi and Cadia
Valley, New South Wales.
“Kharmagtai is a large and
complex, gold-rich porphyry
copper system that bears all the
hallmarks of a potential Tier 1
asset, with many similarities to
giant deposits such as Oyu Tol-
goi in Mongolia and Cadia Valley
operations in New South Wales,”
Xanadu non-executive chairman
Colin Moorhead told sharehold-
ers at the company’s AGM in late
July.
Shortly after starting as chair-
man of Xanadu in November,
Moorhead accompanied chief
executive Andy Stewart to see
Kharmagtai, South Gobi, first- Unlike some porphyry systems which have an epithermal gold cap,
hand. the gold at Kharmagtai identified to date is supergene in nature
After seven years managing
global exploration and resource develop- start progress ever since Ivanhoe [Mines ture at Kharmagtai starting in an environ-
ment for Newcrest Mining Ltd (2008-2015) Ltd] had it 10 years ago. Now a company is ment of improving copper prices.
and chief executive of PT Merdeka Copper funded to really give the project the drilling Copper was edging $US3/lb at the time
Gold as it built Tujuh Bukit in Indonesia, and focus it needs,” Xanadu chief executive of print as supply disruptions and China’s
Moorhead can call on vast experience to Andy Stewart told Paydirt. swift economic recovery from COVID-19
guide both project and company in the de- A two-tranche placement to raise $12 were factors in the red metal’s price rising
sired direction. million was announced in August, with Ar- to almost three-year highs in August.
“To be considered a true Tier 1 copper- gonaut Securities Pt Ltd and CLSA Aus- There are concerns that China alone
gold deposit, Kharmagtai needs to grow in tralia Pty Ltd joint lead managers to the won’t be able to offset the weaknesses of
size and grade. These outcomes are clear- placement. economies in other parts of the world and
ly possible with more drilling, as the miner- Key shareholders in Xanadu – Asia that growth in the copper market will soften
alisation defined to date remains open in all Capital and Advisors Pte Ltd and SSI Asset in 2021.
directions, and importantly, there is clear Management AG – backed the placement, “We’ve been waiting for copper to run,
evidence of higher-grade zones at Stock- which also saw institutions which had sold there hasn’t been success in finding new

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