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NEWS
Despite the number of new resources
listings on the ASX increasing last
year, satisfying compliance measures
required to complete an IPO is not easy.
“IPOs are much harder to get away
today than they were five years ago. It’s
more onerous and the barriers to entry
are a lot harder,” Blackwood Capital di-
rector Francis Harper said.
Harper, the former chairman of West
African Resources Ltd, was sharing his
thoughts with Paydirt upon the debut of
Côte d’Ivoire-focused Tietto Minerals Ltd
on the ASX.
Harper’s Blackwood Capital was the
lead manager of the $6 million Tietto
float, which ended its first day of trading
up over 20% at 24.5c/share, with a mar-
ket cap of $38 million.
The positive start provided some re-
ward for Tietto which had hoped to list
sometime last year.
Nevertheless, with gold at a healthy
$US1,326/oz and investors back on
board with the precious metal, it is an op-
portune time in the market for a company
like Tietto, which has something to show
from the onset.
Within less than two years of acquisi-
tion and from a mere 13,000m of drilling,
Tietto has defined a resource of 10.4mt
@ 2.1 g/t gold for 703,600oz at the Abu-
jar project.
Abujar, comprising three contiguous
tenements over an area of 1,114sq km,
is Tietto’s flagship in the West African
region where it also has gold prospects
– Dube South and Cestos – in eastern
Liberia, near the border of Côte d’Ivoire.
The company plans to conduct ex-
ploration campaigns at
Dube South and Cestos
this year, however, drilling
down-dip of the resource
and concentrating on the
dilation zone at Abujar is
the immediate objective.
Harper, who is non-ex-
ecutive chairman of Tietto,
said an initial 6,000m RC
programme would be con-
ducted to kick-start 2018,
as the company aimed to
expand resources along
strike and at depth.
The company has 70km
of strike to explore, with the existing re-
source defined within 3km of that strike.
“The resource is only to a depth of
180m depth at the moment, with some
open pits going to 400m,” Harper said.
Tietto time
Abujar is 30km from the major regional city of Daloa in central Côte d’Ivoire
Less than 5% of the land package at
Abujar has been explored and Tietto
hopes to complete 30,000m of RC and
diamond drilling this year.
Funds raised during the IPO should
see Tietto through the next two years,
Harper said.
Ausdrill Ltd was a major supporter of
the IPO, with Tietto having the ability to
convert $1.3 million worth of drilling into
equity for the services provider.
“Having Ausdrill on board meant it was
like raising $7.3 million, so we should
have two very strong years out of the
money we raised and we plan to put all of
it into the ground,” Harper said.
As investment appetite
returns to the West African
gold space, demand for
drillers and other services
are starting to increase.
Therefore, to spare costs,
Tietto will purchase a dia-
mond rig and will conduct
drilling of that nature on its
own.
With Côte d’Ivoire host
to gold heavies such as
Randgold Resources Ltd
Caigen Wang (Tongon, 320,000 ozpa)
and Endeavour Mining
Corp (Ity and Agbaou
combined production of 280,000 ozpa),
there is access to services and skills
equipped for the gold sector, while gov-
ernment support is also forthcoming.
“Côte d’Ivoire is sensibly competing
with Burkina Faso, Mali and Ghana and
aside from having a 10% standard inter-
est, they offer a tax holiday for the first
five years of production. They are really
making an effort to develop their gold
mining industry,” Harper said.
“Côte d’Ivoire has about one third of
the greenstone belt in West Africa, but
has remained under-explored because
of the political turmoil in the past. We
will look to acquire more ground as we
go because it is seriously under-explored
due to the civil strike.”
While being an ASX-newcomer, Tietto
is far from an overnight success in Côte
d’Ivoire, thanks largely to managing di-
rector Caigen Wang, Harper said.
“It has been seven years in the mak-
ing,” Harper told Paydirt.
With Liberia in its sights, Tietto was es-
tablished in 2010 before Wang ventured
into Côte d’Ivoire at a time when others
were exiting.
“When Caigen went to Côte d’Ivoire
from Liberia and then the gold prices
collapsed in 2013/14 he was the only
guy with money and everyone else was
sitting on their hands. Caigen was the
only one around active and managed to
forge some good contacts in country. He
turned up at the right time after the civil
strike and landed some good ground,
which holds us in good stead now.”
– Mark Andrews
AUSTRALIA’S PAYDIRT FEBRUARY 2018 PAGE 5