Pan Asia Metals (ASX: PAM) has put its foot on a copper project in Chile that is littered with high-grade rock chips but has never been drilled. The project sits in a well-known copper region and is just 10km north of the world-famous El Salvador copper mine. Notably, the region around it boasts extensive infrastructure including copper smelters and processing plants in the world’s largest copper-producing nation.
The company says its new “Rosario” project boasts significant exploration potential for “Manto-style” copper-silver mineralisation – a high-grade style of copper mineralisation typically found around the pacific rim belt.
Management says the project has potential in three distinct north-south trends over a combined strike length of more than 10km with mineralised zones up to 200m in width.
The key to the project appears to be a rock chip sampling program conducted by the vendors and an ASX-listed company some years ago.
Fifty seven samples went higher than 1 per cent copper and a further 20 showed grades of over 3 per cent. Eleven were as high as 4 per cent and some were as high as 5 per cent copper.
Silver grades averaged 6 grams per tonne and ranged up to 42 grams per tonne. The company says it observed visible copper oxide mineralisation during a preliminary site visit.
The Manto-style of mineralisation occurs throughout the northern parts of Chile and is responsible for significant historical and current copper production. The largest examples of this deposit style have historic production and mineral resources of more than 200 million tonnes grading 1 per cent copper or better and includes the Chilean-based Mantos Blanco and El Soldado copper projects.
Pan Asia as entered a 6-week exclusivity period on the project within the Chanaral province in the Atacama region of northern Chile to finalise due diligence and complete the transaction.
Pan Asia says Rosario is interpreted as highly prospective yet significantly underexplored and supports the company’s recently expanded Chilean lithium holdings. Its objective remains to be a lower third of the cost curve battery metals provider and it believes the new project in an infrastructure-rich, low-cost environment complements that mandate.
Rosario represents a tremendous opportunity to position Pan Asia with a high-grade, low-cost copper project. We view copper as an equally important metal with lithium in the global electrification transition, the supply-demand dynamics are compelling with deficits projected due to declining production and grades, and a lack of new discoveries. Importantly, Rosario is not a pivot, the project is strategic, has the right fundamentals and offers Pan Asia strategic options.
Pan Asia Metals Chairman and Managing Director Paul Lock
The mineralised porphyries at the nearby El Salvador mine intrude the same rocks that host mineralisation at Rosario and the company is looking to see if there might be a genetic link between the Rosario mineralisation and the El Salvador project.
Pan Asian recently secured an extensive lithium landholding in Chile at its Tama Atacama brine project at the start of this year. After a further 303 square kilometres was granted earlier this month, the company’s total landholding at the site is now more than 1200 km sq.
The project lies north of Chile’s lithium chemical refining hub in Antofagasta and has access to rail and road. The move additionally secures the company’s presence in one of South America’s biggest and most strategically important lithium brine regions.
Late last year changes to the Chilean Mining code modified the extension of exploration concessions to four years, with the potential for an additional four-year renewal – replacing the old two-plus-two system. Consequently, the newly granted exploration concessions across Chile will now remain valid for 4 years, providing a longer horizon for exploration and development at Pan Asia’s prospective holdings.
Plans are already in place for a drill campaign aimed at identifying lithium-bearing aquifers at depth. If identified, management has its sights set on defining an initial mineral resource here as soon as the year-end.
Pan Asia also has three substantial lepidolite-hosted lithium prospects in southern Thailand at its Reung Kiet project, which it says is strategically positioned to support Southeast Asia’s burgeoning lithium-ion battery and electric vehicle (EV) manufacturing hubs.
For now however it is all about copper as Pan Asia seeks to explore Rosario. The presence of historical workings at the site is encouraging as the old-timers rarely mined by hand in harsh environments if they were not getting some colour – just how much colour is still there remains to be seen however 73 rocks chips with colour is a pretty good start.
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