The S&P/TSX Venture Exchange was down 1.56% to 733.69. Spot gold fell 1.5%, or US$29.50 per oz., finishing the week at US$1,934.80 per ounce.
Shares of Cornerstone Capital jumped $1.24 to $5.35. The company reported that drilling at its Miocene project, which was scheduled to start in February and March but was suspended due to Covid-19, will restart between December 2020 and April 2021. The Miocene copper-gold project is under a farm-in agreement with Newcrest International, a subsidiary of Newcrest Mining. Cornerstone and Newcrest are targeting epithermal gold-silver and porphyry deposits along an interpreted northern extension of the Maricunga magmatic belt. Cornerstone has a portfolio of projects in Chile and Ecuador, including the Cascabel joint-venture with SolGold in northwestern Ecuador.
Integra Resources rose 34 ? to $4.97 per share. The company recently announced that it had signed a memorandum of understanding with the U.S. Bureau of Land Management to facilitate the hiring of a dedicated mineral specialist in the agency's Marsing office in Idaho who will oversee future permitting work for the company's DeLamar gold-silver project, 160 km from Boise. Permitting activities are underway, including preliminary approval of the surface water sampling and analysis program, the groundwater well drilling plan and sampling and analysis program, as well as the preliminary approval of the proposed air monitoring program and the installation of the meteorological tower at the site. In addition, the company has started an exploration program at the project, with two drill rigs testing the high-grade potential below the Florida Mountain deposit. A third rig has been added at the War Eagle Mountain deposit, 3 km southeast of Florida Mountain and 9 km east of DeLamar, to conduct follow-up drill testing on high-grade intercepts the company encountered last year.
Essex Minerals advanced 32 ? to 68 ? per share. The company reported results from the first-ever drill program at its Cumberland gold-silver joint-venture project in Queensland, Australia, 70 km northwest of the former Kidston gold mine. The highlight was a 6 metre intercept grading 18.8 grams gold per tonne and 160.6 grams silver per tonne starting from 140 metres downhole, including 2 metres of 63.6 grams gold and 462.7 grams silver. "To intersect high-grade gold and silver mineralization in the first drill hole on an early-stage project is a testimony to the quality of structural interpretation and target generation exploration work undertaken over the past six years by our joint venture partner KNX Resources Ltd.," Essex chief executive Paul Loudon said in a statement. KNX Resources is a private exploration company, and Essex has the option to earn and acquire up to 80% of the Cumberland property.