Tinka Resources' shares advance as South Ayawilca drilling continues to excite

Tinka Resources Ltd (CVE:TK) is no doubt making good progress in scaling up its zinc project in Peru where it could be on to a ‘world class’ discovery.

The Ayawilca zinc zone already has an inferred mineral resource of 18.8 million tonnes at 8.2% zinc equivalent, and the firm has been focused recently on the South Ayawilca zone, where it has promisingly hit good grades in a bid to expand the potential resource.

Newsflow has been thick and fast and it looks set to continue in  that fashion for the rest of the year.

Shares on the move..

Shares have also rallied. Tinka stock has risen 200% to 66 cents, from standing at 22 cents at the beginning of March.

In April, chief executive Dr Graham Carman, said of the first two holes of this year’s 10,000 metre drill program at Ayawilca, they were “undoubtedly” the best adjacent  holes ever sunk at the deposit.

Highlights included 51.9 metres at 10.1 % zinc and 62 grams per ton (g/t) silver, and 14.9 metres at a very impressive 20.6 % zinc.

“These grades are pretty spectacular,” he told Proactive at the time.

“You don’t get those sort of thicknesses and grades everyday in drillholes  in a new property.”

• WATCH  – South Ayawilca drilling could reveal a ‘world class discovery’, says Tinka Resources‘ Graham Carman

Drilling is currently continuing with three rigs at South Ayawilca, focusing on expanding the new zinc discovery to the northeast towards the Central Ayawilca resource.

So what are the Ayawilca property and the firm’s other assets?

Ayawilca is a 150 sq km huge area of land 200 km northeast of Lima in the Department of Pasco, Central Peru. It is 40 km northwest of the world-class Cerro de Pasco zinc-lead-silver mine, and 100 km south of the giant copper-zinc Antamina mine.  Tinka owns 100% of the concessions.

Tinka also has the Colquipucro near surface silver deposit, which is what bought the company into the area in the first place (and where zinc was found beneath the silver) which lies around 2 kilometres north-northwest of zinc discovery.

The higher confidence indicated resource stands at 14.3 million ounces of contained silver at 60 g/t silver, while inferred is 13.2mln ounces at 48 g/t.

In December last year, Tinka discovered a new zinc prospect at Pucarumi, which lies several kilometres northwest of the  inferred zinc resource (18.8mln tonnes grading 8.2% zinc equivalent) and within its existing mining claims in central Peru.

High-grade mineralization grading up to 19% zinc and 8% lead occurs in two subparallel horizons at Pucarumi within Cretaceous-age limestones over a strike length of 1.5 kilometres, the firm revealed

Rising zinc prices…?

And all of Tinka’s progress comes encouragingly at a  time of rising zinc prices.

In 2016, the metal commonly used in galvanizing steel, has an excellent 2016, rising around 60%. This year hasn’t been quite so meteoric, not least due to falling steel demand in China, but the signs  are promising of a further uplift.

One official study recently forecast global demand of the refined metal would exceed supply by 226,000 tonnes in 2017.

It currently stands at around $2,633 per tonne. Earlier this year, Canadian broker RBC Capital noted it believes zinc will advance to $1.35 a pound or $2,976 a tonne over the year and singled out the metal as one with the “best fundamentals”.

In August last year, Carman told Proactive that the fundaments for zinc were “absolutely fantastic”.

Tinka is a pre-revenue explorer, and the net loss for the six months to end March was $1.12mln (2016: $361,000). It had cash of $10.8mln at the end of the period compared to $3.7mln at the same time last year.

Story by ProactiveInvestors