Victory Mines receives go-ahead from the Bolivian Government

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Victory Mines (ASX: VIC) has updated the market regarding its mining activities in Bolivia. Central to these developments has been the receipt of permission from the Bolivian state mining company, Corporacion Minera de Bolivia (COMIBOL) to commence a feasibility study on a number of its existing tin tailings sites, as well as four new additional sites.

Commenting on this development, VIC’s Non-Executive Chairman Doctor James Ellingford said, “We are now going to focus solely on extracting value from these tailing sites, both old and new, and will aggressively work towards establishing a minerals processing facility to extract, primarily the tin, as well as potentially, silver and tantalum”.

Acknowledging the challenges the company has endured in reaching this stage, Ellingford said, “This has been a long journey but I am confident, as is the rest of the board, that Victory Mines has the right relationships in place and more importantly the right people on the ground to ensure success.”

Looking to the future the company has committed to dealing directly with, COMIBOL and from a strategic perspective focusing solely on the tailings sites which have the potential to generate value for shareholders.

Of course this is an early stage play in a high risk region and investors should seek professional financial advice if considering this stock for their portfolio.

Ellingford said that the current conditions in Bolivia were robust and favourable, noting numerous changes to the mining laws. Despite this changing landscape he is confident that VIC is in an excellent position to be able to finalise all contractual requirements needed to implement its strategy.

Historical data and government reports point to potential viability for development

There has been historical exploration work completed on all of the tailings sites, but the results are not sufficient to define a JORC resource. However, the data has enabled the company to define exploration targets. These are outlined as follows.

It is important to note that the potential quantity and grade of these Exploration Targets are conceptual in nature and there has been insufficient exploration to estimate a Mineral Resource. Further, it is uncertain if exploration will result in the estimation of a Mineral Resource.

However, a COMIBOL Monthly Report of Geological Operations, Tin Mines, 1974 formed the basis of the exploration target potential as being between 1.3 million tonnes and 1.5 million tonnes at grades between 0.45% and 0.55% tin.

VIC said these metrics were estimated taking into account plant capacity, years of operation and the grade indicated by assay results. A recent survey of the tailings arrived at an estimated tonnage of 1.4 million tonnes.

A drilling program will commence shortly and the subsequent feasibility study is intended to define the technical and economic description of the tin processing plant over a period of approximately six months. The cost of building the processing plant (CAPEX) and the cost for operating the plant (OPEX) will be estimated in the feasibility study.

The projected cash flow for the period of plant operation and other financial indicators will be calculated to prove the profitability of the project. VIC plans to extract the tin (and other metals – silver and potentially tantalum) by gravity, magnetic separation and the flotation process.

The degree of liberation and grain size of these minerals will dictate the most suitable process and equipment to be considered.