New Cu-Au target in PNG district hosting multi-million-oz mines

Los Cerros Ltd (ASX: LCL) has added a third area of near term focus at its newly acquired copper-gold and nickel projects in Papua New Guinea (PNG).

Together with the Ono gold-copper project and the Veri Veri nickel project, LCL has added the Imou gold-copper project to its Q2 exploration workplan after completing a geological review of the target.

The Imou Project is a large copper-gold porphyry project with associated epithermal targets that lies within a district that plays host to the multi-million-ounce Ok Tedi, Porgera and Frieda River projects.

The quick takeaway for us is that while LCL concentrates its efforts and most of its exploration spend on its standout targets, it has a wide array of other targets to test as well — so much so that it is looking for a JV partner to maximise these targets’ potential (undoubtedly a good problem to have).

LCL plans to undertake a field program at Imou in Q2 2023, which features wide intercepts of shallow copper-gold porphyry associated mineralisation including a higher-grade copper-gold breccia zone.

The target has only seen limited drilling with the majority of significant copper-gold intercepts occurring from surface to just 200m depth, including:

• 305.3m grading 0.37% copper, 0.37g/t gold (0.65% CuEq) from 4.7m, including 14m at 2.43% copper, 2.78g/t gold (4.51% CuEq) from 186m.

The objective of the upcoming (limited) surface program is to enhance the broad appeal and prospectivity of the project by demonstrating potential southern extensions and for higher grade, near-surface copper-gold porphyry mineralisation.

This is part of LCL’s strategy to seek joint venture partners for its porphyry-style targets.

The Kusi copper-gold target at the Ono Project will be the predominant focus of LCL’s exploration expenditure this year, but LCL is open to bringing in a joint venture partner to fund ongoing porphyry style exploration at Imou and other PNG porphyry-style projects.

This makes sense since there are a multitude of highly prospective target areas across the PNG projects. These include other prospects at Imou — the Michael’s and Bikaru Creek epithermal targets — which have not been included in LCL’s initial field program.

Here are surface rock chip samples from those two targets:

• Michael’s Creek epithermal target: surface rock chips of 58.5g/t gold, 23.4g/t gold and 12.2g/t gold
• Bikaru epithermal target: surface rock chips samples of 63.6g/t gold and 25g/t gold

These are impressive grades, but the fact that these targets are not near term priorities, we think, speaks to just how much upside potential LCL has here.