Mustang Resources Ltd (ASX:MUS) has sold $230,953 worth of rubies through its newly established sales and marketing office in Thailand during March.
The sale is a positive start for the new Thailand office which was opened last month as a result of a strategic review.
Rubies being sold are from exploration activities at the Montepuez Ruby Project in Mozambique.
READ: Mustang Resources aligns ruby sales strategy with production, improving cashflow
The March sale saw 18,288 carats of mostly lower and medium quality rubies sold at an average price of $12.67 per carat.
Total sales of $1.23 million have now been achieved since September 2017 through the sale of 100,184 carats at an average price of $12.29 per carat.
Rubies on hand for sale stands at 329,309 carats.
Shares are up as much as 13% to 2.7 cents.
Interest received from well-known international jewellery brands
Market development is progressing well with Mustang’s sales and marketing team selecting and developing long-term sales relationships with preferred buyers.
Notably, significant interest received from well-known international jewellery brands and buyers who seek sustainable and responsibly produced rubies with full supply chain assurance.
Montepuez is only at the exploration stage
The rubies being retrieved from Montepuez are part of a bulk sampling exercise meaning operations have good potential to ramp up over time.
Importantly, any further scale-up in future mining at Montepuez has good potential to flow through to increased sales.
READ: Mustang Resources developing ruby and graphite-vanadium projects in Mozambique
The Montepuez Ruby Project is adjacent to the world’s largest ruby deposit discovered in 2009 and currently mined by Gemfields plc (LON:GEM).
Since the start of project development in early 2016, Mustang’s team has made significant progress in exploration, bulk sampling and ruby recovery.
Mustang has two bulk sampling processing plants on site, capable of processing 200 tonnes of material per hour.