The newsflow is coming thick and fast from African Aura Mining (LON:AAAM, CVE:AUR), which this morning revealed the resource estimate for the Putu iron ore project in Liberia has more than doubled.
The inferred resource rises to 2.4 billion tonnes from 1.08 billion at a grade of 34 per cent iron ore, and the company said there is the potential to increase this figure by a further 1 to 2.5 billion tonnes.
Chief Luis da Silva said: “The headline objective of African Aura and our joint venture partner Severstal Resources was a 2 billion tonne resource and I am very pleased that this has rapidly been achieved.
“We expect to upgrade this resource to the indicated category during 2011.
“The joint venture partners are mindful of the importance of moving the project forward as efficiently as possible, for the benefit of the local communities and all other stakeholders, and I look forward to providing updates on progress in due course.”
The latest update follows two very positive announcements from African Aura last week, which unveiled a maiden resource for its Nkout iron ore project in Cameroon as well as some very encouraging results from its Ndablama gold prospect in western Liberia.
The company is planning to split into one iron ore and one gold company that could see the asset base re-rate, and in November it raised £20.3 million, or US$32 million, to fund the two operations. It now has USS$39 million in cash and around US$28 million has already been earmarked to fund work programmes across both businesses.
African Aura boss da Silva explained: “The rationale for the proposed split of the company into separately listed iron ore and gold companies, with shareholders in African Aura receiving one share in each company for each share they hold in African Aura, is a means to allow the market to better measure and reflect the intrinsic value of our assets which is becoming increasingly apparent."