Tajikistan operating gold miner Kryso Resources (AIM: KYS) has announced the appointment of founding director and Chief Executive of ALTUS Resource Capital Limited (LSE: ARCL) Steven Poulton as a non-executive director pursuant to the subscription for shares in Kryso by ALTUS from three months ago.
Poulton was appointed by ALTUS after the company subscribed for shares in Kryso in September, which gave it 10 million shares, or a 6.42% stake in the company. ALTUS also holds warrants over 20 million shares in Kryso, exercisable at a price of £0.08 per share for 60 months from the date of the subscription.
“We are pleased to welcome Steven to the board following the investment in Kryso made by ALTUS earlier this year. I have no doubt that he has an important contribution to make as we progress the Pakrut gold project towards production,” said Non-Executive Chairman and acting Managing Director of Kryso Trevor Davenport.
Poulton, who is a fellow of the Geological Society of London, a fellow of the Institute of Materials, Minerals and Mining and a member of the Association of Mining Analysts, has previously served as Chief Executive of Turkey focused gold miner Ariana Resources (AIM: AAU), which he co-founded in 2002. He has also founded African Aura Resources Limited in 2004, which later merged with Mano River Resource to create African Aura Mining (AIM: AAAM), of which Poulton is a director.
The new director is now expected to contribute to the development of the company’s main asset, the 100% owned Pakrut gold project in Tajikistan, which has a total JORC-compliant gold resources of 2,830,104 oz Au (ounces of gold) and is located within the Tien Shan gold belt, which hosts a number of multi-million ounce gold deposits.
Drilling at Pakrut has previously returned numerous high-grade intersections, including 123.7m (metres) at 6.14g/t (grammes per tonne) Au, 42m at 11.17g/t Au and 50m at 5.67g/t Au.
A bankable feasibility study for the Pakrut project is currently being undertaken by the Beijing General Research Institute of Mining & Metallurgy. The £0.5 million raised from the placement of shares with ALTUS was applied to completion of the bankable feasibility study at Pakrut.
The bankable feasibility study is targeted for completion before the end of 2009. An internal prefeasibility study completed in 2008 envisaged a mining operation at Pakrut producing in excess of 100,000oz Au per annum with cash costs of approximately US$300/oz Au.