Xpedra is a new name to many, having previously been known as Thunderbird Resources with a focus on uranium in Canada.

Scott Funston’s involvement with the company dates back at least 15 years as an investor.

He joined the board last year and was appointed as managing director in February.

“Now we’ve rebranded, refocused, changed management and we’re off in a new direction,” he said. 

Late last year, the company acquired the Springfield gold project in NSW’s Lachlan Fold Belt.

On Tuesday, Xpedra reported the results from the first two reverse circulation drill holes at Springfield. These included a standout hit of 36m at 1.84 grams per tonne gold from 19m, including 13m at 3.1g/t gold; as well as 8m at 2.36g/t gold from 44m; and 10m at 1.28g/t gold from 13m, including 5m at 2.21g/t gold. 

The first hole successfully extended the mineralisation down-dip to the west.

“It’s an excellent start – absolutely no doubt about that, but it is only two holes, and we are waiting on the assay results for the remaining 25,” Funston said.

Springfield sits along a 7km structural corridor, with only 500m of a 1700m intrusive drilled.

Despite multiple historical high-grade gold hits, Xpedra’s latest program was the first drilling at the project since 1999.

“There was only ever 6000m drilled previously at Springfield, and it was mostly aircore, less than 50m-deep holes, reconnaissance drilling,” Funston said. 

“It’s had various owners that have never really systematically explored the project.

“We think there’s upside everywhere – one of my incentives is to get a million ounces into the company, so we’d like Springfield to be able to do that.” 

Another leg

Tuesday was a particularly busy day for Xpedra with the company also announcing a deal with Saturn Metals to acquire the high-grade Neeld gold project, near West Wyalong in NSW.

Xpedra will pay Saturn A$250,000 in cash and issue Saturn 41.5 million shares, of which 39.5 million are subject to escrow for up to six months.

The consideration includes 4 million shares for acquiring and cancelling a 0.75% contingent vendor royalty interest at completion. 

Xpedra will also issue unlisted Weddarla 2.5 million shares for a separate tenement that makes up part of the project.

The acquisition came about when Funston got chatting to Saturn representatives at the Resources Rising Stars Summer Series in Brisbane in February. 

Saturn was happy to offload the project as it focuses on its flagship Apollo Hill gold project in Western Australia.

Neeld historically produced 439,000oz of gold at 41g/t gold, including peak annual production of 44,675oz of gold in 1899 at an eyewatering 101g/t gold. 

Remarkably, there’s been almost no exploration at the project since production ceased in 1916. 

Just four holes at the project have been drilled to deeper than 200m and mineralisation remains open at depth and along strike, with strike extensions of high-grade veins largely untested. 

“We’re attracted by the exceptionally high grades of historical mining, obviously, and the fact that it hasn’t been systematically drilled for a long time,” Funston said.

Funston said the potential for near-term cashflow existed at the project, including via historical tailings dumps that were subject to an internal resource estimate by a previous project owner.

“There’s definitely some gold there in-situ that we’d like to dig up and truck to a mill within the area,” he said, noting that Evolution Mining’s Cowal operation was only 50km away. 

“So, that’ll be an opportunity that we’re investigating, and that’s cheaper-style exploration, where the tailings dump only goes down to about 5m. 

“And then, as time goes on, we’ll target the high-grade gold, chasing parallel lodes at depth.

“We’ll be on the ground as soon as we can get the titles transferred and Saturn get issued their shares.”

Funded for drilling

Yesterday, Xpedra emerged from a trading halt to announce it had raised A$3.2 million via a placement of 159.25 million at A2c per share.

The stock closed above that price yesterday.

Funston said the company sought to raise A$1.9 million and got bids for over A$8 million, resulting in the placement closing in just two hours.

CPS Capital Group and Blue Ocean Equities acted as joint lead managers to the two-tranche placement, with directors committing to subscribe for A$175,000.

“I think now that we’ve done this capital raising and the demand was so heavy, we need to sit down and do a proper budget, because we probably got more money than we thought that we would have,” Funston said. 

“There’s definitely going to be another drilling program at Springfield, which will probably involve RC and some diamond drilling, because we do need to understand the intrusive system itself. 

“Neeld will probably be able to get a bit more funding than we first thought. 

“Every dollar counts when you’re a junior. We want to make sure that we allocate the funds to where we think we’re going to get the best results.”