Augur to acquire four copper, gold tenements in N. Sulawesi

By Romel S. Gurky

ASX-listed Augur Resources Ltd announced Monday that it has entered into an agreement to acquire an 80 percent interest in four highly prospective copper and gold tenements in North Sulawesi from MMG Exploration Pty Ltd.

The company said in a statement that under the agreement, Augur will acquire shares in two MMG Singapore subsidiaries which own the companies that hold the mineral tenements. MMG has decided to withdraw frm Indonesia due to a change in global exploration strategy.

Under the terms of the agreement Augur must pay A$50,000 within five days of signing of the agreement and then a further A$150,000 on completion of all corporate requirements to affect the transfer of shares in the two Singaporean MMG subsidiaries to a subsidiary company of Augur.

Upon completion of a bankable feasibility study on any of the tenements being acquired MMG must elect to either:
(a) contribute towards expenditure of the subsidiary company holding title to the relevant tenement in proportion to its remaining 20 percent interest; or
(b) convert the remaining interest to a 2 percent net smelter royalty based on all production from the tenements.

The four projects: Toluludu, Biyonga, Tapadaa and Tahele, collectively referred to as the?Gorontalo Properties? are located in northern Sulawesi, near the city of Gorontalo. Each of the project areas contain zones of alteration and mineralization indicative of copper-gold porphyry and/or related epithermal-type gold and silver and skarn-type mineralization.

MMG staked the properties in 2009. The exploration licenses or IUP?s are currently in the exploration phase which expires in 2016, after which the licenses can be converted to exploitation stage. The properties were staked based on historical exploration results, however due to a lengthy forest access permitting process MMG was only able to drill the Tapadaa property. The other three tenements received only cursory surface exploration to confirm the historical results.

As such, further basic exploration including surface mapping, soil/rock sampling, trenching, and ground geophysics is required in order to define targets for drill testing.

Augur said it expects this to commence in the December 2014 quarter.

Editing by Reiner Simanjuntak