Moly McLynxJasper drilled (Rick Walker) about 90 holes at McFarlane next to the sphinx property. There is molybdenum there. - Eagle Plains had Touchdown Captial V. TDW (trading at
.05) made a deal for TDW to do more drilling at sphinx. There are good roads power (currently decomissioned), rail access is 60km, property is logged and plenty of drilling (38 holes?) going back to 2004/2005 was done by Eagle Plains. EP did a report that showed true thickness mineralization in an area only 85m x 220m within an 'alteration system' of approximatley 400m x 700m which reported 45 million tons of low grade molybdenum (.04). EP described the deposit is being treated as being an open pit type development site. Touchdown did two more holes for about $222,000 drilling 617 meters and they announced (FEB 12, 2011) the best drilling results to that date of 53 meters at .071 'moly' starting only 27 meters below surface. They also suggest that the deposit tested open in 'one direction'. (toward Lydy?)
So with this in view. If the sphinx deposit is open in the direction of McFarlane and Lydy and the grade they get is starting to increase then there should be plenty more results to show more moly. It looks like Jasper drilled about 90 holes at McFarlane but only announced about half of the holes. They need to catch up and produce some more news on the drill holes that Terralogics (cranbrook consultants that also work for eagle plains!) was apparantly working on completing.
With TDW sitting at five cents, its hard to take this area history and the Touchdown/Sphinx efforts very seriously. But some of the holes that Jasper has already announced show much higher grade (over 1.5%) moly, albeit over much smaller widths, this higher grade faulted trend might cover up to 1.5 km.
Its a bit puzzling that molybdenum does not receive much attention given its reported widespread and rising use. Bill Matlack (Scarsdale Equities, Rockefeller Plaza New York) doesn't even have a price forecast for moly on Kitco. Price forecasts are hard to come by but it looks to be priced at around $14 to $16 for some time to come and is a controlled market . Eric Sprott used to have a lot to say about molybdenum when his molybdenum fund was buying about the same time that Eagle Plains did the 2005 drill program on sphinx.
It looks like the area (lets call it "Moly McLynx" <a nice blend of origins from Irish, Gaelic, British and Egypt>) is an emerging open pit style low grade molybdenum deposit with some higher grade intercepts in stockwork veins and fractures. Jasper assay results could likely confirm similar or better grade as what TDW confirmed previously.
In research report, (issued in 2006 during all the hype that was pumped by Sprott and others) by UBS Investment Research (London), analyst Daniel Brebner wrote, “We don’t believe that the Molybdenum market is well analysed, thus there is no reliable market consensus forecast.” Brebner cited “constraints on molybdenum roasting capacity,” as the main driver in providing price support for this silvery metal at current levels. (moly was at about $25 then). Ray Goldie predictably was very bullish at the time suggesting a continuation of $25+ prices was very supportable. However, Citigroup Global Commodities Analyst Alan Heap predicted molybdenum prices would head lower the next few years. In his half-yearly estimates, the Sydney, Australia-based analyst estimated molybdenum would average $15/pound through 2007. (Looks like Heap (a great mining related name) was quite accurate with that prediction).
In the United States, there are three states where molybdenum can be roasted: Arizona, Iowa and Pennsylvania. China will also be the major supply source of moly concentrates in the future. As their steel industry matures, they will go from crude steel to more value-added products, which contain moly. The largest percentage growth (for the use of moly in the future) would likely be coming out of China.
In 2004, a bottleneck development in the roasting of molybdenum. According to William G. Cook, who is the North American representative for Derek Raphael & Company, presently the world’s largest molybdenum trader, “The roasting sector has not been able to keep pace with the rapid increase in moly demand.” He explained this was a concern, “Roasters are very expensive to build and are environmentally sensitive so this is an area to focus on in the future when evaluating the moly market.”
Lets hope that Lydy/McFarlane has the grade and Moly McLynx has the size.
After all, size matters.