NEW YORK, NY / ACCESSWIRE / May 7, 2015 / Aurvista
Gold Corporation (TSX VENTURE:AVA) (PINKSHEETS:ARVSF) is the subject of a newly
released advisory from mining analyst Jay Taylor of Hard Money Advisors Inc.
Aurvista is a junior miner explorer with one of the largest undeveloped gold
projects in North America with ~3 million ounces Gold (in all categories) at its
Douay Gold Project located along the Casa Berardi Fault, in the prolific Abitibi
greenstone belt of northern Quebec.
Jay Taylor released an advisory to his paid subscriber base upgrading Aurvista
to 'Buy'. This follows his earlier advisory, in March, where he explained the
merits of establishing a long position in AVA.V and recommended AVA.V be added
to subscribers Watch List. Mr. Taylor has a business MBA in Finance &
Investment, in-depth accredited studies in geology, has decades of mining sector
analysis under his belt, and is known for being reserved in his advice, making
this upgrade especially noteworthy; he believes AVA.V is now apt to appreciate
in value and poised for superior return potential.
Full copy of Mr. Taylor's advisory along with chart and additional insight may
be viewed at http://sectornewswire.com/AVAJayTaylor-May-2015-Buy-rec.pdf online.
Mr. Taylor believes Aurvista's Douay deposit has the potential to emulate the
success of the nearby Canadian Malartic deposit and mine of Yamana &
Agnico-Eagle (formerly owned by Osisko). A distinct advantage that Aurvista has
at its Douay Gold Project over the Malartic deposit is the presence of
high-grade gold vein zones. In his prior (Watch List) advisory Mr. Taylor noted
that "a strategic advantage that the Douay holds is that there are still
high-grade gold veins yet to be explored" and stated "the potential to outline
upward to 10 million ounces and perhaps more appears a reasonable possibility."
Mr Taylor explained his rationale with the aid an illustration of target areas
and also provided insight as to how he sees Aurvista accomplishing its
objectives while maximizing returns to shareholders; "In my view, assuming the
company is able to move the Douay West into small-scale production and generate
cash flows along the lines suggested by the PEA, I believe a resource expansion
of 2 or 3 times the current NI 43-101 resource of 3 million ounces is highly
likely."
Excerpts from Jay Taylor's May 1, 2015 upgrade "Buy-Recommendation" advisory on
Aurvista Gold Corporation:
This buy recommendation for Aurvista Gold Corp. should be read in conjunction
with my comments of March 13, 2015 (see
http://sectornewswire.com/AVAJayTaylor-2015-03-13.pdf online), about this
company when I placed it on my "Watch List." Aurvista was one of several
companies I sold at the end of last year, not because I didn’t believe in its
long-term prospects, but because it could provide an immediate tax break and a
chance to revisit its prospects during a period in the gold share market where
there was little worry about a stock running away on the upside.
As I noted in my March 13 comments, the hiring of Jean Lafleur as the company’s
president was key to my renewed optimism for this company and its Douay Gold
Project. My confidence in Lafleur rests on his track record as a Professional
Geologist with 30 years plus of experience in various capacities within the
mineral exploration industry. He has been active with major mining companies
like Newmont, Falconbridge, and Placer Dome. And from 1998 to 2003, Jean worked
with McWatters Mining Inc., a Quebec-based junior exploration and mining
company, and was instrumental in the discovery of new ore reserves for the
company's gold projects in the Val-d'Or and Malartic Mining camps, including
development of the bulk gold exploration program at the Canadian Malartic Gold
Property which eventually became Osisko's 20 million ounce Canadian-Malartic
Deposit.
Lafleur knows the geology as well any geologist does and in fact what has him so
excited about the Douay’s prospects is its similarity to the world-class
Malartic Gold Mine discovered by Osisko. Not only is the Douay located in a
similar regional geological setting and in the same Abitibi Gold Belt, but its
structural patterns are similar as well, which is why Lafleur is so confident in
his ability to ramp up this 3-million-oz. deposit into something much bigger.
Whether the Douay can replicate Malartic with its 9 million ounces of reserves
plus a whole lot more in various resource categories remains to be seen. But
there is a huge amount of exploration potential, plus there are some strategic
advantages that the Douay has that the Malartic did not have when Lafleur began
exploring and developing that deposit. Specifically, the Douay has some
higher-grade veins and I have to think management may be thinking in terms of
some early production potential from near-surface high-grade veins from which to
fund larger scale exploration. I say that because out of the blue in the March
24 press release, Lafleur stated, "In the event that any shareholder missed it,
the Sleeping Giant mill owned by Aurbec Mines Inc., a subsidiary of Maudore
Minerals Ltd., located 50 kilometers south and east of Douay, is now in
receivership. A call for tenders is expected in Q2, 2015."
Exploration Potential:
In a March 24, 2015, press release, the company announced progress on
engineering studies for an open-pit design at the Douay West Project. The work
on pit engineering was completed but the firm that is carrying out the work,
Golder Associates Ltd., was also retained to look at underground prospects
including either an open-pit and underground scenario or an underground-only
scenario given the potential to exploit the high-grade vein system in an
underground scenario. The company wants to compare the economics of either
scenario, but in order to do so is planning to complete an infill drilling
campaign that would lead to an update of the mineral resource and the start of a
more comprehensive prefeasibility study later this year. But I have to think
that given Lafleu's "out of the blue" comment regarding the possible
availability of the Sleeping Giant Mill, he has his eyes on possibly mining some
higher-grade mineralization as a means of generating some early cash flows from
high- grade near-surface veins in the Douay West area. I put in a call to the
company's CFO regarding that idea. When I hear back regarding that matter I will
let you know. But it is my hunch.
Absent from recent exploration efforts has been big picture generative work to
better understand factors controlling mineralization on the program. Under
Lafleur's leadership, independent geophysical and geological consultant Yvan
Bussières, PEng, of St-Eustache, Quebec has been hired to help refine the
original 25 exploration targets outlined in 2014 into five higher-priority gold
and base metal sites for follow-up fieldwork during the 2015 summer exploration
season, assuming of course that the company can raise funding to carry out the
work.
Regarding the exploration plans, Jean Lafleur recently stated, "The strategy
behind the ongoing geophysical and geological interpretation work was to assist
in identifying additional targets with similar geophysical properties to those
associated with already known gold mineralization on the project."
Management now believes that the previous and current results still show the
potential for additional and significant gold and also base metal
mineralization, similar to those of other bimodal gold and base metal
occurrences and deposits in the Abitibi Greenstone Belt of Quebec and Ontario.
With numerous electromagnetic input conductors identified outside of the known
gold mineralization corridor, the potential for this 20-km-long Casa Berardi
Deformation Zone to host a major deposit appears to be very good. In fact only
about 5 kilometers of this 20-kilometer zone have been explored extensively and
only another 5 kilometers have been explored at all. So the generative program
is designed to provide a more intelligent, big picture understanding of the
Douay's prospects and to help prioritize its exploration efforts to expand
mineralization to at least a potential 10-year mine life.
In addition to the generative program, ground geophysical surveys are being used
to indentify disseminated sulfides and faults potentially linked to the gold
mineralization. A total of 68.6 new line kilometres of IP surveys were recently
completed by the company covering gaps in the extreme NW corner of the Douay
property and the western end of the porphyry zone. The porphyry zone sector
hosts the majority of the lower-grade gold mineralization at Douay and overlaps
the base metal target area west of the south porphyry. Both sectors covered were
integrated with the 11 previously completed IP surveys done during previous
campaigns and will be re-interpreted as a single database. Approximately
one-half of the IP database has been compiled and readied for interpretation
with final results expected later in the second quarter of 2015.
Early results show a complex network of faults criss-crossing Douay with
consistent east-west, northeast-southwest and northwest-southeast trends
mirroring structures outlined by the airborne magnetic survey that are parallel
to the Casa Berardi deformation zone, its subsidiary faults and EM Input Lafleur noted in his March 24 press release that "As a rule of thumb in the
mining business [I want] to define minimum 10 years of mineral resources before
advancing Douay West to the feasibility stage. Right now there are three
additional gold targets within a 1-kilometer radius of Douay West from which to
add mineral resources, in addition to the immediate Douay West potential on
strike to the west of the planned pit and at depth below 250 meters. These
additional zones include the Porphyry, Porphyry NW Extension, and the NW zones."
The Bottom Line:
As I noted in my March 11 report, the capital costs to commence open-pit
production with custom milling are estimated to be C$12.2 million. Assuming the
market wakes up to this company's potential and begins to price the ounces in
the ground at a more reasonable level so that capital can be raised efficiently,
even in these dire times, a $12.2-million capital nut to crack does not seem out
of the question. Potentially, work being carried out this year will upgrade and
increase the Douay ounces and further enhance the economics. Once production
begins, an additional $50 million will be required to fund underground
development and initial stoping. A higher level of confidence in the economics
should be forthcoming with additional drilling and feasibility work to be
concluded this year.
However, as noted above, management's comments about examining both the
underground-only option versus the open pit plus underground option, combined
with Lafleur's comments about the nearby possible acquisition of a mill at fire
sale prices, lead me to believe underground mining of near-surface high-grade
mineralization could be an emphasis early on to generate cash flow from which to
expand this company's growth organically. With the company now having a
competent jockey in place to exploit this world-class exploration potential that
I have always believed the Douay has, and with the gold markets seemingly
bottoming out, I was compelled to put this company back on my list after
"enjoying" a 2015 tax loss sale.
Full copy of Mr. Taylor's advisory
along with chart and additional insight may be viewed at
http://sectornewswire.com/AVAJayTaylor-May-2015-Buy-rec.pdf online.
Market Equities Research Group has identified the following research links for
additional DD on Aurvista Gold Corporation:
- Aurvista Gold Corporation corporate website:
http://www.aurvistagold.com
- SEDAR Filings for Aurvista:
http://sedar.com/DisplayProfile.do?lang=EN&issuerType=03&issuerNo=00031701
- Aurvista Q1-2015 CEO interview:
http://sectornewswire.net/JayTaylor-AVA-03-16-2015.mp3 [running time: 31
minutes].
- Q1-2015 Market Equities Research Report on Aurvista:
http://sectornewswire.com/Report-AVA-0127-2015.pdf
- Recent Mining Journal review of Aurvista:
http://miningmarketwatch.net/ava.htm
This release may contain forward-looking statements regarding future events that
involve risk and uncertainties. Readers are cautioned that these forward-looking
statements are only predictions and may differ materially from actual events or
results. Articles, excerpts, commentary and reviews herein are for information
purposes and are not solicitations to buy or sell any of the securities
mentioned. Readers are referred to the terms of use, disclaimer and disclosure
located at the above referenced URLs.
Contact information:
Fredrick William, BA Ec.
Market Equities Research Group
f.william@marketequitiesresearch.com
SOURCE: Market Equities Research Group