JOHANNESBURG (miningweekly.com) – GoldStone Resources’ board has, following an extraordinary general meeting and the admission of new shares to listing on Aim, approved the proposed £1.25-million investment in GoldStone by Aim-listed exploration and development company Stratex International.

While the transaction rendered Stratex a 34% equity shareholder in the group, the exercise of warrants would give it a 50.1% stake in GoldStone.

As previously announced, the GoldStone board had now been reconfigured and had seen the appointment of Stratex’s Christopher Hall, Bob Foster and Emma Priestley.

Stratex and GoldStone chairperson Hall said Stratex was pleased to see the completion of its strategic investment in GoldStone and looked forward to working with management towards the establishment of an economically openpittable, oxide resource in Ghana.

“We will also be reviewing their exploration projects, in Senegal, where Stratex is already active, and in Gabon, where early-stage drilling on two properties has been encouraging,” he outlined.

Hall added that the existing 600 000 oz, low-grade resource in Ghana provided an attractive foundation on which to try to build an economic, surface mineable, oxide gold project. 

“There is already a 100 000 oz oxide resource and future work will focus on extending this along strike, in parallel structures, under adjacent geochemical anomalies and, potentially, by combining with other known resources within trucking distance,” he said.

The group would also be reviewing the potential for high-grade ore shoots.

"We will be intensively evaluating the exploration results in Gabon to determine whether their potential justifies a small company like GoldStone operating in three distinct jurisdictions.

"The newly reconstituted management team is fully committed to cost-effective exploration with a clear focus on creating value from finding, expanding and developing low-cost, economic gold resources in established mining districts,” he commented.