PERTH (miningweekly.com) – The share price of ASX-listed Silver Mines increased by 50% on Tuesday after the company announced that it would continue with an acquisition drive.

Last month, Silver Mines acquired the Conrad silver project, in New South Wales, from fellow-listed Malachite for A$350 000 and the issue of A$125 000 in shares. The acquisition followed an October decision in which the company decided to follow a silver-focused growth strategy.

Silver Mines told shareholders on Tuesday that precious metals and silver specifically, were expected to outperform equities and other assets, with prices potentially testing or exceeding the highs reached in 2011/12.

It was with this in mind that the company’s board concluded that it would be in the best interest of the company to evaluate, acquire and explore opportunistically priced silver deposits.

A key focus of this would include acquiring known silver deposits with a demonstrated Joint Ore Reserves Committee-compliant resource that provided a low entry price to silver assets on a per ounce basis.

Silver Mines noted that adding silver ounces and continuing to accumulate additional silver resources would provide a backing per share on a silver ounce per share basis.

The company also expressed the view that it was currently cheaper to buy already demonstrated silver ounces in the ground, rather that explore for them in the current market cycle, adding that Silver Mines would be actively looking for Australian silver deposits that were not necessarily considered economic in the low silver price environment, but would provide exponential growth in values as the price of silver increased.

It was expected that eventually, it would become more expensive to acquire existing silver resources, and that the cost-benefit equation would tilt in favour of exploration. This would represent the second stage of Silver Mines’ strategy, as the company would then conduct carefully targeted exploration.

Silver Mines noted that the company remained engaged in discussions with a number of groups regarding potential corporate transactions; however, these were still ongoing and incomplete.

Silver Mines was trading at a high of 0.3c a share on Tuesday.