Centaurus Metals Ltd is pleased to report further positive drilling results from its 100%-owned Canavial Iron Ore Project, located 10 kilometres from the Company’s flagship Jambreiro Iron Ore Project in Minas Gerais, Brazil, supporting the positive initial results obtained from maiden drilling in 2011 and laying the foundations for a maiden JORC resource estimate. The latest results add further weight to the emerging potential of the Canavial Project as an additional source of friable itabirite feed for the Jambreiro Project, where development is scheduled to commence later this year. On the strength of the results to date, Centaurus is aiming to complete a maiden JORC resource for Canavial by May this year.

Highlights of the recent RC drilling results include the following continuous intersections (see attached Table 1 for a full list of the drilling intersections to date from the Canavial Iron Ore Project):

37.0m @ 41.9% Fe, 7.2% Al2O3 and 0.05% P from surface in Hole CAN-RC-12-00009
23.0m @ 42.0% Fe, 10.2% Al2O3 and 0.07% P from surface in Hole CAN-RC-12-00015
12.0m @ 40.3% Fe, 5.5% Al2O3 and 0.06% P from 17.0 metres in Hole CAN-RC-12-00012
19.0m @ 29.0% Fe, 4.6% Al2O3 and 0.07% P from 69.0 metres in Hole CAN-RC-12-00011

The nature of the mineralisation identified at surface and in RC chips at the Canavial Project is, for the most part, the same as that at Jambreiro; accordingly, the Company expects that the Canavial mineralisation will be amenable to beneficiation to produce a high-grade, low impurity product in a similar way to Jambreiro. Beneficiation test work using the Jambreiro flowsheet design is underway. In addition, as the Canavial Project is predominantly covered by eucalypt plantation, environmental licensing for drilling and future project development will be relatively simple, as was the case with Jambreiro.

Centaurus delivered a positive Bankable Feasibility Study (BFS) on the Jambreiro Project in November 2012, outlining a robust 2Mtpa project capable of generating revenues of A$836 million and EBITDA of A$545 million over an initial 9-year life. The Company has since commenced initial development activities and is progressing the statutory licensing process in line with the established schedule to enable site works to commence in Q2 2013.

The recent drilling is the second campaign of drilling on the Canavial Project area. An initial exploration campaign conducted in 2011 returned the following continuous intersections.
45.0m @ 37.9% Fe, 7.2% Al2O3 and 0.12% P from 26.0 metres, and
28.0m @ 24.4% Fe, 6.6% Al2O3 and 0.07% P from 126.0 metres in Hole CAN-RC-11-00005
27.0m @ 22.3% Fe, 2.3% Al2O3 and 0.07% P from 58.0 metres in Hole CAN-RC-11-00003
19.0m @ 27.9% Fe, 3.2% Al2O3 and 0.10% P from 13.0 metres in Hole CAN-RC-11-00006
The Canavial tenement is dominated by quartz-mica schists and soils that are locally iron rich with occasional outcrops of itabirite mineralisation associated with the Middle and Upper Formations of the Archean Guanhães Group – the same formation that hosts the Jambreiro Deposit.

Drilling at the Project targeting the iron-rich soils and anomalies from a ground magnetic survey completed in 2011 has confirmed the presence of itabirite mineralisation. Drilling to date has indicated that the main mineralised zone ranges in width between 15-45 metres, with average iron grades of between 30-40 % Fe.