PERTH (miningweekly.com) – ASX-listed Winsome Resources has announced a A$60-million capital raise to accelerate lithium exploration at its projects in Canada.

The capital raise will consist of a combination of flow-through shares (FTS), an institutional placement and a share purchase plan (SPP).

An initial A$19-million will be raised through the FTS provisions under Canadian tax law, with the shares to be placed at a price of A$4.18 each representing a 79% premium to Winsome’s last closing price. Some 4.58-million shares will be issued under the FTS provision.

Additionally, Winsome will also undertake an institutional placement of 15.5-million shares, at A$2 a share, being the same price as the FTS block trade, raising a further A$31-million. The offer price of the institutional placement represented a 14.2% discount to Winsome’s last trading price on February 1, and a 10% discount to the company’s five-day volume weighted average share price.

AN SPP is expected to raise a further A$10-million, with eligible shareholders allowed to subscribe for between A$2 500 and A$30 000 worth of new shares in the company, also at a price of A$2 each. Some 5-million shares will be placed under the SPP.

“Winsome Resources is excited to launch this capital raise, and to see the high level of interest from quality investors globally,” said MD Chris Evans.

“The additional working capital will allow the company to further ramp up exploration and resource drilling activities at Cancet and Adina as we work towards announcing maiden resources across our projects.

“The company continues to see exciting progress and results at Cancet and Adina, and that underpins our decision to pursue this raise and move even more aggressively towards declaring maiden resources and ultimately developing the projects toward lithium production.”

The funds raised will be used to expedite follow-up drilling at Adina and Cancet and to fund surveys and fieldwork as well as preliminary drilling campaigns at the company’s other projects.