Taiton Resources launches $10 million IPO to explore the potential for another Olympic Dam story

Taiton Resources Ltd has launched an initial public offer (IPO) to raise up to $10 million at 20 cents per share to advance its polymetallic and gold projects in Western Australia and South Australia, with a focus on the Highway Project in South Australia.

The Highway Project lies within a prominent geological address that hosts major IOCG (iron oxide copper gold) deposits including Olympic Dam, Carrapateena and Prominent Hill.

Location of Highway Project.

On admission, Taiton’s project portfolio will comprise the following:

• Highway Project in South Australia,
• Lake Barlee Project in Western Australia; and
• Challenger West Project in South Australia.

Taiton managing director Noel Ong spoke with Proactive recently about the IPO and plans for the projects.

Highway Project

The company has set its sight on advancing the Highway Project, situated about 590 kilometres from the state capital of Adelaide.

Taiton’s target evaluation of the Merino Prospect within the project has identified the potential for large-scale molybdenum-enriched polymetallic porphyry overlooked by prior explorers.

Notably, the evaluation of the data shows that Merino is potentially tapping the source rocks that feed the Olympic Dam IOCG Belt.

This is impressive given that the Olympic Dam IOCG Belt hosts the multi-billion-dollar Olympic Dam mine, one of the largest copper deposits in the world.

Zircons indicating Olympic Metallurgical Event

The zircon geochronological work completed by Taiton provides compelling evidence for not only an extension to the OME (Olympic Metallurgical Event) Domain, but also that Merino itself is likely a shallow hydrothermal system (i.e., by way of the zircon isotope analyses).

The zircons analysed which was extracted from the porphyritic granite (as shallow as 7m depth), appear indicative of hydrothermal mixing of fluids concentrated in lead, uranium and REEs (rare earth elements).

Importantly, Taiton has identified very shallow basement from the historical drilling data (Figure 1), with most of the holes indicating a depth of less than 20 metres.

Figure 1 - Previous exploration results for the Merino Prospect-Highway Polymetallic Project. The area is suspected to form part of a rift complex containing porphyry systems and coeval with the OME according to recent geochronological dating by the company.

This is important for Taiton in that it is cost effective for the company to explore for porphyries and IOCG at such shallow depths.

Taiton’s zircon geochemistry analyses indicate a magma related to mineralised porphyry and haematitic IOCG systems with high oxidation state, high-water content, and a high degree of fractionation.

Initial interpretation is for a large hydrothermal system at Merino, with successive overprinting and evidence of vectoring to a core yet to be discovered under shallow cover.

CSIRO hydrochemical survey supports a hydrothermal active zone

Hydrogeochemical water bore analyses undertaken by CSIRO/GSSA in the area of the Merino Prospect are suggestive of the presence of hydrothermal systems at shallow depth (which tends to corroborate the Taiton data).

Interestingly, the Highway Project lies within circle no.5 in Figure 2 below, which shows areas for potential mineralisation identified by CSIRO based on the known mineralisation expressions.

Figure 2: New areas of interest across South Australia based upon the available hydrogeochemical data.

Potential discovery of a new mineral province

Taiton has identified several untested residual gravity anomalies from the SARIG database which are coincident with the new area of interest identified by CSIRO/GSSA's assessment of hydrogeochemical data.

Figure 3 – Porphyry/IOCG system target area.

The area is anomalous for IOCG type elements, which in conjunction with zircon geochronology work by the company, suggests potential OME-age hydrothermal system.

Taiton is focused on the red areas in Figure 3 which have been considered as “unmineralised” in the past.

It is like when Gold Road Resources Ltd (ASX:GOR) was working at the Yarmana Greenstone Belt.

Everyone assumed that the rocks are too young and there will be no gold mineralisation like what they see in the Norseman-Wiluna Belt (Kalgoorlie Region).

Now, Gold Road is nearing a 10-million-ounce gold resource.

Exploration strategy

Taiton believes that existing data supports a strategy for the discovery of molybdenum-enriched porphyry at Merino Prospect.

Follow-up exploration will assist in the compilation of an ore paragenesis model of the style and type of mineralisation at Merino.

Taiton’s initial exploration will comprise a multi-disciplinary approach:

• induced polarisation (IP) geophysical survey
• reconnaissance drilling
• geochemical and petrological studies
• gravity surveys

IPO details

Taiton is aiming to raise a minimum of $7 million and up to a maximum of $10 million from its IPO which closes on October 21, 2022.

The proceeds from the IPO will be utilised by the company to continue systematically explore its projects.

While Taiton has developed and designed programs to undertake exploration activities on each of the projects, it will also pursue and assess other new business opportunities in the resources sector over time which complement its business.

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