Pretivm Resources Inc. (PVG)

[silver100]

First bulk sample result produces over 4,000 gold ounces - Pretium

Initial results from the processing of around 80% of the bulk sample from Pretium’s Valley of the Kings section at Brucejack has come up with more gold than anticipated as likely to be contained in the full sample.

http://www.mineweb.com/mineweb/content/en//mineweb-gold-news?oid=219222&sn=Detail

Readers may recall the recent furore over the bulk sampling programme initiated by Pretium Resources on its Valley of the Kings section of its Brucejack gold/silver project. There was a dispute between consultants Strathcona and Snowden over sampling methodology, leading to the withdrawal of Strathcona, and a collapse in the Pretium stock price, with Pretium effectively saying that in an orebody of this type, with ultra high grade stringers in amongst a low grade matrix, the Strathcona tower sampling procedure was inappropriate and one should await the results of assays from the full 10,000 tonne bulk sample before building that into a resource calculation.

On Pretium’s own understanding of the potential orebody, the company was expecting to see the full 10,000 tonne sample containing around 4,000 ounces of gold. Now the company has come up with a preliminary announcement that the first 8,090 tonnes processed by independent company, Strategic Minerals LLC has come up with 4,215 ounces of contained gold, with a further 1,910 tonnes of the bulk sample still to be processed. This is equivalent to a gold grade of 16.2 g/tonne. There is also a small amount of contained silver in the sample but not enough to raise the overall gold equivalent grade by more than another 0.2 g/tonne.

Now, because of the distribution of the high-grade stringers, the remaining 1,910 tonnes still to be processed may not add significantly to total gold ounces. However, even if there is zero gold in the remaining tonnage to be processed, which is highly unlikely, this would leave the overall grade from the 10,000 tonne bulk sample at over 13 g/tonne – high grade by any modern standard and certainly the basis for calculating an ore reserve for final studies.

The results to date thus surpass the target of 4,000 ounces of gold projected to be produced from the entire 10,000 tonnes of material excavated. Processing is continuing on track and is expected to be completed by the first week of December. The gold content is partly in a gravity concentrate (2,542 ounces) and partly in a flotation concentrate (1,588 ounces) with around 85 ounces lost in tailings. Shipment and sale of the gravity concentrate has commenced, with shipment of the flotation concentrate to begin on completion of processing. The final amount of gold produced will be announced at the end of processing and assaying, which is expected by mid-December.

Pretium founder and CEO, Robert Quartermain, and his company had come in for some pretty vitriolic criticism in the Canadian media over the Strathcona withdrawal with all kinds of doubts raised on the earlier statements about likely gold content in the bulk sample. While the figures announced in the Pretium release on this first contained gold figure are noted as subject to final establishment of weights and assays and settlement, one can be pretty sure the announcement would not have been made if there was any likelihood of significant change. This would seem to fully vindicate the company, and its main independent consultants, Snowden, in their positions and will likely have done no favours for Strathcona and its preliminary findings.