Horizonte Minerals (HZM.TO) (HZM.L) has now completed a maiden resource estimate on its Serra do Tapa nickel project in Brazil. And that first resource estimate appears to be able to move the needle for Horizonte Minerals as it contains just over 70 million tonnes at an average grade of 1.22% nickel (for a total nickel content of almost 1.9 billion pounds) using a cutoff grade of 0.9% nickel. Not only is this a sizeable resource, the average grade is excellent (there also is a small cobalt component of 0.05%) and the 70 million tonnes are entirely in the measured and indicated resource categories. There also is an additional 2.7 million tonnes at 1.14% nickel in the inferred resource category but we can easily ignore that.
This additional resource pushes the total measured and indicated resource ( to 280 million tonnes at 1.25% nickel for a total of almost 8 billion pounds of nickel (as well as in excess of 300 million pounds of cobalt) and this now really establishes Horizonte Minerals as one of the largest nickel juniors out there and it’s impressive to see the company needed less than 50,000 meters of drilling to define a large resource in the measured and indicated categories. The Serra do Tapa rock could be processed at either the Araguia or the Vermelho plant should Horizonte decide to develop both projects.
Now the nickel price seems to be gaining strength again, it may be a good idea to have another look at Horizonte Minerals in the near future as the company used a nickel price of $14,000/t and the current nickel price has already exceeded that level.
Disclosure: The author has no position in Horizonte Minerals
