Comstock
Here are Canadian small cap stocks moving on news today and worth watching:
Manson Creek Resources Ltd. jumped as much as 250 per cent and hit 25 cents (U.S.) - its highest level in about 4 years - in early trading Monday after saying it has discovered three areas of intensively oxidized and weathered rock containing zinc, lead and other pathfinder elements on its Tell property near Mayo, Yukon. Company officials said they believe the new gossans are extremely significant because of the number of successful drill discoveries made on similar formations elsewhere in the region.
iCo Therapeutics Inc. has fallen closer to a year low of 25 cents on news that co-founder John Clement is leaving the drug compounding company, resigning his positions as chief technology and development officer to pursue unrelated business and personal interests. Prior to launching iCo with chief executive officer Andrew Rae in 2005, Mr. Clement had been director of business development at QLT Inc. and earlier as director for extramural research at Biochem Pharma Inc. He is expected to stay at iCo through an indefinite transition period.
Bravada Gold Corp. edged away from a year low 8 cents early Monday after saying it has identified and partially delineated a new zone of near-surface mineralization at its wholly owned Wind Mountain low-sulfidation gold and silver project in northeastern Nevada.
Tethys Petroleum Limited, which has an existing year low of 94 cents, announced that its entire issued ordinary share capital has been admitted to the standard category of the Official List of the Financial Services Authority and has commenced trading on the main market of the London Stock Exchange under the ticker symbol TPL. Depository interests, representing Tethys Petroleum ordinary shares, have been admitted to CREST. Shareholders wishing to trade securities in the company electronically on the London Stock Exchange can trade depository interests representing Tethys Petroleum ordinary shares in CREST.
Directors at RX Exploration Inc., which is trading close to an existing year low of 40 cents, are telling investors to disregard recent statements by the company's former CEO about a possible joint venture at its Bald Butte property in Montana. In a statement late Friday, the miner said then-CEO Murray Nye last month prematurely disclosed talks with a "major North American producer of molybdenum" to develop the site near Marysville, Mont. Mr. Nye was part of dissident slate defeated July 6 in a proxy fight for control of the firm and was replaced by Darren Blasutti, one of three past senior executives from Barrick Gold Corp. with seats on the eight-member board. The company similarly contends Mr. Nye was trying to influence the shareholder vote when he said the ramp-up at the adjacent Drumlummon mine was ahead of schedule and exceeding projections by a wide margin, with as much as 800 tons of gold ore per day reaching the surface for milling. Those comments, new board chairman Lorie Waisberg said, "may invite investors to extrapolate long-term results at Drumlummon on the basis of short-term activities" not yet supported by feasiblity studies. But conflict and controversary also are nothing new at Drumlummon, which produced an estimated 1.45 million ounces of gold and silver between 1883 and 1910 before it deliberately was flooded by its owners when they lost a protracted court fight after mining operations encroached onto a neighbouring company's property.
Lorus Therapeutics, with an existing year low of 41.5 cents, is pushing forward with safety-profile testing of its LOR-253 drug candidate, announcing plans to raise up to $4-million from the sale of equity units to support Phase I clinical studies in the United States of the prospective treatment for solid, large-cell tumors. According to regulatory documents, Lorus is recruiting patients 18 years and older whose cancers have not responded to conventional therapies to receive increasing amounts of the drug over an eight-week period to determine maximum tolerated doses. In preclinical studies LOR-253 has shown potential to slow the growth of colon, prostate and certain types of lung cancer as well as leukemia. The company expects to wrap up the new funding round by Aug. 2. Clinical trials are set to run through August 2012.
Sego Resources Inc. is set to begin Phase II percussion drilling Monday at its Miner Mountain copper and gold porphyry project near Princeton, B.C. The company previously drilled about 4,500 metres across 54 holes and on Friday said the provincial Ministry of Energy and Mines approved a new, area-based permit allowing diamond and percussion drilling, along with trenching, throughout the 2,000-hectacre Miner Mountain property during the next five years. The current drilling program calls for 35 additional holes at a cost of about $300,000, according to Sego company documents.
British authorities earlier Monday formally approved the Field Development Plan proposed by Calgary-based Sterling Resources and the British affiliate of RWE Dea AG for the Breagh natural gas field in the North Sea. Sterling has been trading close to an existing year low of $1.52. Breagh field is the first large-scale production project for Sterling, which holds a 30 per cent stake with majority partner RWE Dea owning the rest. Initial licences were let in 2004 and 2005 and the companies began a major exploratory drilling campaign two years later. Sterling and RWE Dea now expect to export gas starting next year from the Breagh Alpha offshore platform via a 20-inch pipeline to the British mainland already in place. The companies last week announced a senior secured loan worth about $160-million (Canadian) for Phase I development.
Synchronica PLC said an existing mobile operator customer based in the Middle East has placed a $740,000 follow-on order for Mobile Gateway user licences, expanding an initial $1.5-million (U.S.) order for licences received late last year. Mobile Gateway enables the operator to offer mass-market messaging services including push e-mail and instant messaging through most types of mobile handsets. Synchronica said the deal is the third major order from a client in the Middle East within the past seven months.
Vena Resources Inc. said additional drill results from the recently completed program at the Esquilache project include an intersection of 5.85 metres of 505.9 grams silver per ton in the Mamacocha vein. It also reported an intersection of 2.95 metres of 254.5 grams per ton silver, 1.01 per cent copper, 7.41 per cent lead and 11.35 per cent zinc within the Ivet/Elvira structure starting about 100 metres below the Mamacocha adit.
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