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Ferrum Crescent, Jubilee Platinum, Patagonia Gold, Orogen Gold, Namakwa Diamonds news briefs

Contributed by Fox-Davies Capital

Ferrum Crescent has signed a Process Engineering Agreement with Italian iron and steel making technology and equipment supplier DANIELI.

In this news:
- Danieli to act as process engineer in BFS
- Beneficiation Plant design at proposed Moonlight open pit mine location comprising crushing, grinding and beneficiation, tailings storage
- Pelletising Plant design, to produce direct reduction grade pellet at a railhead for further conveyance
- Laboratory testing and process work on Moonlight iron ore to define and confirm the most suitable process configuration of the BP and PP to produce high quality DR grade pellet (based on metallurgical testwork)
- Analysis by Ferrum of final pellet plant construction location and related infrastructure near completion
- Other service providers including mine design to be appointed by Ferrum.

FD Comment:
The BFS is expected to take 12 to 18 months during which time the Company hope that progress will be made on infrastructure upgrades by Transnet from the Waterberg to Richards Bay to enable Ferrum to export up to 6Mtpa of pellets starting in 2018. We believe this infrastructure will be upgraded, primarily to develop the Waterberg coalfield and being driven by Eskoms coal requirements. Whether there will be sufficient capacity given the Transnets capital constraints remains to be seen.

Jubilee Platinum PLC announced that it is issuing 1,194,455 Shares as the third and final tranche of consideration for the purchase of further shares in Jubilee subsidiary Power Alt (Pty) Ltd. As a result, Jubilee's holding in Power Alt will increase by 1.9% to 70% and completes its acquisition goal for Power Alt, thereby enabling the Company to pursue its strategy to maximise Jubilee's exposure to the growing demand for the sale of private energy to the South African electricity public utility. The Company expects that 1,194,455 ordinary shares of 1 pence each will be admitted to trading on AIM and the JSE on 28 February at 8am United Kingdom time and 10am South African time respectively.

Patagonia Gold PLC announced it has raised gross proceeds of approximately £6.2M (approximately US$9.4M) through a subscription of 41,196,687 new ordinary shares of 1p each in the Company each at a price of 15 pence per Subscription Share. The Issue Price represents a discount of approximately 3.23 per cent. to the closing middle market price of 15.5 pence per ordinary share on 26 February 2013, being the last trading day prior to this announcement. The net proceeds of the Subscription will be used to fund exploration and drilling expenditure on the Cap-Oeste and COSE projects in Argentina and to provide general working capital for the Company.

Orogen Gold has announced its exploration plans for Deli Jovan in Serbia and Mutsk in Armenia for the current year.

Planned work includes:
- Deli Jovan Gold Project Serbia (55% Interest)

- Gindusa West
1. Follow-up detailed trench and diamond drill testing of 8m wide high-grade gold zone, which included 3m at 29.6g/t Au from a exploratory trench on a soil anomaly late last year
2. Further drill testing of potential new hidden gold veins, one of which assayed 6.75g/t Au over 0.95m from drilling in 2012
3. Initial trenching on several untested gold-in soil anomalies at Gindusa West covering a 1,500m by 750m area

- Gindusa Main Zone
1. Infill and step-out drill testing of the high grade gold vein systems at the Gindusa Mine area aimed at demonstrating the potential for resource delineation
2. Completion of 75% earn-in to Deli Jovan expected in H2 2013

- Mutsk Gold Project, Armenia
1. A due diligence evaluation programme is planned on the JV property over a potentially large epithermal gold target with drill intercepts of up to 14.4m at 1.09g/t Au.

FD Comment:
The recent trenching at Gindusa West proved exciting, whilst the Company is hoping Mutsk proves comparable to Lydian International's Amulsar gold project which has 2.3Moz at 0.8g/t. Under the terms of the JV Orogen must spend at least US$150k by August, which if successful gives it the right to earn an 80% interest by spending US$2.5M by August 2016. Orogen is fully funded for its FY'13 exploration programme and should have a strong news flow over the coming months, with work expected to start at Deli Jovan next month, after the Spring thaw with the aim of producing a maiden resource.

Namakwa Diamonds Ltd announced that it has successfully closed its recent tender of rough diamonds at CS Diamonds in Kimberley for production from its South African subsidiaries which ran between 18(th) and 21(st) of February 2013. The North West Province production, totalling 1,962 carats, was sold at an average price of US$496 per carat, with an average stone size of 0.50 carats. The sale realised revenues of approximately US$ 0.97M.

FD Comment:
Theo Botoulas, Chief Executive Officer of Namakwa Diamonds, said: "The Tender achieved satisfactory results with certain articles selling at above expected premiums. We are pleased with the overall results achieved. Our North West product continues to receive a lot of interest from local and international buyers."