News & Analysis » UK

Fox Marble, Hochschild Mining, Polo Resources, Weatherly International news briefs

Contributed by Fox-Davies Capital

Fox Marble has successfully extracted three blocks of high quality red marble from its Cervenilla quarry in Kosovo. These were shipped to Carrara in Italy and processed and cut into polished sample slabs. This produced attractive results with minimal damage and wastage, highlighting the quality and durability of Cervenilla marble. This is very positive for the Company as it demonstrates that they can operate in Kosovo, even in winter and that the marble produced at Cervenilla is robust enough to withstand the stresses of processing with minimal wastage. This is important as it impacts the price Fox Marble receives for the blocks.

Hochschild Mining PLC announced that its wholly owned subsidiary, 1710503 Alberta Ltd. (the "Offeror") has, since the initial extension of its November 16, 2012 offer (the "Offer") to acquire all of the outstanding common shares of Andina Minerals Inc. ("Andina") for CAD $0.80 per Share in cash on December 28, 2012, received as at 5:00pm (Toronto time) on January 11, 2013 tenders of an additional 5,308,672 Shares. The Offeror has taken up, and will within the time prescribed by applicable law, pay for all such additional Shares validly deposited pursuant to the Offer and not withdrawn prior to 5:00 p.m. (Toronto time) on January 11, 2013. Shareholders who deposited their Shares to the Offer will receive payment for such shares as soon as reasonably possible. After taking up the deposited shares, Hochschild and its affiliates now own 117,432,924 Shares, representing 90.84% of the outstanding Shares on a fully-diluted basis.

As more than 90% of the Shares sought were deposited to the Offer, the Offeror intends to acquire all of the remaining Shares of Andina not deposited under the Offer pursuant to the compulsory acquisition provisions of the Business Corporations Act (Alberta) which transaction is expected to close in February 2013. As soon as possible, the Offeror further intends to cause the Shares to be de-listed from the TSX Venture Exchange and Andina to cease being a reporting issuer under applicable securities laws.

Polo Resources has released its NAV as of the end of December 2012. The total NAV was £97.5m split £4.6m listed investments, £66.8m unlisted investments and £26.1m in cash and receivables. With a current share price of 2.75p, Polo is trading at a 24% discount to its NAV of 3.62p per share.

Weatherly International has released its 2Q'13 update. Highlights include: the completion of the Bankable Feasibility Study ("BFS") for the Tschudi Copper Project; an $88m project financing term sheet signed with RK Capital covering 100% debt funding of project; that the Tschudi financing due diligence underway; that the preliminary work on the expansion of Central Operations into Old Matchless has started and the 2Q'13 production from Central Operations was 5,780 tonnes of copper concentrate containing 1,328 tonnes of copper metal, produced at a higher than budgeted head grade and recovery.