Struggling LionGold gets small respite of good news

A FAINT flicker of good news has come in for ailing LionGold which has been hard hit by a slew of bad news.

A recent scoping study on its gold mine project in Ghana-Konongo Project - owned by Australian-listed Signature Metals - has come up with some "encouraging conclusions" after discovering that the area has "reasonable prospects of economic extraction".

The announcement was made by LionGold to the Singapore Exchange based on Signature Metals' announcement to the Australian Stock Exchange.

LionGold owns 77 per cent of Signature Metals, which in turn owns 70 per cent of the Owere Mines, its flagship operations. Owere Mines wholly owns the Konongo Project, the subject of the recent scoping study which spans Ghana's renowned Ashanti Gold Belt, an area rich in gold mining history.

As such, the firm said the project has the potential to be developed as a profitable underground mining operation with a base-case internal rate of return of 35 per cent and a net present value of US$22.3 million.

The study by Snowden was commissioned during the September quarter to assess the technical and economic merits of the Konongo Gold Project.

LionGold shares were unchanged at three Singapore cents as at noon with some 11 million shares done.