Group Ten drills 3.33% NiEq over 13.2 metres at Stillwater, Montana

Group Ten Metals Inc. [PGE-TSXV; PGEZF-OTCQB; 5D32-FSE] has drilled wide, high-grade intervals of nickel sulphide with palladium, platinum, rhodium, cobalt, copper and gold in a third tranche of drill results from the 14-hole resource expansion campaign completed at the 100%-optioned flagship Stillwater West platinum group element/nickel/copper/cobalt plus gold project in Montana, United States.

Results continue to support the company’s priority objective of expanding the October 2021 inaugural mineral resource estimates with multiple wide and highly mineralized intervals returned in step-out drilling in the DR-Hybrid deposit area at Chrome Mountain. Drilling in 2021 focused on resource expansion in three of the five deposit areas delineated by the 2021 estimates.

Similar wide and well-mineralized intervals have now been reported from all three deposit areas as announced December 20, 2021, and March 7, 2022. Mineralization remains open to expansion along trend and at depth in all five deposit areas that are in the 12-km-long resource area within the broader 32-km-long land package in the lower Stillwater Igneous Complex.

Highlights include drill hole CM2021-05 that returned 400.8 metres of continuous battery and precious metal mineralization grading 0.30% Nickel Equivalent (NiEq), equal to 0.80 g/t Palladium Equivalent (PdEq), with successive contained higher-grade intervals including 96 metres of 0.60% NiEq (1.56 g/t PdEq) and including 13.2 metres of 3.33% NiEq (8.88 g/t PdEq) as 2.31% Ni, 1.51 g/t Pd+Pt+Au+Rh (4E), 0.35% Cu and 0.115% Co starting at 37.6 meters. This is one of the widest high-grade intercepts ever recorded in the Stillwater district.

The results from CM2021-05 represent an important new discovery with the same distinctive signature of high-grade nickel sulphide, platinum group metals and gold as encountered in CM2020-04, which returned 8.5 metres of 1.74% NiEq (or 4.65 g/t PdEq) within a broad mineralized package located approximately 125 metres to the west. This zone remains open to further expansion with additional drilling.

CM2021-06 returned 0.26% NiEq (0.71 g/t PdEq) over 345.0 metres, including 75.4 metres of 0.37% NiEq, or 0.99 g/t PdEq, and a second, lower interval with 148.4 metres of 0.30% NiEq, or 0.79 g/t PdEq. CM2021-04 returned 247.2 metres of 0.21% NiEq (0.57 g/t PdEq) mineralization including two long intervals at higher grades.

Results also continue to highlight the potential for significant co-product rhodium values at Stillwater West, with drill samples in Chrome Mountain holes CM2021-04, -05, and -06 up to 0.36 g/t Rh within the mineralized horizons. At recent values, rhodium trades at more than 16 times the value of platinum and 8 times the value of palladium on a spot price basis at over USD 16,000/oz. Sibanye-Stillwater, adjacent to Group Ten’s Stillwater West project, is the primary US producer. Supply constraints for rhodium have supported rising prices since 2017.

Assay results remain pending from five holes in the HGR deposit area at Iron Mountain and portions of holes CZ2021-01 and IM2021-04, in addition to rhodium assay results on a number of mineralized intervals reported to date.

These results, in addition to results released March 7, 2022 and December 20, 2021, demonstrate significant potential to expand the October 2021 mineral resource estimates with multiple long intervals at grades well above the 0.20% NiEq cut-off grade used in that study. Potential is also shown to expand existing resources at higher cut-off grades, such as 0.35% and 0.50% NiEq. Moreover, these results provide important intercepts in step-out drill holes located up to several hundred meters from the resource estimate block models.

Dr. Danie Grobler, Group Ten’s Vice-President of Exploration, commented: “I am excited to extend my experience obtained over the past two decades at the Platreef in the northern Bushveld Complex to Group Ten’s Stillwater West project. We see significant comparability with Platreef-style mineralization in the lower Stillwater Complex and in particular, early evidence of higher-grade Flatreef pegmatoidal-style mineralization targets within the project’s layered magmatic stratigraphy.”