Harte Gold raising $6 million in bought deal financing

Harte Gold Corp. [HRT, TSX] is raising $6 million from a bought deal offering of 20 million flow-through common shares priced at 30 cents per share. Harte is the company that recently commenced production at its Sugar Zone Mine located 80 km east of the Hemlo Gold Camp in northern Ontario.

Harte said it has struck a deal with Echelon Wealth Partners Inc., which has agreed to purchase the shares on a bought deal basis, the company said in a press release that was issued after the close of trading on September 11, 2019. Echelon has been granted a green shoe option to buy up to an additional 15% of the flow-through shares sold under the offering at the issue price.

Gross proceeds from the offering of flow-through shares will be used for Canadian exploration expenses and will qualify for as flow-through mining expenditures under the Income Tax Act (Canada). The offering is expected to close by September 27, 2019.

Harte shares were unchanged at 27.5 cents on Thursday. The shares are trading in a 52-week range of 21 cents and 55 cents.

Harte is Ontario’s newest gold producer through its wholly-owned Sugar Zone Mine. The project is estimated to contain a NI 43-101 compliant mineral resource of 1.1 million ounces of contained gold and an inferred resource of 558,000 ounces of contained gold.

A feasibility study was completed on the Sugar Zone mine in February, 2019, which estimated total reserves at 890,000 ounces of gold.  Exploration continues on the Sugar Zone, which covers 79,335 hectares of a significant greenstone belt.

In the second quarter ended June 30, 2019 Harte said gold production increased by 42% from the previous quarter to 7,754 ounces. The average head grade of the mined ore was 6.01 g/t gold. Net revenue in the second quarter was $11.8 million, marking a 50% increase in comparison to the previous quarter. The average realized gold price during the quarter was US$1,305 per payable ounce.

Mining operations are currently expected to run for 12 years and will support further resource expansion drilling in the immediate vicinity of the mine and the ramp up of property-wide exploration programs.

In addition to the Sugar Zone property, Harte Gold also holds the Stoughton Abitibi property on the Destor-Porcupine Fault Zone, east of Timmins, Ontario. That property is adjacent to the Holloway Gold Mine.

Harte acquired the Sugar Zone property in May 2010 from Corona Gold Corp. [CRG-TSX], a company headed by mine financier Ned Goodman. At the time, Corona received cash payments, plus shares equal to a 9.9% stake in Harte.

Some of the exploration since then has focused on Hemlo-style mineralization to the east of the Sugar Zone. This is a reference to the famous Hemlo gold discoveries of the early 1980s, which were rich enough to support three mines – Williams, Golden Giant, and David Bell.