The reported diamond drill holes targeted internal model gaps within the top 1,000 vertical meters of the Apollo system, which is part of the company’s Guayabales Project. Drilling on the western side of the Apollo system intersected high-grade mineralization, expanding that section by up to 50 meters.

Figure 1: Plan View of the Apollo System Highlighting Infill Drill Holes in this Release (CNW Group/Collective Mining Ltd.)

Drill Hole Results and Western Expansion

Key intercepts include:

486.00 meters at 2.01 g/t gold equivalent from 54.10 meters downhole (APC-141).

144.30 meters at 2.08 g/t gold equivalent from 324.45 meters downhole (APC105-D5). This intercept is cited as the one that expanded the Apollo system westward by up to 50 meters at an elevation of 1,450 meters above sea level (MASL).

These results are expected to improve the internal block model grades, extend the mineralized volume, or upgrade confidence in the estimation.

Drill holes from Pad 30 cut mineralization beginning near surface, including:

APC-141: 486.00 meters at 2.01 g/t gold equivalent from 54.10 meters downhole.

APC-147: 84.55 meters at 2.04 g/t gold equivalent from surface.

Drill holes from mother hole APC-105D at Pad 18 extended the volume of the mineralized Apollo breccia body up to 50 meters horizontally and 140 meters vertically toward the southwest margin.

Ongoing Exploration and 2026 Plans

Figure 2: Plan View and Section Highlighting the New Western Expansion of the Apollo System (CNW Group/Collective Mining Ltd.)

The company has completed approximately 142,000 meters of diamond drilling to date across the Guayabales and San Antonio projects, with 102,000 meters at Apollo. Numerous drill holes are awaiting assay results.

Ten drill rigs are currently operating across the company’s properties:

Guayabales Project: Six rigs are in operation. One rig is moving to conduct expansion drilling at the outcropping tungsten, gold, silver, and copper zone. Two rigs are performing infill drilling at Apollo (1,500 MASL to 1,000 MASL elevations). Two deep capacity rigs are focused on expanding the high-grade Ramp Zone at depth (below Apollo), and one rig has started drilling at Target X.

San Antonio Project: Four rigs are targeting the Pound zone, which has previously intersected a shallower zone of gold and silver-rich, intermediate sulphidation sheeted veins and a deeper gold-copper porphyry system.

Collective Mining is finalizing plans for an 80,000 to 100,000-meter drilling campaign in 2026 across the Guayabales and San Antonio projects. The company anticipates completing a maiden resource estimate for the Apollo system in the fourth quarter of 2026.

Figure 3: Plan View of the San Antonio Project’s Pound Target with Visual Descriptions of Drill Holes SAC-24, SAC-25, and SAC-26, all of Which Cut Potentially Significant Mineralization. Assay Results are Pending (CNW Group/Collective Mining Ltd.)

Headline photo: Plan View of the San Antonio and Guayabales Projects Highlighting the Pound Target and the Apollo System (CNW Group/Collective Mining Ltd.)

The Santa Ana project, wholly owned by Outcrop Silver, encompasses 27,000 hectares in Colombia’s Mariquita District, which is historically recognized as the country’s largest and highest-grade primary silver district. The project’s maiden resource estimate, detailed in a June 8, 2023, “NI 43-101 Technical Report” prepared by AMC Mining Consultants, indicates an estimated indicated resource of 24.2 million ounces silver equivalent at a grade of 614 grams per ton and an inferred resource of 13.5 million ounces at a grade of 435 grams per ton.

The La Ye vein is approximately four kilometers south of the existing mineral resource area. Drilling results have demonstrated high-grade silver-gold mineralization in both concentrated zones and broader mineralized intervals. These findings suggest the potential for significant resource growth at the Santa Ana project.

Silver Equivalency Formula (CNW Group/Outcrop Silver & Gold Corporation)

Outcrop Silver’s 2024 exploration strategy focuses on extending known mineralization and testing new high-potential areas along the project’s extensive 30-kilometer mineralized trend. The company aims to demonstrate a clear pathway to substantially expand the resource, positioning the Santa Ana project to develop into a high-grade, economically viable, and environmentally responsible silver mine.

The company emphasizes its commitment to responsible mining practices and community engagement, aiming to contribute positively to the local economy while adhering to sustainable development principles.

Outcrop Silver continues to advance its exploration efforts at Santa Ana, with ongoing drilling and analysis aimed at further delineating the project’s resource potential.

Photo credit: Outcrop Silver.

The big three rating agency said in a statement that the increase was driven by Gran Colombia refinancing its “2020 and 2024 debentures through its $98 million USD senior secured gold-linked notes, the settlement of its 2018 debentures with shares, and an enhanced mine plan at its Segovia operations focused on cost reductions and high-grade ore bodies.”

The combined impact is expected to lead to a better liquidity position, which has allowed the Toronto-based mining firm to invest more in drilling and general business.

Gran Colombia, however, remains vulnerable to weak gold prices and a stronger Colombian peso, in Fitch’s assessment.

The company’s “credit risk lies in 2020 and 2021, with an expected lower production profile and possibility for lower grades,” stated Fitch. “Should lower gold prices and a stronger peso coincide with lower mine output, this would pressure cash flow.”

The find came at the Acorazado-1 exploration well and marked the Canadian oil company’s fourth discovery in 2018, which will help set the stage for its plans to drill 34 more wells during the fourth quarter of the year, according to the firm.

The Acorazado-1 well was drilled to a depth of 15,470 feet with 356 feet of gross thickness in the Mirador formation sandstone reservoir. “Open-hole wireline logging operations identified five separate, potentially hydrocarbon-bearing sections of the Mirador formation,” said the company in a statement.

Richard Herbert, chief executive officer of Frontera, noted that though there are indications of lowered reservoir pressure, the “well has identified a part of the structure which contains resources which have never been previously drilled and developed.”

Frontera Energy, which now has an output of 65,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day in Colombia and Peru and is pushing for production growth in 2019, plans to drill exploration and appraisal wells later this year at its Coralillo-3 and Cocodrilo-1 sits on the Guatiquia block in addition the Jaspe appraisal wells in the Quifa North area.

“Frontera’s strong production profile is well-timed with the upcoming expiration of our oil hedges at the end of October, which will increase our exposure to Brent oil prices by nearly $25 per barrel based on recent prices,” added Herbert.

This figure, however, is slightly up, by about 3%, compared to its depressed output of 59,131 barrels per day in the final quarter of 2017.

Higher oil prices also didn’t help lead to better financial results. Frontera, formerly known as Pacific Rubiales before a rebrand in recent years, realized just $249.5 million USD in sales and a net loss of $3.1 million USD in the first quarter.

These figures are down from the $316.6 million USD and $8.5 million USD net gain in the first quarter of 2017. It is also well below the $335.3 million USD in sales that the Toronto-based company made during the fourth quarter of 2017, when Frontera had a net loss of $32.5 million USD.

The uptick in oil production this quarter compared to the final quarter of 2017 was driven by an uptick in its output in Peru. Oil production in Colombia actually decreased from 56,593 in to 52,195 over the same time frame.

The drop is even more prominent — by nearly 10,000 barrels per day — compared to the 62,180 barrels per day average Frontera reported in Colombia in the first quarter of 2017.

In a statement, the company noted that the declines in Colombia were “a result of social unrest at the Cubiro block that has now been resolved” in addition to “increased volumes of 1,257 boe/d paid-in kind to Ecopetrol S.A. from production at the Quifa block pursuant to the high price participation clause in the governing exploration and exploitation contract.”

The firm’s natural gas output also has continued to fall over the past year. Frontera produced just 4,875 boe/d in Colombia in the first quarter of this year, down significantly from 5,314 boe/d in the fourth quarter last year and the 6,489 it managed in the first quarter of 2017.

Frontera attributed this to “natural production declines on the company’s natural gas assets at La Creciente.”

The growth news comes from Peru, where Frontera Energy brought its oil production from just 2,538 barrels per day in the fourth quarter of 2017 to 9,157 barrels per day this quarter.

Still, with the output drops in Colombia across the board, the company’s 66,227 boe/d in total oil and gas production was down from its 72,524 figure reported in the first quarter of 2017.

Frontera Energy is drilling, however, as it continues on a strategy it has coined “positioning for growth” in 2018.

“In April, we started drilling at our Acorazado-1 location in the Llanos foothills of Colombia, targeting a large structure on trend with the giant Cusiana and Cupiagua fields,” stated the company.

It also reported that two oil exploration wells in the Guatiquia block — Coralillo-1 and Alligator-2 — are completed and have been tested at an average of 1,000 barrels per day. Another well, the Jaspe-6D exploration well in the Quifa area, has is testing at an average rate of 187 barrels per day and the company has set the third quarter of this year to drill its offshore Delfin Sur-1 exploration well in Peru.

The Colombian government, which owns the vast majority of Ecopetrol shares, will receive a dividend of around $1.17 billion USD (3.2 trillion pesos).

Shareholders received 89 pesos per share, or roughly $32 USD for every 1,000 shares, a figure that was approved at the Bogotá-based company’s March 23 general assembly.

The Colombian government, which owns the vast majority of Ecopetrol shares, will receive a dividend of around $1.17 billion USD (3.2 trillion pesos). The sum is being distributed in two separate payments, one that was completed yesterday on April 19 and the second that will be paid on September 17, the company said in a statement.

The combined total of 3.6 trillion pesos represents a distribution of 55% of Ecopetrol’s profits in 2017.

With more than $2.3 billion USD in profits last year, the company, which has been embattled in an environmental crisis following a well rupture that spilled a substantial amount of oil in Colombia last month, posted its best results in four years.

That windfall is helping Ecopetrol to up its investment in exploration this year, drilling more wells as it looks to expand reserves that have fallen considerably in recent years.

“2017 was a year of intense exploratory activity, as we worked hard to build the foundations for the company’s future growth,” said Felipe Bayon Pardo, chief executive officer of Ecopetrol S.A., earlier this year.

READ MORE: With $2.3 Billion USD in 2017 Profits, Ecopetrol Posts Best Results in Four Years

“We ended the year with a total of 21 wells drilled,” added the CEO. “Through this deployment of activity we succeeded in incorporating more than 250 million barrels of oil equivalent in contingent resources, leveraging the future increase in the business group’s reserves.”

Along with hitting a production goal of up to 725,000 barrels of oil per day in 2018, Ecopetrol began the year with plans to drill at least 620 development wells and 12 exploratory wells. Some 20 pilot projects were also planned in an attempt to further improve oil recovery from existing wells, according to Bayon.

Photo: Ecopetrol headquarters in Bogotá, Colombia (Credit: Dvalencia)

Called Istanbul-1, the Canadian firm’s well was spud on February 27 and is targeting the Jimol formation at a true vertical depth (TVD) of around 8,000 feet. Reaching the full depth is expected to take up to 25 days.

PentaNova Energy has an 80% “beneficial working interest” in the Maria Conchita block, according to the company. Other notable wells nearby include Aruchara-1, drilled by Texaco in 1980, and Tinka-1, which was drilled by Ecopetrol in 1988.

“Colombia’s most significant source of natural gas production, the 6 TCF Chuchupa field, is located approximately 50 kilometers northwest of the company’s newly spudded well,” stated PentaNova Energy in a statement.

“The Chuchupa field, discovered in 1973, a strategic energy asset for Colombia, currently produces approximately 30% of the country’s daily output,” added PentaNova Energy, “although gas production has been in decline since 2002 creating a supply problem in the face of rising gas demand.”

(Photo credit: vaazdev / Pixabay)

The Toronto-based company projects to maintain this average level of between 70,000 to 72,000 barrels per day, after royalties and internal consumption, throughout the first quarter of 2018 “assuming normal operating conditions,” said Frontera Energy in a statement.

“2017 was a year of review and stabilization, 2018 is expected to be a year where the company is repositioning for growth.” – Barry Larson, Frontera Energy CEO

Though the 2017 year-end level falls within the company’s exit guidance range of 70,000 to 75,000 barrels per day, Frontera Energy only averaged an estimated 64,445 barrels per day in the fourth quarter. This was below the 71,068 barrel-per-day average from the third quarter, a shortfall that the Toronto-based firm attributed to “downtime experienced in Peru during the quarter.”

In better news from Peru, however, Frontera Energy did report reaching 8,240 barrels per day from Block 192 in the country, which beat its prior expectation of between 6,000 to 8,000 barrels per day.

New Drilling and “Repositioning for Growth”

The company is also ready to begin a drilling strategy that will expand upon the nine active rigs expected to be operational during the first quarter. (Six of the active rigs will be in the Quifa, Cajuar and Jaspe heavy oil areas, with the other three operating on the light oil-focused Guatiquia block.)

In all, Frontera Energy said it plans to drill between 40 to 50 wells during this period, with “40 to 45 will be development-focused and five will be exploration-focused.” Frontera CEO Barry Larson, said that, “2017 was a year of review and stabilization, 2018 is expected to be a year where the company is repositioning for growth.”

The exploration effort will be “focused on the Alligator 2x well on the Guatiquia block, the Acorazado well on the Llanos 25 block, both in Colombia, and the Delphin well on the Z1 block offshore Peru.” Preparation for the Llanos 25 well “is underway with drilling expected to begin in April,” stated Frontera.

“Our teams are working hard on delivering continued operational improvements from our existing producing assets, while a balanced exploration program provides risked upside for both production and resources in the short and medium term,” said Larson.

All of the Toronto-based firm’s Colombian operations are now held by the Colombian branch of Meta Petroleum Corporation, a wholly owned subsidiary of Frontera Energy. The reorganization was intended to streamline operations and “eliminate legal entity redundancies,” according to Frontera Energy.

Given the expectations of adding more output, Frontera Energy says that it projects production of up to 75,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day.

In addition to the structural changes, the company announced that other operational developments and expected production gains will push its overall output to around 75,000 barrels per day, according to an internal projection.

The company noted that it is seeing gains from the horizontal drilling it completed at its Quifa field in Colombia, where new wells are now delivering “close to 300 barrels per day of heavy oil, nearly double the rate of legacy horizontal locations on the field.”

Frontera Energy is currently testing the results of Alligator-1X, a recently completed exploration well that discovered oil in three reservoir zones.

The company also announced the following developments within Colombia: “The anticipated startup of a waterflood pressure maintenance project on the Copa field, drilling currently underway related to the implementation of a waterflood pressure maintenance project on the Guatiquia block, and continued success on the vertical well drilling program at Quifa and Cajua where new vertical wells are delivering approximately 130 barrels per day of heavy oil, and adding either new 2P reserve locations or drilling outside the existing 2P boundary of the field.”

READ MORE: Frontera Energy Adds Richard Herbert to Board and Promotes Three New VPs

In a larger operational update, Frontera Energy announced that it has been working to improve its situation in Peru, where the company has been “working with local indigenous groups and PetroPeru to establish framework agreements” to restart full production on its “Block 192” holding where a blockade by the community was lifted on October 31.

Those efforts, say the company, allowed production to recommence in early December. Current oil production on the block has reached more than 5,000 barrels per day “with the goal of increasing oil production to between 6,000 barrels per day and 8,000 barrels per day, net to the company after royalties and internal consumption, before the end of the year.”

In all, the company has raised its production, “after royalties and internal consumption,” to more than 66,500 barrels of oil equivalent per day. Given the expectations of adding more production in the company’s Quifa field and Ardilla field holdings in Colombia, as well as increased output in Peru, Frontera Energy says that it projects production of up to 75,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day.

On the financial front, Fontera Energy said in a statement that it “has already exceeded the high end of Operating EBITDA guidance of $300 million USD to $350 million USD, with over $360 million USD of operating EBITDA in the 11-month period ending November 30.” It added that the firm expects to finish “towards the low end” of its capital expenditure projection of $250 million USD to $300 million USD.

Three rigs are now operating as a part of the Canadian company’s 15,000-meter exploration campaign, and it plans to add another two rigs to the effort in the third quarter of this year. Continental Gold is expecting to see the initial results of this drilling campaign in September.

Photo: The Higabra Valley tunnel at Continental Gold’s Buriticá goldmine in Antioquia. (Credit: Continental Gold Inc.)

The firm said that it will target locations that it believes have “high-grade gold potential” that have been previously identified by early-exploration work during the past two years. “The aim of the directional drilling program is multifold and will include infill drilling of both probable reserves and inferred resources in order to move them into higher classification categories,” said Continental Gold in a statement. It is also planning to use “step-out drilling” below its Higabra Valley tunnel while searching the nearby mineral reserve blocks.

“We are excited to have drills turning again for the first time in more than two years and expect that future results will continue to be positive,” said Ari Sussman, chief executive officer of Continental Gold. “With both the Yaraguá and Veta Sur deposits wide open for expansion, we are confident that drilling will drive shareholder value as we embark on our next phase of corporate growth.”

Based on a study done by the company, it believes it can recover nearly 3.5 million ounces of gold and more than 6.4 million ounces of silver from the 70,000-hectare Buriticá site.