Gryphon Gold Options Castle Peak Property
VANCOUVER, BC - Gryphon Gold Corporation reported that it has optioned the Castle Peak Property located in Esmeralda County, Nevada from Kinross Gold Corporation. The Castle Peak Property hosts a low sulfidation, epithermal gold system that has encountered up to 90 feet of 0.014 opt gold starting a depth of 30 feet.
Castle Peak is located within the Gilbert-Boss-Castle Mining District in Western Esmeralda County, Nevada and consists of 40 unpatented mining claims (800 acres) located at the southern margin of the Monte Cristo Range. The Property is situated 6.5 miles west of the Seabridge Gold's Castle-Black Rock Property and is hosted in the same Miocene rhyotite and andesite host rocks with similar low sulfidation alteration.
Kinross has drilled 35 holes at the Castle Peak Property that encountered +0.003 opt gold over at least 20 feet in 23 of the 35 reverse circulation holes. Gold mineralization is hosted in Miocene rhyolite and overlying andesite that has undergone quartz-illite alteration related to sheeted and stockworked quartz veins. Surface rock geochemistry indicates a gold-silver epithermal system in which 93 of 770 samples analyzed contained over 0.029 opt ppm gold with anomalous mercury, arsenic, and antimony.
"The Gilbert-Boss-Castle District hosts alteration over a similar area and of similar intensity to that of the major districts of the Walker Lane to include Goldfield, Tonopah, and the Comstock" says Steve Jones, Gryphon's VP of Exploration. "Castle Peak with its possible ore grade intercepts is a great place for Gryphon to start its evaluation of a major district."
Under the option agreement, Gryphon Gold will receive a 100% interest in the Castle Peak Property by expending US$1,000,000 in field expenditures over four years. Kinross will retain a Net Smelter Royalty of 2% if the spot price of gold is less than or equal to US$1,500 per ounce or 3% Net Smelter Royalty is the spot price of gold exceeds US$1,500 per ounce. Kinross has the option of regaining up to 75% control of the Property if Gryphon reports a NI43-101 compliant resource of over 2.0 million ounces of gold and if Kinross expends three times (3x) the expenditures of Gryphon with all expenditures spent on field work on the Property. Kinross will have a 120-day period to exercise its right to earn back its control of the property after the NI43-101 reporting of the +2.0 million ounce resource. Gryphon is not required to make any payments to Kinross and the four-year, $1,000,000 earn-in will be spent entirely on field work on the Property.