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The Valeriano Project, located in the Huasco Province of the Atacama Region of northern Chile, is situated approximately 151 kilometres southeast of the City of Vallenar. Following the addition of 2,331 hectares of exploration concessions in 2023, the Property consists of 15 exploitation concessions and 14 exploration concessions covering a total area of 6,126 hectares.
The Project’s eastern and southern boundaries are formed by the Chilean border with Argentina and the concessions fall entirely within Chile. The Valeriano Project hosts a large copper gold porphyry deposit, below a near surface oxidized epithermal gold deposit that extends from surface to a depth of 100 metres1.
In 2023, ATEX reported updated mineral resources for both the oxide gold deposit and copper gold porphyry1.
In 2022, Phase II drilling was the company’s first test of the porphyry system with two drill holes (ATXD17 and ATXD192) targeting the high-grade central trend, initially intersected by Hochschild drill hole VALDD-14. Both drill holes intersected significant mineralization confirming proof of concept for the potential of a higher-grade core of ≥0.8% CuEq within the Central High-Grade Trend at Valeriano.
In 2022-2023 Phase III drilling utilized directional drilling to expand on the successes of Phase II and reduce costs by re-entering historical drill holes and drilling daughter holes from depth. The Program has successfully expanded the mineralized corridor within the Valeriano project, extended the high-grade (≥0.8% CuEq) core and discovered a third porphyry trend to the west of the Central Trend.
Phase III drilling further bolstered ATEX’s proof of concept and intersected the project’s longest intersections to date in eight drill holes (ATXD11A3, ATXD214, ATXD11B5, ATXD225, ATXD22A6, ATXD236, ATXD22B7 and ATXD247).
2023-2024 Phase IV drilling again utilized directional drilling to realize the successes of past programs. ATEX has vastly improved the understanding of the geometry of the Valeriano system and demonstrated more continuity of the higher-grade core by intersecting the best grades seen on the Project to date. At the end of the campaign, the system remained open in all directions despite increasing the strike length on the mineralized intrusive units to over 1.2 kilometers demonstrating potential for scalability of the deposit. Additionally, the late-stage epithermal system overprinting wall rock mineralization that was intersected above the top of the porphyry units provides another exciting exploration target to follow up on in Phase V and represents potential optionality as a separate high-grade domain within the greater resource envelope and higher up in the system. Assay results from 8 drill holes were released (ATXD12A8, ATXD16A9, ATXD17A9, ATXD2510, ATXD17B11, ATXD2611, ATXD25A12, and ATXD26A12). Drill holes ATXD25A, ATXD26A, and ATXD2712 were paused at the completion of Phase IV and will be re-entered during the Phase V program.
Based on the option agreement originally signed in August 2019, and amended in January 2020 and August 2023, ATEX can earn a 100% interest in Valeriano by September 1, 2025. For details of the payments and work commitments, please see the company's corporate presentation.
1 For further information, please see ATEX’s NI 43-101 compliant technical report titled “Independent Technical Report for the Valeriano Copper-Gold Project, Atacama Region, Chile” with an effective date of September 1, 2023, prepared for ATEX by SRK Consulting (Chile) SpA. A copy of the foregoing technical report is available on ATEX’s website and also under ATEX’s SEDAR+ profile at www.sedarplus.com. As set out in the foregoing technical report, Copper Equivalent (CuEq) is calculated assuming US$ 3.15/lb copper (Cu), US$ 1,800/oz gold (Au), US$ 23/oz Silver (Ag), and US$ 20/lb Molybdenum (Mo) and metallurgical recoveries of 90% for Cu, 70% for Au, 80% for Ag, and 60% for Mo using the formula CuEq % = Cu % + (6481.488523 * Au g/t) + (94.6503085864 * Ag g/t) + (4.2328042328 * Mo g/t).
2 For ATXD17 and ATXD19 results, procedures and QA/QC information, see press release from June 13, 2022.
3 For ATXD11A results, procedures and QA/QC information, see press release from February 7, 2023.
4 For ATXD21 results, procedures and QA/QC information, see press release from February 27, 2023.
5 For ATXD11B and ATXD22 results, procedures and QA/QC information, see press release from March 30, 2023.
6 For ATXD22A and ATXD23 results, procedures and QA/QC information, see press release from June 5, 2023.
7 For ATXD22B and ATXD24 results, procedures and QA/QC information, see press release from July 13, 2023.
8 For ATXD16A, ATXD17A, ATXD12A, ATXD25, AXTD17B, ATXD26, ATXD25A, ATXD26A and ATXD27 results, procedures and QA/QC information, see press release from June 25, 2024.