Categories: Precious Metals
Topics: General Precious Metals

Mawson Resources (TSX: MAW) CEO Michael Hudson on Exploration Programs at Rajapalot in Finland & Recently Acquired Properties in Australia

Gerardo Del Real: This is Gerardo Del Real with Resource Stock Digest. Joining me today is the Chairman and CEO of Mawson Resources (TSX: MAW)(OTC: MWSNF), Mr. Michael Hudson, Mike, how are you?

Michael Hudson: I'm pretty good. Thanks, Gerardo. Nice to talk to you again.

Gerardo Del Real: You have to be one of the hardest working people in the resource space. Of course, you help lead the team at Hannan Metals (TSX-V: HAN)(OTC: HANNF), which is on to a basin-scale, exciting copper-silver project, though it has different types of systems that we're discovering. You also are busy in two different countries with Mawson Resources. 

You had some news today that has to excite shareholders. The last time you and I spoke, you had reported the final 9 drill holes from the winter drill program. Here we are just a couple of weeks later and you're back at it, following up with exploration in Finland and Australia. I would love for you to provide a brief overview of what you have going on. Then I have some questions for you.

Michael Hudson: Okay, yeah. Gerardo, in summary, we're absolutely back at it. We're fully funded. As you know, we've got $18 million in the bank, and people don't invest for you to sit on your laurels. So we're back at it in Finland. We've got geophysical crews working and collecting data along strike, immediately along strike from the resource areas. By the way, we're on track for our resource upgrade through August this year in Finland, as we've just wrapped up that 14-kilometer drill program. 

But the summer-permitted areas where we can test the extensions of this host sequence, 3 kilometers long, it's got lots of smoke, I suppose you could say. We've got grab samples going up to 1,500 grams gold and boulders that have the same style of mineralization that could have only come from this area because we know the movement of glaciers. So lots of smoke and excitement. 

Then equally as exciting is we've started exploration in Australia. We closed on our acquisition in Australia only in late March. We've all been in a bit of a strange situation, locked down, but things are opening up here in Australia. So we've got a team. I was out on the ground last week. We're working out what to do with putting contracts out. We'll have geophysicists on the ground and geologists on the ground collecting data over the coming few months. We're also putting drill tenders out too now, because we want to be drilling on at least a couple of properties in Australia well before the year's end, over the next 3 to 4 months.

Gerardo Del Real: Excellent. Let's start with Finland. You mentioned having a lot of smoke, I believe it was late last year. You really had a tiger by the tail, and what helped you land that was the geophysics, right? It seems like there was a step change that was made. Once you understood how the conductors were interacting with everything else, it really led for a very high hit rate. 

I noticed in this release that the geophysical team has been mobilized. It's on strike from the resource area. I have to believe the level of confidence going into the exploration season is pretty high this time.

Michael Hudson: Yeah, it's a good point, Gerardo. It's an area we've looked at and obviously collected a reasonable amount of data to get all this smoke. But it's been two years since we've been out in these areas. In two years, we've collected 66% of the drilling basically in the resource area. So you could say that our knowledge and understanding of the system has gone up exponentially since last time we were just only 500 meters along strike exploring. 

The two key breakthroughs, the unlocking the code was one, the EM, or electromagnetic geophysics and the intimate association we see there with mineralization as we've drilled it further, and two, the geological controls and geological understanding, which is normal and happens in every project where the smart geologists working. The more data, then the more information you have to form your theories and the closer they become to what actually is happening in the ground.

This is the first time for many years we've gone back there. We know how easy these things are to miss. We went after Palokas, which has expanded beautifully. We've had some great results as you mentioned – 8 meters at 19 grams, 7 meters at 17 grams – over the last few months, hundreds of meters down plunge from the system we chased for years. That's just getting the orientations right and drilling it in the right orientation, which we haven't done yet in this new area called Hirvimaa, which is a long strike system.

Gerardo Del Real: Well said. In Australia, we know it's one of the hottest addresses in the world for gold. Gold is looking to push through that $1,800 level very soon here in US dollars. I know in speaking with you through the years, Mike, that you tend to be very cautious and conservative in the early stages of your exploration programs. When I see language that reads, and I'm just going to read it, it says, "In Victoria, preliminary field investigations confirm the presence of extensive gold mineralizing systems in all three project areas and heavily support the proposed strategy to explore for Fosterville-like, shallow orogenic epizonal gold." 

I could continue. The “heavily support” part of this release is interesting to me, because I know how conservative you tend to be early on. You've been in the field. Can you share some of what you've seen thus far, and why you're this confident this early?

Michael Hudson: Well, you're trying to drag out my thoughts here, Gerardo. I will answer your question in a little bit more detail, but we will have a lot more information over each of the projects that we're exploring in Australia over the next weeks. However, the story holds up completely. Redcastle, which is immediately along strike from Costerfield, where a million ounces has been taken out, parallel to Fosterville. Fosterville and Costerfield are the two major epizonal mines in Victoria. 

We're immediately along strike from Costerfield, and Redcastle was mined 40 years before Costerfield was even looked at by the old timers, as they went for the higher grades. Redcastle was extremely high grade. We're talking 1860s times. So a very different mantra in how they looked, but seriously hasn't been looked at beneath those old timers' mines from those days.

Sunday Creek is everything that we've seen. There's a lot of gold everywhere. Nobody's really understood it or collected systematic data, looking for high grades at depth. That's pretty low-hanging fruit. Equally, Doctor's Gully, it was mined out in alluvials and high-grade mines by the old timers. It was a relatively significant field in itself, yet nobody's really looked and understood what's happening there. We met a guy metal detecting out in the field, myself and the field team, and he was picking up gold in bedrock, detecting in the strangest of places. So if he can do it in two dimensions, I'm sure we've got a good chance in the third dimension.

Gerardo Del Real: Exciting stuff, Mike. Is there anything else you want to add to that?

Michael Hudson: No, that's all good. We're cashed up. We'll collect the data. We'll be drilling again in Finland on these targets that hopefully we'll generate, and we'll be drilling in Australia all too soon. A nice time to be exploring for gold.

Gerardo Del Real: Absolutely. Thank you for that thorough update, Mike. Appreciate your time.

Michael Hudson: Thanks, Gerardo.

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