After storming the market with a $27.5 million placement last week, Many Peaks Minerals (ASX: MPK) will continue its aggressive pace of drilling through 2026 and is on track to complete over 50,000m of drilling by year’s end – which is mainly focused on resource growth across the 37km of strike at its flagship Ferké Gold Project. Following on from an initial 15,000m campaign of expansion and delineation completed ahead of the recently published maiden MRE of 1.323Moz at 1.54g/t Au at Ouarigue – the diamond drill rigs continue uninterrupted, with the Company adding RC drilling to the campaign. MPK also announced the commissioning of a Pre-Feasibility Study for the established resource, which is due in Q4 CY26 and should reflect the attractive economics put out by numerous research providers, such as SCP’s 116kozpa at an AISC of US$1,683/oz or Morgan’s 110kozpa at an AISC of US$1,809/oz.
With 5,447m of aircore drilling across 172 holes, and an initial 6,673m of RC drilling across 58 holes – the Northern section of Ferké is primed for the same deep diamond drilling that discovered Ouargie, and MPK has excellent targets that will imminently be drilled. Ferké South is also shaping up to be an incredibly prospective area that MPK has built up a substantial database around, which will form the basis of its drilling campaign at the end of this quarter designed to discover if there is thick and high-grade Ouarigue-type mineralisation lying beneath the 4,530 soil samples, 253 rock-chip samples such as 118g/t Au and 56.1g/t Au, and 476 near-surface channel samples that have been compiled.
The placement valued MPK at $0.90/share for a $151.1 million market cap, and the company’s $33 million war chest equates to a $118.1 million enterprise value. Assuming 76.5% ownership of the Ferké project, this implies a $117/oz EV/Resource ratio. West African gold developers have been trading at an average of $200/oz, and MPK now has sufficient capital to drive a serious resource growth campaign while having a PFS in the works that will justify the developer premium. The incredible efficiency executed in the formation of the maiden MRE flowed through to an all-in cost of just AUD$11.25/oz, including all acquisition and discovery expenses. Even if this were to double, and MPK were to spend $22.5 million to add another 1Moz, this would put the current EV up to $140.6 million and imply an almost ludicrous $60.5/oz – which is unrealistically below the peer average and price targets of SCP ($2.60), Morgan’s ($2.48) and Canaccord ($1.85, pre-resource). So at the current baseline, MPK likely warrants trading at least closer to the peer average, certainly above it with a favourable PFS – and any further discovery or resource inventory has potential to drastically increase the share price to prevent that EV/Resource figure from dipping too low.
This placement of $0.90/share was an all time high capital raise price and valuation for MPK – and follows the $13.5 million placement completed in July last year at $0.72/share, which came after the March 2025 raise of $6.22 million at $0.35/share. Blackwood Capital was on all three deals, while Canaccord was there for the July and May raises and SCP Resource Finance joined in the latest round in conjunction with its research initiation. There seems to be a relatively consistent shareholder base supporting MPK’s journey, with larger and higher priced raises being executed as the company has achieved success in following through on its exploration plans at Ferké – which is a trend that is very well placed to continue.
The robust geological model that has emerged after the extensive drilling completed over the past year has demonstrated superb continuity of mineralisation that has bolstered the confidence of Ouargie’s bulk tonnage nature, to the extent of 83% of the resource being in the Measured and Indicated categories – and SCP forecasting a 116kozpa mine with an NPV of US$1.4 billion at US$4,800/oz, with potential for Ferké to get to 3Moz and MPK to hit $2.60/share. The meticulous methodology that MPK implemented to define the Ouarigue prospect’s resource can also be utilised to systematically explore the rest of Ferké’s massive 37km mineralised corridor, where there are hopefully many more standout assays awaiting. The best ones to come out of Ouarigue were 47m at 3.72g/t Au from surface, 45m at 8.58g/t Au from 104m including 25m at 14.8g/t Au from 116m, 84.8m at 3.01g/t Au from 295.8m, including 7.5m at 9.27g/t Au, as well as 75m at 6.11g/t Au from 427m, including 7m at 52.9g/t Au.
While Ferké is definitely MPK’s flagship project and priority focus at the moment, the company also has an extensive portfolio of other projects in Cote D’Ivoire, with Odienné shaping up to be an extremely exciting opportunity. It sits on the same tectonic corridor that hosts $3.7 billion Predictive Discovery’s (ASX: PDI) 5.4Moz Bankan Gold Project and the 1.5Moz Kineiro Mine, as well as $2.8 billion Resolute Mining’s (ASX: RSG) 2.2Moz ABC Project. Initial RC drill testing was guided by aircore drilling of gold anomalies and hit 21m at 1.21g/t Au including 6m at 3.17g/t Au, with a whole array of targets that MPK has been building on and refining by conducting geophysics and geochemistry at the 758km2 project, which will be followed up by further RC and aircore drilling beginning in around a month. Just a few kilometers south and on the same 30km Sassandra fault corridor is the 1.71Moz at 1.64g/t AuEq resource belonging to Awale Resources (TSX: ARIC), with two main prospects, one that contains assays such as 75m at 1.9g/t Au from 242m, and another which has recorded 32m at 45g/t Au from 164m.
The cross section below is from the latest diamond drill assays that MPK released as a part of its resource confidence upgrade drilling campaign at Ouargie, with huge intercepts like 106.7m at 2.52g/t Au from 154.75m including 17.95m at 8.21g/t Au confirming the thick, high-grade and bulk tonnage nature of the deposit:
Source: MPK
The cross section below is from the outer margins of the Ouarigue pit-constrained target area, and it depicts one of the latest drill holes intersecting the mineralised shear zone to the south, along strike from the mineralised intrusion domain. This 10.9m at 1.01g/t Au from 208.9m to the south was complemented with a 9.45m at 1.7g/t Au from 142.15m to the North (not visible here) – with both holes supporting the potential for resource growth in the metasediment-hosted structural corridor. As seen below, MPK has two RC holes planned to increase pit constrained ounces, reduce strip ratios and upgrade inferred category mineralisation:
Source: MPK
Ferké is located in one of the most prospective gold regions in the entire world, with a litany of multimillion ounce projects in its vicinity – with its geological analogue Bonikro seen below amongst the swarm of other mines. It also shows MPK’s other projects – Odienné, Baga and Oumé:
Source: MPK
MPK’s schedule of planned work for the remainder of the year and into 2027 is extensive, with two diamond rigs and one RC rig spinning at Ferké, combined with geophysics, geochemistry and the PFS, as well extensive exploration taking place at Odienne and Baga – which is a 633km2 project 21km west of the 4.5Moz Assafou gold discovery:
Source: MPK
In terms of its journey from an explorer to a developer and ultimately a producer or takeover target, MPK is in a very attractive position, where there is very little exploration risk but still huge resource growth upside, an imminent developer premium from a feasibility study that has already been forecasted by multiple reputable research providers with narrow variability between them, and a management team that has well and truly demonstrated their thorough understanding of the project and ability to execute.
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Disclaimer: This article is for informational and marketing purposes only, and does not constitute financial advice or a recommendation to invest. All opinions expressed are our own. We may receive fees or other forms of compensation in connection with the publication of this content, and may own shares in any of the mentioned companies. Please do your own research and seek professional advice before making any investment decisions.