As copper becomes ever hotter property and the tantalising price of $3/lb heaves into view, at least for the optimistic among us, companies with their focus on the metal naturally become more interesting. A recent newcomer to the London market, Kalahari Minerals [AIM:KAH] can offer investors no less than three copper projects, with a uranium joint venture thrown in to add piquancy to the proposition.

Altogether, Kalahari can already boast an estimated 250,000 tonnes of copper in the ground across its Namibian ground, which makes it clear that the company has moved beyond exploration and into the pre-feasibility phase with its two key projects. The area in which the company is operating was explored preliminarily by other players back in the 1970s, and a sizable portion of the presently known resources originate from this spell, but failure by those then exploring to come across any very large targets plus a deteriorating political situation in Namibia brought proceedings to a halt.



Now that the copper market looks very different and the politics of Namibia have improved, Kalaharis ground is a lot more desirable. Indeed, the companys Chairman Mark Hohnen admits that it has been lucky to have been able to stake the areas it has, which essentially amount to a large slice of the Namibian section of the Kalahari copper belt, which has some geological similarities with the much storied Zambian copper belt.

Kalaharis first order of priority is the Dordabis project, within which it has homed in on a deposit known as Koperberg. Drilling here has identified oxide and sulphide zones of mineralisation and recorded some good intersections, the highlight of which has been 5 metres graded at 3.43% copper. A small scale pilot processing plant is already recovering copper cathode on site.

The Koperberg resource is still open, and an alluring possibility raised by Hohnen is that it could conform to the Olympic Dam geological model. That is, a massive body of IOCG (iron oxide copper gold) mineralisation with significant smatterings of uranium. It is too early to tell whether this is the case or not, but such a scenario is certainly something pleasant to dream of for Kalahari shareholders, and the company has allocated funds specifically towards testing this hypothesis.

Kalaharis second key project goes by the name of Witvlei, and hosts five known copper deposits along with a number of prospects. The next step for the company will be to try and expand the existing deposits and define resources at the prospects in order to come up with a total resource of a potentially economic size.

If this resource development programme comes up with the goods, Hohnen suggests that an attractive option for Kalahari at Witvlei may be the tried and tested development model of establishing initial cash flow from oxide material before moving on to trickier-to-process sulphides. The same development path could also be worth considering at Koperberg if the Olympic Dam model is not found to hold true there.

Kalaharis only grassroots stage project is Ubib, which has been is known to host copper gold mineralisation with a hint of uranium but needs appraising more thoroughly before much more than this can be said. The project is located some 15 kilometres from Anglo Gold Ashantis Navachab gold mine, which obviously auspicates well. Current work is centred on stream sampling to help identify prospective target zones for the application of more advanced exploration techniques.

The Husab uranium project, which is a joint venture with Extract Resources [ASX:EXT] structured to give Extract 51% and Kalahari the remainder, has surprised both companies. Hohnen says that little was thought of Husab until last year, when some great radiometric anomalies were turned up. The presence of uranium along with other metals has now been confirmed, and diamond drilling to test the deposit at depth begins in the next couple of weeks.

Husab is located right between the Rossing uranium mine, owned by Rio Tinto [LSE:RIO; NYSE:RTP], and the Langer Heinrich deposit, which is being developed by the uranium darling of the Australian market, Paladin Resources [ASX:PDN]. Extract has already gained significant recognition from its constituency of investors for Husab, and if drilling confirms the joint venture partners optimism, then the project could well help win Kalahari some fans in the London market, where uranium plays are not as numerous as they could be, and hence much in demand.

Investment Outlook

Kalahari has raised 6 million by way of its AIM listing, and intends to devote the largest portion of this sum to work at Dordabis. Therefore, this is the project that investors should be keeping their weather eye on. Significant progress down the road to feasibility is sure to add value to the company, other things, such as the copper market, being equal.

But in addition to Dordabis, there is scope for either or both of Witvlei and Ubib to shape up and grab investors attention. Husab already stands out, and with a high level of market interest in new uranium projects still apparent, it is a nice asset for Kalahari to have.

well done all holders.
rf
remember dont be afraid to take a profit or hold on too long. or bail out too soon, remember also you is now an old timer, hopefully having learned lessons.(bit like counting on oil never getting below 100 again ) lots of stuff to consider there.
good luck
jkd

You are a wise old owl jkd....thanks....well here we go...could go either way I suppose, but up is more likely !.

Well...it's down....for the moment !.

Hardly any trades at all...what's happened to the rush of blood ?, and buy buy buy sort of thing ?.

it would not be imprudent for any holders to lock in some profits ..... i strongly suspect the lemmings have been chasing, just as they did MXP only last week, which has now back to 4.5/5.00 from its high of about 9.00 ..... no more need be said

Sold half for a free ride on the rest as I have nearly doubled my original investment...probably will regret it as it has gone up since I sold but a profit is a profit and I have made plenty of mistakes in the past....!.

it can never be wrong to bank a profit!

Lastest news,

Notice of Major Shareholdings by Emerging Metals Ltd

Kalahari Minerals plc, the AIM listed mining exploration group with a portfolio of copper, base metal and uranium interests in Namibia, was notified on 16th December that AIM listed Emerging Metals Ltd ('Emerging Metals') has increased its stake in Kalahari through the purchase of 6,250,000 new ordinary shares in the Company's recent fundraising, increasing its stake to 11,245,000 new Ordinary Shares, representing 6.28% of the Kalahari's total voting rights.

Kalahari Executive Chairman Mark Hohnen said, 'At a time of market uncertainty, the recent fundraising was a clear indication of the level of investment interest that exists for Kalahari, both through new and existing shareholders. We welcome the current stake building by Emerging Metals, in particular the involvement of Non-Executive Co-Chairman Mr. Stephen Dattels, who has an excellent track record within the mining sector having founded and/or financed a number of ventures, with his most recent being Namibian uranium company UraMin Inc. which was sold in July 2007 to Areva, the French government-owned fully integrated uranium company for $2.5 billion.'

The 5th company invovled in this venture, (EXT, KAH, RIO and URU), a specialist
in such projects. This as you can see from the above could be hugh, due to quality
of the field along with the markets thirst for uranium. A shortage + with neclear
energy being classed as green(???)and many new stations being built will only
exasperate the supply.
For me its "when not if" RIO will take over Rossing and at present KAH are taking legal action in an Aussie C/Law to prevent them(RIO) having one its personal on
the owners (EXT)on the board. And the final price payed could be many multiples of todays M/Cap, as can be seen from the above news.
Patience is whats required here so back in the bottom draw for my holdings.
aimho
cyril
meta

The present price of U-3 O-8 is $47/lb, but has been much higher, well over the
100/lb. Anyone taking the trouble to do the calcs will see the value here, i believe 5/lb has been mentioned as the in-situ benchmark?
Its well worth considering buying EXT on the ASX as its a considerable discount to
Kah's SP.
cyril

Well, I decided to take the full profit......but I'll be back no doubt...just too sharp a spike for my liking and I have work to do so cannot keep on watching all the time but I'll come back in at some stage. I just expected this to rise some more this morning but can't complain..biggest profit for ages !.

For me i took a belated stake in URU, which is trading at a large discount to its
SP and hold over 20% of KAH.
RF this imv is a takeover battle and could erupt at any moment?
cyril

Double post again, i must need a new mouse?
cyril

who are EXT????

EXT (Aussie)are the owners of the rossing field, which in turn is held by KAH and RIO.
http://www.kalahari-minerals.com

Plenty of info on their site.
cyril

Took profit too early..., but there you go...could have gone either way !.

greed is a very seductive siren .... thus, it is exceedingly tempting to dabble in KAH and/or ENK or similar ..... MXP (for me) proved to be a very interesting example, in that i got in late but, on the back of the impetus (and the sheep!), i managed to make and bank a decent profit ..... had i hung on, that profit would now be pretty much if not entirely wiped out.

decisions, decisions!

A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush but then again the great late "Benny Hill" said that two birds in the bush was more fun than one in hand !.

two birds in the hand in the bush ain't too tragic either!

Euhh no !.

Could not resist it but bought back via EML which has big exposure to this stock....the only thing the spread is not fantastic but has been reduced today....did not want to break the 30 day rule....wish I had these in a Sipp or such......EML is at an incredible discount to assets plus $ in hand and profiting with the exchange rate....started a new blog on there.