This item is part of Stockwatch's value added news feed and is only available to Stockwatch subscribers.

Here is a sample of this item:

by Will Purcell

The diamond and specialty minerals stocks box score on Thursday was a bleak 66-103-141 as the TSX Venture Exchange lost five points to 549. James Bruchs's Tsodilo Resources Ltd. (TSD) was unchanged at 27 cents on 6,000 shares Tuesday and has not traded since.

Tsodilo had been counting the days -- and then the hours and minutes -- waiting for the two-month appeal window to close on the Botswanan government before cheering its victory in a dispute over licences covering the Xaudum iron project. That window slammed shut in mid-February. Now, just three weeks later, Mr. Bruchs, chairman and chief executive officer, has opened the door to making nice with the Botswanan politicians and bureaucrats by withdrawing the contempt motion it had filed against the government late in January.

And so, Mr. Bruchs and his crew are back to cheering the Xaudum inferred resource of 441 million tonnes grading 29.4 per cent iron, 41 per cent silicon dioxide, 6.1 per cent aluminum oxide and 0.3 per cent phosphorous. That rock covers the Block 1 area, a zone that Mr. Bruchs deems to be "just a fraction" of the total Xaudum iron formation resource. Indeed, Tsodilo extrapolates the entire formation to host "on the order of five billion to seven billion tonnes at 15 to 40 per cent iron."

The remainder is available to Stockwatch subscribers.
Sign-up for a FREE 30-day Stockwatch subscription and SEE NO ADS