When speaking about his company’s 100 per cent owned Paris silver project in South Australia, Investigator Resources Managing Director Andrew McIlwain wastes little time getting to the point.

‘Paris is the primary asset of the company that sits within a significant landholding in South Australia,’ McIlwain says.

‘In Australia, there is nothing else like it due to the fact that we have some lead among a lot of silver, whereas most other deposits have silver among lead and zinc.

‘It is the highest-grade undeveloped silver project in Australia, where we are currently moving towards completion of a definitive feasibility study.’

As far as Australian silver exploration plays go, anybody with even a passing interest in this particular precious metal should stop and take a long, hard look at the credentials of the Paris silver project.

The project currently hosts a JORC 2012 resource estimate of 18.8 million tonnes at 88 grams per tonne of silver and 0.52 per cent of lead for 53.1 million ounces of silver and 97,600 tonnes of lead.

Paris is a shallow, high-grade silver deposit amenable to open pit mining, providing outstanding exposure to a metal with strong commodity, renewable energy, and manufacturing and investment demand.

A prefeasibility study completed in 2021 returned financial results of pre-tax net present value of $202 million and pre-tax internal rate of return of 54.1 per cent, with capital costs of $131 million.

A recently completed reverse circulation drilling program demonstrated continuity of prospective geology while proving silver and lead mineralisation continues further south of the existing Paris mineral resource estimate.

The results produced the highest one-metre silver assay of the 2022/23 drilling program at the southern end of the Paris deposit: PPRC882 (Line -0.75) – 25 metres at 207 grams per tonne of silver from 73 metres, including eight metres at 615 grams per tonne of silver from 78 metres, including one metre at 2410 grams per tonne of silver from 80 metres.

‘This latest drilling added 25 per cent length to the existing resource, which should result in additional ounces,’ McIlwain explains. ‘Importantly, there was silver present in the last line of drilling, presenting potential to extend the resource.

‘We have numerous regional exploration opportunities around Paris that have been starved of attention.’

Beyond Paris, Investigator entered into a staged earn-in agreement with Thor Energy to acquire up to 80 per cent of the Molyhil tungsten project in the Northern Territory.

Investigator has conducted an extensive field review of the tenement areas, as well as completing a comprehensive review of available core and samples held in Alice Springs.

Molyhil hosts a mineral resource estimate comprising measured, indicated and inferred mineral resources totalling 4.4 million tonnes at 0.27 per cent of tungsten trioxide, 0.1 per cent molybdenum, and 0.05 per cent copper, using a 0.07 per cent of tungsten trioxide cut-off.

Investigator Resources considers Molyhil a reasonably advanced project with the opportunity to update the resource to take advantage of recent molybdenum gains.