ECR Minerals plc (LON: ECR), the exploration and development company focused on gold in Australia, provides the following update on its operations.

Ongoing preparations at the Blue Mountain Project

ECR has leased a percussion drilling rig which will shortly move to Lolworth but the Company also took the opportunity to carry out some drilling at Blue Mountain whilst the rig was travelling through Queensland.  This decision has paid dividends. Holes are some 6m deep and around 5m apart.  Drilling time is around 20 minutes per hole, including movement of the rig and set up, meaning that the Company has been able to quickly drill and analyse prospective areas at the project.

Drill samples are catalogued, panned and inspected for signs of visible gold before sending appropriate samples to the lab for further analysis.

By way of illustration, during the past week, ECR has identified and mapped a suitable area for trenching measuring some 200m in length, 27m in width and 3m depth.  The 16,200 cubic metres with an assumed project grade of 0.6 grammes per bank cubic metre and the current gold price of approximately US3,290 represents a gold value in situ of over US$1.1 million. The analysis of this area was undertaken with speed and precision, factors that were greatly enhanced by the drilling programme.  This area represents just a small fraction of the potentially mineable zones across the Blue Mountain Project and illustrates not only the financial scale of the project but also the speed at which ECR is able to assess its viability.

During last week, ECR’s chairman, Nick Tulloch, and chief geologist, Adam Jones, conducted a review of the Blue Mountain Project to assess areas to be drilled.  The scale of the project area is extensive and, accordingly, the Company has decided to keep the rig on site at Blue Mountain to continue operations, moving the rig to Lolworth later this month as described below.

Earlier this year, ECR published a cost analysis that clearly indicated the Blue Mountain Project may be capable of generating indicative revenue potential of approximately A$470,000 (US$295,000) per month. This potential revenue illustration used an average grade of 0.6 grammes per bank cubic metre and Gekko Systems Pty Limited’s projected 91.7% recovery rate, with a wash plant with a 25 tonne per hour capacity, to provide prospective output per month of over 3,000 grammes (over 100 ounces) per month, using a gold price of US$2,790 per ounce.

Subsequent work continues to support that illustration, albeit it now equates to A$544,000 (US$350,000) per month when using an updated gold price of US$3,290 per ounce.  More particularly, the work to date has increased the Company’s confidence in using higher capacity wash plants and the table below illustrates the potential scale up that could be achieved.

Illustrative monthly revenue and production at the Blue Mountain Project

Wash plant capacity (per hour)	25 tonnes	40 tonnes	50 tonnes	60 tonnes
Monthly revenue	A$544,000	A$871,000	A$1,088,000	A$1,306,000
Gold (grammes)	3,347	5,355	6,694	8,033
Gold (ounces)	118	189	236	283

Investors should note that the above figures are illustrations of the Blue Mountain Project’s potential based on the assumptions stated and the illustrations should not be considered a forecast or guarantee of revenue.

The opportunity at the Blue Mountain Project has attracted interest from third party production partners.  Any such partnership may give ECR the ability to scale up operations but on the basis that revenue would be shared.  The Company will keep these opportunities under review whilst it assesses the scale of the project.

Lolworth drilling programme

Once work has completed at the Blue Mountain Project, the ECR team and drill rig will move up to Lolworth.  At present, the Company anticipates remaining at Blue Mountain until at least the end of this week, but potentially longer to ensure we optimise use of the rig to map out production plans.

This has necessarily delayed commencement at Lolworth, however our planned work programme to drill a series of 40 – 80m holes across four locations at the tenement is unchanged. With ECR’s work at Blue Mountain substantially adding to our knowledge of alluvial mining, the team will for the first time assess whether this methodology could also be employed at Lolworth.

The drilling campaign in Lolworth is likely to take 3 – 4 weeks, most likely commencing mid-August and concluding early September.  As with previous work there, ECR will seek to draw on the Company’s partnership with the Geological Survey of Queensland and James Cook University, whose respective surveys will provide the Company with further data points across the project area.

Total Voting Rights Update

ECR also announces that application has been made for 212,728,300 new ordinary shares of 0.001 pence each in ECR (“Ordinary Shares”) to be admitted to trading on AIM (“Admission”) and it is expected that Admission will become effective on or around 5 August 2025.

The 212,728,300 new Ordinary Shares were previously validly allotted by the board of directors of ECR (the “Board” or the “Directors”). However, the previous Board did not at the time make an application for these Ordinary Shares to be admitted to trading on AIM. 

Admission and Total Voting Rights

Upon Admission, ECR’s issued ordinary share capital will remain unchanged at 2,269,512,954 Ordinary Shares. This number will represent the total voting rights in the Company and may be used by shareholders as the denominator for the calculation by which they can determine if they are required to notify their interest in, or a change to their interest in, the Company under the Financial Conduct Authority’s Disclosure Guidance and Transparency Rules.

Nick Tulloch, ECR’s Chairman, said: “I spent much of the last two weeks in Australia on a trip that covered Melbourne, our office in Bendigo, Sydney and finally the Blue Mountain Project in Queensland.  Our decision to bring a rig onto the site has immediately paid off with our understanding of the project already considerably increased. 

“This has been an efficient and accurate means of making preparations for the location of trenches and, as we have illustrated in today’s announcement, is enabling us to map out the scale of the opportunity.  Our findings to date continue to support our confidence in the Blue Mountain Project and its potential to be a very significant generator of revenue for ECR.”

Review of Announcement by Qualified Person

This announcement has been reviewed by Adam Jones, Chief Geologist at ECR Minerals Plc. Adam Jones is a professional geologist and is a Member of the Australian Institute of Geoscientists (MAIG). He is a qualified person as that term is defined by the AIM Note for Mining, Oil and Gas Companies.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION, PLEASE CONTACT:

ECR Minerals Plc	Tel: +44 (0) 20 8080 8176
Nick Tulloch, Chairman Andrew Scott, Director	info@ecrminerals.com
Website: www.ecrminerals.com
Allenby Capital Limited	Tel: +44 (0) 3328 5656
Nominated Adviser Nick Naylor / Alex Brearley / Vivek Bhardwaj	info@allenbycapital.com
Axis Capital Markets Limited	Tel: +44 (0) 203 026 0320
Broker
Lewis Jones
SI Capital Ltd	Tel: +44 (0) 1483 413500
Broker
Nick Emerson
Brand Communications	Tel: +44 (0) 7976 431608
Public & Investor Relations
Alan Green

ABOUT ECR MINERALS PLC

ECR Minerals is a mineral exploration and development company. ECR’s wholly owned Australian subsidiary ECR Minerals (Australia) Pty Ltd (“ECR Australia”) has 100% ownership of the Bailieston and Creswick gold projects in central Victoria, Australia, has six licence applications outstanding which includes one licence application lodged in eastern Victoria (Tambo gold project).

ECR also owns 100% of an Australian subsidiary ECR Minerals (Queensland) Pty Ltd which has three approved exploration permits covering 946 km² over a relatively unexplored area in Lolworth Range, Queensland, Australia. The Company has also submitted a license application at Kondaparinga which is approximately 120km² in area and located within the Hodgkinson Gold Province, 80km NW of Mareeba, North Queensland.

Following the sale of the Avoca, Moormbool and Timor gold projects in Victoria, Australia to Fosterville South Exploration Ltd (TSX-V: FSX) and the subsequent spin-out of the Avoca and Timor projects to Leviathan Gold Ltd (TSX-V: LVX), MGA has the right to receive up to A$2 million in payments subject to future resource estimation or production from projects sold to Fosterville South Exploration Limited.

ECR Australia also has approximately A$75 million of unutilised tax losses incurred during previous operations