Sandfire boss Karl Simich is putting his fingers in all sorts of pies at the moment as he searches for the company's next growth project, and the talkative son of Croatian and Italian parents seems to think that Adriatic Metals is a particularly tasty morsel.
Street Talk can reveal Sandfire offered to take all of the $15 million raising at Adriatic are conducting this week, but the offer was politely declined by the junior, which did not want to give away a blocking stake too easily.
Sandfire already owned more than 7 per cent of Adriatic, which is searching for zinc and base metals in Bosnia and Herzegovina. It's understood Simich is in negotiations to increase his shareholding in Adriatic to 10 per cent.
Ashanti Capital are helping Adriatic with the raising, which is timed to capitalise on the stock's stunning run from 17¢ in June to as much as 68¢ earlier this month.
Adriatic is not the only junior whose progress is being closely watched by Sandfire, with the copper miner also deeply interested in the work that Kingston Resources are doing on Papua New Guinea's volcanic Misima Island.
Placer Dome produced more than 3 million ounces of gold at Misima before being taken over by Barrick, and Kingston are trying to revive an open pit that is now overgrown with jungle.
Sandfire owns just over 9 per cent of Kingston and is understood to have been suitably impressed by the gold grades of more than 3 grams per tonne reported by Kingston earlier this month.
And Sandfire isn't the only significant gold and copper producer that is well aware of Kingston's work on Misima; in a case of the mountain coming to muhammad, OceanaGold managing director Mick Wilkes recently joined the Kingston board, so don't be surprised if deal hungry Oceana plays a role in the future of the explorer with the $28 million market capitalisation.
