The £7.6 million-market cap junior uses previous work by respected international mining consultancy SRK to promote an exploration target of 1-2 million oz within 100m of surface at Sanankoro, at grades between 1-1.3gpt.

Company founder and CEO Jonathan Forster said the company was on track to deliver a scoping study this quarter, with the initial resource "focused on the oxide, starter-pit, potential of the project, targeting the opportunity for a low-cost mining operation".

"This estimate is the first step in defining the overall oxide potential at the project, where to date less than a quarter of the 1-2Moz SRK exploration target has been tested. We have also been able to include a small amount of sulphide material in the MRE, confirming our belief that exploration expansion into the sulphide zones could provide significant future upside."

Sanankoro was the focus of about US$9 million of previous exploration spend by Gold Fields and Randgold.

Cora said the pit-constrained inferred resource of 5Mt at 1.6gpt sat within the SRK-derived target of 30-50Mt at 1-1.3gpt. Nearly 90% of the initial resource is said to be oxide material.

Cora Gold was trading at 9.38p in August, having touched 2.85p in May this year. It was changing hands at 5.89p early today.