It intersected 6.8m at 56.45g/t gold-equivalent, or 53.34g/t gold, 106g/t silver and 1.16% copper, which it said was the highest grade and best intersection from Kora vein K2 and possibly the best hole drilled to date in Kora North.

The drill hole was oriented upwards, above the current working level and CEO John Lewins said K92 looked forward to defining the potential of the Kora deposit.

K92 bought the project from Barrick Gold (CN:ABX) in 2015 and has been working towards achieving commercial production, with the ramp-up temporarily hampered last year by vandalism over landowner issues. 

K92 last week declared commercial production effective February 1, mining the Kora North lode eight months after the first discovery hole and expects to achieve design level in the June quarter when longhole stope production begins.

K92 did not base its decision to mine on reserve estimates or feasibility studies.

The mine produced more than 2,700 gold equivalent ounces in January and K92 expected total cash costs for the month to be below US$850/oz AuEq.

Shares in the company, which were trading above C$1 a year ago, lost 1c on Friday to 48.5c, capitalising it at $78.4 million.