The Kelowna, British Columbia-based company is undertaking trial mining at its Krone-Endora at Venetia mine, in South Africa's Limpopo province, which is a stone's throw from the De Beers Group's flagship Venetia mine - the country's most prolific diamond producer.
The company, with a market valuation of C$19.3 million, had modified the in-field dry-screening plant to crush larger kimberlite material in an effort to reduce the amount of fine kimberlitic clays that gets processed in the downstream main treatment plant, which caused issues with process water recovery.
The special category rough diamonds recovered include one high-quality 18.45ct gem octahedron rough diamond, two gem quality rough diamonds weighing 18.56 and 14.71cts, respectively, and three non-gem quality rough diamonds weighing 21.92, 17.32 and 15.84cts. The processing also recovered about 2,400cts of rough diamonds.
"We are very pleased with the results of the initial modifications made to the processing plants, as well as with the number of larger diamonds recovered on very limited volumes," said Diamcor CEO Dean Taylor.
He added the initial modifications met or exceeded expectations, prompting the team to shift the focus to running increasing volumes in the coming weeks. Completing the installation of the paste thickener system would also allow the company to further increase processing volumes for the long term.
The news on Thursday lifted the stock nearly 19% to an intra-day high of C38c a share, but by Friday afternoon, the gains had evaporated and the stock closed down 6% at C32c apiece.
