Rex Minerals : Soils define new targets at Hog Ranch

ASX and Media Release: 30 March 2022 ASX: RXM | OTCQB: RXRLF

Soils define new targets: program over entire Hog Ranch begins

Rex Minerals Ltd (Rex or the Company) has received assay results from trial soil surveys (soils) completed at the Company's 100%-owned Hog Ranch Gold Property in Nevada, USA.

Highlights

•  Trial soils at Airport and Bells show strong association with gold in drilling and define new target positions

•  Pathfinder elements also show excellent potential to find gold underneath shallow cover rocks

•  The Company is now confident that soils can assist in the targeting of large-scale gold mineralisation at Hog Ranch

•  A large-scale soils program is underway for over 79km2 (~7,900 samples) at Hog Ranch.

Figure 1: Historical gold in soils (left) relative to new gold in soils (right) shown over the assay results in drilling information exceeding 0.5g/t gold from the Airport Project area.

Rex Minerals' CEO and Managing Director, Richard Laufmann, said: "The new soils, compared to the poor historical data, are showing a much closer link to our gold intercepts from drilling.

"The gold endowment we know today for Hog of over 2.2Mozs of gold, looks like the footprint to a much larger system. We have high expectations that the soils can help unlock the bigger picture at Hog Ranch."

Soil sampling results (Figures 1 and 3) have been received from both the Airport and Bells Project locations (Figure 2) at Hog Ranch. Both trial soil surveys were completed at a 50m x 50m spaced grid to provide for a much higher level of resolution of the gold and gold pathfinder elements when compared to the historical soil sampling information.

This trial soil sampling information was completed as a test of the two most common geological environments which occur at Hog Ranch (see Figure 2), which are:

•  Areas of outcropping felsic host rocks at the Bells Project area, and

•  Areas of shallow cover rocks towards the centre of the Hog Ranch caldera at the Airport Project area.

Historical soil sampling information at Hog Ranch has occurred over multiple phases, using different sampling and assaying techniques and at an irregular grid - all of which has been found to be inadequate for the effective drill targeting of the gold mineralisation at Hog Ranch.

In contrast to the historical soil dataset, this new trial dataset has shown that soil sampling can provide for a relatively accurate view of the gold which has also been defined by the drill hole data. Rex now has confidence that a large regional dataset could greatly assist with the discovery of new, large-scale gold mineralisation at Hog Ranch.

Figure 2: Location diagram of the Airport and Bells Project areas within the broader Hog Ranch Property in north-west Nevada.

Airport Soil Sampling Results - Background

In late 2021, Rex made some new discoveries from RC drilling at the Airport Project area. This was based on targeting from 3D IP information (see Rex announcement dated 27 August 2021). These results were found to be close to the surface but did not match very well the historical gold in soils or other pathfinder elements which are commonly associated with gold in epithermal environments such as Hog Ranch.

Based upon the above, Rex concluded that a new higher resolution soil survey over a regular grid pattern at Airport may provide for a better association between the gold in drilling relative to the gold and other pathfinder elements on the surface.

The results from this test work proved to be very effective in highlighting the close link between the known gold in drill hole data relative to the gold in the soil sampling information (Figure 1). It was also shown that the common pathfinder elements in most cases can highlight the position of gold mineralisation which may exist at deeper levels, where there is no evidence of gold on the surface

(Figure 3).

Figure 3: Historical pathfinder elements (As) in soils (left) relative to new results in soils (right) shown over the assay results in drilling information exceeding 0.5g/t gold from the Airport Project area.

Rex now has a combined dataset at the Airport area of airborne magnetics, airborne hyperspectral data, a 3D IP geophysical survey and the new soil sampling dataset, all of which point to a series of gold bearing north-north-east striking faults which appear to be the key controlling conduits to the higher-grade gold mineralisation at Airport.

The structures inferred from the airborne magnetic dataset at Airport and the surrounding area appear to extend for a great distance beyond the current drilling information. It is anticipated that the gold and gold pathfinder elements in soils could show where these large-scale structures host further gold mineralisation either close to the surface or underneath shallow cover rocks.

Bells Soil Sampling Results - Background

Rex has an extensive historical drill hole database, followed by a number of well-spaced recent drilling information leading to the current Mineral Resource at Bells of 560kozs gold (see Rex announcement dated 23 March 2021). Beyond the current Mineral Resource at Bells, some new airborne magnetic data and airborne hyperspectral data indicate that the surface area of the gold mineralisation at Bells may well exceed the currently defined Mineral Resource.

To test the possible effectiveness of soil sampling at Bells, a new survey was undertaken at a 50m x 50m grid over a 4km2 area to cover both the Mineral Resource and the additional anomalism which was first identified from the airborne hyperspectral survey.

Similar to the results from the Airport soil sampling, both the gold and pathfinder elements at Bells, closely match the higher-grade gold in drilling results (see Figures 4 and 5). In addition, the further potential, as defined from the hyperspectral survey, was found to have significant anomalism in the pathfinder elements, but lower levels of gold mineralisation (Figure 4). Rex interprets these results to indicate that the gold mineralisation at this location potentially exists at deeper levels, below the immediate surface environment.

Figure 4: Plan view of new gold in soils results shown over the assay results in drilling information exceeding 0.5g/t gold from the Bells Project area.

The results from the soils sampling at Bells have given Rex confidence that the large area of outcropping host rocks, which include the much larger Krista Project area (with a surface area exceeding 20km2) could benefit greatly from a new soil sampling program.

Figure 5: Plan view of new pathfinder elements (As) in soils shown over the assay results in drilling information exceeding 0.5g/t gold from the Bells Project area.

Next Steps for Hog Ranch

Rex has now commenced a large-scale soil sampling campaign at Hog Ranch which will extend over the bulk of the Mining Claim area for approximately 79km2. A total of just over 7,900 samples will be undertaken in the first phase based on a 100m x 100m grid pattern, which will be followed up at a later stage with 50m x 50m sample spacing for the broad locations which show significant gold and/or pathfinder element anomalism identified from the current survey. The first round of results from the new regional soils surveys are anticipated in the coming months.

This announcement has been authorised for release by the Company's Chief Executive Officer.