Rumble Resources Limited (ASX:RTR) has been of interest to me for quite some time, and its recent recovery from a significant drop in share price has captured my attention. From a company standpoint, I am thinking that the new strategy is striking all the right chords in waking up the bull from a near 4-year hibernation.
From a technical perspective, Samso spotted the value way before the discovery hole for the Earaheedy project way back in March 2021. I had tried to approach management at that time to host their prospective project on a Coffee with Samso but was kindly turned down. A while later, the company put out a release on the 19th of April 2021, "Major Zinc-Lead Discovery at Earaheedy Project, Western Australia," and that was when the share price took to the sky (Figure 1).
Figure 1: The share price chart of Rumble Resources Limited (ASX:RTR) (source: commsec)
Reflecting my views on the optimistic market outlook for 2025, Rumble seems to have a new management team with what seems to be an effective strategy. I believe it may be worthwhile to assess the potential of the existing project portfolio.
Over the last few weeks, I have started to express my belief in a market shift (2025—The Year of The Golden Snake—Has The Market Catalyst Emerged?) and am wanting to discover potential under-the-radar opportunities and decide which ones have the potential to advance. As retail investors, we can't choose the perfect timing or the right investment without conducting research.
For those who want to skip to the parts of the review, please use the list below.
1.0 The Rumble Resources 2025 plan.
After examining the most recent presentation from the RIU Conference in Fremantle, it seems to represent a promising new beginning for Rumble Resources. My initial impression is that analyzing Rumble Resources' Vision and Mission statements and employing some creative thinking, would be an effective way to uncover the deeper meaning and initiate the DYOR process. It is always a good way to understand what the company wants us to see as their path forward.
With a current market capitalization of AUD $40M, 940M shares issued, and about AUD $4.6M in the bank, it’s a solid start. One anomaly I noticed is that the Earaheedy project might be generating value that doesn't align with market sentiment. This is a legacy "asset" that won't disappear in a quick fashion, so I'm unsure if this will be a concern in the future.
1.1 New Message
Rumble Resources is now all about the Western Queen Gold project and targeting open-pit mining and toll processing in 2025. This new strategy is fully funded by the Bain Group, an Indian-based mining company that has agreed to fully finance the project's development with up to AUD $35M (Development of Western Queen Gold Project). The release does state that it is an Indicative Non-Binding Term Sheet, but I am not sure if this is now a binding proposition. This would be a good question for Peter Harold, the Managing Director and CEO, if I could convince him to do a Coffee with Samso.
With gold prices surging and investor interest in the precious metals sector rising, Rumble’s near-term production story is why it got me curious enough to do this discussion.
“When you've got a gold project in a gold environment like we're in, you've got to get into production as soon as you can.”
— Peter Harold, MD & CEO
2.0 The Prize Project—Western Queen Gold Project
(source: Rumble Resources Limited website)
The Western Queen Gold project lies 110km NW of Mt Magnet within the Yalgoo Mineral Field of Western Australia and comprises two mining leases, M59/45 and M59/208, and 2 exploration tenements, E20-0967 and E59-2443, which are 100% RTR.
The Project has 3 nearby operating gold processing mills (see Figure 2). The closest mill is the Dalgaranga Mill (48 km), which has a capacity of 2.5 Mtpa. The Checkers Mill (Mt. Magnet) has a capacity of 1.9 Mtpa, and the Tuckabianna Mill has a capacity of 1.2 Mtpa.
Figure 2: Rumble Resources Limited's Western Queen Project Location and Neighbouring Gold Processing Facilities (source: Rumble 2025 RIU Presentation)
2.1 History and Resources
The Western Queen Gold Project has historically produced 215,000 ounces of gold from two mined deposits: the Western Queen (Central) Mine (189,500 oz) and the Western Queen South Mine (25,500 oz). In August 2021, an updated Mineral Resource Estimate (MRE) reported a 35% increase in total resources, now at 2.1Mt @ 2.42g/t Au for 163,268 ounces. Indicated Resources grew significantly, rising 145% to 1.1 Mt @ 1.95 g/t Au for 67,145 ounces. The combined open-cut and underground resources are detailed in Table 1.
Table 1—Western Queen Project Resource Estimate (source: Rumble Resources Website)
3.0 Western Queen Gold Project—2025
Rumble has upgraded the resource by 76% to date, and the resource is now up to 286,600 ounces from 163,268 ounces historically. Figure 3 highlights the existing historical pits and the potential mineralisation beneath, anchoring the future of the mining process.
Figure 3: Western Queen Gold Deposit Longitudinal Section – Highlighting Previous Production, Resources and Potential New Resource Areas. (source: Rumble Resources Limited)
For those still awake, it's important to understand the strike length. For those unfamiliar with the term "Strike," it refers to the distance of potential mineralisation. The 2.7 km strike length is what Rumble is relying on for its mining narrative. Rumble is concentrating on Western Queen South, which contains 85,000 ounces across the two smaller deposits within their current mining plan.
3.1 New Results
On February 17, 2025, Rumbles announced the results of Phase 1 drilling: "High-grade gold and tungsten assays returned from Phase 1 drilling at Western Queen." The objective of Phase 1 drilling was to evaluate several shallow positions, which revealed two new high-grade lodes beneath Princess, under a pegmatite intrusion (Figure 4).
Figure 4: Drilling from Rumble's First Phase drilling program is shown here through a longitudinal section of the Princess deposit showcasing the newly discovered high-grade lodes, illustrating their parallel southward plunging orientation in relation to the existing Western Queen Central lode. (source: Rumble Resources Limited)
The drilling appears to be consistent with the extent of the mineralising body, which is great, but whether they will make it economically viable in the future will be important. The noted tungsten mineralisation is very interesting, and with grades of greater than 0.2% WO₃, this could be a positive addition to the economics.
Tungsten is an interesting commodity, as it is one of the metals that are controlled by China, and it has hit the news front with China restricting its flow of the metal. which could throw a very positive spin for Rumble. My experience with tungsten will throw caution to the wind on this news, but in our uncertain nature of the business, it looks more than interesting for now.
4.0 Western Queen South Gold Project—The comparison to the Never Never Gold Deposit.
In Peter Harold's presentation at the RIU Conference in Fremantle, he compares the Western Queen mineralisation to that of the Never Never deposit, which is being developed by Spartan Resources Limited (ASX:SPR). Figure 5 below illustrates his thoughts on the likely similarity of mineralisation and the potential upside of the Western Queen South deposit.
Figure 5: Rumble Resources Limited Western Queen South comparison to Spartan’s Never Never (to scale). (source: Rumble 2025 RIU Presentation)
Peter describes that the Never Never has over 2M ounces, and Western Queen South has only been drilled down to 300m and hence has the potential to be open with depth. This concept is good in principle. This concept is not new, and as many exploration and mining geologists will agree, the potential is always there, but reality is another ball game.
The positive spin to that thought is that a consistently mineralised system that looks like it is at the Western Queen South deposit typically tends to continue with depth. Most times when they "disappear," it would be a truncation, or a cutting off, of the mineralised body. If that were to happen, then the task would be to identify where it has been "moved" to, in terms of directions.
5.0 Western Queen Gold Project - The Other Targets
As most of the focus for Rumble has been on Western Queen South and Western Queen Central, there appears to be a potential upside along the other part of the shear zone (Figure 6).
Figure 6: Western Queen Shear Zone Prospectivity over TMI Airborne Magnetics. (source: Rumble 2025 RIU Presentation)
There is another 2km stretch between the Duke and Cranes deposits that remains largely unexplored, with some significant findings like 14m @ 4.7 g/t Au. It is good to remember that over the past 5 to 10 years, the reinterpretation of existing serial magnetics has been highly successful in targeting.
Recently, geochemical sampling has been overtaken by the growing preference for geophysics. Explorers have come to realise that technology is transforming our understanding of what lies beneath the surface, and in many cases, geophysics is more economical. While I am a strong advocate of geochemistry, when it comes to probing deep below the surface, the timing of results and sometimes the funding required, geophysics offers numerous advantages.
6.0 Western Queen Gold Project—The Tungsten Story
As mentioned earlier, the tungsten story adds some real meat to the whole Rumble story. The occurrence of Tungsten with gold is not a new concept, but the grades that have been reported at the Western Queen project are very enticing.
Some readers may remember that I have mentioned in the past that I was involved in a tungsten project around 2012. When I am looking at the results in one of the slides from the RIU presentation (Figure 7), the grades of up to 4.58% WO₃ and one submeter of 18.35% WO₃ are a tungsten miner's dream.
Figure 7: A presentation slide during the RIU conference that highlights a potential tungsten mix to the Western Gold project. A photo of the core looks like the mineralisation is dense and consistent with a likely mature mineralising system. (source: Rumble Resources Limited)
The other major tungsten deposit that sits within a stone's throw from the major Telfer gold deposit is the famous O'Callaghan deposit in the Patterson Range. Time will tell what is in store with the tungsten part of Rumble's story, but the market is very hard to commercialise.
7.0 Samso Concluding Thoughts
The Rumble story is finally taking a positive turn for shareholders after spending a long period on the bearish side. Shareholders, who have endured a prolonged downturn, haven't had much to celebrate since the initial surge to over AUD $0.60 in 2021, followed by a gradual decline with little noteworthy progress (Figure 8).
Figure 8: Rumble Resources Limited share price chart since 2015. (source: comssec).
Looking back on the Rumble Resources share price, as I have mentioned earlier, I approached management many times to get the story on Coffee with Samso to talk about the Earaheedy project, which, with the size, grade, and potential size, would have gone well.
My thoughts are that the gold mining play with the support of the Bain Group is the perfect recipe and timing. I do think that the Earaheedy project is not a good fit. The best option for the Earaheedy project is to spin it out into another entity and let Rumble be a full-fledged gold play.
This is not to say that the Earaheedy project has no value, but in the context of the very sensitive mineral exploration sector, this will lead to confusion as to where the underlying value proposition is. The Western Queen and all of its potential need to be the centre of attention. I am sure I am not saying anything that the management is not already planning, as this is the standard operandi for companies like Rumble.
As I am not a mining engineer and I have not looked at the mining potential in great detail, I cannot comment on that part of the Rumble story with any authority. I take what has been presented as valid. In saying that, I do have some questions, but I am hoping that management will accept my invitation to come to Coffee with Samso.
What is apparent currently is that the share price curve is flattening out now over the last 12 months (Figure 9). This is a good sign, and the ups and downs are expected, but the time is now for management to deliver what they are promising.
Figure 9: Rumble Resources Limited share price chart for the last 12 months. (source: comssec).
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