High-grade gold deposit found in an unexplored region

A first look at the assay sheet from Founders Metals’ third hole at the Maria Geralda target is hard to ignore. The core shows 22.5 m (73.8 ft) of 11.88 g/t gold (Au), a combination of width and tenor that exploration geologists chase their whole careers.

Maria Geralda sits about 3.1 miles (5 kilometers) southeast of the company’s existing Lower Antino camp, yet the zone had never been drilled until this spring.

The hole was sited on a 400 × 500 meter (437 x 547 yard) surface anomaly where more than half the auger samples carried over 0.1 g/t of gold.

The intercept, therefore, did not arrive out of thin air, but its magnitude surprised nearly everyone on site.

Why the gold numbers matter

Vincent Combes, a structural geologist at Founders Metals Inc., calls the district “one of the rare places where intrusion-hosted and shear-hosted systems converge within a single greenstone belt.”

Projects in the Guiana Shield, a 1.7 billion year old craton spanning Suriname and its neighbors, host several world class orogenic camps.

Explorers measure ore grade in grams per ton (g/t). Industry shorthand pegs high grade gold at anything above 10 g/t, medium between 1 and 10, and low below 1 g/t.

Maria Geralda’s interval clears the high grade bar with room to spare and, crucially, it does so over a run long enough to matter for potential mining methods.

Most early hits at Antino came from narrower shoots. Stretching the same grade over a 73 foot (22.5 meter) span could simplify future engineering studies, lower dilution, and reduce the tonnage a mill must push to achieve a given output.

Reading the rock record

Maria Geralda lies on a northwest striking fault where tonalite dykes butt against metavolcanic units.

Mapping by Combes and co-authors shows that such contacts localize brittle deformation, opening the fractures that later fill with quartz and gold-bearing fluids.

The wider Antino Yaou Benzdorp belt formed during Paleoproterozoic collisions that welded the West African Craton to the Amazonian plate.

Subsequent transpressional shearing folded those layers, and late brittle overprints provided final pathways for mineralizing fluids. This has left the stacked veins and breccias that are seen today.

Maria Geralda sits exactly where models predict stress rotation around rigid intrusions.

The new hole confirms that vein swarms there host free gold as well as pyrrhotite, a sulfide that explains the subtle magnetic highs traced in last season’s ground survey.

High-grade gold changes perspective

Open pit mines rarely average more than 2 g/t, so a lode running near 12 g/t changes the cost equation.

High grade means fewer truckloads for the same mass of gold, and less waste rock to reclaim. It also raises the ceiling on how deep a future pit can go before strip ratios kill economics.

While the headline intercept grabs attention, long sections of lower grade mineralization below the main shoot hint at stacked lenses.

If future holes prove continuity, Founders could outline a bulk minable zone rimmed by select underground targets. Such a configuration often attracts mid-tier producers looking for pipeline assets.

The company’s 60 kilometer (37 mile) drill budget for 2025 suggests management understands that the real prize lies in finding repeatable thickness and grade along several miles of strike, not just in a single sparkling core run.

Implications for Suriname

Mining and oil together already account for about 60 percent of Suriname’s GDP and nearly 90 percent of export revenue.

Each fresh gold discovery therefore carries national weight, promising jobs, royalties, and, if managed well, infrastructure dollars for remote districts.

Yet Suriname’s rainforest terrain adds cost and regulatory scrutiny. Roads, power lines, and camps thread dense jungle where rainfall tops 160 inches (4,064 millimeters) a year.

The state continues to refine guidelines aimed at balancing growth with biodiversity and Indigenous land rights, lessons that have been hard won after decades of informal placer activity along the Marowijne Greenstone Belt.

Local economists note that large, modern operations such as Rosebel and Merian have broadened the tax base and funded new schools, but they also caution that commodity cycles can whipsaw public budgets. A sprawling Antino complex would amplify both the upside and the exposure.

Next steps in the field

“The 22.5 meters interval grading 11.88 g/t gold represents some of the highest grade mineralization we’ve encountered to date,” stated Colin Padget, President and CEO of Founders Metals.

He added that following up with step out holes ranks as the top priority for the remainder of the wet season.

Crews are already cutting pads 160 ft (48.8 meters) north and south of the discovery collar. Downhole electromagnetic work will guide azimuths, and visible gold intervals will go through metallic screen assays to reduce the nugget effect.

Samples continue to move by helicopter to FILAB Suriname in Paramaribo for fire assay and gravimetric checks.

If assays deliver similar widths and grades over the next quarter, the company plans to fly an airborne LiDAR survey to tighten its structural model before wintering in a second diamond rig.

That timetable keeps the story advancing without the costly hurry that often trips junior explorers.

Investor caution and community stakes

Early success can spark market enthusiasm, but experienced investors know that one intercept does not equal a mine.

Resource estimates require tight drill spacing, metallurgical test work, and economic studies that fold in haul roads, power supply, and rainfall management.

Community leaders from Tapanahony and Lawa districts have asked for clear consultation on land access long before any construction permits.

Founders says it intends to use the responsible mining framework Suriname adopted in 2022, which mandates baseline water studies and transparent royalty tracking.

A well designed project could funnel tax income toward local clinics and schools, but rushed development risks social friction and environmental damage. The next two years of drilling and baseline data collection will shape which path prevails.

Information obtained from a corporate publication by Founders Metals.

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