Lion Rock sees monazite-rich zones spread across Minta Est

Shallow monazite appears across the first Minta Est results

Lion Rock Minerals Limited (ASX:LRM) has found the early signs of a broad, shallow monazite-bearing system at Minta Est, with the first 69 holes from a 761-hole campaign returning repeated heavy-mineral zones and rare earth signatures. The strongest reported interval reached 1.94% estimated total rare earth oxides and 3.62% calculated monazite in recovered heavy-mineral concentrate from hole ME0120, which ended at 8 metres in saprolite.

Other results included 2 metres at 4.51% total heavy minerals with 0.74% TREO and 1.41% calculated monazite from 5 metres in ME0111, and 2 metres at 8.06% total heavy minerals with 0.72% TREO and 1.33% calculated monazite from 4 metres in ME0119. Around 40% of the 69 holes had intervals above 0.5% TREO and 1% calculated monazite, while 13 holes ended in mineralisation because the shallow auger method could not reliably penetrate deeper material.

Heavy-mineral grades provide the wider exploration signal

The rare earth results sit inside a broader heavy-mineral story. Fifty of the 69 holes returned at least 3% total heavy minerals, and 30 returned at least 5%, with several zones beginning at surface or within the first few metres. Notable intersections included 5 metres at 5.52% total heavy minerals from surface in ME0075, 5 metres at 5.71% from 2 metres in ME0092 and 4 metres at 7.07% from 3 metres in ME0123.

The latest results extend the significance of the company’s earlier surface rare earth assays, which included high-grade TREO in saprolite. Lion Rock says the highest and most consistent TREO and calculated-monazite results in batches 31 and 32 clustered near a north-south drainage channel and close to earlier in-situ results, supporting its interpretation of a monazite-enriched granite source beneath the alluvial and residual material.

Magnetic separation shrinks the material stream

The processing signal is potentially as important as the grades, though it comes from only two screening composites. In batch 31, middlings represented 15.38% of recovered HMC mass but contained 75.6% of the calculated composite-head TREO. In batch 32, middlings made up 26.61% of mass and carried 84.1% of calculated TREO. Their TREO grades were 0.781% and 1.437%, respectively, compared with calculated head grades of 0.159% and 0.455%.

ICP-MS/OES testing put neodymium and praseodymium at roughly 24% of TREO and dysprosium and terbium at about 1%. Those figures are consistent across the two composite tests and matter because these are the magnet rare earths the company is targeting. But the testwork used one-eighth splits of contributing samples, included duplicates and was mass-weighted rather than statistically representative of the full drilling population.

Assay limitations leave the economic test ahead

There is a sizeable analytical qualifier attached to the headline numbers. TREO was estimated from a limited XRF rare earth suite, while calculated monazite is an XRF-derived proxy rather than a direct mineralogical measurement. The reported percentages describe material within recovered HMC, not grades in the original bulk sample, and the tested size fraction excluded slimes and oversize. Lion Rock says those exclusions may mean the in-situ monazite content is under-reported, but that remains to be established.

The next evidence will come from the remaining 692 holes, direct ICP-MS/OES assays of original samples, mineralogical studies such as XRD or QEMSCAN, and deeper drilling into saprolite and the interpreted granitic source. Until those results arrive, Minta Est has a persuasive exploration pattern and an encouraging early concentration response, but not yet a resource, a confirmed mineral assemblage or an economic development case.