Two new core holes at Arizona Gold & Silver's Philadelphia Gold-Silver Project in Mohave County, Arizona, did what step-out drilling is supposed to do: they extended the mineralized system down dip and sharpened the company's picture of a north-plunging higher-grade zone inside the Perry Zone. The company announced the assays on September 30, and the market noticed — shares fell about 15% to 57¢ in Toronto trading that morning, valuing the company near $87 million (about US$61 million), a reminder that drill results and market reactions don't always travel together.
- Hole PC26-173 cut 43.59 meters at 1.48 g/t gold and 7.2 g/t silver, including 21.88 meters at 2.52 g/t gold and a higher-grade core of 7.04 meters at 4.24 g/t gold and 15.2 g/t silver.
- Hole PC26-172 cut 70.41 meters at 1.16 g/t gold and 5.6 g/t silver, including a separate interval of 2.87 meters at 4.92 g/t gold.
- Intervals are reported as drilled lengths; true thickness is estimated at roughly 60% of drilled thickness — the usual caveat that keeps honest reporting honest.
- The drilling is testing a broad geophysical anomaly beneath the Red Hills target and refining the position of the north-plunging higher-grade zone within the Perry Zone.
- Drilling continues: hole PC26-174 was completed directly below PC26-173 (assays pending), and PC26-175 is being drilled about 60 meters north of PC26-173.
Open pit or underground?
The shape of these results is the interesting part. Broad, bulk-tonnage intercepts with higher-grade zones inside them give a project two possible futures: a larger open-pit scenario built on the broad zones, or a more selective underground operation chasing the higher-grade shoots — or both. Arizona Gold & Silver has been advancing Philadelphia since 2019 and secured patented claims in 2021, which led to the discovery of the high-grade Perry vein. The current program is pushing the system deeper and northward, with the relationship between the Perry zone and the broad geophysical anomaly beneath Red Hills still to be fully worked out.
More holes in the lab mean more answers on the way — and in a market that sold this release off, the next round of assays will be watched closely.