Founding members of the Deutsche Club in Nicaragua 1901 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

April 10

B2Gold* (BTO : TSX : $4.01)

Radius Gold* (RDU : TSX-V : $0.34)

B2Gold continued to light up the newswire as the company announced that it has entered into an agreement with Radius Gold to acquire a 100% interest in the Trebol and El Pavon gold properties in Nicaragua for C$20 million, payable in common shares.

 In addition, B2Gold has agreed to make contingent payments to Radius of US$10 per ounce of gold on 40% of any proven and probable mineral reserves in excess of 500,000 ounces (on a 100% basis). Based on a previous joint venture agreement with Radius, B2Gold had earned a 60% interest in the Trebol and Pavon properties by expending a total of US$4 million on exploration.

B2Gold and Radius have also agreed to enter into a joint venture agreement on 60%/40% basis with respect to each of the San Jose and La Magnolia properties in Nicaragua, and will continue jointly exploring the properties.

Late last week B2Gold announced an updated mineral resource from its Jabali Project on the  company’s La Liberdad property in Nicaragua and its Otjikoto Project in Namibia.

The company drilled 281 diamond drill holes totalling 38,705 metres at Jabali in 2011, in addition to the 55 holes drilled in 2010. Sixteen holes from January and February 2012 were also used to calculate the mineral resource. As a result, the in pit indicated mineral resource is 4.19 million tonnes at  grade of 3.39 grams per tonne (g/t) gold containing 456,863 ounces of gold and inferred mineral resources is 1.89 million tonnes at a grade of 3.06 g/t gold containing 186,610 ounces gold.

BTO – Takin’ Care Of Business

Canaccord remains positive on BTO due to its strong management team, superior production growth profile, attractive exploration pipeline and several potentially positive catalysts that should drive valuation upside and re-rating potential over the next 12 months.