The First Assay — August 19, 2026

⚑ Hole of the Day

◉ Shallow · From 88.5m Extension · Step-out Ecuador · Moderate Risk ~ Porphyry-Au

Half a kilometre of continuous gold-copper mineralisation from 88.5 m — and the grade inside it is what matters. The 212.5 m core at 1.12 g/t Au is the highest-grade interval Auro has reported at Santa Barbara to date, roughly double the inferred resource grade, and it sits inside a 496.5 m envelope averaging 0.76 g/t. That combination of width and grade at shallow depth is squarely open-pit geometry in a porphyry setting, and DSB-61 was a 70 m western step-out from a historical hole, so the system is growing sideways rather than infilling. At 2.38× GT/MCap this is not the most capital-efficient hole on the sheet — Independence and Athena are three times better on that measure — but at 377 g/t·m it is by a wide margin the largest single gold accumulation, and absolute discovery scale is what the deterministic rule selects on. Two caveats: true width is explicitly unknown, so these are core lengths, and Ecuador carries moderate jurisdiction risk with a permitting history that has stalled better deposits than this one. Eight holes remain pending with four rigs turning; the next batch tells you whether the 1.12 g/t core is a coherent shoot or a lucky pierce.

GT/MCap Spotlight — Top 5

All five are gold on a common price basis today, so these ratios are directly comparable.

◉ From depth ≤200m (shallow)  ·  ⚠ High jurisdiction risk  ·  ~ Moderate jurisdiction risk  ·  ✓ True width stated  ·  ★ HOTD

Today's Qualifying Intercepts — Top 10 of 29

Rating	Company	Metal	Hole	m	Grade	GT	AuEq·m	GT/MCap
Exceptional ★	Auro MetalsAURO	AuPorphyry-Au	DSB-61* ~	496.5 ◉	0.76 g/t	377.3	392.2	2.38
Exceptional	Independence GoldIGO	AuEpithermal-LS	3TS-26-34 ✓	31.0 ◉	9.07 g/t	281.5	304.1	8.89
Exceptional	Auro MetalsAURO	AuPorphyry-Au	DSB-67* ~	380.0 ◉	0.71 g/t	269.8	277.4	1.70
Exceptional	Auro MetalsAURO	AuPorphyry-Au	DSB-61* ~	212.5 ◉	1.12 g/t	238.0	244.4	1.50
Great	Independence GoldIGO	AuEpithermal-LS	3TS-26-34*	9.8 ◉	18.24 g/t	178.2	187.3	5.63
Great	Independence GoldIGO	AuEpithermal-LS	3TS-26-27 ✓	27.6 ◉	5.86 g/t	161.9	176.7	5.11
Great	Athena GoldATHA	AuOrogenic	LL-26-006A*	5.0 ◉	23.85 g/t	119.3	119.3	8.31
Great	Onyx GoldONYX	AuOrogenic	MC26-340 ✓	67.0	1.70 g/t	113.9	113.9	0.86
Great	Onyx GoldONYX	AuOrogenic	MC26-329 ✓	144.5	0.70 g/t	101.2	101.2	0.76
Great	Onyx GoldONYX	AuOrogenic	MC26-340 ✓	24.5	4.10 g/t	100.5	100.5	0.76

↗ View all 29 intercepts in Google Sheets +19 not shown: AURO DSB-66 Great 0.92×, ONYX MC26-329 75m Great 0.62×, ONYX MC26-340 6m Great 0.60×, ONYX MC26-340 1m Great 0.55×, ATHA 1m Great 4.38×/3.77×, IGO 5.07m Great 2.59×, IGO 4.84m Great 2.54×, plus 10 Good-rated rows

Near-miss	Onyx GoldONYX	Au	MC26-329 ✓	32.0	0.30 g/t	9.6	9.6	0.07
Near-miss	Athena GoldATHA	Au	LL-26-008*	4.5	1.37 g/t	6.2	6.2	0.43
Near-miss	Auro MetalsAURO	Au	DSB-61* ~	10.7	0.59 g/t	6.3	6.5	0.04

✓ True width stated in PR  ·  * Drilled width — TW not determined  ·  ◉ From ≤200m (shallow)
⚠ High jurisdiction risk  ·  ~ Moderate jurisdiction risk
GT thresholds — Au: Good >10, Great >50, Exceptional >200 g/t·m  ·  Cu: Good >20, Great >40, Exceptional >150 %·m
AuEq: Au $3,200/oz · Ag $33/oz · Cu $13,700/t · GT/MCap uses C$ mkt cap at August 19, 2026
Auro's AuEq is the issuer's own recovery-adjusted formula (Au + Cu% × 0.259), not the newsletter basis — reported as published.

Not Screened

Twelve in-window drill releases were enumerated but not read this run — the scrape and screen completed, but the run exhausted its working budget before every article could be opened and its assay table verified. Rather than publish headline-derived numbers that a reader cannot audit, they are named here in full and will be picked up by the next run's dedupe sweep:

Aug 19 — Gladiator Metals (GLAD · TSX-V), 40.0m @ 1.98% Cu, 0.31 g/t Au, 13.29 g/t Ag at Cowley, Yukon · NexGold Mining (NEXG · TSX-V), 5.26 g/t Au over 7.0m, Goldboro, Nova Scotia · Kirkland Lake Discoveries (KLDC · TSX-V), 4.4m @ 20.29 g/t Au, Mirado · New Break Resources (NBRK · CSE), 5.28 g/t Au over 11.2m, Moray · Stakeholder Gold (SRC · TSX-V), Cu-Ni-Co and PGE, Loki · Mercado Minerals (MERC · CSE), Copalito programme summary · Juggernaut Exploration (JUGR · TSX-V), Big Mack — visual observations, assays pending.

Aug 18 (post-cutoff) — Hycroft Mining (HYMC · Nasdaq), 12.5m @ 375.41 g/t Ag, Vortex · Metalsource Mining (MSM · CSE), Silver Hill · Pinnacle Silver & Gold (PINN · TSX-V), El Potrero · Soma Gold (SOMA · TSX-V), Escondida vein · Errington Metals (EM · TSX-V), Balfour Zone.

Also excluded by framework: Stakeholder's PGE assays (no GT threshold defined) and SAGA Metals' Ti-V-Fe re-assays (no conversion, not new drilling).

Archived: Google Sheets · Master archive merge deferred this run — needs manual reconciliation