Highlights

• Firm commitments to raise $35 million from existing shareholders and leading global institutional investors
• Funds raised will enable:

–   the commencement of key pre-development activities at the Sanbrado Gold Project, including underground access into the high-grade at M1 South deposit, on site water storage for construction and an upgrade of camp facilities;

–  acceleration of infill and extensional resource drilling at M1 South and M5; and

–  an expansion of the regional exploration programme.

• Upgrade to Feasibility Study on track for completion end Q2 2018
• Post completion of the placement WAF will have $47m cash at bank

West African Resources Limited (TSX-V:WAF) (ASX:WAF)  is pleased to announce that it has received firm commitments to raise A$35 million through a placement of 109.375 million shares at A$0.32 per share.

The Placement was heavily over-subscribed, and supported by existing shareholders, as well as several new large institutional investors from European, North American and Australian markets.

Commenting on the success of the Placement, Managing Director Mr Richard Hyde said:

“The demand for the Placement is a strong endorsement of the quality of the Sanbrado Gold Project and our strategy to bring forward early development activities, in particular, commencing the underground decline into the high-grade M1 South deposit.

Accessing M1 South from the underground earlier will enable infill and extensional to continue in a more targeted and cost-effective manner.

WAF is now well positioned to deliver an updated Feasibility Study incorporating concurrent open-pit and underground mining this quarter, and press on towards the development of the Project later this year.”.

In respect to the exploration programme, Managing Director Mr Richard Hyde said:

“We have a very substantial mineral endowment in the wider Sanbrado project area to explore, and as such, we have an objective to drill at least 60,000 metres per annum to continue building the mining inventory. This placement ensures we can maintain this pace of drilling.

We are on track to deliver an updated Mineral Resource estimate this quarter, as well as the results of updated Feasibility Study incorporating open-pit and underground mining. The Feasibility Study will integrate the high-grade gold from M1 South into the mine plan, which is expected to deliver transformational changes to the annual production, cost profile and life of mine.”

Hartleys Limited and Sprott Capital Partners, a division of Sprott Private Wealth LP, together were the Joint Lead Managers and Bookrunners to the Placement. Euroz Limited, Cormark Securities Inc. and Macquarie Capital Markets Canada Ltd. were Co-Managers to the Placement.

The Placement will be completed in one tranche, within the Company’s issuance capacity pursuant to ASX Listing Rules 7.1 (86,101,834 shares) and 7.1A (23,273,166 shares).  As WAF has a secondary listing on the TSX-Venture Exchange  the completion of the Placement will be conditional upon the approval of the TSX-V, which the Company anticipates to receive shortly.