Neptune Technologies Returns To The Fold

Neptune Technologies & Bioressources

(NTB - TSX V) (NEPT - NASDAQ)

Basic Shares: 40.2 million

Fully diluted: 43.1 million

Montreal based Neptune and The Howard Group have rejoined hands in an effort aimed at the capital markets and investor relations activities going forward.

NTB and HG had a successful two-year partnership from December 2005 to the end of 2007 that was a period of great expectation and market valuation for the producer of krill oil with its patented and proprietary processes.

This is somewhat a case of deja vu as the stock price was in the range of a $1 the first time around and currently sits 25% above that number after reaching a peak in excess of $8 in 2007.

The difference is the positive strides the Company has made in terms of revenue and production increases as well as what its accomplished in relation to the goal of ultimately reaching a deal with a pharma company for "natural" drug applications.

We have written a detailed and extensive introductory commentary on Neptune that looks at what it has done over the last several years, where it is going in key fronts and discusses the important question of market expectation and valuation.

To read the commentary click here.

Smartcool Sales Soar In First Half Of 2010

Smartcool Systems Inc.
(SSC: TSX-V)
Basic Shares 46.8 million
Fully Diluted 54.7 million

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The Vancouver based green technology company has clearly taken a major step forward with the release of its quarterly and first half (ended June 30th) financial results.

There are two key factors being, what has happened with revenues and are operating costs being kept in check?

On the first point:

• Revenues for the quarter were $1.137 million, representing a 120% increase over the $510 thousand reported in the second quarter of last year.

• Revenues for the six months were $1.772 million, representing a 140% increase over the $736 thousand reported for the first half of 2009.

On the aspect of operating expenses:

• Operating expenses for the quarter declined slightly to just over $1 million, down from $1.176 million in Q2, 2009.

• Operating expenses for the six months fell significantly to slightly more than $2 million, down from $2.69 million for the first six months of 2009.

Of note, the Company stated its objective remains to reach positive cash flow in the fourth quarter of this year.

The Company had $514 thousand in cash and equivalents and $688 thousand in receivables as of June 30th.

To read the news release (click here) and for the complete financial statements and Management Discussion & Analysis (http://www.sedar.com/).

Buchans Acquires Massive Manganese Resource

Buchans Minerals Corporation (TSX-V: BMC)
Basic Shares 112.1 million
Fully Diluted 121.1 million


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The desire of Buchans Minerals to capitalize on strengthening manganese and iron markets is the catalyst for today’s announcement that it has acquired the Woodstock Manganese Property in New Brunswick, Canada.

The property holds three mineralized deposits including, what is being called, the historic Plymouth deposit. The 470 hectare purchase was struck with a private company and sits just five kilometres northwest of the town of Woodstock. In addition, Buchans has proactively staked additional claims surrounding the property expanding its land position to a massive 3,700 hectares or 37 square kilometres.

Excellent infrastructure is in place with the property only 4 kilometres from the Trans Canada Highway with good access to power and water.

Buchans engaged Wardrop Engineering to evaluate the new property with the firm concluding that in this market with new processing technology the property is “potentially economically viable”.

Extensive historical work completed in the 1980’s identified the resource which is believed to be one of the largest undeveloped manganese resources in North America. Buchans believes the project has a reasonable shot at commercial success by utilizing modern techniques for processing manganese in a strengthening market.

Although the historic Plymouth numbers are not 43-101 compliant, Strategic Manganese Corporation, a division of Strategic Metals identified mineralization to depths of 152 metres or 500 feet with an estimated resource of 46.5 million tonnes averaging 10.9% manganese and 13.3% iron. Two other zones with similar numbers have been identified on the property being North and South Hartford.

The obvious question is; what comes next? That was addressed in the news release: “The Company is assessing scenarios for advancing the property including undertaking additional work to assess and define the resources and their potential for development through joint venture or internally”.

Manganese is essential to iron and steel production as well as an alloying agent for aluminum. It also is an essential ingredient in alkaline batteries.

See full news release here.......

Mining Plan Underway For Buchans Minerals

Buchans Minerals Corporation (TSX-V: BMC)
Basic Shares 112.1 million
Fully Diluted 121.1 million


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Buchans Minerals has hired Wardrop, a top engineering firm to complete a preliminary mine plan for two of its advanced properties in Newfoundland.

Lundberg and Engine House are 100% owned by Buchans and both have NI-43-101 compliant resources. Bench scale metallurgical testing is currently ongoing through September and Buchans may proceed towards getting Preliminary Economic Assessment (PEA) status if the evaluation warrants such an assessment. Both open pit and underground mining methods will be considered.

Warren MacLeod, President and CEO of Buchans Minerals stated that "Both the preliminary mining plan and the metallurgical tests are important building blocks towards determining the economic potential of the Lundberg and Engine House resources and we look forward to reviewing their outcome."

Wardrop, A Tetra Tech Company is a multi-disciplined engineering and consulting firm that provides innovative solutions for the natural resource management, energy, and infrastructure markets globally. Wardrop is a subsidiary of Tetra Tech (NASDAQ: TTEK), a leading provider of consulting, engineering, program management, construction and technical services. The combined companies have more than 10,000 employees worldwide and capabilities that span the entire project lifecycle.

See full news release here........

Silvore Fox to Survey Coxheath Property with Latest Airborne Technology

SFX - TSXV
Shares Outstanding – 121.77 Million
Fully Diluted – 153.15 Million

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With money in the bank and a world class technical team on site, Silvore Fox’s 2010 exploration program on its Coxheath property is well underway.

Aeroquest International has been contracted to fly 462 line kilometres and capture data using high resolution Aero TEM IV MAG-TDEN and Radiometrics. In layman’s language this technology is able to identify mineralization such as copper, gold, silver and molybdenum below the surface of the earth. It can identify resources at depths greater than 500 metres.

The company will use the AeroTEM survey data to identify targets for its drill program which is set to begin in September 2010.

SFX’s Coxheath property is located in Nova Scotia, Canada and is approximately 9400 acres in size.

To view the full release, please click here

International Water Guard Shares Are A Steal

International Water-Guard (TSX-V: IWG)
Basic Shares: 39.3 million
Fully Diluted: 46.5 million

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A financial analyst who knows International Water Guard’s business inside out is scratching his head trying to understand why the company’s shares are trading well below fair market value.

Fundamental Research analyst Siddharth Rajeev pointed out in his most recent report that IWG’s working capital of $2.16 million is nearly equal to its Aug. 18th market cap of $2.36 million.

On Aug. 18th, IWG shares closed the day at $0.06 but Mr. Rajeev pegged the fair value of the shares at five times that - $0.30 cents. “IWG continues to be significantly undervalued,” Mr. Rajeev wrote in his Aug. 9th report.

IWG’s business is selling high-tech water treatment and sophisticated water storage technology for corporate and government jets, plus the well-heeled private jet owners around the world. IWG continues its efforts to break into the much larger commercial airline business but admittedly it is a long and grinding road.

Mr. Rajeev noted that transaction activities and the value of mergers and acquisitions in the aerospace and defense industry, “increased significantly year over year in the first half of 2010.” Along with that growth and the expectation that the US dollar will gain strength, Mr. Rajeev expects IWG will benefit from both the aviation industry recovery and a higher-valued U.S. dollar, the latter because IWG’s technology is sold in US dollars.

A wild card in the mix is IWG’s continuing merger and acquisition efforts where the business plan is to leverage its relatively strong cash position and its solid core business to achieve significant growth.

To read the full Fundamental Research Corp. update report please click here.

Green Banking Giant Goes Smartcool

Smartcool Systems Inc.
(SSC: TSX-V)
Basic Shares 46.8 million
Fully Diluted 54.7 million




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Smartcool continues to land international deals with large, reputable companies through its global distribution network.

This time SSCl proved to South Africa's Nedbank that its Energy Saving Module (ESM) could reduce Nedbanks energy bill by approximately 350,000 kilowatts per year and payback the investment in the ESM product in under two years.

A pilot installation into Nedbank's central office in Johannesburg proved savings even higher than originally estimated. Five chillers were fitted with the ESM units through Smartcool's South African distributor Aruba Cooling. The immediate success has led to 10 further installations being planned in other Nedbank locations.

Nedbank Group is South Africa's fourth largest banking group measured by assets, with a strong deposit franchise, the second largest retail deposit base, a client-centric wholesale and retail franchise and a substantial and growing bancassurance and wealth management offering. Nedbank Group's headquarters is based in Sandton, Johannesburg, with large operational centres in Durban and Cape Town - which are complemented by a regional branch network throughout South Africa and facilities in other southern African countries. Nedbank has set rigorous energy saving targets, including a 12% reduction of both energy use and carbon emissions by 2015.

South Africa is faced with rapidly increasing energy costs alongside increasing demand, putting an enormous strain on the state-owned energy provider. Mr. Heini Nel, Managing Director of Aruba Cooling, observed that, "Energy saving solutions such as that provided by Smartcool, are going to become part and parcel within the South African commercial sector moving forward, as the local market adapts to spiraling energy tariffs that will double in the coming 24 months".

George Burnes, President and CEO of Smartcool, states, "We at Smartcool are excited about the progress being made in South Africa- a market we feel holds tremendous growth potential". Mr. Nel added that this successful pilot project with a recognized corporate giant like Nedbank will be influential in lifting the profile of Smartcool's energy efficiency products within the region.

See full news release here.........

Asia Now Identifies Three New Copper/Gold/Moly Porphyries

Asia Now (TSX-V: NOW)
Basic Shares: 65.5 million
Fully Diluted: 68.3 million
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Asia Now's Habo property looks to have something in common with some of the worlds largest porphyry systems. Habo sits in the Tethyan magmatic belt which hosts massive systems like Sar Cheshmeh in Iran and Reko Diq in Pakistan.

Work completed in 2008 at Habo South proved a copper-gold-molybdenum porphyry system that was 2.3 km long by 1.3 km wide; a great start.

Habo is a very large property covering an area of 162 square kilometers. Extensive surface work has just been completed over a 40 square kilometer area at Habo North and East and found that the property contains three new porphyry systems that warrant further exploration. Assays from 636 rock-chip samples have returned with showings of up to 3.1 grams per ton of gold, 0.42% copper, 0.29% moly and 172 g/t of silver.

Dr. Kaihui Yang, President of Asia Now was quoted as saying that “We are planning a program that will include extensive trenching, tunnelling and drilling to test these new mineralized porphyries. We will continue to focus on high-grade porphyry systems that have potential for bulk tonnage, open-pittable mining at Habo.”

See full news release and assay results here........

The drills are turning at Argonaut’s High Gold property

Argonaut Exploration
AGA - TSX.V
Shares Outstanding - 25.2 Million
Fully Diluted - 35.9 Million

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Argonaut Exploration is enthusiastic about its 2010 exploration program on its High Gold property, which is located in the heart of a known mineralized zone just outside of Smithers British Columbia, Canada.

Here’s a summary of this year’s exploration program

• The program features 2,500 metres of drilling, 20 kilometres of Induced Polarization (the use of electrical charges to identify subsurface materials such as ore) and magnetometer geophysical surveys and geological mapping

• The High Gold property is adjacent to very large defined porphyry systems and mineralized zones

• The property has exceptional infrastructure

• Historical rock sampling on High Gold contained 1.2 grams per tonne to 29.7 grams per tonne of Gold

• The company has enough working capital to complete this year’s exploration program
To read the full news release, please click here

To read the full news release, please click here

Argonaut Exploration Looking for British Columbia’s Next Mining Discovery

Argonaut Exploration
AGA - TSX.V
Shares Outstanding - 25.2 Million
Fully Diluted - 35.9 Million

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With gold and other precious metals at an all time high, we are pleased to introduce Argonaut Exploration (AGA.V) as the newest addition to The Howard Group portfolio of clients.

Argonaut has two key properties just outside of Terrace, British Columbia. The company’s 2010 exploration program will focus on its High Gold property, which is located directly next to properties with high porphyry-style mineralization. The potential economic commodities present on both properties are Gold, Silver, Copper, Molybdenum, Lead and Zinc.

Below is a link to The Howard Group’s introductory commentary that details Argonaut’s exploration projects and its objective to demonstrate higher value in the short term.

Click here to read the Howard Group introduction to Argonaut Exploration

Carfinco Top Pick On BNN Market Call - Again

Carfinco Income Fund (TSX:CFN.UN) Units issued: 23.9 million
Units fully diluted: 24 million
Current monthly distribution: $0.02
Q1/2010 special distribution: $0.04
Q2/2010 special distribution: $0.10
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In December 2009, Jason Donville, President and CEO of Donville Kent Asset Management rated Carfinco as his number one pick on BNN Market Call. At the time, Carfinco was trading at about $2.00 per unit. Things were looking positive for the fund as it came out of the recession with a couple of strong quarters behind it.

Fast forward to Friday August 6th when Mr. Donnville was once again on Market Call stating not only that Carfinco is his top pick but that he was still buying it at $4.50 last week. To date, this is a healthy return from the $1.45 when he first began building a position, last year.

His belief is that after the last record quarter Carfinco is valued at "$6.00 plus." He also mentioned that the return on equity is "through the roof" and he thinks that Carfinco could double its current distribution bringing it to a 10% yield and "still retain a bunch of its capital".


About Jason Donville, President & CEO, Donville Kent Asset Management

Jason has had an illustrious career as an award-winning analyst in both Asia and Canada. Prior to founding DKAM, Mr. Donville was consistently ranked as one of the top financial services analysts in the country. In 2004 and 2005, Mr. Donville was ranked in all three financial services research categories (banks, insurance and diversified financial services) in the annual Brendan Woods surveys. Mr. Donville was also recognized as the Top Stock Picker in Diversified Financial Services in the 2004 and 2005 National Post/Starmine surveys, and ranked number 3 for forecast accuracy in 2004 in the same survey.


To view the BNN interview, please click here

Asia Now Finds High-Grade Gold

Asia Now (TSX-V: NOW)
Basic Shares: 65.5 million
Fully Diluted: 68.3 million
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For some time, Asia Now has been drilling on its Beiya North property which sits adjacent to the largest gold mine in Yunan Province, which is reportedly expanding annual production to 200 thousand ounces.

The existing open-pit mine is looking to expand and Asia Now has all of the surrounding land covering 586 square kilometres.

To date for this year, Asia Now drilled seven holes at Beiya North. Four of them have come back with significant mineralization.

High grade gold and silver were found in four of the new drill holes proving that the gold/silver zone extends at least 940 meters from the existing gold mine. This gold/silver zone is still open to the north and west.

Assay results came in with showings of up to 10 grams per tonne of gold and 324 grams per tonne of silver with strong lead and zinc showings.

These recent drillholes intersected high-grade intercepts ranging from 0.9 to 8.7 meters grading 2.0-10.0(grams per tonne)g/t gold, 145-324 g/t silver, 0.4-1.0% copper and 15.3-35.3% combined lead and zinc.

See full news release and assay results here......

Cobalt Coal & The Howard Group – On Watch Mode

Cobalt Coal Corp. (TSX:V CBT)
Basic Shares: 50.4 million
Fully Diluted: 57.6 million

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Last November when The Howard Group began working with Cobalt Coal, the company had a clear objective of achieving positive cash flow in the short term by producing metallurgical coal at its Westchester mine in West Virginia.

Fast forward to today and yes, production is underway with approximately two thousand clean tons sold in July. In an early June news release announcing the start of production, Cobalt management stated the objective was to get to 10 to 12 thousand tons per month. However, Cobalt has encountered some equipment issues that have resulted in a slower production ramp up than anticipated. In addition, the company tried to complete a private placement but faced not only the traditional summer doldrums but a market that was retreating from junior stocks.

As such, Cobalt and The Howard Group have mutually decided to put our relationship on hold while Cobalt focuses on getting its business plan on track, the three main points being production, acquisitions and access to capital.

Anglo Swiss Resources & The Howard Group

We will not comment on Anglo Swiss’s decision not to renew its relationship with The Howard Group.

However, we will say we’re extremely satisfied with the fact that over the past several years we’ve brought many new shareholders to the story, attracted capital at critical points through our relationships and been a constant sounding board over hundreds of phone calls and emails.

We stayed with the story, as have a large number of other people, because Anglo looks to have a reasonable shot at finding a pot of gold. It is fact that there is gold at the old “Kenville Mine” now Nelson Mining Camp site. It simply comes down to, how big is the pot?

As our office alone holds several million shares and others we have brought to the table own multiples of that number, we obviously have extreme interest in the story going forward.

We wish ASW luck and a lot of it.

There are many very patient shareholders who deserve to be rewarded.

Cobalt Ramping up Coal Production at Westchester

From Cobalt Coal (CBT.V) Begins Production at Westchester mine

Cobalt Coal Corp. (TSX:V CBT)
Basic Shares: 50.4 million
Fully Diluted: 57.6 million

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Cobalt Coal has released an operational update on the status of production since it began mining on May 27th at its Westchester Coal Mine in West Virginia.

The first month was focused on initial production of metallurgical coal and rehabilitating the old mine works.

During the first month of operations, the following was accomplished according to management:

a. A total of 1,080 clean tons were produced and sold.
b. The previous mine works were rehabilitated.
c. A stable work force was put in place.
d. The Conveyor Belt Drive was set, and the Conveyor Belt Line has been extended.
e. The Corporation now has six working faces up from two; a greater number of faces will result in an increase in efficiency.
f. Cobalt has purchased a second Roof Bolter that is now on site.
g. A second rebuilt scoop was purchased and is now on site at the Mine.

The second month saw production of a total of 1,974 clean tons of coal.

CBT says that cash flow is currently closely matched to expenditures.

On June 9th, Cobalt issued a news release announcing the first coal sales. At that time it stated that the company believed it could get to 10 to 12 thousand tons per month “on a single shift”. Investors are hoping the company can meet this target in short order.

To view the full commentary, please click here.