He was once Australia’s best known coal baron and owned two major sporting teams. Now Nathan Tinkler is back in the ASX spotlight. Pic: Getty Images
- Nathan Tinkler’s coal return continues to move the needle for White Energy
- Asian Battery Metals strikes copper sulphides at Red Hill in Mongolia
- Lithium Energy sells graphite assets into Matt Latimore backed IPO M Battery Materials
Your standout ASX small cap resources stocks for Tuesday, May 26, 2026.
The (former) bogan billionaire Nathan Tinkler’s re-emergence at White Energy – his third attempted plunge back into the ASX coal scene in five years – has driven major gains for the previously flailing junior.
Tinkler’s failed attempt to muscle in on hard-luck NSW thermal coal story Australian Pacific Coal (ASX:AQC) was followed by a $10m investment in Canadian met hopeful Jameson Resources (ASX:JAL), where his companies later failed to pay the $5m due for the placement’s second tranche and pulled a notice for an EGM to roll its board over late 2022 and early 2023.
His latest investment, the sale of Essential Global Resources LLC and Oceltip Coal 2 Pty Ltd to WEC, has thus far been smoother.
The deal will include the acquisition of EGR and its Lolley No.1 underground coking coal project in Alabama, which is an advanced development project.
EGR and Oceltip’s shareholders would emerge with shares equivalent to 10.7% of the company in exchange.
The second part is the acquisition of Oceltip 2, which is acquiring the Tin Hut Creek project in Queensland’s Surat Basin, for $4m in cash.
The term sheet as it’s so far been reported to the market is non-binding, and the deal is reliant on a $15m, 6c per share cap raising led by Aitken Mount Capital Partners.
If the deal closes and required approvals are received, Nathan Tinkler becomes exec chair and will get a proposed 100m of unquoted employee incentive options. They would vest if the WEC share price stays above 10c for 10 trading days within any 20 consecutive trading days during the 12 months after completion for the first 50m.
For the next 50m, they vest if the WEC share price stays above 15c for the same period of time within 24 months after the deal clears.
Handy then that the price of the firm is already at that level, with WEC trading at 17c after a 31% bump on Tuesday morning – 315% higher in five days.
Coal prices have helped. A disaster at a mine in China over the weekend which killed 82 people and threatens a regulatory crackdown sent front month Australian coking coal futures ~5% higher Monday to US$247/t, though the larger ASX coal stocks like Whitehaven and Yancoal suffered a selloff after a strong Monday as the Dalian contract pulled back.
Visual sulphides don’t always translate to high grade mineralisation, but they can provide a window to the potential of a deposit for punters willing to get in before the hard data comes in.
AZ9 was flying on Tuesday after announcing 21.9m of massive sulphide mineralisation in a hole called MU2603 at its Red Hill project in Mongolia.
Massive sulphide means somewhere around 40-80% of the rock consists of sulphide mineralisation, a class that typically can host high-grade deposits.
Just seeing them isn’t enough – lab assays due in this case in four to five weeks will ultimately tell how much copper, gold and other mineralisation is in the rock.
But the news is promising, with the hit picking up copper sulphide minerals chalcopyrite and chalcocite, and validating a downhole EM conductor around 75m above the mineralisation identified in hole MU2502.
Holes MU2602 and MU2604 also returned copper mineralisation, with MU2604 intersecting 3.6m of massive to semi-massive sulphides rich in sphalerite and chalcopyrite, around 70m west of previous hole MU2601.
All up the mineralised zone now extends to more than 155m of strike.
“The current drilling results continue to highlight the significant and additional unrecognised potential of the Red Hill Cu-Au Project to host high-grade massive sulphide mineralisation with substantial exploration upside,” MD Gan-Ochir Zunduisuren said.
“Importantly, the extent of the massive sulphide intersections identified to date by ABM was not recognised by the historical exploration programs. The mineralised system remains open at depth and along strike.”
RC drilling is now planned to target shallow gold mineralisation found last year in hole MU2501, with a gravity survey to be finalised and interpreted in the coming weeks. The key will be assay results from the recent drilling at Red Hill, or Maikhan Uhl, with the first batch from MU2601 due in a fortnight.
Geophysical and geological data will be used to refine drill targeting areas.
Read More: Asian Battery Metals stretches copper-rich Red Hill sulphide zone
This tiddler owns a host of projects around WA’s Mid West, including the Victory Bore vanadium project, one of the world’s largest vanadium/titanium/iron resources where efforts to find a strategic investor remain afoot.
Its current exploration focus is on the Kadji gold project, a former BHP exploration site near Perenjori, and the Yidby project, which contains a host of gold, copper and iron targets straddling the Great Northern Highway.
That all sounds pretty modest, something backed up in SRN’s miniscule $4.25m market cap.
But there was some joy for the junior today with an option exercise from exec chair Vladimir Nikolaenko, who’s decided to exercise a parcel of close to 7m options at 10c each.
A “vote of confidence” the company says given the strike price is more than 4x SRN’s market rate, the deal from Nikolaenko’s Mutual Holdings clocks in at $695,436.50. But it won’t be paid in cash.
Rather, it has been applied as a reduction of the amount owed by SRN to Mutual Holdings under existing loan arrangements.
“This has the effect of reducing the Company’s loan liabilities and increasing shareholders’ equity by the same amount,” the firm said.
SRN had $427,000 in the bank as of March 31 and had drawn $1.25m of a loan facility extended by entities owned by Nikolaenko.
The firm was trading in the 0.1c range before a 25:1 consolidation in April and now sits at 2.4c.
As tungsten prices run hot, Viking Mines is ready to drill into its Linka project in Nevada, securing US contractor DrilCor for a maiden 63-hole drill program in late June.
It comes after VKA secured approval from the Bureau of Land Management for the first sub-surface exploration at the side in four decades.
Earthworks contractor engagement is in its final stages. A total of 48 drill pads will be set up for the campaign, with Viking funding it through a tidy $4.7m cash balance (March 31).
MD Julian Woodcock called the selection of the contractor a ‘significant step forward’ in the first drill test at Linka in more than 40 years.
“The maiden campaign is designed to deliver across three distinct objectives, verifying historic high-grade intercepts at Linka Main, maiden testing of the prospective southwest extension, and regional reconnaissance across the broader claim package,” he said.
“Each target has the potential to materially advance our understanding of the Linka mineralised system.
“With drilling scheduled to commence late in the June quarter and assay results from our recent field campaigns expected over the coming months, Viking has a strong period of news flow ahead, all underpinned by a fully-funded balance sheet.”
Viking acquired Linka in December last year. Mining occurred at the site between 1941 and 1956 when the US Government halted a program to buy domestic tungsten.
It was never developed beyond 91m, making the asset an obvious entry point for a junior looking to revive US production of the China-dominated critical mineral.
A Queensland company owned by M Resources chief Matt Latimore and coal executive Gerhard Redelinghuys – M Battery Materials Ltd – has paid $20 million to pick up a hatful of graphite projects in the sunshine state LEL was previously planning to spin out.
The firm is part of the coal trader M Resources’ rapid diversification into other mining fields.
Including $5m in cash and $15m in shares, the sale of the Burke, Mt Dromedary and Corella graphite projects will see them become key assets in the planned $15m IPO of M’s battery metals business.
Lithium Energy is planning to distribute the M shares in specie to its shareholders or seek approval to distribute 75% of them to shareholders at the end of an escrow period if an ASX escrow is imposed.
MBM already owns the Yambungan graphite project, acquired from Rio Tinto in December 2024 and just 8km from Burke and Mt Dromedary. It also owns a major package of vanadium tenements in the Julia Creek field.
It completes a major shift in strategy for LEL, which also sold its Solaroz lithium project in Argentina for A$97m in a staged deal originally announced in 2024 and completed last year.
LEL has been exploring for gold and copper at its Capricorn project in central Queensland but was a cash box even before the MBM deal, with $64.4m in the bank as of March 31 – cash backing of 57.5c per share against a share price of 34c today, even after an 11.5% gain.
It also owns the White Plains lithium brine project in Utah.
LEL and its shareholders will hold a planned one-third of the MBM business post IPO, intended to be conducted at 50c per share.
This article does not constitute financial product advice. You should consider obtaining independent financial advice before making any financial decisions.