Patriot says there is strong inbound interest in its Corvette project

afr.com:

Toronto-listed shares in Patriot Battery Metals have soared overnight after the lithium explorer confirmed it had “received strong inbound interest… from a range of tier 1 global mining and chemicals companies”.

The miner, which is also listed on the ASX and is working on the Corvette lithium project in Quebec, said it was seeking legal advice on a report published by Night Market Research which alleged the company was manipulating its share price by delaying the results of test drilling.

Ken Brinsden, chairman of Patriot Battery Metals. Trevor Collens

The activist short-seller also alleged that Patriot had used “curiously timed buyout rumours” to inflate its share price, and that its reserves could be up to 40 per cent lower than previously touted by the company.

Overnight, Patriot said details of the maiden resource at Corvette would be released “in coming weeks”.

“The resource is expected to be a large-scale and high-grade lithium deposit when benchmarked against other hard rock lithium projects globally,” the company told shareholders.

Blair Way, Patriot’s chief executive, said the company received the last batch of assay results from a winter drilling program “which means our imminent release of the resource remains on track”.

“I am confident that the upcoming maiden resource will demonstrate the significance of the Corvette discovery to the evolving North American and European lithium raw materials markets,” said Mr Way.

Canadian shares in Patriot soared 8.6 per cent to $CAD15.67 ($A17.6), clawing back the $CAD280 million slashed from the company’s market capitalisation following the activist short seller’s claims on Friday. The company now has a market capitalisation of $CAD1.92 billion.

At the same time, Canada’s