Athena Gold finds new anomalies at Laird Lake

Executive Summary

• Athena Gold Corp. has released results from its 2025 summer till program at the Laird Lake gold project in Ontario’s Red Lake district, identifying four new distinct zones of gold anomalism: Nemo, Bounty, Hugo, and Chungus.
• The company has materially expanded its land package by staking an additional 2,302 hectares, bringing the total project area to 7,457 hectares.
• Three of the new zones (Nemo, Hugo, and Chungus) represent entirely new target areas with no historical occurrences, while the Bounty zone coincides with known high-grade showings. These targets are road-accessible with minimal overburden, positioning the company for a maiden drilling campaign this winter.

Key Details

• New Anomalies Identified: Four discrete zones of gold anomalism were identified, ranging from approximately 200 to 3,000 metres in length.
  • Nemo, Hugo, and Chungus Zones: These are new target areas with no previously documented historical occurrences. They exhibit broad, less nuggety (disseminated) geochemical signatures.
  • Bounty Zone: Coincident with known gold showings, including a previous surface grab sample of 373 g/t Au. It is proximal to the Balmer-Confederation unconformity.
• Geochemical Signatures: The anomalies returned Au-Ag-As-Bi-W (gold-silver-arsenic-bismuth-tungsten) signatures characteristic of major deposits in the Red Lake district.
• Structural Context: Anomalies appear proximal to northwest-trending structures associated with the Laird Lake fault system, potentially analogous to the LP fault system hosting the Great Bear deposit.
• Land Expansion:
  • Previous land position: 5,155 hectares.
  • New staked area: 2,302 hectares.
  • Total project area: 7,457 hectares.
  • Project now spans approximately 20 kilometres of prospective ground.
• Exploration Strategy:
  • Targets are road-accessible with minimal overburden (0–200m glacial drift magnitude proposed).
  • QA/QC data from 1,899 till samples (collected via Dutch augers, avg depth 27cm) returned high-quality results within three standard deviations of certified values.
  • Next steps include ground-truthing via field prospecting in the coming weeks to finalize targets for the maiden drill program scheduled for winter.
• Technical Review: Data reviewed and approved by Benjamin Kuzmich, PGeo, Vice-President of Exploration and Qualified Person under NI 43-101.

Notable Quotes

• Koby Kushner, CEO: "We are beyond thrilled with the results from our 2025 till program at Laird Lake, which have revealed four significant gold anomalies in Ontario's Red Lake gold district. The discovery of the Nemo, Hugo and Chungus zones, combined with the expansion of our land package to over 7,400 hectares, positions Athena to unlock substantial value in this prolific gold camp. With minimal overburden and road-accessible targets, we are well positioned to efficiently advance these discoveries toward our maiden drilling campaign this winter."
• Benjamin Kuzmich, VP of Exploration: "The new targets identified happen to occur in areas with very thin overburden. Additionally, we believe the till material sampled likely underwent minimal glacial displacement from surface mineralization near the new anomalies. This means that we should be able to ground truth these targets cheaply and quickly in order to finalize drill targets for our maiden winter drilling campaign."