AUSTRALIAN firm OZ Minerals is “moving towards an initial gold resource” in Cambodia, it said Thursday in a statement announcing results for the third quarter.

The company had completed about 60 percent of a “significant drilling campaign” during the period at its Okvau prospect in western Mondulkiri province, with nine holes drilled by the end of September, it added.

“The aim of this programme is to expand on previous encouraging drilling results,” the OZ Minerals statement said, adding that an initial resources estimate would be finalised during the first quarter of 2010.

Acting Chief Executive Bruce Loveday said in July that OZ Minerals had “done enough work now to believe that there may well be a gold system there that is of interest”.

Thursday’s announcement also said drilling had started at its Area 6 prospect outside of Okvau that had produced “high-grade gold mineralisation”.

OZ Minerals’ third-quarter results, which showed that the firm’s Australian gold production was unchanged during the period, prompted its share price to close 0.76 percent up at A$1.32 (US$1.22) on the Sydney stock exchange Thursday.

Gold prices have hit repeated record highs since last week as the dollar rate has crashed, but early trading Thursday in London saw a dip in prices, Bloomberg reported, as traders began to sell to cash in on recent high prices.

In Cambodia, gold was selling at a new high of $1,290 per damlung Wednesday, according to prices at Phnom Penh’s Ly Hour Exchange, representing a 1.57 percent rise on the previous day’s price.