Andean Silver (ASX:ASL) said it is advancing an expansion drill program at the Cristal prospect within the Cerro Bayo silver-gold project in Chile, according to a Tuesday Australian bourse filing.

A significant intercept at the prospect resulted in 4.5 meters of 584 grams per tonne grade of silver equivalent, including 380 g/t silver and 2.5 g/t gold.

The program is expected to be completed in the first quarter and the results will be used in the resource estimate for the prospect, which is also expected to be completed during the same quarter.

It also began a major geophysical campaign over the project and the geophysics data will be integrated with mapping and surface geochemistry to identify resistive structures up to a depth of 300 meters.

The firm's shares rose 6% on Tuesday's close.