Excluding the sep-18 qtr, ore milled ranged between 455k tonnes and 535k tonnes for the prior 4 qtrs. The plant wasn't just maintained but upgraded and the stope ore had increased significantly when compared to the prior qtr as a base - so I estimated 500k tonnes and incremented this by 50k tonnes per qtr up to the expected on-going run rate of 600k tonnes for Q4. The grade from the prior 5 qtrs ranged between 1.74g tonne and 2.24g tonne. Stope and development ore is increasing with better grade so I used 2.2g tonne for Q2 incrementing to 2.5g then 2.7g. I used 85% as the recovery rate across the 3 qtrs due to the promoted recovery expected post upgrade. This was an oversight as I should have ramped it up over the 3 qtrs. The result was obviously far below this level so this did NOT lead me to the conclusion the result was "shocking", just that further understanding was required.
You obviously didn't pick it up but the published guidance for the sulphide plant is to produce 136kozs for the year. The varying oxide production is irrelevant for the purpose of this forecast. YTD 37kozs have been produced. 99kozs left to deliver in order to achieve guidance. At full production 85% recovery and 2.7g/tonne the most that can be produced is 88k tonnes. Therefore guidance will NOT be met. How well the ramp up proceeds will determine how short we will be, it will be well short. Q2 was a shocker for sulphide.
You defended the Q2 as reasonable on the basis of ore mined. I took your reasoning and extrapolated for the remainder of the year:
|
Column 1 |
Column 2 |
Column 3 |
Column 4 |
Column 5 |
Column 6 |
Column 7 |
Column 8 |
Column 9 |
Column 10 |
Column 11 |
| 1 |
|
Ore |
Grade |
g's in Ore |
Recovery |
g's |
ozs |
Ore |
Non-Stope |
Non-Stope |
Total Ozs |
| 2 |
|
Mined |
|
|
Rate |
Recovered |
Recovered |
Milled |
Ore |
ozs |
Produced |
| 3 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| 4 |
Q1 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
15,702 |
| 5 |
Q2 |
180,000 |
2.7 |
486,000 |
0.85 |
413,100 |
13,282 |
500,000 |
320,000 |
8,272 |
21,554 |
| 6 |
Q3 |
355,000 |
2.7 |
958,500 |
0.85 |
814,725 |
26,194 |
550,000 |
195,000 |
5,041 |
31,235 |
| 7 |
Q4 |
555,000 |
2.7 |
1,498,500 |
0.85 |
1,273,725 |
40,952 |
600,000 |
45,000 |
1,163 |
42,115 |
| 8 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| 9 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Total Updated Forecast |
|
|
101,606 |
| 10 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Published Company Forecast |
|
|
136,000 |
| 11 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Variance |
|
|
-25,394 |
| 12 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Variance as % |
|
- |
-23% |
This leads to a 23% shortfall to guidance. In addition we will not achieve 2.7g and 85% recovery for the remainder of the year. Playing with the parameters can achieve some improvement but there will always be a significant shortfall.
Now I would like to return to where I started before you jumped down my throat:
"For me there isn't really enough information to determine whether this is a good report........but there are things that make me cautious for the short term and what will need to be done to arrive at full production."
As I sat my concern is how we get from now to steady state production and whether we have a funding shortfall. Missing guidance is a funding issue. The over performance of the oxide plant may off-set this but it is a point to be understood. So I say again there are things that make me cautious and I want to see the qtly. You don't need to be so defensive and threaten all and sundry as the dreaded "naysayers".
W
(20min delay)
