As usual (and I suppose this is true for most announcements)...

As usual (and I suppose this is true for most announcements) I'll have to spend some time trying to read between the lines, but first thoughts:

- for once, a no excuses quarterly. Outputs improving, no obvious revision of metrics. It's clear not everything is peachy just yet, but if the cash costs continue to go down for the next quarter my faith may be restored.

- I don't like that the presentation has gold metrics but no financials. In the financials is where the secrets lie.

- Cash balance improved by $8 million but sell down of gold reserves responsible for at least $4 million of that, possibly more given that the costs of production for reserves would have come out of previous quarters. I realise that there's infrastructure spend, but wouldn't it be nice if ALD just sat back and mined for a couple of quarters.

- I need to look at the exploration side a bit more closely. Though I'm obviously contradicting what I just said, I think well targeted spending on exploration is well worth the risk and money and I hope that they're getting this part right.