SINGAPORE (Nov 10): CNMC Goldmine has announced earnings of US$1.1 million ($1.5 million) for the quarter ended Sept, down 51.8% from its earnings of US$2.25 million a year ago on lower revenue and higher capital expenditure.
Revenue for the quarter nearly halved to US$4.7 million from $8.5 million in 3Q16 as lower ore grades crimped the group’s production and sales volume of fine gold.
As a result of the lower gold output, the all-in costs of US$1,546 per ounce in 3Q17 were higher than the all-in costs of US$728 per ounce in 3Q16, exacerbated by the higher capital expenditure of the construction of CNMC’s new carbon-in-leach (CIL) plant.
The company consequently incurred an after-tax loss of US$0.15 million, but ended the quarter with a net profit after including an unrealised foreign-exchange (forex) gain of US$0.3 mil and tax credit of US$0.9 million.
In its filing on Friday, the group also announced that its CIL plant is in the process of conducting trial operation. Due to the bulk of the CIL plant’s capital expenditure spent in 3Q, CNMC’s all-in cost of production is expected to decline in the quarter ahead.
“We spent the last few months putting together this new plant with the goal of turning around the decline in production since the fourth quarter of 2016,” comments Chris Lim, CEO of CNMC.
“CIL technology is widely proven to be effective in extracting gold from ground ore, with recovery rates of up to 95%. We believe output at the Sokor gold field will increase once the plant goes into commercial production,” he adds.
Shares in CNMC closed flat at 29 cents on Thursday.
