LONDON (Alliance News) - Aureus Mining Inc Thursday said it has improved the gold recovery levels at the New Liberty gold mine in Liberia, with further improvements still to come as the miner advances toward commercial production next month.
Aureus shares were up 13% to 3.40 pence per share on Thursday morning.
The gold miner said the recovery levels at the processing plant at the mine increased in January and current stand at an average of 85% in February. However, Aureus said that the recovery level has averaged 87% over the last week, and that further improvements are expected.
"It is anticipated that overall plant performance will continue to improve towards design levels throughout the coming weeks, with commercial production expected to be declared by the end of March 2016," said Aureus.
"The company will declare full commercial production once the entire process plant is operating at full design capacity and in a manner consistent with management expectations," said the miner.
Gold production from the mine since the start of 2016 stands at 11,001 ounces of gold, of which 5,478 ounces were produced in January with the other 5,523 ounces coming in February - suggesting production is steadily rising as a result of the recovery improvements.
To put that into some form of perspective, Aureus produced 17,172 ounces of gold from the mine in the entire second half of 2015.
The company continues to progress with the development of an updated mine plan which will be finalised by the end of this month, and said the business plan will form the basis of discussions with Rand Merchant Bank, Nedbank Ltd and the Export Credit Insurance Corp of South Africa Ltd about an appropriate debt repayment schedule following the deferral of the first debt repayment which was due on January 31, it said.
By Joshua Warner; joshuawarner@alliancenews.com; @JoshAlliance
Copyright 2016 Alliance News Limited. All Rights Reserved.
