Papua Mining Share News (PML)

LONDON (Alliance News) - Papua Mining PLC Monday said its pretax loss narrowed in the first half of 2014 as administrative costs decreased.

Papua has around 2,600 kilometres of licenses, made up of 13 exploration licenses for copper and gold in Papua New Guinea, 12 of which are on the island of New Britain.

The company, which is yet to produce any revenues, said its pretax loss narrowed to USD881,222 in the six months to June 30, compared with USD1.2 million in the first half of 2013.

The company said it had USD4.9 million in cash at the end of the first half, compared with USD6.9 million last year.

Papua said its exploration programmes in Papua New Guinea are progressing "satisfactorily", having seen a series of positive indicators in the Tripela drilling area.

"We continue to carry out focused exploration programmes on certain selected target areas on our other licences in New Britain, and we have had some very promising early results from these areas which we plan to follow up with more detailed exploration with a view to defining drilling targets. Ground with less favourable initial results has been dropped," the company said in a statement.

Papua Mining shares were trading 2.8% lower midday Monday, at 26.50 pence per share.

By Rowena Harris-Doughty; rowenaharrisdoughty@alliancenews.com; @rharrisdoughty

Copyright 2014 Alliance News Limited. All Rights Reserved.