Member Info for DASUT

Rebess, Liberum and what they know about anything I know not as what a load of old rubbish must have had a bad dream and woke up in a bad mood because doesn't make any sense whatsoever.
I don't take any notice from the likes of such so called analysts because unless they have first hand experience it is only conjecture.

Rebess as I say I really don't get it we get good news and a kick in the teeth at the same time. Sell of Batie/Konkera to one of the big boys (or maybe Horgan can sort out something with Resolute who are not necessarily one of the big boys but they have some great guys working for them and like a challenge), to finance Doropo and ABC, an additional mine or two no longer a single resource, not hampered by the Burkina risk, Cote D'Ivoire less risky and NOT land locked so easier logistics, experienced contractors, including Lyco working in West Africa for many years also well known to Horgan and his team. What's not to like?
So let's give Horgan some credit Batie was always somewhat complicated and risky and could have proved expensive in the long run and if maybe Lyco struggled with the process then best cut your losses.

I really don't get it I am out in the garden labouring for the wife from early on this morning. I switch on my emails at 5pm and see the West African announcement and pretty much everything I read came as no surprise whatsoever. Batie West/Konkera has been pretty much mothballed since 2014 and OK yes they have tried to make it viable by drilling over the large expanse but as expected has been placed in the "Too Difficult basket".
OK yes frustrated that we aren't digging for gold in the next months at Doropo BUT it does point in the right direction "they have something worth going for" and again this wasn't a surprise as this resource came on board later and the good news is they are now going for a pre feasibility study so we are on the home stretch of putting a shovel in the ground at long last "a plan"!
So then I logged on here expecting to see a healthy rise in our SP as I say I don't get it. Conspiracy theories wasted funds on drilling confirmation that Burkina doesn't cut the mustard ???
OK yes frustrating but to be expected and to be very honest surprised that Burkina decision wasn't announced earlier guess they wanted to combine the announcement with the good news at Doropo and ABC, to actually reduce the impact.
Also as expected contract mining and also great news that Lycopodium part of their advisory team so process pretty much sorted and sounds simple operation.
Not enough proven to go for broke so still needs the due diligence to satisfy the money men but as I say at long last a plan is out there for a way forward and another 200 thousand ounces per annum on the horizon. So why all the doom and gloom?

Tibbs don't play down the juniors too much as new markets often start with the juniors who can work far quicker as less white tape and internal wrangling. Won't necessarily bring the resource to a mine but will generate the interest of the big boys if they can prove up something of a resource. Granted there will also be some also rans living in hope.

Rule 1 & 2 how right you are but must say I enjoyed my early postings back in the 70's but so much has changed over the years. My first ever posting Sierra Leone in 1971 and the senior guys would brag that they were having a long weekend in Abidjan where they could eat excellent French food and enjoy restaurants with outdoor seating similar to Southern France.
I never had the money to experience such an extravagance as very much a small boy back then.
My last trip to West Africa was back in 2007 and the changes over my career were quite considerable and I am sure the changes since 2007 would be equally considerable.
Security is one of the major changes as I thought nothing of driving out of Freetown and spending hours travelling up country to visit customers. Even did similar trips in Nigeria back in 1973/4 even out and about around Kano and Kaduna but certainly wouldn't recommend this these days. Back then had to be done as pretty much impossible to get hold of anyone over the phone.

I was definitely asleep at the wheel as looked at the AGM notice to get details of when and where to ask a question and I had missed the deadline.
Where did you find out that there were no questions as was hoping to read some sort transcript not just the results of the voting which I have seen?

Cowichan a little harsh OK announced four years ago but there has been a pandemic and refresh of the board and it was made clear 12 months ago that there would be a delay as didn't want to import people and possible virus. so less that 3 years to undertake detailed feasibility, select right type of solar/battery system to provide satisfactory ROI ($37 million) and interact with their switchgear, then a detailed tender process, sounds a long process but a little credit please as they are actually trail blazers as the largest investment made on a mine for a solar project in fact believe largest green energy renewables project on a mine anywhere in the world.
At the same time they have a mine to run, tender for other concessions and hopefully bring in an exploration project or two to the construction phase.

Tibbs if Kees needs paying by a mining company to be a journalist and provide an editorial then doubt he will be invited. Work as a consultant for a major investment organisation then this would be a different affair.
Currently whilst the underground mine is obviously important to the long term it is the open pit where the next few years revenue will be coming from, but good news from the underground workings can only be beneficial.
Visits to a mine by analysts can only be staged once otherwise why go back again unless it is for a jolly. If the visitors are worth their salt they should be asking questions and pretty much demanding to look at areas of importance, after all they are representing very important major investors.

Tibbs Kees Decker did get it pretty much spot on eventually but I didn't feel he had enough knowledge of the mine after reading through his first report which wasn't borne out by the results in the following 12/18 months, so I thought wrongly that he lost some credibility.
Why didn't the analysts who have visited the mine pick up on impending issues? Why don't we hear more telling questions at the phone in's from these guys?
Who are these so called analysts I would love to walk the mine with them to understand what it is that they are looking at, I think Pardey would make a good analyst as a writer of fiction rather than facts?
Glad to hear Kees is talking to Horgan only a pity that Kees isn't able to visit the mine at this time.

Tiger no I wasn't aware of the killings in Burkina unfortunately this isn't unusual in Burkina in recent years. OK it is a distance from Batie and such events will be closely monitored and security is always a major priority on a mine, particularly gold mines. This will be another reason for delaying Batie going to production but more I think is that Doropo looks to be the richer resource.
Somnamna The last I read was that Doropo has a proven reserve of 2.4 million ounces with a further 1 million inferred. It would be a guess without seeing the mine plan and calculating what the annual production is likely to be but I am sure once the mine plan is established the engineers will be looking at the annual tonnage and then calculating expected ounces from known/expected grades.
Now for the guesswork if we take Roxgold from memory a proven reserve of approximately 1 million ounces grades of 2 ounces and mining 4 pits to produce approximately 100,000 ounces per annum. So my guess will be something above 100,000 ounces, doubt this helps as it is dangerous to try to make any more accurate predictions with no known facts and based only on the reserves.
Best to wait for advice from the board.

Somnamna Yes Horgan and his associates and maybe his Toro contractor do have the all important experience and contacts to bring one or more of the resources to production hopefully in the near future.
Interesting comment that not all grass roots exploration make it through to production, this is an obvious comment but most would have ceased exploration in the very early years, hopefully not spent the funds that Centamin have spent.
Not sure Burkina has the political stability for Bate West to move forward "yet" but Cote D'Ivoire looks good for a go at Doropo.
Here's hoping.

Tibbs this sounds really good and this is what I mean about getting the juices going but it is still early days and production of 100 plus thousand ounces per annum. Proven reserves in the largest pit of under 500 thousand ounces close to what Centamin at Sukari produce in a year.
However yes Centamin do need need to get on with it as their reserves are even more interesting.
Really looking forward to hearing what the board has to say in the coming weeks.

Autonomy1 it is an opinion not necessarily an assumption as to carry out all of the work necessary to discover gold there is a need to house the workforce of drillers, geologists and many other personnel so there will be a camp of some sort.
All I am saying is that it isn't my experience once the reserves have been proven and the button pressed to go mining that it is years to produce the first ounces.
Yes they will need funds and we have discussed this significant fact at some length a while back. If they say they are going mining this will I am sure be covered in the plan and it's timeline.
There are as I have said previously very few if any mines that don't need to borrow to grow and I would suggest there will be many financial institutions interested in funding what I hope will be a sound business plan.

Sorry should have said there are plenty of mines in West Africa and elsewhere operating with 100 ton size trucks and reckon this size truck is maybe the most popular as most versatile with the majority of the very successful and efficient contractors.

Autonomy1 It has already taken years to prove the orebody of a given mine and there is no reason why it should take years to produce gold from the given resource .
I would suggest there is already a camp in place and this can be a temporary tented village with mobile generators. OK there won't be a processing plant and there won't be mining equipment.
In West Africa given it's history there will be contractors with available equipment to open up the mine putting in the initial access roads and there will also be mining contractors with shovels, 100 ton trucks. dozers, graders etc that can kick start the mine by mining what is known as the oxide ores and placing on leach pads or stock piles ready for when the plant and mining equipment arrives.
There will also be manufacturers and their representatives already in deep discussion and talking contracts making plans and taking risks by putting equipment on order and in the pipeline to reduce lead times, adapting production schedules and talking to shipping lines.
This is what gets the investors juices flowing it's called putting the plan with a time line out there and exciting the market.

Tibbs there is nothing new in this article as Artisanal mining has been in existence in the developing world since before the Pharaohs. Much of this is similar to what the old Western movies describe as the gold rush which is alluvial panning or digging old river beds. This type of mining is somewhat hit and miss very risky.
There have been so many attempts over the years to curb such activities when the answer is to stop prohibition and legalise and form a structure which will give the workers a proper buy in and ownership rather than allowing the smugglers and mafia types the control.
The problems are deep rooted and unless you have worked in such developing countries it is so difficult to explain how difficult it is to change. It is like one step forward and at the very least six steps backwards and that is if anyone who can get changes started is actually interested in doing something as it may or may not be in their interest.
Head and brick wall springs to mind.
I do hope one day artisanal mining is legalised world wide and the guys putting their lives at risk can then be educated, protected and benefit rather than living from hand to mouth.

Cowichan problem is the word veteran! There again the Africans do show considerable respect to their elders.

In the past I have defended the delay and justified the defence saying that it is important to dot the i's and cross the t's as starting before all is known and then re confirmed many times over it is dangerous to move to opening up. I don't change my thoughts on this strategy as I had my first posting to West Africa in 1971 and there is an old saying WAWA (West Africa Wins Again) when things don't go to plan.
The above said enough is now enough and it is time for a full explanation to the shareholders what their plans are for what look to be strong resources.
I have seen since the gold mining revival in the late 1980's early 1990's commencing with Ghana many mines that are still operating, kicking off with a proven resource estimated to be in the region of a million ounces. OK there have been a few failures but there are many successes.
The experience in West Africa of governments and mining personnel is considerable when it comes to bringing in a resource, so my message to the board is get it done.

Results are good because they are on target for high end and should give us a slight improvement in SP. Impressed by lower than expected costs given the record material movement and low grades.
I don't get why there is no announcements relating to the new concession(s) in Egypt maybe a ploy to drip feed good news?

Sotolo OK get what you are saying and this is entirely why I say how important the ounces are and as far as Centamin Sukari are concerned this is dictated by grades and more ounces pretty much means more efficient use of the equipment and this means costs reduced.
When making recommendations on equipment fleets the mining engineers will get deeply involved with the equipment manufacturer's representatives and the aim should be to achieve the lowest cost per tonne.
Sukari has to be all about efficient use of all of their assets and the hole that current management are currently in is they struggle to maintain efficiency and therefore consistency because they don't have the flexibility of numerous "faces".
My hope as you mention is that the unstable wall has been over stated but more so that the time and cost to get back to the annual 500,000 ounces plus has also been exaggerated.
There have been some major decisions made by the new management team over a very short period of time one being the introduction of a contractor dedicated to waste removal or opening up additional "faces". Any contractor worth their salt will be looking to impress and if they are working on a tonne moved contract then it is in the contractor's interest to impress.
What I also like is that there is now an additional fleet of equipment on site at a known cost based on performance and allows for growth if required at a later date to utilise and quickly mobilise this fleet for mining the all important ounces, at Sukari or open up a new concession area.