Member Info for the_shareminator

Good post, recommended! The market has dropped accordingly over the past year on numerous failings, neccessary dilution and lack of progress. As you have pointed out this has culminated in a very reasonable market value for what is potentially a 25,000 ounce producer. Even with operating costs around $100000/oz (assuming that will be the end year target) the company will be able to fund future exploration and ramp up production to the stated target of 100,000 ounces by 2017. But at the moment the market value is IMO quite fair. At this point the $6m fine and fees stand - this is a huge blow to a junior struggling to meet deadlines and stated targets. It was 30,000 ounces this year at Sekisovskoye originally which is again likely to be downgraded. The BOD can only make efforts to improve production rates through careful mining procedure (monitoring recovery rates etc). They have a lot of catching up to do considering only 14k out of 100k tonnes has been processed. I think when HMB prove that they can operate at this level without the need for further issues, loans or grants, then and only then will investors realise the potential this company has to offer. It is by no means concrete, but at current gold prices HMB should be raking in the cash.

Lol touché! Anyway there seems to be a fair amount of buying/selling at this level, hopefully this is rock bottom

It was a passing comment and should have been highlighted in the Overview. HMB should not have made foolish predictions to costs to try and limit damage to investor confidence. Their guidance in previous updates over this issue has been shambolic! The paragraph on the fine does not mention this. "The court actions relating to the TD3 leak are on-going and Hambledon is co-operating fully with the government and courts on all matters. The Company has engaged two specialist law firms to assist in the appeal against the penalties. We remain confident that the fines paid to date will be significantly reduced once the appeal process is completed. Further announcements will be made in due course once more information becomes available." There is also the issue with Akmola, and the companys continual reassurances that it will get what it wants 'soon'. As has been displayed here on previous occassions, the BOD advise shareholders on events they cannot possibly know. I think there are quite a few disgruntled shareholders here, people who have been invested for much longer than I have

I agree with your post. Also where was the mention of operating costs, gold sales and margins. The company does have potential to reap great rewards with the POG being as high as it is. It will be encouraging to see if HMB can increase the recovery of gold, process higher grades and reduce operational costs in the coming months. Increased production should be a given considering they have been saying this for months... GL

I'm not sure what to make of the update considering we know the facts about the fine (from the previous update) and yet HMB don't highlight this in todays release! It's quite shocking really, surely THAT is one of the most important events to have transpired in the last quarter... The good news is that we should see an increase in production and in recovery levels perhaps up to 10,000 ounces per quarter. Further drilling would have been fully funded but if HMB lose their appeal and have to pay anywhere near the $6million fine then it is a possibility that further placings are conducted. I hope they won't be wrong twice about the scale of the fine and their chances of reducing it!

http://www.investegate.co.uk/Article.aspx?id=201204121327032306B

Dreadful update today! Completely missed it earlier. Initial thoughts are 'what the bleeding hell is the company doing!?' in regards to the fine for the leak. "Hambledon has maintained a consistent and transparent approach to all actions with the Kazakhstan authorities and, as far as it is aware, is in full compliance with all court requests, actions and laws with regard to this matter." The above sentence does not instil confidence, it sounds as if they don't know what they are doing! $4.1m additional burden, almost $6m total (although potential to claim some of that back!). Don't think 2p will be breached although perhaps the market will make sense of it all valuing us at £20m... Glad I only dabbled here, it will be a while yet before i see 3p+ again...

Like most miners recently HMB is suffering, made all the worse by the dilutionary effects from a few weeks previous. The same can be said for CNR (which I heavily in). Both have fallen through the placing price. KEFI has clung onto its 3p placing price just about. Anyway I'm quite happy to hold until this bottoms out, 3.2p average with a Mcap of less than £50m will look cheap by the end of the year, value will return in the second half of 2012. GLA

Wednesday 01 February 2012 Administrative Fine On 2 November 2011 the Company announced that it had temporarily suspended operations at its mineral process plant at the Sekisovskoye mine whilst a leak in Tailings Dam 3 was repaired. Operations at the mineral process plant re-commenced on 7 November 2011. The Company estimates that production of gold for November 2011 was reduced by this interruption in operations by approximately 650 oz. On 29 December 2011, the Company announced that preliminary information had been received from the Chief National Environmental Inspector for Eastern Kazakhstan of the Irtysh Environmental Department regarding a fine for the rupture to the liner in Tailings Dam 3, constituting an administrative offence arising from environmental damage. The appointed court investigator has imposed an initial fine in relation to the breach of approximately Tenge 272 million (approximately US$1.83 million). The Company has appealed against the level of this initial fine and is confident that it will be reduced. No specific time period for payment of the fine has yet been stipulated. The Company expects to make an appropriate provision in respect of the fine in the Group accounts for the year ended 31 December 2011. A court hearing on 26 December 2011 was adjourned and is expected to be held in Q1 2012 although no specific date has been stipulated. It is intended that up to US$1.75 million of the Placing proceeds will be applied towards payment of the fine. If the final sum due is in excess of US$1.75 million then it is expected that the balance will be funded out of the Company’s cash reserves.

1m buy at 3.05 earlier

BBE have made a very decent short term return on their £500k investment in December 2011. The 10.7m top up in their holding of Wessex at 5p will be worth roughly £1m now, their total 65m shares valued at £6.4m. Value will be realised IF Total do proceed with the takeover at 10p. But BBE have had very poor year end results up to now, the financial loss realised in 2010 widened throughout 2011. BBE's does have royalties but these are comparably small compared to their rate of expenditure. Their exploration licenses are for targetting shale gas, which is going through a rough patch with the general public at the moment.

Slow positive progress in the recovery of the Fijian gold mine is being made, but with higher grades, gold production and sales, and a higher gold price, it seems better profit progression could have been anticipated for the three months to end February 2012. Stubbornly high total cash costs of US$1,419 per ounce (/oz) remains the reason for this disappointment. This cost, albeit down from the $1,530/oz recorded in the comparable period of 2010/11, does include increased development costs which need to occur to put the underground mine on a strong footing, but the company remains vulnerable to any further downward lurch in gold price. The current share price probably correctly reflects the recent falls in gold price and their high cost nature.

I'm in as of today, not expecting a 50% rise tomorrow but fully expect one by year end! I'm positive this will be a £50-100m company once the company has made strides in ramping up production. HMB going for a "capital investment programme north of $25m this year" "Well funded for the next 12-18 months" http://www.proactiveinvestors.co.uk/companies/ceo_focus/1044/-hambledon-mining-ebrd-invests-in-kazakhstan-gold-miner-1044.html http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=vWoruSE5z0g Annual report with improved financial results due in June 2012

http://minesite.com/news/hambledons-profits-look-set-to-surge-as-gold-production-in-kazakhstan-rises-significantly

http://minesite.com/news/triple-plate-junctions-major-partners-continue-to-make-progress-on-its-portfolio-of-gold-projects-in-the-far-east

This all sounds wrong, so very wrong. Keep well clear guys, no longer a pizza business just another 'investment company' riddled with problems. Very disappointing.

Why has he been removed? As far as I could tell he was short on GBR but he seemed to recognise the negatives/risks present here. The guys who sold at 1.26 on the 19th must be kicking themselves now, GBR rising on the back of small volumes

There are plenty of % figures, their quarterlies tend not to include tables of data. The HY results which do, weren't taken well either, this has fallen from 2.25p since i think. If you look back at their Q4 2010 results and read their initiatives over the winter months, i'd expect the same sort of strategies to be tested this fall. The coming quarter will be very interesting. A loan facility would be a better form of debt with the way the markets are right now, i don't think they could get enough interest for a full placing subscription without going significantly below the current SP.

Avoided a catastrophe here! Clearly the results aren't what the market hoped they would be. However there have only been 3 trades totalling less than £4000 and the company has lost almost a quarter of its value (down to £2.8mcap). I mentioned in a previous comment that the market sentiment and EU troubles would have an impact on the growth strategy here. New small businesses won't opt for franchise arrangement during tough times. This is probably why growth in the last quarter was only 2.6%. Also “Attracting new franchise candidates to the business has been slower than originally expected,” the company said. The good news here is the markets are turning, next quarter figures should improve, especially considering we are now experiencing winter weather!

keeping out of GBR for the time being, have done my dd and despite what some are saying here, this has potential to grow. But with the Europe news today and general sentiment with banks, it would be risky jumping in now, especially with news not expected in the immediate future. Securing Austrian deal would change things but can't see any other major news in the pipeline