Photo by: Bloomberg
TORONTO (miningweekly.com) – The TSX-listed stock of Fortuna Silver Mines on Monday rallied after the company reported record output from its two operations located in Mexico and Peru.
For the first three months of 2014, the Vancouver-based company, which owns the San Jose mine, in Mexico, and the Caylloma mine, in Peru, reported a 55% rise in year-on-year silver output to 1.5-million ounces, and an 81% increase in gold output to 8 150 oz.
The miner also reported rising lead and zinc output.
Fortuna said that silver and gold output were 12% and 13% above guidance, respectively, as average head grade for both metals was 13% above plan, placing the company on track to produce six-million ounces of silver and 32 300 oz of gold, or 7.9-million silver-equivalent ounces for the year.
"I am very pleased with the strong production figures for the first quarter of the year. Gold and silver outputs were both above plan and costs remained well in line with our guidance for the year," president and CEO Jorge Ganoza said.
In the quarter, cash costs for San Jose totalled $66.61/t, which was healthier than the full-year forecast of $67.10/t, and at Caylloma, cash costs totalled $87.85/t, also below guidance of $88.30/t.
The company also reported that it had completed a 2 000 t/d mill expansion at the San Jose mine earlier this month, and expected to ramp up to the new run rate by the end of the month. The miner also revealed that it was assessing expanding the mill even further, to a rate of 3 000 t/d, owing to continued exploration success at Trinidad North.
Despite rising as high as C$4.47 a share on the TSX in early Monday trading, the stock settled at C$4.34 apiece, up 32.38% year-to-date.