Trevali on target with African asset acquisitions as zinc output rises

VANCOUVER (miningweekly.com) – Trevali Mining's addition of two new African mines paid off in the zinc producer's pro-forma second-quarter results, which showed that 63% of the company's zinc-equivalent payable pounds were contributed from Rosh Pinah (Namibia) and Perkoa (Burkina Faso).

Trevali is acquiring both assets from Glencore under definitive agreements announced in March, and with an effective date of April 1. However, finalising the new $190-million debt facility and regulatory items will extend the closing of the acquisitions to August 31.

Vancouver-based Trevali has reduced its full-year guidance for the Santander mine, in Peru, owing to increased underground water issues that have delayed production development of the higher-grade Magistral North zone by about a quarter, with mill feed in the interim coming from the Magistral Central/South zones while pumping infrastructure upgrades are finalised. The company has deferred mining in the higher-grade Magistral North and Oyon zones to later this year and into 2018.

Santander’s payable zinc-equivalent nevertheless rose 15% quarter-on-quarter to 12.07-million pounds. The company expects the operation to produce between 52-million and 57-million pounds of payable zinc-equivalent in concentrate.

At the Caribou operation, in British Columbia, Trevali missed guidance because of lower zinc grades. However, the company maintained its 2017 production estimate. Caribou, which declared commercial production on July 1, 2016, produced 17.88-million pounds of payable zinc.

Meanwhile, the second quarter represented Perkoa's best operating quarter to date, at 46.61-million pounds of payable zinc produced, as higher zinc head grades (16.31%) and recoveries more than offset lower than expected ore throughput. The 2017 production guidance estimate (on a full-year basis) for the Rosh Pinah mine is 100-million to 105-million pounds of payable zinc in concentrate.

Trevali expects Caribou to produce between 90-million to 93-million pounds of zinc.

Rosh Pinah produced 24.79-million pounds of zinc. The 2017 production guidance estimate (on a full-year basis) for the Perkoa mine is 165-million to 170-million pounds of payable zinc in concentrate.

The company expects to report results for the second quarter ended June 30 on August 10.