K92 Mining Inc. reported a significant increase in revenue for the fourth quarter of 2024, reaching $120.3 million, a 60% rise year-over-year. The company also recorded a 75% increase in annual revenue, totaling $350.6 million. This impressive growth aligns with InvestingPro data showing a remarkable 63.52% revenue growth over the last twelve months. The strong financial performance was complemented by a robust stock market reaction, with shares rising 1.68% to close at $10.88, approaching its 52-week high of $7.67.
Key Takeaways
- K92 Mining achieved a record quarterly production of 53,401 gold equivalent ounces.
- The company maintained its position as a tier-one mid-tier producer, targeting over 300,000 ounces annually.
- Stage three expansion is set to commission in Q2 2025, aiming for 1.2 million tonnes per annum.
- Zero lost time injuries were reported in Q4, highlighting strong operational safety.
Company Performance
K92 Mining’s performance in Q4 2024 was marked by substantial growth in both production and financial metrics. The company processed 96,614 tonnes at an impressive 18 g/t gold equivalent head grade, reflecting a 27% year-over-year increase in production. This growth aligns with the company’s strategic expansion plans, positioning it as a leading mid-tier producer in the gold mining sector.
Financial Highlights
- Revenue: $120.3 million in Q4 2024, up 60% year-over-year.
- Annual Revenue: $350.6 million, a 75% increase.
- Cash Flow from Operations: $170.4 million annually.
- Cash Balance: $141.3 million, with an additional $20 million in restricted cash.
- Cash Costs: $483/ounce in Q4, $664/ounce for the year.
- All-in Sustaining Costs: $837/ounce in Q4, $10.66/ounce for the year.
Market Reaction
Following the earnings announcement, K92 Mining’s stock saw a positive movement, rising by 1.68% to $10.88. This performance is notable as it approaches its 52-week high of $11, indicating strong investor confidence in the company’s growth trajectory and financial health.
Outlook & Guidance
Looking ahead, K92 Mining has set a production guidance of 160,000 to 185,000 gold equivalent ounces for 2025. The commissioning of the stage three expansion in Q2 2025 is expected to further boost production capacity. The company is also exploring multiple high-potential targets to sustain its growth momentum. InvestingPro analysts have revised their earnings estimates upward for the upcoming period, with expectations of continued profitability and sales growth. Access the full Pro Research Report to explore detailed growth projections and peer comparisons across 1,400+ stocks.
Executive Commentary
CEO John Lewins highlighted the company’s strong financial standing and transformative growth, stating, "We’re in an extremely strong position in terms of our finances." He also expressed optimism about the gold market, saying, "Let’s see the gold price go beyond $3,000."
Risks and Challenges
- Market Volatility: Fluctuations in gold prices could impact revenue.
- Expansion Risks: Delays or cost overruns in the stage three expansion could affect future production.
- Operational Challenges: Maintaining low cash costs and high production efficiency is crucial.
- Regulatory Changes: Potential changes in mining regulations could impact operations.
Q&A
During the earnings call, analysts inquired about the 2025 outlook, focusing on expected high grades in Q1 and the transition plan between existing and new processing plants. The company reassured stakeholders of a smooth transition, supported by the recruitment of additional metallurgical graduates.
Full transcript - K92 Mining Inc (KNT) Q4 2024:
Conference Operator: Thank you for standing by. This is the conference operator. Welcome to the K92 Mining twenty twenty four Fourth Quarter and Annual Financial Results Conference Call. As a reminder, all participants are in listen only mode and the conference is being recorded. After the presentation, there will be an opportunity for questions.
I would now like to turn the conference over to David Medalak, President and COO. Please go ahead.
David Medalak, President and COO, K92 Mining: Thank you, operator, and thanks everyone for attending K92 Mining’s twenty twenty four fourth quarter results conference call. We hope you and your families are doing well. In addition to myself, we have on the line John Lewins, Chief Executive Officer and Director and Justin Blanton, Chief Financial Officer. I would also like to remind everyone that after the remarks from management, the call will be followed by Q and A session. As we will be making forward looking statements during the call, please refer to the cautionary notes and risk disclosure in our MD and A and Slide two of the webcast presentation.
Also, please bear in mind that all dollar amounts mentioned in the conference call are in United States dollars unless otherwise noted. Now, I’ll turn it over to John to provide you with an overview.
John Lewins, Chief Executive Officer and Director, K92 Mining: Thank you, David, and welcome, everyone. I’ll start with safety, which is always first priority. I’m pleased to report that there were no lost time injuries recorded in the fourth quarter, marking yet another major safety milestone with now six consecutive zero LTI quarters. During this time, two independent safety audits were completed. From those audits, a number of actions were identified and many actions have been taken and completed to date.
Safety technology on-site has been enhanced, including a proximity and collision and poison system and in cab monitoring with more systems planned in the future. Resources for safety and training have been and continue to be expanded, including additional personnel. There’s also been multiple positive leading indicators as shown in the charts for several consecutive quarters. There has now been a significant increase in job safety assessments to reinforce our safety first mindset and the number of safety warnings from our in cab monitoring system has significantly reduced. As stated on previous conference calls, we take the increased loss to injury frequency rate in 2023 very seriously, while also noting that historically K9 two has operated with one of the best safety records in PNG and the broader Australasian region as shown in the previous slide.
I’d like to reiterate the K9 two is relentless in its pursuit of our goal of achieving zero harm amongst our workforce. K92 is extremely pleased and proud to have received yet another industry ESG award during the P and G Investment Week Conference in Sydney in December. This time for Outstanding Community Humanitarian Initiative. The award recognizes K9 two’s Sustainable Livelihoods Agriculture Program. It’s a program that has rapidly grown with approximately 180 farmers participating, of which approximately 80% are women.
This has enabled the communities to supply fresh produce not only to K92, but also to local vendors and markets, reaching as far as supermarkets in Port Moresby. In early March of this year, the first large shipment consisting of eight tons of produce from farms arrived in Port Moresby, which is testament to the size, scale and overall success of the program. We’re currently in the process of working with international partners to upscale this program even further. K92 is extremely proud of the positive impact we’re having on the prosperity and development of Papua New Guinea and we encourage you to read our latest sustainability report found at www.kninetimining.com. Moving on to operational performance.
During the quarter, the Kinantu Gold Mine delivered record quarterly production of 53,401 ounces gold equivalent. A total of 96,614 tonnes were processed at a head grade of 18 grams per tonne gold equivalent, which was the highest head grade since Q4 twenty twenty and well above budget. Benefiting from higher grade stopes in the sequence as outlined in the 2024 operational guidance, increased proportion of high grade tonnage utilized for the process plant blend in addition to a positive gold grade reconciliation versus the latest independent mineral resource estimate. Due to these higher grades and a lack of lower grade to blend with this material, throughput was deliberately reduced to maximize recoveries. For the year, a record 149,515 ounces gold equivalent was produced, delivering year over year production growth of 27% that significantly exceeded the top of our production guidance range of 120,000 to 140,000 ounces gold equivalent.
In addition, cash costs of $664 per ounce beat the guidance range of $820 to $880 per ounce and all in sustaining cost of $10.66 dollars also beat the guidance range of $14.40 dollars to $15.40 dollars gold. As annotated on the chart, all in sustaining costs have been notably higher than cash costs since the beginning of twenty twenty three due to K92s ongoing considerable investment in our Stage three expansion, with costs expected to decline significantly after delivering the expansion, which will be discussed later in the presentation. Now, in terms of our key operational quarterly physicals, total material mine was the second highest on record with plant throughput as noted earlier significantly reduced to maximize recoveries due to the high head grades. This provided us with the opportunity in the underground mine to prioritize waste development for Stage three expansion, resulting in a record of 209,000 tons of waste mined. Development delivered a notable increase of 17% from Q3, including a monthly record set of nine zero four meters in the quarter.
The development rates in Q4 are particularly encouraging as it was largely ahead of the various key enablers that are required to be integrated. Now these include the power upgrade, which was completed in Q4 and certainly was a factor for the improved quarter over quarter advance rates, especially late in the quarter. The interim primary ventilation upgrade, which was actually only completed in January. Now this has resulted in a 50% increase in airflow, which is notably higher than the 30% increase expected, confirming that the modeled airflow resistance factors for the expansion were conservative. Second stage of the interim water upgrade, which was completed at the January, providing clean water services to the main mine.
Number of available headings also increased significantly and will continue to increase through the year driven by opening up of additional mining fronts. High speed development experts, our major focus is on the enhanced maintenance program to increase equipment availability. Now in 2024, the process plant delivered very strong performance, including daily, weekly and monthly records that were 12%, thirty one % and forty five % respectively higher than the 600,000 tonnes per annum or sixteen forty four tonnes per day that the stage 2A plant upgrade has been designed to achieve, which was outlined in the definitive feasibility study. Recoveries have also been very strong. With the last three quarters of twenty twenty four recording gold recoveries notably higher and copper recoveries moderately higher than DFS.
Now this outperformance is driven by a trialing of a new reagent mix, which was identified as part of the DFS metallurgical test work program. And in addition, we benefited from those higher gold grades in the second half of the year. Now the strong performance of the stage 2a plant bodes well for the stage three plant, which has a more optimal circuit design, improved technology and instrumentation, including online analysis. I think the throughput records also highlight the potential that the stage three process plant, which was designed on the same conservative throughput parameters as a Stage 2a process plant is much more capable than its 1,200,000 tonnes per annum design. And as a result, the Stage three process plant currently being built has been designed to make allowance to make it cost effectively expandable through simple upgrades to the flotation and filter press capacity to achieve 1,800,000 tonnes per pound that we’re looking for in Stage four.
I’ll now turn over the call to our Chief Financial Officer, Justin Blanche to discuss our financial results for the fourth quarter.
Justin Blanton, Chief Financial Officer, K92 Mining: Thank you, John, and hello, everyone. During the fourth quarter of twenty twenty four, we had revenue of $120,300,000 an increase of 60% when comparing to 2023. We sold 48,851 gold ounces at an average selling price of $2,564 compared to 33,273 ounces at an average selling price of $1,898 in the prior year. As at 12/31/2024, there was 4,961 gold ounces in the inventory, including both concentrate and dore, an increase of 3,074 gold ounces when compared to September 30. During the year ended 12/31/2024, we had record annual revenue of 350,600,000.0, a 75% increase from prior year.
We sold a record 141,159 gold ounces at an average selling price of $2,356 compared to 97,355 ounces at an average selling price of $1,869 in the prior year. During the fourth quarter of twenty twenty four, our cost of sales was $32,600,000 compared to $35,900,000 in the prior year or $23,800,000 compared to $24,900,000 before non cash items. Lower cost of sales was partially due to a buildup of our ore stockpile inventory and concentrate and dore inventory that was expensed subsequent to year end. During the year ended 12/31/2024, cost of sales was $142,200,000 compared to $111,400,000 in the prior year or $106,800,000 compared to $77,700,000 excluding non cash items. Cost of sales is higher primarily due to lower costs capitalized as development costs, higher depreciation and depletion costs, as well as higher royalties due to increased sales when compared to 2023.
Q4 ’20 ’20 ’4 cash flow from operating activities before changes in working capital was $72,000,000 compared to $38,600,000 in the prior year, a new quarterly record. For the year, we also saw record cash flow from operating activities before changes in working capital of 170,400,000.0 compared to 82,100,000.0 in 2023. As of 12/31/2024, we had 141,300,000.0 in cash, cash equivalents, and term deposits, plus 20,000,000 in restricted cash, which subsequent to year end became unrestricted while still spending a hundred and 2,000,000 in expansion capital. At 12/31/2024, Kinanetu had a working capital balance of 117,000,000 and a loan outstanding balance of 60,000,000. As John mentioned, during the fourth quarter, the Kinantu gold operations produced 51,371 ounces of gold, 958,312 pounds of copper, and 41,992 ounces of silver or 53,401 gold ounces equivalent.
We sold 48,851 ounces of gold, 954,657 pounds of copper, and 42,088 ounces of silver. During the year, the Kinantu Gold Operations produced 139,123 ounces of gold, 4,926,738 pounds of copper and 142,009 ounces of silver or 149,515 ounces of gold equivalent. We sold 141,159 ounces of gold, 5,051,087 pounds of copper and 145,428 ounces of silver. In Q4 twenty twenty four, we incurred a cash cost of $483 and an all in sustaining cost of $837 per ounce of gold, which was significantly below our selling price of $2,564 per ounce. For the year, we incurred a cash cost of $664 and an all in sustaining cost of $10.66 dollars per ounce of gold, which was also significantly below our selling price of $2,356 per ounce.
Our 2024 cash cost per ounce of gold increased from $585 in the prior year to $664 The increase can be attributed to expenditures incurred during the temporary suspension in the first half of twenty twenty four, lower amounts of costs capitalized to development and lower amounts of byproduct credits when compared to prior year. It is important to note that we will see downward pressure on costs via economies of scale as operations ramp up and the Stage three expansion is complete. I will now turn the call back to John to continue with the rest of the presentation.
John Lewins, Chief Executive Officer and Director, K92 Mining: Thank you, Justin. For the exploration and growth section, we begin with an update on the Stage three and four expansions, which plan to fundamentally transform K92 into a Tier one mid tier producer through sequentially increasing production to over 300,000 ounces gold equivalent per annum with the commissioning of the Stage three expansion targeting the second half of second quarter of twenty twenty five and then to over 400,000 ounces per annum gold equivalent with Stage four targeting second half of twenty twenty seven. As at the February, ’70 ’5 percent of Stage three and four growth capital has either been spent or committed with a significant portion of the project on a fixed price lump sum basis. Importantly, the project is fully funded and our financial position is strong. K92 has a strong cash balance, ending 2024 with $141,000,000 in cash plus $20,000,000 of restricted cash and the restricted cash subsequently to the quarter end became unrestricted in January and we’ll report to our cash balance in our Q1 financials.
We also have access to significant amounts of liquidity through an undrawn credit facility with $60,000,000 available to draw down on demand and an additional $30,000,000 of liquidity available through an accordion feature. The record gold price environment has resulted in strong free cash flow generation. As Justin noted, our net cash balance grew significantly during the second half of twenty twenty four, even after considerable capital expenditure during the period. And lastly, our commodity price downside is protected through the cost effective purchase of put option contracts. In late September, we purchased for 2,200,000 option contracts for the next nine months covering 12,500 ounces of gold per month at $2,400 per ounce to protect against downside price risk.
To be clear, it’s not a hedge. We sell at spot if it’s higher, which it obviously has been. This is an insurance and we retain full exposure to the upside in commodity prices. In summary, our financial position and outlook is obviously very strong. Now in January, we announced our 2025 operational guidance outlining yet another year of production growth, forecasting 160,000 to 185,000 ounces gold equivalent production, while making significant investment in terms of both sustaining capital and growth capital as we transform Kinantu into a Tier one mid tier producer.
Production is expected to be back end loaded again, driven this time by higher throughputs as the new Stage three expansion process plant is commissioned and then scheduled to be handed over to operations in Q4. Production in the second half of the year also benefits from stockpiling planned in Q2 ahead of the Stage three expansion process plant coming online. Moving on to progress for the Stage three expansion construction and starting with the underground, the Twin N Klein is complete. The first ore pass has been developed and expected to be fully operational mid year. Puma Incline breakthrough is also planned for around mid year.
Upon breakthrough of Puma, we expect an additional 50 cubic meters per second airflow with a further 50 cubic meters per second airflow forecast upon development of the next ventilation rates representing a 50% to 60% increase in airflows from current levels. I note that we’re drilling the pilot for the ventilation rates right now. And due to the previously conservatively modeled mine resistance factor, which we mentioned previously, we now expect to not need that new primary vent fans to meet our initial stage three vent requirements. These fans are needed for later stage three, stage four. And so our plans are to opportunistically install these in 2026 to minimize disruptions to production, which obviously will happen installing them.
On the pace fill, commissioning is targeted to commence in Q4 after the process plant has been handed over to operations. And while the infrastructure is being transformed, so is our mining on a number of fronts with significant increases underway due to the ramp up. So we now move on to the drone footage taken just a few days ago with a construction site for the 1,200,000 tonne per annum Stage three expansion process plant. Starting at the dry end of the plant, in the foreground, the ROM pad continues to be constructed with waste rock as it becomes available from underground. Work on the primary jaw crusher was well advanced.
Thus far, the conveyor cable tray and the transformer have also been installed. The surge bin is approximately 95% complete. On the grinding circuit, preparation works are well underway for the installation of the ball and sag mills. The cycle and tire as you can see is installed, maintenance crane also installed and the installation of electricals under the MCC and mills is underway. Piping installation is also ongoing.
For the flotation area, all works are active for structural, mechanical and piping installation and are approximately 95% complete. The installation of the flotation cell hoppers and pump installation is also ongoing. Pipe racks for water services are also being installed. In terms of the thickness, the concentrate thickener is nearly complete and the tailings thickener is about 85% complete. Lastly, water services are ongoing.
All the pumps and piping have been installed. The electrical installation is in progress. I’m also pleased to report that all the civil works are complete. In terms of ancillary buildings and construction, pleased to report the warehouse construction is now complete as is the interim power plant. For the pace fill, all long lead items have been ordered.
Front end engineering design work is completed, detail engineering and design contracts have been awarded to GR Engineering and Quattro Engineering and early earthworks are underway. Underground construction contract has been self awarded and the construction contracts for the tailings filter plant, the surface storage system are planned to be awarded later this quarter or early Q2. A note in early February, we were pleased to have hosted the Governor of Merobe province, one of our two key provinces, the Honorable Luther Wenge. It was his first time visiting the Kinantu Gold Mine, also his first time visiting an underground mine. We’re delighted to have taken him on a tour of the underground mine process plant, as well as the stage 3 construction sites and also our various exploration sites via helicopter.
The visit received significant positive coverage by local media, including a significant TV coverage. Now in terms of exploration, we’re currently drilling the Cora, CoraScythe, Judd, JuddScythe vein systems from underground plus the Aracompa vein system from surface. We just completed a program of drilling CoraScythe, JuddScythe from surface this month. Now on the December 3, K92 reported a total of 95 holes at Cora, Cora South, Judd South. These results continue to demonstrate that this is a world class deposit with significant growth upside.
The results announced multiple new near mine infrastructure dilatant zones in the Twin Incline mining front, as outlined by the two blue dash lines inside the lower black ellipse there. In addition to extending the high grade zones as shown in the upper black ellipse. The discovery of the new dilatant zone near mine infrastructure, it’s particularly significant as it represents the first time that a dilatant zone has been drilled off with sufficient drill density. Prior dilatant zones discovered have been largely through wider spaced surface drilling. What these particular dilatant zones show us is that there is significant strike length potential of these zones with K2 recording over 100 meters of strike and K1 recording approximately 60 meters of strike.
These dilatant zones are approximately 175 meters from our underground workings and upon completion of the pastel plant will be in a position to unlock this high productivity potential of these zones for the expansion. Now, Ajat results continue to extend high grade mineralization uptick and above the main mine workings as shown in the top black ellipse there, in addition to recording multiple high grade results outside of the current resource. On February, we announced the latest 13 holes at Atacampa, bringing the total number of holes drilled in the maiden drill program to 43 holes. A major highlight from the results is the confirmation of two significant high grade veins over a significant strike length named AR1 and AR2. Based on drilling to date, both veins are thick recording average true thickness for AR1 of 3.14 meters and 2.94 for AR2 over strike lengths of approximately six seventy five and seven seventy five meters respectively.
With a strong high grade drilling hit rates plus five gram per tonne gold equivalent of 50% for AR1, 42% for AR2 and a plus 10 gram per tonne gold equivalent 28% for AR1, 21% for AR2. We clearly see high potential for underground mining of high grade vein system at Atacampa. The drilling results also extended the interpreted bulk tonnage zone approximately 150 meters to the south. The zone is now defined as 900 meters along strike and to a vertical depth of approximately six fifty meters with an average true thickness recorded from drilling of around 48 meters, demonstrating strong bulk mining potential. The bulk zone remains open in multiple directions and we view it as a longer dated project with the high grade the priority in the near term.
It’s important I think to illustrate just how rapidly Atacampa is growing. The far left image is from February 2024 and our latest drilling results are shown on the far right approximately one year later. When we commenced drilling at Atacampa, we had one rig operating, but given the significant exploration success today, we’ve had up to four rigs operating with plans to continue to increase upon this delivery of additional rigs in addition to commencing exploration at Maniapi, a parallel vein system less than a kilometer away later this year. Importantly, only approximately 50% of the non mineralization strike length of this corridor has been drill tested by K92 to date and that’s the known mineralized strike length. I think lastly, we’d like to highlight the significant pipeline of highly prospective exploration targets, which we have around the Kinantu Mine.
The colored icons indicate where we’re currently drilling. The black icons indicate where we plan to drill in the next twenty four months. Upon delivery of the Stage three expansion, we expect not only a major inflection in our production and free cash flow, but also a significant ramp up in our exploration budget, aiming to target many of these highly prospective targets concurrently. And with that, operator, we’d like to commence the Q and A session. Thank you.
Conference Operator: Thank you. We will now begin the question and answer session. The first question comes from Alex Terantute with Ventum Financial. Please go ahead.
Alex Terantute, Analyst, Ventum Financial: Yes. Hi, guys. First of all, I just wanted to say congrats on finishing the year very strong. I’d like to see those numbers. First question here, outlook for 2025, I know we’re two months in.
I’m just curious if any insights as to how things are tracking so far? And maybe more in particular, any thoughts or comments you can share on grade and tonnage expectations? And I’m asking just considering how strong the second half of the year was where your grades were up quite a bit and your throughput was dialed back. So, especially for the first half this year, if you have any insights you can share, that’d be great.
John Lewins, Chief Executive Officer and Director, K92 Mining: Okay. Thanks, Alex. In terms of the outlook for 2025, obviously, we’ve given our guidance and we’re, you know, that’s our numbers at this point in time. It is a relatively wide guidance because we are obviously commissioning our, our stage three. And as, as was said in the presentation, the expectation is certainly that unlike previous years where the back end loading has been grade driven, in this instance, we believe that the back end will be more, tonnage driven as we as we bring, stage three plant into full production in the fourth quarter.
I think in the context of the first, first quarter, what we have said is that, we we have seen a continuation of the higher grade that we we saw in in the fourth quarter. And so there is, there’s certainly an expectation that the first quarter will will probably be the highest grade for the year, with some of that higher grade obviously coming through during during the quarter. So certainly, we we do expect, I mean, basically, the whole quarters are going to be pushing up from where they have been in the past. And, and, certainly, the first quarter will will see a similar similar sort of thing where we do expect it to be strong in comparison to previous first quarters.
Alex Terantute, Analyst, Ventum Financial: Okay. It’s good. Thanks for that. Second question, you noted on the call earlier about building up a stockpile ahead of the mill starting up later in Q2. Any color you can give on the size of that inventory that you want to build and how you’re tracking on that target?
And then I guess kind of a related question, any I know you’ve got two separate mills, the current one and the new one that you’re building, but should we expect any sort of downtime as you make that transition or are you going to try to kind of keep things continuously operating?
John Lewins, Chief Executive Officer and Director, K92 Mining: Okay. So, first of all, in terms of stockpile, the intent is to focus on opening up underground and not necessarily bringing too much to surface because we do we do get oxidation if material sits too long on the surface. We’re okay for a couple of months, but longer than that, you can see, oxidation, which is variable depending where it comes from and how much sulfides you’ve got in it and what have you, and how fine they are. The expectation in terms of stockpile by the end of the second quarter, we’re certainly looking for somewhere between, I think, 10 and about 20,000 on the ground. And, sorry.
What was the second part of that question?
Alex Terantute, Analyst, Ventum Financial: I was just curious how you guys are tracking so far, but like you said, if you’re focusing on building up the opening of soaps underground, then maybe
John Lewins, Chief Executive Officer and Director, K92 Mining: Oh, sorry. Yeah. The second one was the was the plants. Okay. So the intent is to continue running, the old plant through until some point in the fourth quarter so that the the existing plant continues to run normally, certainly during the third quarter, while we’re going through the commissioning process for the new plant.
And at some point during that fourth quarter, we’ll switch off the old plant and we’ll be running only the new plant. Now in order to be able to do that, we have recruited additional people. That includes I think we took almost the entire graduates from, the University of Lay, that came out, end of last year, beginning of this year. All the metallurgical graduates, have got a year with us. I mean, we take some every year, but we basically, we’ve, yeah, we’ve taken more than the entire rest of the industry and and basically every single graduate, I think, who who qualified this, at the end of last year, has got a job, but the vast majority of them are with us.
So we have, built up the numbers so that, we can do that. And then also that they can be involved in that setup optimization of the new plant going forward.
Alex Terantute, Analyst, Ventum Financial: Okay. That’s it for me. Thank you.
Conference Operator: This concludes the question and answer session. I would like to turn the conference back over to John Lewins for any closing remarks.
John Lewins, Chief Executive Officer and Director, K92 Mining: Thanks, Drew. Well, I mean, obviously, we have been exceedingly pleased with the second half of the year. The numbers, I think, reflected and confirmed confidence in the ability of the mine to deliver, even though we had a hiccup at the first, during the first half of the year. To be clear, though, the better than guidance performance was driven by primarily higher grades coming out of, primarily JUD. We had about 20% more grade, I think, out of those stops than we anticipated.
So, probably close to 10,000 ounces that came out in Q4 came from a higher than anticipated grade. And for clarity, we don’t expect that suddenly the mine will start producing 20% more gold than the mineral resource estimate says it will. It was a specific area within JAD, and it s certainly something we ll look at when we do the next update in the mineral resource estimate for Jatham Cora next year. Also importantly was the significant increase we saw in recoveries, where, we kicked up to 95, 90 six percent, and in fact, beyond there in certain circumstances. And while that was, certainly, partly driven by grade, it was also, as as mentioned, the, the new suite.
And so that probably added 2,000 ounces to the second half of the year, which is substantial when you consider that, there’s no cost associated with that. It’s simply getting more out of what you’ve mined. That bodes really well for the new plant, when you consider that the new plant is, obviously it’s got far more technology, there’s more process control, and of course it’s got online analysis, so that you’re getting results and able to more effectively control the plant itself. So, certainly, it it bodes well for the future, and and, we certainly anticipate, at this point in time, we’ll see better recoveries than we’ve allowed in in the, in the study, which I think are running at about 92.9 for gold. We certainly expect to see better than that from, from the plant going forward, which should see an improvement in the in in the numbers that come out of the stage three and stage four expansion.
We’ve set ourselves up well for what is our most transformative year to date, where we bring in our stage three expansion, with the start of commissioning of that around, around mid year. We’re in an extremely strong position in terms of our finances, and that is a position which, quite frankly, with the gold price where it’s at and our our increasing production is only improving as we go forward. So this is, this is a really exciting year, I think, for K nine two. Our people are very excited at the, at the opportunities there, the exploration people with all the work that they’ve got ahead of them and the potential to increase, expenditure year on year over the next few years and really put a lot of work into increasing our resources outside of Chad and Cora. So exciting year.
Look forward to, having another call in about three months’ time where hopefully we can give equally impressive numbers for the first quarter. Thank you everyone for your time today and let’s see the gold price go beyond $3,000 and be good for all of us. Thanks very much.
Conference Operator: This concludes today’s conference call. You may disconnect your lines. Thank you for participating and have a pleasant day.
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