Orezone Gold (ORE.TO) announced it has produced 41,301 ounces of gold at its Burkina Faso based gold mine in the first quarter of this year. This means the company remains comfortably on track to meet its full-year production guidance of 140,000-155,000 ounces of gold.
During the first quarter, Orezone processed in excess of 1.4 million tonnes of rock (which is more tha 10% above the nameplate capacity) at an average grade of 0.96 g/t gold and thanks to the recovery rate of 92.2%, the production came in slightly higher than anticipated. And thanks to the high average realized gold price of almost $1,900/oz, Orezone generated a total revenue of in excess of $80M and was able to repay almost $10M of principal on its senior loans.
In a subsequent exploration update, Orezone also highlighted some high-grade gold intervals encountered in the Phase III resource definition program.
Some of the encountered grades (the 30+ and 42+ g/t results) are quite atypical for oxide-hosted gold systems but it obviously bodes well for the economics of Burkina Faso’s newest gold mine.
Disclosure: The author has no position in Orezone Gold. Please read our disclaimer.
