OceanaGold poised to hit lower end of 2024 production guidance

Listed miner OceanaGold (Philippines) Inc. (OGPI) on Tuesday said it is on track to hit the lower end of its production guidance this year, with quarterly growth anticipated in the third and fourth quarters of the year following the decline in output in the first half.

OceanaGold Corp. executive vice president and chief operating officer for Asia-Pacific Peter Sharpe said that while the firm was not able to mill as much ore as planned in the second quarter, it is expected to rebound in the second half.

“We certainly expect the third quarter and then fourth quarter to be much stronger than the second quarter,” he told reporters in a briefing in Makati City on Tuesday, but noted that output would have a slightly lower grade before improving after a couple of years.

OGPI is a subsidiary of OceanaGold Corp., which also operates the Waihi and Macraes mines in New Zealand and the Haile mine in the United States.

The Philippine firm reported a decline in gold production to 23.1 thousand ounces (koz) in the second quarter from 32.2 koz the previous year, while copper production fell to 2.8 thousand tonnes (kt) from 3.4 kt.

This brought year-to-date production of gold to 49.4 koz, and copper production to 5.8 koz, versus the company’s earlier production guidance of 120 koz to 135 koz of gold for this year, and 12 kt to 14 kt of copper, which Share set is on track to be hit, albeit on the lower range.

“We expect gold production to increase in the second half of the year as we access higher grade ore and increase mining rates from the underground,” OGPI president Joan Adaci-Cattiling said in an earlier filing.

“We are also continuing to invest in exploration, both near-mine and regionally, and look forward to sharing results in the future,” she added.

In the same briefing, Sharpe said the firm has implemented changes in operations after the two fatalities reported this year, such as adjustments to the underground design which reduced the size of the hole in the ground before it is backfilled, reducing the time of large open voids.

Sharpe noted, however, that the adjustments were not connected to the fatalities.

OGPI reported that a contractor of the Didipio mine was killed after sustaining head injuries while attempting to remove a metal blockage from a jaw crusher late last month, while another fell while working in the plant in June.

The company listed on the Philippine Stock Exchange (PSE) in the second quarter, raising P6.08 million from the sale of 456 million secondary shares. The final price was lower than its initial maximum target of P17.28 per share.

Shares in OGPI were last traded at P13.48 apiece, down by P0.08 or 0.59% from Monday’s finish of P13.56 per share.—LDF, GMA Integrated News