The rare thing: It gets real.
Here’s the NR of the 3q15 financials and while the large impairment was already flagged, the Ana Paula things assumed and the small operating loss no surprise, the big news comes further down the line:
Assuming the gold price remains in its current range over the next year,
open pit operations will continue up to mid-2016, at which point the
Mine would be placed on care and maintenance. Heap leach operations
would continue through to early-2017. Production guidance for fiscal
2016 is between 65,000 and 70,000 gold ounces with a cash cost of
approximately $700 to $750 per gold ounce. In the event of a sustained
increase in the gold price, the Company could continue operations as
outlined in the most recently published NI-43 101 technical report
(dated December 6, 2013), which would see production continuing up to
2022 (based on reserves at a $1,250/oz gold price).
You have to wonder about the integrity of that Bruce B guy who came before this interim CEO, but that aside what we have today is a breath of fresh air, even if it does for the stock price in the near-term. In effect, what TMM has just said to us is, “Hey, you’re right, we’re not profitable, so we’re going to mine the few profitable ounces we have at the mine and then not dig the rest out”.
This is something that many, many other precious metals mining companies should be doing at the moment, but they’re not because they’re run by people too chikkinshit afraid of losing their jobs by admitting they’ve been living a lie.