Firestone recoveries goes up by 36.8% QoQ
Firestone Diamonds provides its quarterly update on operations at its Liqhobong Diamond Mine for the quarter ended 30 June 2018 (Q4 of the Company's 2018 FY) and guidance for FY 2019. Liqhobong is owned 75% by Firestone and 25% by the Government of Lesotho .
According to the update, Zero lost time injury record maintained with over 6.2 million man hours worked since project commencement in July 2014. The exceptional operational performance resulted in several new production related records during the final quarter and market guidance being achieved for the financial year to end-June 2018.
Recoveries 36.8% higher than Q3 at 263,512 carats, resulting in a full year total of 835,832 carats, within guidance of between 800,000 and 850,000 carats. A total of 261,985 carats sold in the quarter (Q3: 217,380 carats), realising revenue of US$18.6 million (Q3: US$17.6 million ) at an average value of US$71 per carat (Q3: US$81 per carat) mainly due to a larger proportion of run of mine diamonds and fewer valuable stones recovered; and Net cash increased by $2.5m in the quarter to $27.8 million.
Paul Bosma, Chief Executive Officer, commented: "The fourth quarter saw record production. We were able to access the high grade blocks in the mine plan and thanks to excellent operational performance we were able to achieve record carat recoveries. The increased volume translated in an improved cash position at the end of the financial year.
"As always, the average dollar per carat achieved is highly sensitive to the incidence of special stones, of which, we saw a lower incidence in this particular quarter. However, we continue to have grounds for optimism given the parts of the ore body we plan to exploit over the next 12 months. We recently completed a structural and geotechnical assessment of the pit and the outputs are now being used to rerun our life of mine plan. We look forward to updating the market in this respect during the first half of FY 2019."
