RE: Does someone understand ML's 4th Quarter numbeI had interacted with Mercator early this week as a result of reviewing their March 31,2008 SEDAR documents and a couple of my questions were similar to some raised by Zockempire in his post ID 23007784. The company responded rapidly and clearly. I consider that a few clarification items can be shared without infringing on normal confidentiality :
- Production was 2,380,556 during Q4. The larger number was a typo that did not get corrected.
- Average copper price realized was $3.09(not $2.37) and the $3.09 was the price used in Revenues shown in the report – Revenue from copper sales divided by production. Again, the error above re Q4 production numbers not corrected from earlier document.
I would observe relative to Zockempire post the following additional personal comments:
- The current process is a leaching operation and production(copper, Moly and silver) from the milling process is planned to commence in mid-year in phase 4 expansion start-up.......... the numbers(in Q4 2,705,994 and in Q3, 2007 2,148,817) that Zockempire referred to as milled were in fact mined numbers including waste.
- Yes grade clearly decreased in Q4 compared to Q3, 2007
-I would also observe that costs in Q4, 2007 and since the Feb. 2007 Financing, reflect future expansion funding expenses, while the increased production associated with this planned expansion has not yet materialized(due to start around mid-year 2008). A consequence of this reality is that the company made $12.06 million in interest payments during 2007 on the Notes issued by the company earlier in the year. .......these payments were on two dates June 30, 2007 and Dec. 31, 2007 but were accrued in the quarterly reports under normal business practice.
- A further major contribution to year 2007 costs was stock-based compensation expenses which had a total for the year 2007 of $11.92 million and were listed as part of administration in some summary report lists.
- There was also a significant Tax adjustment reflected in total taxes for year at $1.103 million(current plus future) for year 2007....see balance of approx. $3.8 million under Income Taxes refundable on the statement of cash flows.
I hope that some of this is useful,
Peace,
Good Decision-making to All,
ElJ