In May 2020 Ascot filed a Feasibility Study (the “Study”) prepared in accordance with a National Instrument 43-101 Technical Report (“NI 43-101”) for its 100% owned Premier and Red Mountain gold projects (the "Project") located in the Golden Triangle near Stewart, British Columbia, Canada. The Study outlines a low capital restart plan to feed the Premier mill at 2,500 tonnes per day (“tpd”) to produce approximately 1.1 million ounces (“Moz”) of gold and 3.0Moz of silver over eight years.
Feasibility Study Highlights:
Base case assumptions are using a US$1400/oz gold price, $17/oz silver price and CAD to US exchange rate of 0.76. All values shown in Canadian dollars unless otherwise noted. Some figures may not add due to rounding
- Base case Pre-Tax Net Present Value (“NPV”) NPV5% of $516M, internal rate of return (“IRR”) IRR of 62%;
- Base case After-tax NPV5% of $341M and IRR 51%, and after-tax payback period of 1.8 years;
- Assuming a spot gold price of US$1710 per ounce and spot CAD to US exchange rate of 0.71, the project economics increase to an After-tax NPV5% of $602M and IRR 78%;
- The base case utilizes Proven and Probable Reserves of 6.2Mt at 5.9g/t gold and 19.7g/t silver; this includes the impact of the mining dilution and excludes all resources outside of planned stopes
- Low initial capital expenditure of $147M, including a 9% contingency, and 22% indirect costs;
- Life of Mine (“LOM”) payable production of 1.1Moz of gold and 3.0Moz of silver with peak production of 180 thousand gold equivalent ounces;
- LOM operating costs (“C1”)* of $145 per tonne processed or US$642 per payable ounce produced and LOM all in sustaining costs (“AISC”)* of $174 per tonne processed or US$769 per payable ounce produced.
* C1 and AISC are Non-GAAP and IFRS measure see note 1 of Table 1
Based on the above, IMO, once they get the bugs out they should make good money. Even if their AISC rise they are are starting from a very low number.