Tuesday, January 19, 2010

Sigma West

Century should notify the market as soon as the power is turned on. They should also issue a note (either as part of another NR or its own NR) once all 39 miners have arrived (and let us know when the next group is expected). Also, Century should let the market know immediately once the first ore is extracted in March and as soon as the new crusher is operational in April. It would be nice if Century issues bi-weekly updates on Lamaque (even when there is no news - they can still remind the market on what they are busy working on). They should do this up until the first gold pour.

Century should hurry up and put a preliminary 3D model of the Bedard Dyke structure on the home page of their website. Maybe have it small (so it doesn't crowd the page) then people can click on it to make it larger. The 3D model can be a work in progress and it can get updated constantly as the Vulcan team progresses. My thinking is that anything is better than nothing. The market should not have to attempt to glue the pieces together in order to visualize what the Bedard Dyke might look like, and especially since most people in the market do not have the geological expertise to interpret a lot of this technical info.

Also, Century should a provide more detailed view of the mining plan for over the next 6 to 12 months. I think it will go a long way in people understanding what steps the company is taking to achieve the near-term production targets.

Actually, all of these minor communication improvements will (not only allow investors to be better educated and allowing for more informed decisions on their investment, but also) able investors to instill confidence in management to execute the plan.

Anyway, one should note that Sigma West (near to the Bedard Dyke) already has 22,000 ounces in P&P Reserves (perhaps not far from the Bedard Dyke access portal). It would make perfect sense to mine these ounces early. These 22,000 ounces could provide 4 - 5 months of ore feed during the early stage ramp up months, without even considering other sources of ore that could be mined simultaneously.

There are also 72,000 other Sigma West ounces booked as inferred. It's not clear if some of these inferred ounces relate partly to past Bedard Dyke drill results. Either way, there have been 13 additional drill holes from the Bedard Dyke since the resource calculation was done. As such, the new drilled data will likely increase the Sigma West resource total by quite a bit.

The North Wall Zone has 257,000 P&P reserves booked, plus 408,000 further ounces of inferred. Century will begin mining these 257,000 North Wall ounces later in 2010 or beginning in 2011 (the North Wall already has an access portal and a haulage decline).

The mineralization of the North Wall is made up of dykes, shears, dippers and flats. There seems to be some similarities with the Bedard Dyke, especially with the dykes, dippers and flats. We don't know what the size of the Bedard Dyke will ultimately be. As you can see, the North Wall has 664,000 ounces. Can the Bedard Dyke deliver that many ounces? That remains to be seen. Even if the Bedard Dyke delivers 30% of the North Wall, it would still equate to 200,000 ounces (which is nice). A 50% delivery gets us 334,000 ounces for Bedard Dyke. A 100% delivery obviously gets us 664,000 ounces.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I agree that we should be kept up-to-date as you outlined,except for the part about "even when there is no news". I've seen the market get upset at news that they considered negligible or of little import, and subsequently punish the stock.

Thanks for your insight and expertise. We're lucky to have you on board, is what I say.