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ReGIonAL RoUnD-UP

Abujar ripe for debt finance

ietto Minerals Ltd managing director Canaccord Genuity lifting its price target for cluding 1m @ 98.03 g/t), 7m @ 12.48 g/t
TCaigen Wang is confident his company the company from 60c to 80c. Euroz Hart- from 66m (including 4m @ 21.45 g/t) and
can lock away debt funding for what is likely leys also increased its valuation from 78c 19m @ 2.33 g/t gold from 66m (including
to be West Africa’s next gold mine before to 89c. 1m @ 23.17 g/t).
the end of the year. Wang praised executive director Mark “In terms of scale, what we’ve got to look
A robust DFS published by Tietto last Strizek and chief operating officer Matt Wil- forward to is so much exploration upside,”
month confirmed the company’s Abujar cox, who joined Tietto just before the PFS Strizek said.
project in Cote d’Ivoire will comfortably sit was completed earlier this year, for cham- “The last five years [of the mine plan]
among the top 20 largest gold mines in pioning the improved economics at Tietto there’s just so much room to be able to
West Africa when in operation, with a re- through an enhanced resource model and improve coming from drilling around the
markable 260,000oz set to be produced in procurement of key equipment. project and underneath [the open pit floor].
the first year alone and an average 200,000 Wilcox, whose previous job was oversee- The pit actually took out some of the areas
ozpa across the first six years. ing the successful build of West African Re- in the PFS we had for an underground, but
The DFS revealed a number of improve- sources Ltd’s Sanbrado gold mine over the that’s now been swallowed up. There’s still
ments from the PFS released in April, in- border in Burkina Faso, secured an unused a lot of good numbers down there we need
cluding 30% more gold in the first year of mill which allowed Tietto to increase the tar- to follow up.
production and 20% over the life-of-mine, geted throughput for Abujar to 4 mtpa. “And then you’ve got simple things like
based on a 68% increase in reserves and “We really appreciate the effort that between AG and APG where there’s this
78% uplift to the indicated resource at Abu- Mark and Matt have made over the past mineralised strike which hasn’t really been
jar. six months,” Wang said. “Because of their drilled yet, only a few holes in it. We know
Pre-production capex of $US200 million work, the results in the DFS didn’t really there’s gold there and it’s a really great op-
(including contingency) was down 13% on surprise us, but the eco-
nomic improve- Abujar DFS – October 2021
ments still turned
out better than Mine and processing life: 11 years
what we could
have expected. Ore processing rate: 4 mtpa fresh ore
These results b l e n d
are fantastic and Average production (years 1-6): 200,000oz
robust, whether
from production Average production (LOM): 155,000oz
profile or from fi- Revenue: $US2.87 billion
nancial numbers,
at all ranges of AISC (years 1-6): $US804/oz
gold price it is still AISC (LOM): $US832/oz
very robust.”
Tietto has forecast gold production of 260,000oz Free cash flow (pre-tax): $US1.28 billion
from Abujar in the first year alone, according to a The PFS previ- Average free cash flow (LOM): $US118 million
DFS released last month ously outlined a
base-case open EBIDTA: $US1.52 billion
pit mining scenar-
the previously reported estimate. io at Abujar over 6.5 years Payback: 0.9 years
Speaking to Paydirt following the re- with the option to expand to NPV (pre-tax): $US959 million
lease of the DFS, Wang said the improved nine years via the addition of IRR (pre-tax): 115%
economics had come as no surprise to the an underground and other
company and many of its key backers, with satellite feed sources. For Pre-production capital: $US176 million
the focus now shifting to securing the cru- the DFS, Tietto simplified Contingency: $US24 million
cial funding package required to begin con- its approach and focused
struction at Abujar. purely on a larger open pit. *Based on a $US1,700/oz gold price
“We’ve been talking to over a dozen quite Potential underground
serious financial providers – some are tra- and heap leach options will now be con- portunity to continue to add.”
ditional, some are non-traditional – but they sidered in upcoming scoping studies which Tietto has earmarked further improve-
have been waiting for the DFS results to run parallel to the open-pit development. ments to the DFS through a 30,000m infill
come out before progressing,” Wang said. Strizek believes the market is still yet to drilling programme designed to increase
“We will give them time to read it and di- grasp the full-scale of the opportunity in resource confidence and 5,000m of deep
gest it, and we expect them to issue the up- front of Tietto at Abujar, especially with the drilling to investigate Abujar’s underground
dated term sheet this month. We also hope drill bit continuing to turn up high-grade re- potential. The company will also test up to
that we can sign a debt document before sults not included in the current mine plan 20 regional prospects within 10km of the
the end of this year so that we can still work which is based on reserves of 34.4mt @ 1.3 proposed plant.
on our schedule.” g/t gold for 1.45 moz. – Michael Washbourne
Tietto’s DFS received glowing reviews Best hits from recent drilling at AG Core
from the investment community, with included 3m @ 35.5 g/t gold from 85m (in-

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