$5.2m record sale price as Auric WA gold party continues

The golden party has continued for Auric Mining at Jeffreys Find near Norseman, in Western Australia, after the company sold 1243 ounces of gold for a record $5.2 million from an initial toll milling program at Focus Minerals’ Three Mile Hill plant.

The current campaign is Auric’s fifth one conducted on ore from Jeffreys Find and the first ore the company has put through the Three Mile Hill mine.

In November, Auric commissioned a final 120,000 tonnes of Jeffreys Find ore to be processed at Three Mile Hill while 142,000t remained to be put through the Greenfields mill to complete a 300,000 to contract.

When the 420,000t total has been processed activities will cease at Jeffreys Find, completing stage 2 mining.

A further 55,480t still needs to be processed before completing the toll milling campaign at Three Mile Hill Mill, while operations at Greenfields Mill remain on track for completion by late January next year.

Auric says of the 64,500t so far processed at Three Mile Hill, only 33,857t or about half of that initial campaign has been reconciled to produce 1243 ounces of gold at a head grade of 1.22 grams per tonne (g/t).

Management said the lower-than-average “run of mine” 1.61g/t grade was primarily due to the company’s decision to first process lower quality ore while trialling the plant’s performance and ore recoveries.

Ore recoveries for the lower-grade ore came in at an encouraging 93.6 per cent.

Stage two mining at Jeffreys Find has already delivered 8,794 ounces of gold across three toll milling campaigns.

The resulting gold sales have reached an impressive $33.14m, with the highest price per ounce peaking at a striking $4233 per ounce.

And it seems an even better result may be on its way as the company still has a lot of gold in play.

Auric has 228,000t of ore left to process and pour at both the Three Mile Hill and Greenfields mills, with the grades expected to climb back up to 1.61g/t and impressive recovery rates already running at 93.5 per cent.

Jeffreys Find will soon start to deliver further substantial cash for Auric, we are extremely happy. It has been an outstanding investment for the company and our shareholders.

English said the company expects a terrific result from the return on investment and free cashflow generated from mining Jefferys Find, and that this impetus should carry the company forward into 2025 and future years.

Auric’s joint venture with Kalgoorlie-based BML Ventures has been a cornerstone of its success. Under the terms of the agreement, BML oversees mining, haulage, milling operations and all related expense. After sale of the gold, BML subtracts all direct costs before splitting the surplus cash proceeds with Auric on a 50:50 basis.

Since the final processing of ore is due to wind up at the end of January and mining at site is almost complete, most of the costs associated with the highly successful Jeffreys Find mine have been incurred, leaving an increasingly big cash surplus in the kitty to be distributed between the partners in the next month or two.

With a series of bigger cheques likely to be coming Auric’s way, the company will soon be able to turn all its attention and funding towards its Munda mine near Widgiemooltha in WA.

The company will next year begin a 125,000t starter pit grading 1.8g/t to pull out 6100 ounces of gold. It will look to gather more detail and a better understanding of the bigger 145,000-ounce orebody prior to ramping up a full-scale mining and toll treatment operation at site in 2026.

With Australian dollar gold prices touching all-time highs in the past few days above $4270 per ounce, converting the 6100 starter pit ounces to cash should give Auric’s coffers a good short-term kick.

Having already produced 8794 ounces in 2024, the residual ore being processed from Jeffreys Find could take that total number to more than 20,000 ounces.

With the addition of a further ounces likely to come from Munda in the next six months and gold prices on the rampage, it seems Auric may well have been touched by the gold gods.

Is your ASX-listed company doing something interesting? Contact: matt.birney@wanews.com.au