Mountain Province Diamonds, which is a 49% participant with De Beers Canada in the Gahcho Kué diamond mine located in Canada's Northwest Territories, announced strong financial results for the first quarter ended March 31, 2022.
The diamond miner said in its statement that during the first quarter only 507,000 carats were sold for total proceeds of US$66.7 million resulting in an average value of US$132 per carat, which is 52% higher as compared to average values in Q4 2021 of US$86 per carat but 16% lower in terms of volume of carats sold.
The increase in average values in Q1 reflected the demand growth across the rough diamond market along with upstream stock levels, now believed to reflect operating inventories only.
During the first quarter Gahcho Kué experienced an outbreak of COVID-19 Omicron that caused disruption to both operations and maintenance activities, the statement said. These two events have been largely resolved, but within the quarter production was below internal expectations, as the feed rate through the primary crusher continued to be lower than planned.
Mark Wall, the Company's President and Chief Executive Officer, commented: "I'm extremely pleased to see the Company's strong financial performance in Q1, with a record adjusted EBITDA of $44.6M in the first 3 months of the year. In addition to its strong financial performance, the Company closed a US$50M Junior Credit Facility with its largest shareholder, and produced an updated NI 43-101 Technical Report which demonstrated an NPV attributable to Mountain Province of over $1.2Bn. These milestones are significant steps forward as we progress through what is to be a pivotal year for the Company, and all of its stakeholders. Going forward Management time will be focussed on guiding the Operator to optimise the operation and addressing the financing requirements of the Company."
Vladimir Malakhov, Rough&Polished
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