Newcrest Mining expects to hit the bottom end of its full-year guidance range as disruptions at its two Australian mines impact on production.
The gold and copper miner on Thursday posted a 2.6 per cent drop in March quarter production to 598,602 ounces of gold, after maintenance at its Cadia mine and heavy rainfall at Telfer in Western Australia hurt performance.
Newcrest had more bad news, with Cadia - its biggest mine - likely to operate below capacity for several months after a magnitude 4.3 earthquake in early April.
The miner is still not able to give a timeline for restarting operations at Panel Cave 1 of its Cadia East mine, but says production at the larger Panel Cave 2 will restart in early 2018 after rehabilitation and ground support work is completed.
The Cadia East mine is currently subject to a prohibition notice from authorities, so operations remain suspended.
Newcrest is considering temporarily re-commissioning the nearby Ridgeway mine, as well as processing surface stockpiles in the interim period.
Earlier, the company said production at the Telfer mine tumbled 32 per cent to 76,022 tonnes in the March quarter because of record rainfall in January.
However, all-in sustaining costs fell to $US713 per ounce in the three months to March 31, down 5.1 per cent from the previous quarter.
Some of the cost gains are likely to be offset by a jump in energy charges in future quarters.
Newcrest said it had finalised the electricity supply contract for Cadia for the 2018 financial year, at a base price that is 90 per cent higher than it currently pays.
The impact of this was estimated, prior to the quake, at being between $US40-45 per ounce, but will depend on its production volume and energy consumption.
"In response to these higher electricity prices, Newcrest has accelerated a market engagement process to source both improved pricing and reliability of longer-term electricity supply to Cadia," it said in a statement.
Despite the disruptions, Newcrest still expects to touch the lower end of its full-year guidance range of 2.35-2.60 million ounces of gold.
Analysts remain wary about the impact on Cadia, which is Newcrest's lowest cost asset and accounts for about 70 per cent of its earnings.
"While the commitment to guidance is comforting, we expect some investors to be wary of the ongoing evaluation of the damage at Cadia given complete costs and timing for a full recovery are not yet known," RBC Capital Markets analyst Paul Hissey said.
At 1100 AEST, Newcrest shares were down 1.2 per cent at $22.17 in a flat Australian market.
Share
