Philex Mining Reports Consolidated Revenues of PhP7.3B for 9M 2015
Pasig—(PHStocks)—The Board of Directors of Philex Mining Corp. (PSE: PX) today announced that operations in the first nine months of 2015 yielded a core net income of PhP811 million, down from the PhP901 million in the same period of last year, due to depressed metal prices. Similarly, reported net income came in at PhP756 million while net income attributable to equity holders of the parent company amounted to PhP851 million.
Production
The third quarter of 2015 recorded the highest metal production statistics for the year. For reference, the average quarterly metal output for 9M2015 was 8.57 million pounds for copper and 27,199 ounces for gold. In the third quarter alone, copper production rose by 2% to 8.82 million pounds while gold output rose 5% to 27,910 ounces. Operational enhancements and equipment upgrades resulted in improved metal recovery rates.
Meanwhile, Padcal mine operated for 269 days in the first nine months of 2015, the same number of days as last year, and milled 6.89 million tonnes of ore. The tonnage translated to 25.7 million pounds of copper produced as copper grades were lower at 0.205%. Meanwhile, gold production reached 81,599 ounces with gold grades slightly improving to 0.440 grams/tonne (g/t).
Revenues
Revenues for the first nine months of 2015 were PhP4.366 billion from gold and PhP2.752 billion from copper. (Average realized prices for gold went down by 10% to US$1,171 per ounce, while average copper prices fell by 19% to US$2.45 per pound.) These price levels were the lowest recorded in the last five years and touched their lowest points in August 2015.
Revenues from petroleum and other sources were mainly affected by lower output from Galoc Phase II and the 45% drop in average crude prices to US$58.7/barrel from US$105.8/barrel last year, resulting in the decline in petroleum revenues to PhP118.8 million. Meanwhile, revenues from silver amounted to PhP55.4 million.
Total consolidated revenues for the period amounted to PhP7.292 billion.
Costs and Expenses
Philex Mining is relentless in its pursuit of managing costs and reducing expenses to cushion the impact of depressed metal prices in the world market. As a result, consolidated operating cost and expenses in the first nine months of 2015 were 13% lower year-on-year at PhP5.612 billion. Specifically, cash production costs declined by 12% to PhP3.525 billion while general and administrative expenses decreased by 28% to PhP533.2 million.
During the nine month period, the parent company repaid a total of US$21.8 million in debt. This brought total debt to US$74.5 million (PhP3.482 billion) as of end-September 2015 from US$96.3 million (PhP4.308 billion) as of end-December 2014.
Outlook
Meanwhile, an engineering study conducted on the mineral resource estimates from the 800-600 meter level (ML), based on our March 2015 disclosure, identified an additional 20 million tonnes of ore reserves that will extend Padcal’s life of mine by two more years from 2020 to 2022.
“The validation of additional reserves in the 800-600ML is indeed a very welcome development for the Company. Aside from extending Padcal’s life-of-mine, the incremental reserves also enhance the Company’s value and provide us with more flexibility before the Silangan project comes on stream.”
