Gem Diamonds’ first-quarter output eased by about 38 percent when compared with the fourth quarter of 2012.
The miner said in a statement that this was due to subdued amount and grade of ore mined following test work conducted at Letseng, its only producing mine located in Lesotho.
Gem Diamonds recovered 18,775 carats during the period under consideration down from 30,181 carats realised during the previous quarter.
The company expects to recover between 115,000 carats and 130,000 carats at Letseng this year.
Meanwhile, Gem Diamonds auctioned 29,205 carats during the first quarter, an increase of 3 percent compared with the preceding quarter.
“Rough diamond prices have improved over the quarter, but this is not reflected in our results because of the lower quality diamonds mined so far this year,” said Gem Diamonds chief executive Clifford Elphick.
No comments:
Post a Comment