Naja, zumindest ist der desaströse Tiefpunkt von Q1 überwunden. Aber alles
dauert bedeutend länger als geplant.
Nalunaq, endlich mal ne Produktionszahl, bei der man nicht gleich vom Stuhl kippt (21,7 kUz ); aber Cash Kosten von 530$!
Apex, lächerliche Produktion von 2,2 kUz
Lefa, immerhin verdoppelt zum Vorquartal ( 24 kUz ggü 10,6 kUz), aber weit von jeder Planungsziffer.
Im 1. Hj Produktion von ca. 61 kUz. Da erscheint es doch fraglich, ob das bereits mehrmals reduzierte Ziel von 291-351 kUz in diesem Jahr noch erreichbar ist. Nalunaq wird kaum steigen und Apex kann man für dieses Jahr vergessen. Dabei sind die geplanten Zahlen 291-351 kUz grademal 2 Monate alt.
Analyse von CAR:
CRU (10,50) –Further delays, but patience pays. Buy
Crew Gold Corporation (CRU) yesterday released their results for Q2. As CRU still is in the ramp up period of LEFA and Apex the P&L was of limited interest.
As at 30th of June, the company has ca $40m cash and invested ca $30m in Q2 of which the majority was spent on LEFA ($28,5m). We believe that CRU eventually will need more financing. CRU currently holds ca 32,9% (including the forward agreement) in CMI representing a value of ca $70m which could be used as a buffer, however we believe there is a possibility for some dilution.
Operations wise, LEFA and APEX are making progress but ramp up takes longer time than announced in Q1 and than our estimates. The process facility at LEFA is already commissioned, CRU took a decision in Q1 to increase the throughput capacity of ore. This shouldn’t be too hard to achieve, the question is the timing of completion. In the Q1 report CRU announced that full capacity should be reached by the end of 2007, which now has been postponed to Q1 08, not a big deal isolated but given the previous delays we believe the market will be reluctant to re-price the share until full production capacity is reached. At full capacity at the current reserve grade of 1,6 g/t, LEFA will be able to produce ca 400,000oz p.a. at a cash cost of $330-350/oz. Production should increase as higher-grade ore from the Sigurini (3,2 g/t) and Banora (2,9 g/t) deposits are included in production. This will also lower cash costs/oz. CRU will release a reserve and resource statement for Sigurini and Banora in Q3.
The phase 2 facility (2,400 tpd) at Apex is also delayed and was announced to be commissioned in the 2nd half of 2008, annualized production for 2008 was estimated to 140,000-165,000oz at a cash cost of $260-280/oz. However, management also declared that the operation is geographically and technically challenging, particularly since no feasibility study has been completed. As such we could see further delays until an optimal production flowsheet has been achieved. On the positive side the company was bullish on the historical (not NI 43-101 compliant) copper-gold porphyry resource of 85m tonnes @ 0,4% Cu and 0,4 g/t Au. During the autumn CRU will perform drillings of these targets.
Nalunaq was on track and produced a record of ca 22,00oz in Q2 and production for the quarter was 450 tpd and increasing towards the target of 500 tpd which is key to achieve the target cash cost of $350-400/oz. Production is still estimated to ca 100,000oz going forward.
In 2008 CRU expects to produce a total of over 500,000oz (management was reluctant to give any more precise guiding due to the uncertainties of exact timing of ramp up completion of LEFA and Apex).
We have made preliminary revisions to our cash cost, production estimates and long-term assumptions and now expect CRU to produce a total of ca 530,000oz @ a cash cost of ca $360/oz increasing to ca 700,000oz in 2009 @ cash cost ca $315/oz. Based on the current forward curve until 2012 and then a drop to $650/oz onwards our DCF-model returns a value of ca NOK 14,5/share which we set as our 6 month target (approximately when LEFA is expected to be fully commissioned).
After successfully commissioning the LEFA project there is further upside when comparing to mid-tier peers, based on an annualized production rate of ca 700,000oz which CRU could hit in late 2008 if LEFA and Apex are commissioned on time @ a cash cost of ca $315, the share would trade at an EV/EBITDA of 5x whereas peers currently trade at an average of 8,3x EV/EBITDA 09e implying a share price of NOK 24, however the average mine life based on reserves and 06 production for the peer group is 22 years whereas CRU only has a mine life of 6 years based on reserves.
We believe the share should hit our 6 month target when LEFA is running at full capacity, prior to that we believe investors are reluctant to re-price the share and CRU will likely also have to increase the reserves (and grade) of LEFA prior to a re-pricing towards peers.
