[miningmx.com] – ANGLO American Platinum (Amplats) may have been buffeted and bullyed by majority union, the Association of Mineworkers & Construction Union (AMCU), but its full-year production target of 2.3 million ounces was intact.
The Anglo American subsidiary said in a production update today that it was sticking to its previous full-year production guidance with no reduction in sales expected from the AMCU-led strike in which 44,000 ounces of platinum were ‘lost’.
“As a result of restructuring of the Company, our short to medium term forecast production will remain at 2.2 million oz to 2.4 million oz,” the company said in its third quarter production report.
Amplats’ figures were one of the highlights of Anglo American’s third quarter production figures in which its copper and its diamond assets performed well. Worryingly, there was a sharp decline in output from Kumba Iron Ore in which Anglo has a 78% stake. The company said full-year export volumes “would be lower” than the forecast 40 million tonnes/year owing to production problems at Sishen.
Amplats warned, however, that with wage negotiations yet to be completed, its cash operating cost for the third quarter of R17,381 per equivalent refined ounce would be negatively affected for the full-year.
Cash costs would also be affected as the full effect of the industrial action took hold as well as restructuring costs kicked in. Amplats is taking most of restructuring costs which have been estimated before at R2.6bn in the current financial year.
In perhaps a precursor of better days ahead, Amplats said the initial stages of the proposed restructuring had taken hold with production at Khomanani mine, Khuseleka 2 shaft and Union North Decline suspended in August.
As a result, platinum production at Rustenburg mines was 132,000 ounces, or 11% lower year-on-year, and some 13% lower quarter-on-quarter.
Analysts viewed the quarter as relatively strong on the refined platinum front, and that the operations were showing promising signs of recovery.
Total equivalent refined platinum production for the third quarter was flat year-on-year at about 623,000 ounces. Production from its own operations, meanwhile, (Amplats has refining capacity for third parties) was 5% lower at 406,000 ounces lower.
