Sierra Madre achieves commercial production in Mexico
Sierra Madre Gold and Silver Ltd. [SM-TSXV, SMDRF-OTCQB] said it has reached full commercial production a its 100%-owned Guitarra silver-gold mine in Mexico. The company said the processing plant, underground mine and all aspects of the operation have now been running at the current capacity of 500 wet metric tonnes per day for the past 90 days. Monthly gold and silver concentrate shipments, concentrate inventories, freshly mined material stockpiles, and revenues generated from sales have all increased on a material basis, the company said in a press release.
“We are delighted to announce full commercial production at Guitarra,’’ said Sierra Madre CEO Alex Langer. “This will allow us to share proper mining statistics, including revenues, costs, profits and all-in-sustaining cost (AISC) per ounce of silver,’’ he said. “We very much look forward to sharing this information during our quarterly and annual financials moving forward.’’
Sierra Madre Gold and Silver is a mineral exploration company with a focus on evaluating the potential of restarting the Guitarra mine and the exploration and development of the Tepic and La Tigra properties in in the State of Nayarit, Mexico. Sierra previously said its key objective is to advance exploration at the Tepic and La Tigra properties to determine whether they contain commercially exploitable deposits of precious or base metals.
The La Tigra project consists of seven mining concessions covering 357 hectares, including historical high-grade mines in the Districto Minero Del Tigre.
La Guitarra is a high-grade, past producing underground mine with an on-site 500-tonne-per-day process facility that operated until August, 2018. The project was previously kept on care and maintenance, and available for a prompt restart. The property is located in the Temascaltepec mining district, in the southeast end of the Mexican silver belt, 130 kilometres southeast of Mexico City.
Operational numbers for 2024 during test mining are as follows:
A total of 1,292.5 dry metric tonnes of concentrate were shipped in 2024, with an additional 94.6 tonnes in inventory at December 31, 2024.
Provisional weighted average silver grade of the fiscal 2024 concentrate shipments was 2,594.2 grams per tonne; gold averaged 34.93 grams per tonne.
Sierra Madre recently has signed a binding off-take agreement with Swiss-based gold minerals. trader MRI Trading AG for 100% of the concentrate sales from the Guitarra mine for a 24-month term.
MRI is a leader in trading metals and minerals, petroleum products, bulk and freight. The company specializes in non-ferrous ores, concentrates, refined and precious metals and their related byproducts for a global smelting and processing customer base.
Sierra Madre shares were unchanged Friday at 48.5 cents and trade in a 52-week range of 70 cents and 25 cents.