Trevali names Grimbeek as President, CEO
Trevali's wholly-owned Caribou Mine and Mill Complex consists of a developed underground mine with significant resources of zinc-lead-silver-copper-gold, a fully permitted 3,000-tonne-per-day processing mill, flotation recovery plant, metallurgical and geochemical laboratories, and a tailings treatment facility, all located approximately 50-km west of Bathurst, New Brunswick, Canada.
Trevali Mining Corp. [TV-TSX, LMA; TREVF-OTCQX; 4T1-FSE] on Monday April 8 announced that Ricus Grimbeek is the company’s new President and CEO. He replaces Mark Cruise, who spent 12 years in role of CEO and was planning to step down, along with Chairman Mike Hoffman, as part of a leadership transition.
Trevali shares advanced on the news, rising 4.49% or $0.02 to 46.5 cents. The shares trade in a 52-week range of 31.5 cents and $1.28.
Grimbeek will assume his new responsibilities on April 23, 2019. He is a mining engineer with nearly three decades of progressive experience in the resource sector and a proven track record of working at all levels in the business.
Prior to joining Trevali, he was Chief Operating Officer of Vale Base Metals North America, where he was responsible for the overall operating and financial performance of 16 mining and refining operations in four countries.
Previously, he was President and COO of South32 Australia Ltd. [S32-ASX, JSE, LSE; SOUHY-ADR), overseeing six operations in Australia and Colombia. Grimbeek has also served as Asset President of Aluminium Australia, Head of Group HSEC for BHP Billiton Ltd. [BHP-NYSE, BHPLF-OTCPK], President and COO of BHP Billiton’s Ekati Diamond Mine, Executive Vice President Mining and Concentrating for Lonmin Platinum.
He holds a Bachelor of Engineering (Mining) from the University of Pretoria in South Africa.
Trevali is a zinc-focused, base metals mining company. It operates the wholly-owned Santander mine in Peru, the wholly-owned Caribou Mine in the Bathurst Mining Camp of northern New Brunswick, the Rosh Pinah Mine in Namibia and its 90%-owned Perkoa Mine in Burkina Faso.
Trevali bought the Rosh Pinah and Perkoa mines, in addition to a basket of other assets, from Swiss metals trading giant Glencore PLc. The US$417.86 million acquisition was completed in August 2017.
Trevali produced 103 million pounds of payable zinc in the fourth quarter, bringing production for 2018 to 407 million pounds. That was at the low end of the company’s guidance of between 400 million and 427 million pounds.
However, the company is guiding investors to expect zinc production of between 361 million and 401 million pounds in 2019. The weaker than expected guidance is based on lowered grade expectations at both Rosh Pinah and Perkoa.
Cash cost guidance of US$0.81 to US$0.88 a pound is also above street estimates. Scotiabank, for example, was anticipating 2019 cash costs of US$0.73 a pound.
In 2018, Trevali produced 41.7 million pounds of lead and 1.2 million ounces of silver.
The Vancouver company recently downgraded the production guidance for its Caribou Mine due to challenging rock mass conditions.