15th Feb 2016 07:49
LONDON (Alliance News) - Acacia Mining PLC Monday said 2015 was "another year of transformation" as the gold and copper miner maintained its dividend despite swinging to a huge pretax loss thanks to a drop in revenue and some hefty impairment charges.
The FTSE 250-listed company swung to a USD124.2 million pretax loss in 2015 from a USD115.2 million profit in 2014, after it booked a substantial amount of impairments and saw revenue decline to USD868.1 million from USD930.2 million.
Impairments totalled USD146.2 million in 2015 and was the cause for the loss, with Acacia Mining not booking any impairments last year.
Although revenue declined year-on-year, Tanzania-focused Acacia Mining saw its cost of sales rise to USD734.2 million from USD688.3 million - squeezing its gross margin to yield a USD134.0 million gross profit compared to a USD242.0 million profit in 2014.
Acacia declared a final dividend of 2.8 cents per share to take the full year dividend for 2015 to 4.2 cents, which is in line with 2014.
"2015 was another year of transformation for Acacia as we continued to transition our company into a low cost producer," said Brad Gordon, chief executive of Acacia Mining.
"We continue to have one of the strongest balance sheets in the sector, and as a result of this and
expected improvements in production, costs and cash flow generation in 2016, the board have recommended maintaining the final dividend in line with 2014 at 2.8 cents per share," he added.
Production fell in 2015 to 731,912 ounces of gold compared to 718,651 ounces a year ago but Acacia sold more gold, with sales rising to 721,203 ounces from only 703,680 ounces. But the company's average gold price fell to only USD1,154 per ounce from USD1,258 per ounce last year.
Copper production in 2015 rose to 15.0 million pounds from 14.1 million pounds, whilst copper sales dipped slightly to 13.3 million pounds from 13.4 million pounds. However, copper prices were also down to an average of USD2.33 per pound of copper from USD3.01 per pound in 2014.
Acacia plans to continue increasing production of gold in 2016 to a range of 750,000 to 800,000 ounces and said its all-in sustaining cash cost will be reduced by around 15%. Production will be slightly weighted to the second half of the year and Acacia also plans to see capital expenditure fall by around 5% year-on-year in 2016 to a range of USD175.0 to USD180.0 million.
By Joshua Warner; [email protected]; @JoshAlliance
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