Central Asia Metals PLC on Wednesday said its pretax profit nearly doubled in the first half of 2018 following the acquisition of the Sasa zinc-lead mine located in Macedonia.
The company’s pretax profit for the six months to June was USD38.4 million, rising sharply from USD20.7 million the prior year.
Central Asia Metals acquired Lyrnc Resurces Ltd, which owns the Sasa mine, in November for USD402.5 million. As a consequence, revenue hit USD96.6 million from USD37.2 million, with Sasa contributing USD57.3 million of this. The remaining revenue was provided by the company’s Kounrad copper project in Kazakhstan.
The miner has maintained its interim dividend at 6.5 pence per share. This forms part of its new dividend policy to return between 30% and 50% of its free cash flow to shareholders.
During the period, four lost time injuries were reported at the company’s mining sites.
“The prices of copper, zinc and lead have been under considerable pressure since June over fears for global growth as a result of trade disputes. While we cannot control the prices of our metal products, we can control our costs and our output, and we are pleased to remain a low cost base metals producer with two operations that are on track to deliver 2018 annual production guidance,” said Centra Asia Metals Chief Executive Nigel Robinson.
“Given that our Sasa integration process is now largely complete, we are once again actively looking for additional growth opportunities,” Robinson added.
Shares in Central Asia Metals were up 2.7% at 224.49 pence on Wednesday.
Source: morningstar.co.uk
