You raise some good points, maybe a bit optimistic though? It's understandable to annualise single months because so much can go better or worse than the design or 'average'. Not that we can do much more atm, but monthly annualised figures need to be checked against guidance and BFS design for validation. given the 12x leverage involved.
June was thought 825,00kt ore mined just before month end, then was ~1,080kt judging by Qtrly 2.48Mt ore mined, but was ~990kt ore in the webinar chart of Ore Mined Actuals (confirmed by Bruce who said "June a shade under 1M tonnes ore mined"... so what was it? 990kt x12 is 11.9Mt annualised, but 1,080kt is 13.0Mt annualised, your 1.245Mt in July would be annualised at 14.9Mt, while guidance is between 10-12Mt steady state. 1Mt per month is 33.33kt per day avg, the BFS design has mining and DMU operating 87.5% of the time, or 12.5% of the time is planned moving and maintenance, or breakdowns/repairs etc. 90kt diff is less than 3 days a month where the DMU is operating at 95% availability in June perhaps instead of 87%...
I'm happy to assume 3Mt mining per Qtr based on June's performance, which is the top of 10-12Mt range. Quite probably there is upside as more the DMU is perfected and more OS than planned is rejected at the DMU. I see no reason for another 10% jump on June's performance given Bruce said "he sees no reason why they can't meet June's mine rate for each month in September". That's hoping for 3 trouble free months at June's rate, not for anything more.
I can't see how they will lift mining rate without rejecting more OS pre-DUM slurry pump to the Wet Plant... that requires physical rectification first, which requires more study. IMO they have the DMU and plant singing in June well ahead of 'conservative ramp up' but not if not maxed out then close to it. I'm more interested in the vexing question of where the current set-up maxes out with production, revenue and costs, also where it might max out with a range of probable re-designs, but will address the ST cash flow in another post.
To try and work out what was going on, I tabled the production figures from various releases below. 1,089kt does seem to work for June, with the ore mined and RHF matching at ~44% of the Qtr, and the contained HM in Ore and contained HM in RHF and matching ... as you'd expect. Higher ore mined but lower grade means HM in RHF is a bit lower % than June's ore mined over the Qtr.
The quoted Ilm-Con looks correct also with 54kt being 45.1% of the Qtr (vs only 42.8% of the RHF), due to June having the highest TiO2-to-Mag con of the three months. Zir-Con goes the other way, even with me adding 0.5kt to June's guided 13kt, and reducing May's guided 12kt to 11.5kt Zir-Con just to make it closer and more sensible. June has lower than it's RHF 42.8% of Qtr, down at 40.7% of the Qtr's Zir-con. The difference between May and June is starkly shown in the ratio of Zir to Ilm con prodcued each months... May = 31.1% Zir:Ilm, where June is 25%. This difference is troubling given both months had the same ZrO2 recoveries and Zr grade in the NMag con?
Reconciliation involves surveyed stockpiles and pits surfaces, amongst multiple variables with the potential for errors, so I'm not trying to squeeze more out of the data quality than is available. Just want to see where it makes sense, where it doesn't, and what might be the average trend we can follow. The lower zircon production from June may be a VHM variation thing, or incorrect figures released for May and June such that it is a steady 27.7% month on month? I'm going to apply 5.00% Ilm of Ore Mined for Sep Qtr, and avg Jun Qtr 1.34% Zir prod'n from ore mined for Sep qtr.
I'll give my views on the cash flow next post... Cheers
(20min delay)