You are right that grade isn't everything, some people are...

You are right that grade isn't everything, some people are comparing this to Cadia and you have to remember that Cadia, while economic, had a massive upfront capital cost to establish the low grade block cave operation, the Cadia Valley AISC's mentioned are costs today - after the horrendous capital cost to bring a block cave operation into production. The Ernest Henry AISC numbers are also meaningless - Ernest Henry is an established med-high grade copper orebody, the copper grades pay for the cost of extraction and milling and the modest gold grades are just icing on the cake, that isn't the case here.

If this were an exploration junior this additional volume of low grade ore would be bad news because of the capital cost hurdle but fortunately ALK are not a one-trick pony and already have an operating profitable gold mine - thats why I'm here. Agree with other posters that they need to find some higher grade parts/core to this porphyry to make it economically viable. Too much volume at too low a grade seems to be the verdict of the market.