Northern Star is “tucking about $5 million a week” into its bank...

Northern Star is “tucking about $5 million a week” into its bank account, managing director Bill Beament said today.
Beament told the Resources Rising Stars conference on the Gold Coast that “it’s all about how much money we are making for our shareholders”.
He said the WA gold miner had about $300 million in cash, bullion and investments and sooner or later it would have to make a decision about what it would do with the growing cash pile.
But “that was a nice problem to have”, he said, before going on to outline the Company’s strong dividend track record.
“Our cashflow is going to a whole new level,” Beament said in reference to Northern Star’s plan to increase production from around 570,000oz a year to 700,000oz a year by 2018.
But this would not see “head office become fat and lazy”. “We run a very lean structure,” he said. “We want to touch and feel our operations on daily basis.
“Our return on equity over a five-year average is 28%.”
Beament also pointed to another resource upgrade for Northern Star. “There is a bit of upside coming up,” he said, referring to the company’s huge exploration success over the past two years.
In particular, Beament said investors should keep their eyes out for an update on the company’s rich Jundee mine.
The Kanowna Belle mine near Kalgoorlie was “flying along” and was now the lowest-cost operation in the stable with an all-in sustaining cost of less than A$750/oz.
“That’s a $1000/oz margin,” Beament said. “That’s extraordinary.”