Copper Mountain Mining (TSX: CMMC) became the latest company to adjust its plans due to collapsing equity markets and near-term copper price uncertainty as a result of the rapidly spreading coronavirus (Covid-19).
The Vancouver-based miner has revised its mine plan and schedule for its flagship asset, the Copper Mountain project in British Columbia, deferring a US$22 million capital spend by delaying the installation of the third ball mill.
As part of a series of measures to reduce operating costs, the company also cut mining rates by 25% to between 120,000 and 160,000 tonnes per day for the remainder of 2020, down from 200,000 tonnes per day.
Copper Mountain Mining said it now expects to produce between 86 million and 94 million pounds of copper this year, down from an earlier estimate of between 100 million and 113 million pounds.
"In periods of low metal prices such as today, we will be disciplined and orderly in our development and take a prudent approach to cash management," Gil Clausen, the company's president and CEO, said in a news release. "We will not sacrifice the future of our mine by high-grading and deferring stripping that builds a liability in the future."
Clausen noted that while the existing mine plan was sustainable longer-term at current low copper prices, the company believed it was better to protect cash flow, adding that he expected prices to recover soon.
The news comes just days after the company's investor relations manager, Dan Gibbons, said Copper Mountain was on track to triple 2019 production in the next two years to reach more than 215,000 lb. annually.
Other than its open-pit project in B.C., the dual-listed miner owns the permitted, development-stage Eva copper project in Queensland, Australia, and a 4,000-sq.-km land package in the nearby Mount Isa area.
- This article first appeared in our sister publication, MINING.com.