Under normal circumstances—and especially where macroeconomic conditions are uncertain or look outright bad—being a gold miner looks like a safe position. For Centerra Gold (NYSE:CGAU), which lost over 17% in Monday’s trading, it found a way to not look safe at all by missing earnings and forecasting lower gold production.
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Centerra Gold posted earnings of -$0.24 per share, which was lower than the -$0.06 analysts were expecting. Revenue was better, as Centerra posted $226.5 million against analyst projections of $161.65 million. Yet even here, it was a loss of a different sort; this time last year, Centerra posted 23.3% higher earnings.
Then came the guidance, which looked even worse. While Centerra did confirm the range, it now expects gold production to come in at the low end of the range. Gold dore bar production at the Oksut mine in Turkey is lost, at least for now, with mercury detected in the recovery plant, which required all sorts of mitigation works that are still in progress. As something of a sop to investors, Centerra revealed that copper production would come in about the middle of the range.
In addition, insider trading at Centerra Gold is looking pretty sell-weighted. Insider confidence is skewing to the Negative, with insiders selling $659,500 worth of stock in the last three months.
