Caledonia Mining reports Q4 gold production 20,172 ounces

Reports FY23 gold production 75,416 ounces. Caledonia Mining announced blanket mine production for the quarter and year ended December 31, 2023. Mark Learmonth, CEO, said: “I am pleased that, after a challenging first half, we successfully met production guidance for the year, producing 75,416 gold ounces. Our 2024 guidance of 74,000 to 78,000 ounces assumes that Blanket will broadly maintain the production rate achieved in 2023 and reflects the prudent decision to suspend mining in lower margin areas which include lower grades and volumes, and higher costs. Our significant investment in Blanket over the past seven years and completion of the Central Shaft has nearly doubled production, extended the mine life and allowed the restart of underground exploration in 2023; in July we announced that the Eroica zone persists to depth and grades are significantly higher than previously thought. We continue to progress with the underground exploration programme and we expect to publish further exploration results in the first quarter of 2024 and a revised resource statement in the following quarter. Our wider capital expenditure programme continues to focus on unlocking value and delivering our multi-asset growth pipeline in Zimbabwe with Motapa and Bilboes, whilst maintaining a disciplined focus on cost and capital allocation. We continue to progress our feasibility studies for the Bilboes sulphide project with a view to determining the best option for Caledonia stakeholders, and I look forward to providing an update in due course.”