The Copper Mountain Mining Corporation (ASX: C6C) share price is reaching new highs today. This comes after the company announced a record quarterly production from its mines, and provided guidance for the 2021 calendar year.
At the time of writing, the Copper Mountain share price is travelling 8.2% higher to $2.37.
How did Copper Mountain perform in 2020?
The Copper Mountain share price is on the run as investors are fighting to get a hold of its shares.
According to the release, Copper Mountain advised that it has achieved record quarterly production for copper, gold and silver. The robust result to finish off the calendar year saw the company exceed its previous production targets.
At the end of the fourth quarter, Copper Mountain produced a record 23.1 million pounds of copper. This reflected a 22% increase on the third quarter period and was 23% up on the same time last year. Management said that the strong performance was due to mining higher copper grades.
In addition, Copper Mountain yielded record gold and silver production, which led to 8,959 ounces and 144,934 ounces, respectively.
In 2020 as a whole, Copper Mountain reported 77.6 million pounds of copper produced. The company had originally projected it would mine and develop between 70 million to 75 million pounds of copper across the period. Total yearly production for precious metals came in at 29,227 ounces of gold and 392,494 ounces of silver.
FY21 production and guidance update
Looking ahead, Copper Mountain estimates 2021 production for copper to be around 85 million to 95 million pounds. The robust guidance comes as the company continues to mine higher grades of the base metal. Furthermore, its mill expansion project is scheduled to be completed in the third quarter. This will allow the company to recover up to 45,000 tonnes of copper per day.
Gold production for the year is projected to be between 25,000 ounces to 30,000 ounces, with its cheaper cousin silver forecast to come in at between 500,000 ounces and 550,000 ounces.
All-in-costs is forecasted to remain low throughout 2021, with total costs coming in around US$1.80 to US$2 per pound. This assumes an exchange rate of CAD$1.33 to US$1.
Words from management
Copper Mountain president and CEO Mr Gil Clausen commented on the company's performance:
Our operating team executed on our operating plan beating our production guidance for this year. We finished the year strong with record production in the fourth quarter as a result of higher grades, which we expect to continue in 2021.
We are continuing to build up a healthy cash position while investing in our low risk, high return growth projects at the Copper Mountain Mine.
Copper Mountain share price summary
The Copper Mountain share price is up almost 200% over the last 12 months, reflecting positive investor sentiment.
The company's shares reached a low of 33.5 cents in March, however they have since shot up to a record high of $2.37 today.
At the current price, Copper Mountain stands a market capitalisation of $459.8 million.
