JOHANNESBURG (miningweekly.com) – Aim-listed Weatherly International’s share price on the LSE dropped by more than 21% on Wednesday as the company reported that it was unable to service its debt facility with Orion Mine Finance.
The current copper price of $4 515/t – a six-year low – meant that the Tschudi mine, in northern Namibia, was not generating sufficient operating cash to pay the debt.
The company was due to repay the first instalment on Tranche B of its $91-million loan to Orion on November 30.
Orion agreed to defer the payment of the instalment and discussions around the detail of these amended arrangements were under way, the company said in a statement on Wednesday.
Meanwhile, Weatherly said it anticipated achieving nameplate production levels of 1 400 t of copper cathode at Tschudi by the end of this quarter.
This followed October’s production of 1 316 t, achieved at a C1 cost of $4 361/t.
Weatherly’s shares were trading at 0.45p on Wednesday, 21.74% lower than Tuesday’s close of 0.58p.