Special Feature
Instability and violence in Mali recently has also weighed on investors’ minds with a general increase in risk perceptions for those miners operating in West Africa. Avocet’s key Inata mine, and which has been the cause of the cratering in the stock price in recent weeks, has had its proven mineral resource estimates cut from 1.85m to an estimate of 0.9m - 1.2m ounces.
TABLE - INATA PROSPECT, BURKINA FASO
18 | www.financial-spread-betting.com | March 2013
Estimates of the total reserves body still runs to almost 3 million ounces from this prospect, however, it is simply the commerciality of mining these resources that has prompted the company to downgrade itself. At the Souma project, which is within the Bélahouro region but outside of the Inata mine license area, a further Mineral Resource of just over 0.5 million ounces has been defined. The Inata gold mine is 90% owned by Avocet and 10% owned by the government of Burkina Faso.