Trevali Mining’s drill program at Santander in Peru continues to add resources to the project, leading to a potential doubling of the mine’s zinc output and further benefiting from a rising zinc price.
Trevali Mining Corp. (TV:TSX; TV:BVL; TREVF:OTCQX) recently announced that twelve new drill holes at the Santander zinc mine in Peru expanded high-grade zinc-lead-silver mineralization and discovered new massive sulphide replacement mineralization in the hanging-wall to the Magistral Central deposit.
This news caught the attention of several analysts. Alex Terentiew of Raymond James stated in a Sept. 21 report that the drill results “are showing increasingly higher grades at depth, above those in the current mine plan.” He noted that these results support expansion potential: “With results at Santander continuing to be positive in terms of grade, depth, and size, we believe these will be supportive of Trevali’s evaluation to potentially expand the Santander operation from the current 2,000 tpd mill capacity up to 4,000 tpd.”
Joseph Gallucci of Dundee Capital Markets also highlighted the expansion potential of Santander, stating, “Santander is currently producing roughly 52 Mlbs of payable zinc per year—the expansion would essentially double that figure, making Santander almost as large as Caribou.” Gallucci also sees Trevali well positioned for a rising zinc market, noting, “With the zinc market continuing to tighten, we view TV as the best vehicle for zinc leverage on the TSX. . .with two operations already in production, and several organic growth opportunities, TV is in optimal position to capitalize on the zinc market.”
Stefan Ioannou of Haywood Securities found that the drill program “has been successful on all counts,” adding, “the intercepts are in close proximity to existing mine infrastructure and Trevali plans to incorporate them quickly into Santander’s near-term mine plan. All mineralization remains open for expansion.” Ioannou has a bullish …read more