Kaiser reloads Tassie gold inventory with fresh ounces - SMH.com.au

AI desk brief

Kaiser Reef has replaced depletion at its Henty underground gold mine in Tasmania with an updated resource of 429,000 oz and a new reserve of 198,000 oz, keeping the operation’s six-year mine life intact. The reserve stands at 1.91Mt at 3.22 g/t, replacing the 25,800 oz mined in the last 12 months to June, while the resource totals 4.23Mt at 3.16 g/t. Management is targeting steady output of 30,000 oz/yr and says the result was helped by a second diamond rig focused on extensions.

The reserve/resource models use a 1.5 g/t cut-off and a gold price assumption of A$4,000/oz, highlighting that current project economics are being framed around a relatively strong local gold price. Kaiser is also trying to maximize plant utilization by processing third-party ore and concentrates through Henty’s 300,000 t/yr plant, while investing A$2.7m in a ROM pad expansion and tailings capacity to support production through at least 2030.

For the market, this is more a supply-maintenance story than a demand driver: it shows a mid-tier Australian producer is successfully replenishing ounces and extending mine life, which helps keep incremental gold supply flowing. Near term, the main catalysts are ongoing drilling success at Henty and the underground program at Maldon, where Kaiser is testing a historically high-grade field with a permitted 200,000 t/yr plant already in place.