Goldplat plc / Ticker: GDP / Index: AIM / Sector: Mining & Exploration

5 May 2022

Goldplat plc
('Goldplat', the 'Group' or 'the Company')

3^rd quarter operating results update

for the period ended 31 March 2022

Goldplat plc, the AIM listed gold producer, with international gold recovery operations located in South Africa and Ghana, is pleased to announce an operational update for the 3^rd quarter, ended 31 March 2022 ("Q3"), of the current financial year.

The two recovery operations continued a strong combined operating performance from the previous quarter and achieved a combined operating profit for the quarter of £2,286,000 which represented a 96% increase against Q3 in the previous period (Q3, 31 March 2021 - £1,165,000).

The combined operating profit for the operating entities for 9 months ending 31 March 2022 increased by 43% to £6,045,000 (Q3, 31 March 2021, £4,220,000).

This quarter's strong numbers were supported by increased operating performance in South Africa of £1,627,000 (Q3, 31 March 2021 - £575,000), whilst Ghana achieved steady operational results of £659,000 (Q3, 31 March 2021 - £687,000).

The following events have contributed to the excellent Q3 operating results:

Ghana

·    The results for Ghana were supported by an increasingly diverse client base in West Africa and South America who provided a wider range of materials, although volumes were reduced due to political unrest in some of the jurisdictions in which we operate.

·    The reduction in volumes has given us the opportunity to focus on other types of by-products and to increase our service offering to mines, whilst we also increased our client base during the period.

·    We continue with our expansion into South America on a measured basis, with limited capital allocated as yet.     

South Africa

·    The strong operational profits for South Africa during the quarter were supported by good production through our circuits, specifically gravity concentrators, and increased gross profits realised on the sales of material processed during the previous quarters. We are also seeing profits being supported by services in and production of platinum group metals ("PGM's").  

·    The construction of our PGM plant is going to plan and should be completed at a capital cost of £300,000, with commissioning taking place during May 2022. This will increase the flexibility in material we can process and will enable us to further develop our PGM recovery business.

·    Further to the PGM plant, we have incurred £100,000 on new plant machinery and the repair and maintenance of the current circuits and expect to incur further £300,000 during QTR 4 in this regard.  

·    The review of our water use license has been completed and we are awaiting the drafting and issue of the license from Department of Water and Sanitation. The license, once received, will provide us the basis on which a new tailings storage facility (New TSF) will be developed adjacent to our existing tailings storage facility (Existing TSF) at a cost of circa £350,000. The intention is for our deposition to be transferred from the Existing TSF to the New TSF, with the New TSF to be used for storage and the Existing TSF to be used for processing. This transfer will provide us with the ability to process the Existing TSF which contains a JORC resource of circa 82,000 ounces of gold (Table 1) at a third-party processing facility once the approval and installation of a pipeline to this third-party processing facility has been completed.  

·    We have received the environmental approval required for the installation of the pipeline to a nearby third-party processing facility, although the required water use license submission is still in progress. The nearby third-party processing facility has the potential to provide the necessary deposition capacity to process the Existing TSF. 

Our cash balances in the group remained strong at £2,000,000 at the end of Q3, with over £5,000,000 locked up in product in transit or already delivered to smelters and refiners. The turnaround of our material has been delayed due to global supply chain and shipping delays, exacerbated by delays at our operation's local ports.  The cash balances in the group at 31 March 2022 reflect both the £312,000 received on the sale of 32,878,000 shares in Caracal for 0.95 pence per share and the payment on account of £200,000 for the share buy-back programme announced on 29 March 2022.

Werner Klingenberg, CEO of Goldplat commented: "I am pleased to note the geographically diversified strength in our recovery operations and the contribution from production of PGM's. This further supports our decision to expand in to the South American market and the investment made into leveraging our current skillsets and infrastructure, to diversify the materials and elements we can process economically. I am encouraged with progress on the tailings facility which should add a further significant revenue stream to the business in future."

For further information visit www.goldplat.com, follow on Twitter @GoldPlatPlc or contact:

The information contained within this announcement is deemed to constitute inside information as stipulated under the retained EU law version of the Market Abuse Regulation (EU) No. 596/2014 (the "UK MAR") which is part of UK law by virtue of the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018. The information is disclosed in accordance with the Company's obligations under Article 17 of the UK MAR. Upon the publication of this announcement, this inside information is now considered to be in the public domain.

Table 1

Mineral Resource Estimate of the Tailings Storage Facility, South Africa

The Tailings Mineral Resource Estimate was announced in accordance with the JORC Code (2012) in a press release on 29 January 2016. Mark Austin of Applied Geology & Mining (Pty) Ltd. was the Competent Person responsible for that announcement. The Company confirms that all material assumption and technical parameters underpinning the Resource Estimate continue to apply and have not materially changed.