Santacruz Silver Releases PEA, New Resource for San Felipe Project

Santacruz Silver Mining Ltd. (TSXV:SCZ) announced the results of its preliminary economic assessment (PEA) for its Mexico-based San Felipe project. It also put out a new NI 43-101 resource estimate for the project.

PEA highlights using a base case of silver at US$19.91 per ounce include:

• Pre-tax Net Present Value (‘NPV’) at a 5% discount rate of US $103.5 million and an Internal Rate of Return (‘IRR’) of 60.6%;
• After-tax NPV at a 5% discount rate of US $61.2 million and IRR of 37.7%;
• Production of 24.3 million ounces of silver equivalent (after milling and smelting recoveries);
• Average annual production of 3.2 million ounces of silver equivalent over a 7.5 year mine life;
• Initial capital cost (‘CAPEX’) of US $36.3 million, including $6 million of working capital;
• Estimated all-in cash costs of US $12.72/oz silver equivalent (including site operating costs, smelter costs, sustaining capital and NSR payments ); and
• Pre-tax payback of 1.6 years after start-up, and 2.3 years after-tax payback.

At a 150 g/t Ag equivalent cut-off, the new resource estimate for all veins is:

• Indicated — 1.1Mt at 76.5 g/t Ag, 2.5% Pb and 6.4%Zn = 423 g/t Ag equiv or 15.2 Moz Ag equiv
• Inferred — 3.3Mt at 64.8 g/t Ag, 1.9% Pb and 4.9% Zn = 326 g/t Aq equiv or 34.3 Moz Ag equiv

Arturo Préstamo, president and CEO of Santacruz, commented:

This Preliminary Economic Assessment is excellent news for the Company and indicates that the San Felipe project has strong economic parameters and is potentially economically viable in the current market environment. The estimated CAPEX for the project is relatively low, and the property has significant exploration upside. The Company will be initiating the priority studies identified by the study team to de-risk the project immediately. These include completing more metallurgical work, initiating exploration drifting and trial mining to evaluate the continuity of higher grade mineralization and ground conditions for potential future mining.

Click here to read the full Santacruz Silver Mining Ltd. (TSXV:SCZ) press release.