Stellar Diamonds has narrowed its loss for the financial year ended June 30, reporting a pretax loss of $2.3 million compared with $7.1 million a year earlier. According to Mining Weekly, the miner continues “to make progress on developing its Tongo-Tonguma diamond project” in Sierra Leone.
Stellar CEO Karl Smithson remarked: “The capital markets for junior resource companies remain challenging, and although the company’s current financial position is weak we have obtained strong shareholder support in recent open offer financings. Stellar continues to carefully manage its day to day working capital and […] we are working on, and remain optimistic of securing, the required project funding to develop the Tongo-Tonguma project”.
According to Stellar, the Tongo-Tonguma project has a 21-year life potential with production targets of over 200,000 carats per year, and an estimated annual cash flows of $45 million. According to Smithson, Tongo “has the potential to be the second largest kimberlite diamond mine in West Africa”.
