Dec 6 2016
Coro Mining Corp. ("Coro" or the "Company") (TSX:COP) is pleased to provide an update on the operations of its 65% owned subsidiary, SCM Berta ("SCMB"); the progress of the Marimaca project; and the acquisition of Minera Rayrock.
SCMB
SCMB owns the Berta copper deposit, the Nora SXEW processing plant, and has an option to acquire 100% of the nearby Salvadora exploration project. SCMB operates in the III region of northern Chile, near the town of Diego de Almagro.
Since early 2016, the Nora plant has been treating material from a variety of dumps from the surrounding district, but as of August, it has been exclusively processing material derived from test mining of high grade material selectively mined from shallow pits at the Berta deposit itself. As such, the operation has not yet reached commercial production, with delays in receiving operating permits for the Berta site contributing to its inability to do so. These are finally expected to be received early in Q1 2017 and SCMB will now proceed to install crushing and leaching facilities at the Berta site. This will enable concentrated pregnant leach solution ("PLS") to be trucked to Nora which will be expanded to 5ktpy cathode capacity. The installation should be completed by March 2017.
Marimaca
Coro is earning a 75% interest in the Marimaca project located 22km E of the port of Mejillones in the II Region of Chile, for which exciting drill results were released by the Company earlier this year (see our website www.coromining.com for details). The initial Marimaca NI 43-101 resource estimate is being completed by NCL Ingenieria y Construccion SA in Santiago and is expected to be released in January 2017.
Minera Rayrock
On August 4, 2016, we announced that we had signed a non-binding Letter of Intent ("LOI") to acquire Minera Rayrock Ltda ("Rayrock"), a Chilean subsidiary of Compañía Minera Milpo S.A.A. Rayrock is the owner of the Ivan 10ktpy Cu capacity SXEW plant located some 18km south of Marimaca and its purchase will enable us to accelerate the project's development and production. The total purchase price is $6.5m of which $0.25m was paid to ensure exclusivity. The Company has now completed its due diligence on Rayrock and anticipates closing the transaction in due course.
Alan Stephens, President and CEO of Coro commented, "We are looking forward to finally getting Berta up to full production of 5ktpy copper in cathode as planned and with luck, see this coincide with continued stronger copper prices. Once this has been done, SCMB will focus on advancing the Salvadora project with a view to potentially further increasing its production. Importantly, the acquisition of Rayrock and the release of our resource estimate for Marimaca will initiate the development of Marimaca as our second copper cathode producing operation."
Alan Stephens, FIMMM, President and CEO, of Coro Mining Corp, a geologist with more than 40 years of experience, and a Qualified Person for the purposes of NI 43-101, is responsible for the contents of this news release.