Kibali is a gold mine located in the Democratic Republic of Congo, 1,800 km northeast of the capital city of Kinshasa. The deposits are located in the Kibali Greenstone Belt. Most mineralizations in Kibali occur along the KZ Trend. The KCD deposit is the principal mineralization consisting of five semi-vertically stacked lodes plunging 25° from surface to 2,000 m northeast, remaining open at depth. Gold was first discovered in the area was in 1903 when agents sent by King Leopold found locals washing alluvials for gold. Mining was carried out by SOKIMO under the auspices of the Belgian government. The majority of mining occured in the 1950s but became sporadic after independence in 1960. An estimated 11 Moz have been extracted from the area between 1906 and 2009, half of which originated from alluvial deposits. Kibali itself was discovered by a joint venture between Barrick and AngloGold Ashanti in 1998 but both withdrew due to political unrest. In 2009 Randgold (now Barrick) and AngloGold Ashanti entered a 50-50 joint venture with the remaining 10% owned by SOKIMO, now controlled by the DRC. Mining commenced in 2012 and first gold was poured in 2013. At the time of publication, Kibali had processed 59 Mt at a grade of 3.48 g/t with a recovery of 85.7%, producing 5.7 Moz gold.
Operations at Kibali consists of open pit and underground operations. Surface mining consist of nine pits of varying characteristics with an aggregate strip ratio of 8.6. Due to high strip ratio, unit cost of open pit ore is relatively high. Underground mining uses varying arrangements of longhole, with up to four stope lifts (140 m height) excavated prior to backfill, ensuring an extremely high level of productivity not typically seen in longhole stoping. Combined operations have a planned throughput of 7.2 Mtpa, over half of which comes from underground operations. At an average LOM recovery of 89%, Kibali is slated to produce in excess of 700 koz per annum until 2029, then reducing to 500 koz by the end of mine life in 2033. As a producing mine, Kibali is under no obligation to disclose project economics. Mining Momentum has estimated project economics using the LOM plan and costs presented in the technical report to estimate a Pre-Tax Cashflow of US$2.0 B (US$921 M AngloGold’s share) and US$1.2 B (US$548 M AngloGold’s share) discounted 10% using the Reserve gold price of US$1,200/oz. Using a gold price of US$1,800/oz results in a Pre-Tax Cashflow of US$5.1 B and US$3.0 B discounted 10%.
| Tonnes (Mt) | Grade (g/t) | Contained (Moz) | AngloGold’s (Moz) | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Reserve | 83 | 3.60 | 9.6 | 4.3 |
| OP | 37 | 2.44 | 2.9 | 1.3 |
| UG | 46 | 4.54 | 6.7 | 3.0 |
| M+I | 57 | 3.41 | 5.4 | 2.4 |
| OP | 23 | 2.25 | 1.5 | 0.7 |
| UG | 34 | 3.93 | 4.3 | 1.9 |
| Inferred | 23 | 2.70 | 2.0 | 0.9 |
What a deposit! Kibali is a true Tier 1 operation every senior gold miner craves to have in their portfolio. While the Reserve depletes to 2033, there is little indication of slowing down, rather just a scheduling characteristic of task availability, which will be pushed back indefinitely as Resources are converted into Reserve. Mining Momentum is confident the massive 34 Mt M+I Resource and 15 Mt Inferred Resource will result in another decade of underground mining not to mention exploration potential at depth. Kibali is a truly world class deposit that will be printing money for many decades to come.
The information presented above does not constitute investment advice. This is a summary from the NI 43-101 Technical Report effective December 31, 2021 (INSERT), with commentary from the author. Statements above do not represent the views of AngloGold Ashanti. If any discrepancies arise, the information contained within the NI 43-101 are official and final. For latest depletion data, please refer to the AIF update.