Saturday, March 17, 2007

Blue Note (BN.V)

Blue Note (BN.V)

Blue Note is a little known near-term producer. It is building a new mill to commence operations in June and will start mining the ore for the mill in April. The metals are zinc, lead, copper and silver.

Blue Note will be a commodity winner due to their choice to develop their mine and cash in on the commodity prices rather than to drill their property. An educated look at the property told them they have these metals at depth. An existing mine in the area has been mining for over 20 years and has mined to incredible depth. The geology of the area is similar.

Blue Note has put the resource to work by building a mine and earning money sooner rather than later and also tying up capital to establish a reserve that won't be used for 20 years.

They are most price sensitive to zinc, then lead, then silver. Copper has little influence on their cash flow as it will only contribute perhaps 2% of the total.

The number get impressive for 2008. They have adjusted their prices way down, $1.17 for Zinc, $0.44 for lead, $2.29 for copper, and $11.65 for silver. The costs also decline, to $0.55 net of by product credit, and it gives them about $58 million in pre-tax cash flow. After taxes I calculate 2008 EPS of about $0.14, exceptionally impressive for stock currently trading at $0.47-$0.48, and those earnings strongly take into consideration the price of commodities coming down. The IRR on the mine is 126.3%.

As a near-term producer, Blue Note is one that will win big time for its investors.

0 Comments:

Post a Comment

<< Home