Hochschild Mining PLC on Wednesday announced a 20% increase in gold production in the first half of the year, thanks to improvements made at its key mine.

The London-based precious metals miner produced 120,160 ounces of gold in the first six month of 2024, up from 100,550 ounces a year before.

Hochschild credited a ‘better-than-expected performance’ at its Immaculada mine in Peru. It attributed this to the implementation of continuous improvement projects on site.

Hochschild also reported a ‘solid’ first major contribution from its new Mara Rosa mine in Brazil. The Mara Rosa mine reached commercial production in mid-May and has now reached a nominal capacity of 7,000 tonnes a day. Hochschild expects the processing plant to reach a stable throughput of 8,000 tonnes a day.

However, the firm reported a 7.0% decrease in silver production for the last six months to 5.0 million ounces from 5.4 million ounces

Looking forward, Hochschild expects to produce up to 360,000 gold equivalent ounces or 29.9 million silver equivalent ones this year.

Hochschild produced 152,792 gold equivalent ounces and 12.7 million silver equivalent ones in the first half of this year.

In 2023, it produced 300,749 gold equivalent ounces and 25.0 million silver equivalent ones, so production is expected to increase in 2024.

Chief Executive Officer Eduardo Landin commented: ‘We have delivered a robust second quarter...and remain on track to meet our annual production and cost guidance.’

Hochschild shares were up 2.7% to 181.79 pence per share in London on Wednesday morning.

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