Newcrest Quarterly Gold Production Falls but Guidance Maintained

MELBOURNE, Australia--Newcrest Mining Ltd. stuck with its production guidance for the fiscal year despite a drop in gold output for the first quarter.

Newcrest produced almost 523,000 troy ounces in the three months through September, a drop of 5.2% on the prior quarter, but said it expected production to increase over the coming quarters.

The Melbourne-based miner in August warned that output for the quarter would be lower than the average implied by its guidance for the year, after a plant shutdown at its Lihir mine in Papua New Guinea in July and a planned shutdown during the quarter at the Telfer operation in Western Australia's Great Sandy Desert.

At the time, it forecast gold production of between 2.4 million and 2.65 million ounces for the year, after slipping to 2.44 million ounces the year before.

Production at part of Newcrest's Cadia mine in eastern Australia resumed in July after operations were disrupted by an April quake, and the company said with the continued ramp-up of operations there and fewer planned shutdowns for the Lihir mine, it expected overall production would be stronger in the second half of the year than in the first six months.

Newcrest said copper production for the quarter hit about 17,000 metric tons, a rise of 29% on the previous quarter. It has forecast copper output of 80,000-90,000 tons this year against 83,000 tons in fiscal 2017.

Write to Robb M. Stewart at robb.stewart@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

October 25, 2017 17:57 ET (21:57 GMT)