Viento soars on $40m BC contract
Shares in Viento soared after the troubled contractor announced it had won a two-year, $40 million mining, crushing and screening contract with BC Iron for the miner's Warrigal hub.
Viento executive director John Silverthorne said the contact would enable its subsidiary Viento Contracting Services to use its capabilities in materials processing, providing the complete service including running the continuous miners, loading, hauling, crushing and screening of ore.
The award follows the recent successful completion of a haul road to the Nullagine joint venture project's outcamp four and five.
Viento will begin work in April.
BC said Viento would operate a second hand Vermeer 1655 surface miner that the Nullagine joint venture had agreed to purchase from Fortescue Metals Group for $1.8 million, which would result in reduced capital-related operating charges at the site.
BC Iron revised down its second half all-in cash cost guidance to $53-$57 per wet metric tonne (free on board).
Managing director Morgan Ball said the company's contracting strategy was key to its 2015 cost reduction efforts and it was pleasing to achieve meaningful savings for the Warrigal hub.
"The pricing and competitiveness seen in the tender process provides comfort that further cost savings can be achieved through the reassessment of the main mining, crushing and screening contract and the road haulage contract in the second half of 2015," he said.
Viento shares had doubled to 6.8 cents at 7.20am on the news while BC shares were up one cent, or 2.44 per cent, to 42 cents.
