The Çöpler Mine: SSR Mining’s Profitable Gem in Turkey
Marie Soukup
The Çöpler Mine is one of the largest gold mines in Turkey, and in the world. Business Enquirer lifts the veil on SSR Mining’s unique asset.
For several years, SSR Mining, Inc. has been one of the leaders within its industry. As a company, they have amassed great success in acquiring good, long-lasting sources of gold and other minerals to sell within the market. The company itself continues to leverage a solid financial report, and their free cash flow generation has allowed for profitable organic success. Using their district-scale land packages and reserves, they pride themselves on their superior returns to their shareholders in the stock market.
SSR Mining is known for its diversified efforts and portfolio, which spans the globe. With their home offices in Vancouver and Denver, this firm produces silver, gold, zinc, and tin and is currently one of the largest producers of these products. Furthermore, they also have the largest silver mine in Argentina. Since 1946, SSRM has had continual success, expanding its success to 14 different properties across the world. Their total assets are nearly $828 million, but they are likely only to grow further if they successfully explore their new mine in the Çöpler District of Turkey. From Turkey to the US to Canada, SSRM boasts solid returns and strong leadership focused on value creation for their stakeholders. With expertise in project construction mining processing, the company commits itself to great success, health, safety, and even environmental management. With their latest addition—the Çöpler Mine—SSRM continues to impress their shareholders and grow their company in exciting ways. For shareholders, their latest investment of time and exploration into the undiscovered regions of Çöpler District should be compelling and a sign of further profitability. Owned by SSR Mining Inc., the Çöpler Mine is part of the Çöpler District, located in east-central Turkey in the Erzincan Province. The Çöpler Mine is only 1,100 km southeast of Istanbul and 550 km east of Ankara, the country’s capital city. The mine itself is only 80% owned by SSRM, and it has been in operation since 2010. As one of the largest gold mines in Turkey and the world, their success and operations are noteworthy and imperative for the mining industry.
The Çöpler District is a prosperous region within Turkey with plenty of mineral resources and available areas for mining. Thus far, there are specific licensing areas that SSRM has purchased a stake in for their uses as a company. These same licenses areas will also be reserved to extract several minerals they produce as a company. At this time, SSRM has access to the Çöpler Mine, Demirmagara, Çakmaktepe, and the Mavialtin Porphyry Belt. SSRM currently licenses these areas alongside Kartaltepe JV. SSRM, as a leading, free cash flow focused intermediate gold company, has four producing assets that are spread out throughout the world between the USA, Turkey, Canada, and Argentina. In combination with their global pipeline of high-quality development and exploration assets, they have a stake and profitable investments worldwide, spreading from North America to South America to Europe and Asia.
Their profit-producing assets have allowed them to become an industry leader as a company. Currently, their four operating assets have produced over 711,000 gold-equivalent ounces up until now. However, with the further exploration of the Çöpler Mine through their operations and future goals, it is only a matter of time before that number doubles in coming years.
Much of the current operations that have been the most profitable for SSRM in this specific Çöpler District have been from Çöpler Mine. In this district portion, SSRM has acquired millions of tonnes of gold. Another important mine that has become a promising gem in Turkey for SSRM has been the Çakmaktepe Mine. This mine is only 50% owned by SSRM at this time. Regardless, the mine itself is located 5 km away from the Çöpler Mine infrastructure. These mining operations began in 2018, and the first phase was completed by 2019. Given that Çöpler Mine was first explored and extracted in 2010 and Çakmaktepe Mine was first entered in 2018, there’s still much exploration to be conducted for the future. However, SSRM has concluded that with more geological understanding, more appropriate resources and reserves will be collected, much that people assume to be of the same caliber and the same expectation as that of their first primary extraction mine in the Çöpler District. Still, even despite the need for further research, the Çöpler Mine has seen great success thus far in its operations.
To date, people estimate that the reserves contain about 6 million oz of gold, making this a profitable investment for SSR Mining and other firms within the industry. There are several assets and benefits to having a stake in this mine and its current operations. The mineral reserves recently totaled in December 2021 reached 4.3 million ounces of contained gold. This excluded their stockpiles, which were left separate from this end-of-the-year report.
Even beyond the millions of ounces of gold producing notable profitability for SSRM, this site demonstrates good numbers of gold mining production. SRM Mining reported that they could make 329,276 ounces of gold in 2021 at the mine site. In addition, each ounce of gold sold retailed for an average of $713 in 2021, demonstrating the beneficial investment SSRM created more than a decade ago that continues to pay off even in 2022.
With the presence of gold and copper-gold deposits at this important mining site, SSRM has a vision for the future that would involve extending its mine operations. However, as profitable as their efforts have been thus far, this is only the start of their future successes. Their recent report from the first quarter of 2022 revealed that their development strategy would be future-focused and targeted explicitly for longevity. Specifically, SSRM is targeting efforts beyond this first quarter towards their Mineral Reserve Case, which will incorporate maiden mineral reserves from another of their partially owned mines, Çakmaktepe Extension. In addition, SSRM has also announced that they are contemplating the construction of a copper concentrator to help process their Çöpler Copper-Gold sulfide ore at the site.
The focus on a mine-life extension will be conducted in the future through exploration, hoping to identify other potential ore that could complement their existing plans for extraction and profitability. In addition, drilling regionally will be undertaken to identify other sites that could be of benefit for SSRM’s goals and their vision for total access to every aspect of the Çöpler District.
One of the most critical projects that SSRM has conducted over the years has been the extraction of their Copper-Gold minerals. This project consists of their sulfide mineralization and the specific resource pits found in the Çöpler Mine. The Initial Assessment Case that was conducted demonstrated an estimate of close to one million ounces of gold from this project, and it would produce $218 million in capital expenditures. With an internal revenue rate of 60%, SSRM’s operations in the Çöpler District have certainly ensured significant profitability within this oasis of gold reserves.
Concerning their current operations and exploration of the region at large, the Çöpler District has plenty of available space that SSRM is planning to investigate further. These investigations will not only be necessary for discovering more mines to extract from, but they will also ensure that they maintain the profitability of their more recent operations and discovered gold deposits. As producers of silver, gold, tin, and zinc, it is only expected that SSRM will achieve its goals of finding further deposits and securing more success in this new region.
SSRM’s exploration licenses cover an area of about 17 to 25 km in size. With 80% of the claims being owned for Çöpler Mine for specific regions, SSRM will continue to uncover and investigate these crucial regions of this gold mine region. SSRM has a highly diversified portfolio that has continued to give them long-life assets with high-profit margins, so it is expected that SSRM will maintain, if not grow, their current profitability substantially upon their further exploration.
The Çöpler Mine is one of SSRM’s most recent investments, but it can quickly become one of the most profitable within its portfolio. Given the returns, they have found from the few mines that they currently operate and oversee, industry experts all nod to the continued organic and promising success of SSRM in the industry. If they find other mines to explore and extract from for gold and other resources, the Çöpler Mine will only add to their long list of good choices that has driven their continued success in the 21st century. With the help of their future endeavors and continued operations in the Çöpler District, SSR Mining can expect to see great success in their future and more promising productions regarding their gold supply. As for their stakeholders, news of the operations will only ensure that their investment returns grow strong. At the same time, SSRM has continued to dominate the industry for almost a century. Thus, even experts beyond the mining industry would likely conclude that SSRM is at the dawn of another significant successful investment.
www.ssrmining.com
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Posted Jan 31, 2024
Completed a complimentary article for Business Enquirer (BE Media) publication for Q2 2022.
