Continental Coal completes first export thermal Penumbra sales

Continental Coal has completed its first export thermal coal sales in South Africa, the company announced Wednesday.

Continental said over the past two weeks the run-of-the-mill (ROM) coal mined from its third operating mine in South Africa, Penumbra Coal Mine, and has been processed through the company's Delta Processing Operations.

Together with coal from the Company's Ferreira Coal Mine, the Penumbra coal has been sold into the export thermal coal market and was dispatched to the Richards Bay Coal Terminal on December 8th.

Additional export coal will be loaded and dispatched this week, with plans to ramp up the underground mining with the second 14HM15 Joy Continuous Miner and associated equipment delivered to site early this month.

"ROM production is forecast to increase with the commissioning of the second Continuous Miner in the New Year and up to 95,000 tonnes of ROM coal production is planned in the March 2013 quarter, before reaching the targeted quarterly ROM producton rate of 185,000 tonnes in the June 2013 quarter," the company said in a statement.

Continental's shares were at 300p, up 4.35% Wednesday, as the company has forecast sales of about of 200,000 tonnes of high-quality export thermal coal for Penumbra which is excepted to generate about $17m in revenue this financial year and to rise to about $45m in fiscal 2014.

RD