Effective from February 17, PureGold appointed Terrence Smith as chief operating officer, Bryan Wilson as vice president mine general manager of the PureGold mine and promoted Phil Smerchanski to vice president of exploration and technical services.
"PureGold represents a rare opportunity with all the makings of a long-life, highly profitable gold mine in a world-class gold-mining district. I have been continually impressed with the quality of the team in place and with the growth potential of the asset, and I look forward to stepping in to lead the next phase of PureGold's development," new COO Smith said.
On January 4, PureGold replaced Darin Labrenz with Troy Fierro as president and CEO, and Sean Tetzlaff with Chris Haubrich as chief financial officer.
The PureGold mine in the Red Lake district of Ontario had had a challenging time since production began at the end of 2020.
Gold production for 2021 stood at 27,437 ounces grading at 4.3 grams per tonne, which was well below the 59,000oz grading 7.0g/t that was outlined in the feasibility study for the first year of production.
The mine had issues with maintaining access to enough high-confidence, high-grade stopes to provide high-grade ore to the mill.
The company is targeting production at the mine in the range of 600-700 tonnes per day, or 60%-70% of mill capacity, for the first quarter of 2022.
PureGold traded on the Toronto Stock Exchange at C$0.73/share on February 21. Towards the end of 2020, the stock hit C$2.90/share.
PureGold had a market capitalisation of C$322.07 million.
