Why did St Barbara (SBM) shares get smashed today?
SBM -9.02%: the gold producer was hit hard today with operational issues plaguing two of their mines. The company downgraded expected production for the year by around 8% to 330-360koz, and increasing cost guidance by nearly 10% to $1,547-$1,695/oz. The issues at their Leonora site in WA relate to a change over of mining contractors at the site with McMahon struggling to employ the required workers – a very typical sort of story across the contracting space in recent times. The operations at Simberi in PNG are also having workforce issues with the COVID impacts there causing havoc.