SSR Mining – Time to Buy after the CRASH?

SSR Mining (SSRM) is in the midst of a disaster. Their stock tumbled more than 60% after experiencing a landslide at their cash cow Copler Mine in Turkey.

In this video, I go over what happened, the extent of the damage, the risks that SSRM faces, as well as the potential reward that could come from this.

This is a tragedy any way you look at it. With that said, it’s our job as investors to look objectively analyze a company to determine if the risk/reward is weighted in our favor.

Disclaimer: As of the releasing of this video, I own shares in the company as a speculation. I may sell those shares for a profit or buy more shares at any time. Never make any investment decisions based on my videos. This sector is very risky and this should not be considered investment advice. It’s my opinion that SSR Mining faces an enormous amount of risks as of the release of this video. Always do a lot of your own research before investing your hard earned money.

#miningstocks #ssrmining #ssrm

As of recording this video SSR mining is down 60% in just a couple of days due to a disaster that occurred in Turkey I’m going to go over what happened I’m going to actually show you videos of what actually happened and then we’re going to look into whether this is a potential

Investment or something to stay far away from so we’re going to go into the risks that I see with this and also the potential rewards keep in mind this isn’t investment advice and this is just my opinion I based on my own research and you should always do lots of your

Own research before investing any of your hard-earned money and then after we go over the risks and rewards I’m going to talk about whether I would personally place bets on SSR mining today so this was a landslide that happened at their shop mine in Turkey it’s spelled Copler

So in this video I’m just going to pronounce it Copler but I don’t believe that’s how it’s pronounced in Turkish but anyway they have this Heap Leach pad there and what they do is they have basically Ally this ground Dugout and it’s lined so that the chemicals they

Use can’t leak into the ground and what they do is they place a bunch of ore here but they don’t just fill it to this line according to their feasibility study they actually fill it a 100 meters up or up to 100 meters and if you can

Picture a football field that’s a full football field plus one Endzone 100 meters is about 110 yards so they they put all this ore up here and then what they do is they leech the gold out using cyanide well what happened is there was some sort of slip that created a

Landslide and all of this ore went tumbling down the mountain and about one kilometer away is the Euphrates river that runs along right here now you can only imagine what kind of trouble they would be in and what kind of f they might face if this ore filled with

Cyanide got into the Euphrates so now let’s look at what actually happened this picture that you see right here this is the leech pad and now we’re going to watch a couple of videos of what happened from two different Angles w and this next clip is dash cam footage of somebody driving a mining truck where the landslide happened and in this clip you can actually see a truck it’s two trucks ahead that actually gets buried by the landslide but be looking at the top of your screen because that’s where

You see the landslide start spee foreign speech fore and this next clip is just a really short video of the aftermath And now let’s talk about the risks and why the stock sold off so much first of all there are nine miners unaccounted for in a press release it says they’re buried underground but I don’t believe there’s any underground portion to this mine so I believe they’re buried in the rubble

So unfortunately I I think the chances that they’re alive are very very low so nine miners unaccounted for and we can probably assume that they all passed away now of course we’re going to hope for the best and my prayers go out to the miners and their friends and

Families the next risk with this is that the same company at the same mine had a pretty significant cyanide spill in 2022 now they got fined for that and they were allowed to continue operating but will they be allowed to continue operating after a second big mistake we’ll see the

Next risk is that Copler is their single biggest mine and it’s their most important operating mine they also have a development project that’s very important as well but that’s not yet in construction and they’re going to have to spend a bunch of money to get that

Built as of right now this is by far their biggest cash producer next is the locals are pissed for good reason and there were actually environmental activists warning about the possibility of this exact thing and what they were warning about actually happened there’s already been a lawsuit filed against the

Company since this event happened and I’m going to read the translation of that right now it has been disclosed to the public many times by our association and it has also been revealed through the technical reports submitted in the lawsuits we filed and then they go on

With some other quotes that they had in previous law lawsuits that they had filed against this company in our petitions we repeatedly say although the buildings were mentioned in the expert report no questions or evaluations were included both verbally during the discovery and in our petitions regarding

The leech pile which was flowing before an earthquake in addition it is necessary to determine the dimensions of the area where both past and ongoing loading has been carried out in terms of Heap leaching and to determine the possible slips and flows that may occur in the future in terms of ground in

Order to clarify and dispute and meet our claims considering the experiences of the past year some facilities have experienced demolition slipping and flowing again the landslide disaster in the Heap leach field in recent months and the earthquake in the region reveal the extent of the risk and destruction

So these slips were already happening just at a lesser level something else I was really disappointed about was their press release the morning that this happened it reads SSR mining announces a suspension of the operations at the Copler mine as a result of a large slip on the Heap Leach pad this event

Occurred on the morning of February 13th at approximatly 6:30 a.m. eastern standard time and all operations at Copler have been suspended as a result to call this a large slip are you kidding me come on and I had to find out from Turkey Turkish news sources that there were miners trapped under the

Rubble I went on to Turkish news sources and I’ve discovered this not from their press release not the next day when they shared that but that same day that same morning I found out from Turkish news sources that there were probably nine minors dead so if I knew that certainly they

Knew that so how about a press release that reads something like there was a large slip at our Heap bleach pad that resulted in Landslide and now nine employees and contractors are unaccounted for and missing and buried somewhere under the rebel um search and rescue efforts are underway and more

People are on their way to help and all operations at the Copler M have been suspended as a result come on as an investor tell us what you know now for clarity I I was not an investor in this company when this happened but like if I

Were an investor that’s what I would want to know and that is relevant information that they most certainly had at that time of the press release I was very very disappointed in that in the same day that This Disaster happened they also released updated guidance for all their minds and also updated

Technical reports for the minds and as a result of that they were going to have a conference call to discuss those things despite This Disaster happening they continued with the conference call and I listened to this and I thought it was really toned deaf and like not allowing

Us investors to know any of the important stuff going on with what just happened at the Copler mind now I don’t have a transcript of this in front of me but in the beginning of the call they briefly mentioned it like oh the person who was going to be running this uh

Can’t be here because of what’s going on at Copler and there was a large slip on the Heap Leach pad and we’ll update you when we have further information and then they go on to talk about all their assets and the updated uh studies on them and whatnot and then at the end

When we get to Q&A they end the call they end the Q&A after one question about what happened about the disaster that happened I thought it was really weird that they even had this call considering what happened like it would make sense if they’re like hey we’re going to postpone

This for now sorry like we were planning to do this today but we’re not going to and here’s what’s going on with our Copler mind and here’s what’s going on with this landslide that happened and by the way they have yet to even mention that it was a landslide and in this

Conference call they didn’t even mention that their guidance might be affected by what happened today and also they were talking about how great their safety record was in 2023 on the same day this happens and you have nine people missing and probably presumed dead doesn’t look good bad stuff is going to

Happen with every company it’s inevitable eventually something bad will happen with every company but how you respond to it and how you let your investors know what’s going on is really important and so far I’m very disappointed with what they’ve done with that the next thing is Will Copler ever

Reopen and if it does how long will it take now I’m not smart enough to know but it’s obvious that locals are really pissed especially since people were warning about this experts were warning about the potential of this happening this could be a politicized issue and in

My opinion for good reason so will the government continue to let it operate I don’t know do they need to sell these assets to some other company and let some other company run them maybe and I mentioned assets plural well the Copler mine is in turkey and

SSR mining has a really really important development project called hod Maden and hod Maden is also in Turkey will the disaster at Copler also affect their ability to develop hod moden I don’t know maybe maybe SSR mining will be forced to sell off hod moden or something I don’t know

Another potential risk is that four people have already been arrested in regards to this one of which is the operations field manager there at the Copler mine now what does this mean I’m not sure it could mean that they’re going to be The Fall Guys and the

Government’s going to say hey look we’re doing something about it and we’re arresting these people or maybe for arrest is just the beginning of something much much larger and if it’s the beginning of something much much larger well then that could be a risk now let’s talk about the other side of

The coin this is a very evolving situation and actually after I record Ed that last part I found out some new information about these nine people who are missing five are expected to be in a container Hut now I’m not sure what a container Hut is but I picture a

Shipping container that’s turned into a place where you can stay maybe they use a shipping container turn it into a place where workers can take a break or something like that or where they can work from now maybe it’s something like that and if they were in that maybe

Maybe they were protected enough to survive that debris I don’t know but but that’s better than just them being outside and being crushed by all the rubble for sure so maybe there’s a chance and then a one was suspected to be in a truck and three in a vehicle so

Maybe there’s a chance to find them alive we hope and pray that that’s the case and the next super important point is that according to their annual report last year Well early 2023 they have insurance now I want to read you what it says in that annual report

Under the section of condition of physical assets and insurance it says we maintain insurance policies against property loss and business Interruption and Ure against risks that are typical in the operation of our business in amounts that we believe to be reasonable such Insurance however contains exclusions and limitations on coverage

Particularly with respect to Environmental liab ability and political risk I would love to see that insurance policy to learn in what amount the Copler mind is insured for and if this is a situation that might be covered because they had to shut down the mine

And they could have a lot of risks and expenses associated with this in addition to that lost Revenue but if they’re insured against all of that which is a possibility based on what it says in their annual report published February of 2023 well then they could be

Receiving ceing a huge check from the insurance company and in regards to how big of fines they might face now it could totally destroy the company if they faced fines in the billions of dollars however in that 2020 cyanide spill by the way I made a mistake

Earlier I said it happened in 2022 that was wrong it happened in 2020 and the mine reopened in 2022 but for that cyanide spill they were fined less than $1 million so if that’s a sign of future fines well then that might not have too

Big of an impact on the company but if the fine gets into hundreds of millions of dollars or billions of dollars well then that’s going to have a serious impact on the financial health of the company the next point I would like to make is that this Landslide it’s not

Like it went into a town and took out a whole town of people this Landslide went down into Barren land at least it appears to be Barren land where there’s not really anything there it went across a road but I think that’s about it so I

Mean it could have been a lot worse like if there was a town down in that Valley where the landslide happened well that could be really bad but it’s nothing like that another good thing is that SSR mining says that the ore that spilled down didn’t contain any cyanide so I’m

Not sure exactly how it went so maybe they were stacking ore onto the leech pad and they hadn’t yet introduced the cyanide to start leeching the gold out and if it’s true that there is no cyanide in that well then that eliminates the risk of cyanide getting

Into the Euphrates the next good thing is is that since this Landslide has happened there has been soil testing done by the company and by Third parties like an environmental agency in turkey and all of them are saying so far that no cyanide is being found in those tests

That are being done in the field so that’s a really good sign in terms of minimizing the Environmental destruction of This Disaster and the day this happened this information wasn’t available so that made me really nervous about how big of fines and how big of cleanup costs that SSR mining could face

In regards to this but if there was no cide in this ore and there’s no cyanide being detected in the stuff that spilled down into the valley that’s a really good sign that it’s not as serious as some people are making it out to be I’m not trying to minimize the seriousness

Of what happened but I don’t think anybody is going to argue with me that having no cyanide going into the water sources is better than having cyanide going into Euphrates and there’s a couple other really good points in terms of their financials one is that they have other profitable Minds so there’s

Still cash flowing even as all this happens because all this is happening at the Copler mine but then they have a few other mines that are producing cash every single day and in addition to that they have 262 million of net cash so you take their cash minus their debt and this is

What you’re left over with $262 million so they’re a very financially stable company so I think the most likely scenario is that Copler reopens sometime in the future will that happen I don’t know when will it happen I don’t know this is just my best guess I think it

Will happen if I had to take a guess I would say probably within a year but anything could happen and I could definitely be wrong but even even if Copler never reopens the company is trading at very very low valuations so now let’s look at the valuations the

Stock is very volatile right now but at the moment it’s trading at 475 USD and that puts the market cap at about $970 million however remember they have that net cash of $262 million so you subtract that so the market is valuing the company at $78 million and compare

That to the net present value of the company’s assets and that is $ 3.72 billion and that’s including Copler so with Copler included the company is trading at 19% of nav just 19% that is very very low for a producing mid-tier company but let’s assume Copler never reopens and SSR

Mining gets zero value for Copler in that case the company is trading at 34% of nav so that’s assuming cobbler will never ever reopen the company is still only trading at 34% of nav meaning that today buying the stock you’re basically buying a dollar for 34 so now let me

Give you my take on the company whether it’s a buy here or not the day this happened I was really worried about cyanide getting into the Euphrates and with that gigantic unknown I thought it was too big of a risk but now that we’re getting news and we’re getting tests

Coming back and it’s not just the company saying they’re not detecting any cide but also an environmental agency in Turkey saying they aren’t detecting any cyanide well then that’s a very good sign that that’s not going to be a problem and that was the biggest thing I was concerned about other than the

People losing their lives so since the stock price has plummeted and we’ve received that confirmation that there’s no cyanide being detected I would say yes I think it’s a buy here now I’m sure someone will say how could you possibly recommend this you’re profiting off of other people dying you’re profiting off of

Tragedy and you know what whether I buy stock in this or not it’s not going to bring those people back this event already happened and my action to today cannot do anything to change that the very first rule of investing that anybody learns is Buy Low and sell

High and in order to buy low that often means buying when there’s a tragedy or buying when there’s Panic almost anytime the stock price is super super low or the stock price of some company crashes is after something really bad has happened so if you can’t

Get past the idea that stocks are cheap when something bad happens I mean maybe investing isn’t right for you or maybe you can work on that to to try to figure out how you can get past that mental barrier because in order to buy low you have to buy when

There’s panic and when there’s Panic it usually means that something bad happened whe whether it’s something bad that happened with the economy whether it’s something bad that happened with that particular company anyway like buying low means buying when something bad happened so that’s the number one

Rule of investing and if you can’t get past that well maybe you need to work on that and if you can’t work on that well maybe investing isn’t for you I’m not in any way trying to justify what happened or trying to diminish the importance of what happened or anything like that I’m

Just trying to look at this objectively to determine whether right now it’s a good speculation or not and in my opinion yes it is if you found this video helpful please subscribe to the channel and next watch one of these videos that’s going to help you become a better Mining stock investor