Below is part of a post I made at Chithouse today but it might be worth looking at again here as an offset to our existing debt.

From Chithouse post today:

As anyone can see revenue has started to flow and only the lead and zinc cons sold so far with the sale of the gold pyrite con to follow. This allows the mill produciton to increase output to capacity as it has freed up considerable storage space so revenue will be rising sharply. Of course this still leaves the approximate $25 million of precious metals in the tailings for the small 60 tpd mill to process and this is less than any existing debt:

Sept 11, 2008

Conclusion and outlook

While our current mineral inventory of over 200 million silver-equivalent ounces is already substantial, the company is of the opinion that there is considerable evidence of much more mineralization at depth. This view is based on the numerous amounts of data collected, interpreted and integrated into our MineSight computer program since the beginning of the year. With each successive drill hole, our geological 3-D model continues to gather high-quality evidence that further confirms the regional model. In essence, the deeper we drill, the wider and more richer the grades should become.

So why all the excitement by the company's geologists?

The deepest drill intercept to date among all our Velardena properties, hole No. 21, returned the best combination of assay results and widths of all the hundreds of holes we have drilled previously. Never before has the company encountered such a thick, four-metre, intercept of massive sulphides combined with excellent grades. Although there has been a few intercepts in other holes that yielded better grades, never had we encountered both excellent grades and width together as found in drill hole No. 21. The thickness is very important as it shows that the system is increasing in strength as we go deeper from the current workings, as predicted by the geological model.

We are currently drilling hole No. 25 and then hole No. 26 will immediately follow. Once hole No. 26 is completed, the company will commence deeper drilling by pushing holes 21 and 23 up to 200 metres deeper than they were originally drilled. Consequently, if our geological model continues to be correct, the company fully expects to find more of the same quality mineralization as we discovered in hole No. 21. That is, a rich, high-grade and wide mineralized vein/body at depth.

Sept 29, 2008

Several months ago the company opted to curtail the processing of mineralized material for a number of reasons including the fact that the company's mining efforts were beginning to interfere with its exploration activities in the region it was exploring at that time. Since then, the company's exploration has advanced to other areas and with the continuing strength in commodity prices, ECU resumed the processing of its mineralized material. The company's main focus continues to be on exploration and over the past several months ECU has reported tremendous successes with its exploration program and it expects to provide an updated NI 43-101 as soon as possible. Coincident with ECU's recent exploration successes, the company has been milling at its flotation plant in Velardena at an approximate rate of 200 tonnes per day (tpd) where it is generating a lead concentrate, a zinc concentrate and a pyrite/gold concentrate. The majority of the company's silver product is incorporated within the lead concentrate whereas the majority of its gold is within the pyrite/gold concentrate.

The lead and zinc concentrates can be sold to various smelters around the world. As such, ECU has secured the sale of its concentrates through an international broker who can package several small quantities of concentrates from junior producers and offer global smelters concentrate packages in sizes that can essentially compete with major producers. In this way, these brokers can negotiate more attractive terms with the smelters thereby allowing small producers to obtain respectable prices for their concentrate.

The company has sold MK Metals an initial inventory of 400 tonnes of lead concentrates and 450 tonnes of zinc concentrates. The shipments started on Saturday and will be finished this week. The total value of these shipments will be approximately $1.2-million (U.S.).

With regard to ECU's gold/pyrite concentrate, the company has conducted several metallurgical tests to optimize the net smelter return (NSR) value of the pyrite/gold concentrate. ECU is in the process of evaluating certain options for this concentrate and once it has identified the best option it will report it to its shareholders. ECU currently has a pyrite/gold concentrate inventory of 7,000 tonnes containing approximately 5,000 ounces of gold and 35,000 ounces of silver.

The ability to realize value for its concentrates is exceedingly important in that it provides additional integrity to the quality of ECU's expanding mineral resource. The company expects that the expansion of its mineral resource will incorporate the successful results it has announced over the past several months, namely i) the discovery of both the western extension (press release in Stockwatch dated Aug. 29, 2007) and the eastern extension (press releases in Stockwatch dated March 31, 2008, and May 28, 2008) of the main Terneras vein on the main Velardena property, ii) the discovery of a new vein at Chicago (press release in Stockwatch dated May 8, 2008) which provides continuing evidence of the exploration potential on the Chicago property, iii) very encouraging results at ECU's San Diego joint-venture property (press release in Stockwatch dated June 23, 2008) and iv) ECU's most exciting discovery this year, the massive sulphide lenses at depth (press release in Stockwatch dated July 9, 2008) which the company believes are located very close to the intrusive which created the source of mineralization for the extensive system of veins at Santa Juana on the main Velardena property.