From Michel Roy's interview with Bill Murphy, we have the following paragraph:

Using the converted numbers, from the database used by Micon but modified to remove the bulk mining in all veins excluding San Diego, we get new resources of 16.4Mt 3.48 g/t Au, 195 g/t Ag, 1.61% Pb and 1.97% Zn. Using recoveries obtained in metallurgical tests and current contracts (NSRs of 76% for gold, 64% for silver, 62% for lead and 41% zinc, which can be improved, I am 100% certain), we would get between $4.32 and $5.19 total cost per oz for silver-eq. and $279 and $335 total cost per oz of gold-eq. If we were to use the credit method, we would be negative in both cases. Also that was calculated using prices of $1,087 for gold, $16.82 for silver, $0.90 for lead and $0.87 for zinc."

From ECU's October 22 production news release we have the following statement:

Michel Roy, CEO and Chairman stated, “We continue to be pleased with operations at the oxide mill with tonnage running above design capacity. We have advanced our underground development in order to ramp up our sulphide operations and bring the sulphide mill up to its design capacity of 320 tonnes per day. Once complete, the two mills will be operating at a combined rate of up to 900 to 1,000 tonnes per day.”

I had previously known that the oxide mill's capacity could be increased based on posts by GWR, however this is the first time I have seen the company talk about higher tonnage in a news release. I do not know if the higher tonnage for the oxide mill is currently possible or if we will need to make improvements to the mill, but it appears that Michel is talking about 580 to 680 tpd for the oxide mill. Just for the fun of it, lets assume an avearge tonnage of 950 tpd going forward, with todays prices and the grades and NSR (net smelter return) in the narrow veins as described above by Michel. I have developed a table which projects future revenue based on these imputs.

To be honest, I figured revenues would be high due to high gold and silver prices, but these numbers blew me away. I think we still have some work to do to get the NSR upto the amounts used in the tables. Also of interest, note above in the paragraph from the interview with Bill Murphy that the tonnage in the narrow veins at this point is 16,400,000 tonnes (this will go higher). If we use the annual tonnage from the table based on 950 tpd, we have a mine life of 16,400,000/346,750 = 47.29 years.

Since our cost once we start running the sulpide mill at the 320 tpd capacity will rise to maybe $7 million per quarter, we could have annual profit of $65 million which is about 20 cents per share. Like I said, ECU has some more work to get to this point and the Q4 production and revenues will be interesting when they come out in Febuary. Even though ECU was the biggest silver stock gainer on the TSX yesterday, it looks like we have the potential to run alot higher thanks to high metal prices and better grades in the actual ore veins.

Also notice my cost estimate of $7 million per quarter. If we convert this to cost per oz silver equivalent we get $7,000,000/$23,025,150 x $28/oz = $8.51/oz. This is higher than Michel's estimate of $4.32 to $5.19, but I am including total cost including corporate and he is looking at the mine operation cost only.