3 June 2015
Vancouver, BC - North American Tungsten Corporation Ltd. (TSX.V: NTC) ("NTC" or "the Company") announces a series of temporary layoffs of employees at the Company's Cantung mine over a six week period of time. Depressed tungsten prices have had a significant negative impact on operating results during calendar 2015. In addition, operating results have been negatively impacted by a number of operational issues over the last 30 days, the most significant being a power supply issue over the last five days which has resulted in the Company losing its ability to produce any product during that period of time. The Company believes power supply issues will be resolved this week.
The Company has implemented cost savings measures including the temporary layoff of approximately 80 employees, primarily in mining related activities. Given the standard rotational schedule, each employee will miss one work rotation of three weeks. The Company believes that it has sufficient accessible tungsten ore and ore stockpiles available to continue to operate the mill and ship product to its customers throughout the layoff period.
Management will continue to evaluate and implement measures to minimize capital expenditures and reduce expenses in the near term.
Kurt Heikkila, Chairman and CEO, stated "While our operational issues are substantially behind us, the depressed tungsten prices continue to negatively impact our results. Tungsten prices have been volatile over the last two to three years and we fully expect them to increase from their current level over time, but in the meantime, we will continue to reduce our operating expenses at Cantung. We appreciate the significant contributions of our employees and understand the impact that this difficult decision has on our employees."