Reports from mining companies in North Idaho suggest activities will increase in 2024.

Coeur d’Alene-based Idaho Strategic Resources, the company formerly known as New Jersey Mining Co., is having its first profitable year due to production at its gold mining operations near Murray, Idaho, says Travis Swallow, director of stakeholder relations and corporate development at the company.

“It looks like 2024 will be largely the same, with the same rate of production,” Swallow says. “Back-to-back years of profitability would be great.”

Idaho Strategic Resources reported net income of $404,000, or 3 cents per diluted share, for the third quarter ended Sept. 30, up from a loss of $1.9 million, or 16 cents per share in the year-earlier quarter.

Revenue also was up, totaling $3.3 million in the third quarter, compared with $1.7 million in the year-earlier quarter.

“It’s pretty rare to turn profit at this level of production,” Swallow says.

Gold prices are being buoyed in part due to an alliance of nations that includes Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa, he contends.

“As these nations are getting together and collectively moving away from the U.S. dollar, gold prices go up,” he says.

The market price for gold was $1,982 per troy ounce as of Dec. 11, up from the year-earlier price of $1,791, but down from a 2023 peak of $2,067 a week earlier, on Dec. 4.

Meantime, the market price for silver was $22.86 per troy ounce as of Dec. 11, down slightly from the year-earlier price of $23.39 and down from a high of $26.93 earlier this year, on April 14.

Looking to the coming year, Swallow says Idaho Strategic Resources plans to continue exploration of its holdings in central Idaho, where recent trenching indicates strong mineralization of rare earth elements. Such elements are used in technology, energy, aerospace, and defense sectors.

Rare earth elements currently are imported mostly from China, creating supply-chain and national security concerns, he says.

“We’ve got to do more resource definition,” he says. “Production will depend on permitting and how badly our government wants these elements.”

Hecla Mining Co., also of Coeur d’Alene, reported a net loss of $22.6 million, or 4 cents per common share in the third quarter ended Sept. 30, a slight improvement compared with a loss of $23.7 million, or 4 cents per share, in the year-earlier quarter.

Hecla President and CEO Phillips S. Baker attributes the loss in part to production and sales costs for producing gold at the Casa Berardi mine, in Canada; the suspension of the Lucky Friday mine near Mullan, Idaho, following a mine shaft fire; and earlier delays in key infrastructure projects that are being completed to ramp-up production at Keno Hill, in Canada.

“Our plans for returning Lucky Friday to production in early 2024 are well underway,” Baker says in a press release regarding the third-quarter results. “Hecla is already the largest silver producer in the U.S. and will be Canada’s largest silver producer when Keno Hill achieves full production.”

Hecla expects to produce up to 20 million ounces of silver annually by 2025.

The company also is transitioning Casa Berardi into an open pit-only operation, a measure that aims to reduce production costs compared with underground mining.

Bunker Hill Mining Corp., a Toronto-based exploration-stage company, continues its efforts to restart production at the historic Bunker Hill silver, lead, and zinc mine, in Kellogg, Idaho, which it purchased in 2021.

Sam Ash, Bunker Hill CEO, says in a November press release, the company has made “significant advancements toward an on time and budget restart,” which is anticipated in late 2024. The mine, which began production in 1891, has been closed since 1981.

Recent activity at Bunker Hill includes expansion of an access tunnel, installation of an underground compressor, and construction of shop space. Mill equipment that Bunker Hill has acquired and moved to the North Idaho site from a location near Metaline Falls, Washington, currently is being refurbished.