Vertex Minerals’ (ASX:VTX) share price fell 3.6% in lunchtime trades to 26cps, even as the company prepares for its first gold sale from a recently commissioned plant.

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The reason for the perhaps counterintuitive market response could have a lot to do with Executive Chair Roger Jackson’s forthcoming comments on the nature of difficulties with commissioning. (That, and, a photograph of what appears to be one fleck of gold on a shaker table.)

“The commissioning of the stockpile material has presented some challenges with the way the old stockpile material breaks down and has initiated intermittent blockages, which has hindered the commissioning process, which otherwise has gone very well,” Jackson said on Friday in the company’s release.

Between the lines, the first gold sales will come from weathered existing stockpiles left over by former mine operators at Vertex’s project. The plant, aging infrastructure to be sure, is also a potential issue for eagle-eyed investors.

Vertex is yet to get underground to the Reward deposit to start processing that material, which Jackson stated would be higher-grade.

“We are very pleased to know the feed grade material sampled from the stockpiles are averaging 2.40 g/t, which is consistent with previous test work and bulk sampling.

“It is important to note our main game is mining the Reward gold mine material, which is very high grade and hasn’t been weathered like the stockpiles so does not present these processing hinderances.”

Of the material Vertex is gearing up to sell, it has the option to sell other concentrate or dore bars, with the latter being a kind of ‘pre-bullion’ ingot with higher impurities but still fairly common.

Still, overall sentiment is bullish: The company is up +226% YoY.

VTX last traded at 26cps.

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