Hecla Mining (NYSE:HL) Earnings Up in Second Quarter

Hecla Mining (NYSE:HL) reported earnings of $13.7 million, or 6 cents a share for the second quarter, beating estimates of 4 cents a share.

Revenue increased to $88.63 million, from $74.61 million in the same quarter last year. Last year Hecla had a loss of $0.9 million for the quarter.

Hecla Mining Company President and Chief Executive Officer Phillips S. Baker, Jr., said, “Our mines, operating management and orebodies combined with current prices allowed Hecla to generate an extraordinary amount of cash flow for the amount of production. With very low operating costs per ounce, our margin was in excess of $20 per ounce of silver which drove cash flow of $54 million in the quarter, the second highest in Hecla's history. This cash flow enabled Hecla to deploy financial resources to support larger exploration and development programs to build for the future. Importantly, we increased our cash balance during the recent quarter by more than $80 million to almost $200 million."

By-product credits allowed the company to have negative cash cost in the quarter, the reason margins were over $20 an ounce. Costs were a negative $2.41 an ounce in the first half of 2010.