Million ounces of silver, which is a gold equivalent total of almost 54,000 ounces of gold. As you know, in early August, we received approval from the Peruvian government for Inmaculada's modified environmental assessment, so the disruptions have ended, and we have started to catch up process in mine developments. Tonnage did increase in this quarter, and gold grades were also strong. Production for the first nine months of the year was just over 136,000 equivalent gold ounces. In Argentina, the San Jose operation delivered increased tonnage in the third quarter, which helped increase steadily to 3.0 million silver equivalent ounces, which brings the nine months total to 7.9 million ounces. You can expect the fourth quarter to be the strongest of the year.
Our production was 790,000 silver equivalent ounces, which is slightly better than the first two quarters of the year, reflecting higher than expected grades. The existing mining area is close to completion, and as we have stated before, we do expect to place the mine on care and maintenance soon. Turning to our Mara Rosa construction project, we have a strong quarter of construction, with the total project progress now at 98%. The processing plant at Mara Rosa is almost complete, and the operational permit is expected from the authorities this quarter, while we have already been given permission to commission the dry circuit. We began pre-stripping the pit some months ago, and we now have a stockpile of 1.5 million tons of ore for the ramp-up period.
We remain on plan and budget, and I look forward to give, to giving you a fuller update on our Capital Markets Day next month. Our broader exploration plans are exciting, but we expect the bulk of results from the drilling campaigns at Inmaculada and San Jose in the last quarter of this year and into 2024. On the financial side, we have approximately $114 million of cash, which translates to a net debt of $260 million and a net debt, the last twelve months, EBITDA of 1.12 ratio. The cash balance reflects the capital expenditure at Mara Rosa, but offset by strong solid cash generation in the quarter. We will also draw $60 million of our $400 million medium-term debt facility that we took out in December 2022 with Scotiabank and BBVA.
So to sum up, a solid good quarter of production, the gold of Inmaculada mine are for 20 years and continued strong progress at Mara Rosa. I hope that the team and I will see you many the next month at the Capital Markets Day in London. It will be on the 22nd of November. And with that, I would like to open for questions you may have for me or for the team. Thank you very much.
Thank you. Hello, gentlemen. Thank you. If you would like to ask a question at this time, press signal by pressing star one on your telephone keypad. Please make sure this function on your phone is switched up to allow a signal to reach our equipment. If you wish to cancel your request, please press star two. Again, please press star one to ask a question. We would also just a moment to assemble the queue. Now the first question comes from Richard Hatch from Berenberg. Please go ahead. The line is open.
Thanks very much. Yeah, good morning, Eduardo, and team, and thanks for the call. Just a few questions. The first one is just on Mara Rosa, on permitting, which is something which we've been watching quite closely with Inmaculada. You note that the operational permit is due to be expected to be received in Q4. Are you happy with that expectation? You know, having sort of seen expectations of Inmaculada having permits being promised and being missed. You know, are you comfortable that Q4 is deliverable, and what's the risk if you don't get it in Q4 in terms of ramp up? That's the first one, please.
Thank you very much for the question. We don't see any problem coming from the permits. We have a very close relationship with the authorities. We have already received some permits for commissioning, and the authorities are waiting just to completion of the plant, construction of the plant, which is close. We don't expect any problems whatsoever to get these permits.
Okay. Thank you. Right, but, but if you, if you don't get it, what is the, what is the risk in terms of the timeframe, timeline, you know, any, any kind of critical items there that, that make the, the, the biggest risk in terms of that not being received in terms of Mara Rosa reaching first production, or, or are you comfortable with the timeframe that, that you've got to, to deliver in H1?
Okay. Since we have very good progress at Mariposa, as you know, 98%, and we have told the market that we will start production on H1 2024, even if we wouldn't get the permit, which is very a very remote probability. I think we'll get a permit early in the year. Yeah, and it will not affect our guidance to the market in terms of the first production of Mariposa.
... Okay, thanks. Okay, and the second one's on San Jose. On your guide, I mean, your guidance is 6-6.3 million ounces of silver equivalent, 73-76 gold equivalent, attributable. I mean, on my numbers, it looks like you're gonna have to have a pretty big quarter to get anywhere near that, in particularly in terms of grades. You know, how comfortable are you that you are gonna be able to reach guidance at San Jose?
Thanks again. I mean, we expect to good grade on the fourth quarter. Yeah, and I mean, we expect to have a strong quarter on 20 on the last quarter of the year. So we know that we have, I mean, we have a not that good grades on the third quarter, but I have seen the production plans, and it looks like that we are going to get into areas with very good grades, and we will try to complete the, I mean, the guidance.
Okay. But happy with the guidance rate range as it stands?
For the moment, yes. We are very happy with the guidance.
Okay. And then the last one is just a bit on timing. So I think, you know, particularly at Inmaculada, sales volumes, particularly for gold, were a bit light versus production. And the same goes for San Jose. So should we expect to see a catch-up in some of those volumes in Q4? Or is there something else going on that we need to be thinking about?
Yes. That's true. We are doing a lot of development at the moment to try to catch up the delays from the MEIA. And that will be reflected on the cost, for sure. But we will try to reduce costs in every aspect, in order to, I mean, to complete the guidance, to complete the year, you know, accomplishing the guidance that we presented to the market.
Okay, thanks very much.
Richard, Charlie here. Just, just to sort of follow up on that, as well as that, I think generally every year our sales have always been pretty much in line with production, even if there can be, you know, spillover sometimes in from one quarter to the next. So they, they don't always match, you know, from quarter to quarter. But by the end of the year, I think if you look historically, you'll always see, sales pretty much in line with production.
Okay. Understood. Thanks, Charlie. Thanks .
Thank you. And as a reminder, to ask a question, please signal by pressing star one. We will pause for just a moment to allow you to signal. And we have a question from Camilla Jenkins. Please go ahead. Your line is open.
Good afternoon, Eduardo. It's Camilla Jenkins. I'm a private investor with Hochschild Mining. I just wondered for the capital market event, is that something open to private investors like me, or is it just for the business guys?
Charlie, you can help us with that question, please?
Hi, Camilla. It's Charlie here.
Hi, Charlie. Sorry. Didn't know if that was something open to-
I think generally it is something that's targeted in just really institutional investors and analysts.
Okay.
Obviously, look, why don't we talk offline and we'll see what we can do.
All right. That's one. And, a bit of a sort of cheeky one, really. I know we're hopefully getting a bit better where we are, but any sign of a dividend possibly for next year back on the cards?
Well, I think in terms of the dividend, I'm sure Eduardo and Marie Angel will have something to say about it. But, you know, obviously this year we had the permit situation.
Absolutely.
We were also building, of course, Mara Rosa.
Yeah.
As a result, I think we took a very prudent step, especially prior, you know, the full year this year or full year of 2022. We just, we realized, you know, the president of the board was not in a position to recommend a dividend. I'm sure that they will, you know, obviously, have another look at it in February, when they meet to discuss the final dividend. But obviously we need to complete, you know, our capital allocation targets-
Of course.
such as Mara Rosa, principally.
Yeah. No, absolutely.
And then the-
I was wondering if that was, you know, obviously something to be considered for later on down the line when things improve. So that'd be great. Thank you.
No problem.
And thank you. And as final reminder, to ask a question at this time, please signal by pressing star one. We will pause for just another moment to allow you to signal. As there are no further questions in the queue, this concludes today's question and answer session. And at this time, I'd like to hand the call back over to the team for any additional or closing remarks.
Okay, thank you very much for the call, and thank you for being here at this conference call. Let me say that we are looking forward to meet you all in November, on the twenty-second of November, on the Capital Markets Day. And we look forward to presenting, you know, the strategy of the company at that event. Thank you very much.
Thank you. This concludes today's conference call. Thank you for your participation, ladies and gentlemen. You may now disconnect.