Jerritt Canyon Operation Achieves Steady-State Production

VANCOUVER - Yukon-Nevada Gold Corp. reported that its wholly-owned Jerritt Canyon processing facility in Nevada has reached steady-state operation. After facing a series of challenges in reaching target gold production rates earlier this year following a planned shutdown in January, Jerritt Canyon has operated continuously over the last month processing an average of 4,112 tons per day. Jerritt Canyon is operated by Queenstake Resources USA Ltd., a wholly-owned subsidiary of Yukon-Nevada Gold Corp.

In the first half of June the plant has processed an average of 4,200 tons per day, 7% higher than planned production of 3,933 tons per day. In the past month including the first fifteen days of June, gold recoveries were over 12,000 ounces recovered to the CIL circuit, 11,218 ounces were shipped with the remainder still in plant inventory. At this level of production the Company is generating positive cash flow from operations as well as covering the maintenance capital required to continue to operate the facility effectively going forward.

A further increase in crushing circuit availability will be achieved by the replacement of an inadequately manufactured bucket elevator supplied and installed during the recent shutdown, which was the cause of serious downtime in the first four months of this year. Construction required to replace this component with two conventional belt conveyors is expected to be completed in July. A backup mobile crushing and screening plant has been installed and tested in order to ensure continued plant performance during the replacement phase.

On April 25 the Company received an order allowing it to operate both roasters at 110 tons per hour per roaster, an increase of 22%. This was an important step in the operation ramping production up to 4,600 tons per day by the end of 2012 and 4,800 tons per day in Q1 2013. The Company will be pursuing further increases in the allowed operating rate as the year progresses and the emissions technology installed is shown to be effective.

Randy Reichert, Chief Operating Officer commented, "Our team at Jerritt Canyon has worked incredibly hard to bring the operation to commercial levels. We are now seeing the results of this effort and the operation is in excellent shape to meet our gold production target for 2012 of between 140,000 and 150,000 ounces."