Avino Silver & Gold Mines Ltd.

Thank you for standing by. This is the conference operator. Welcome to the Avino Silver and Goldmine's Q3 2023 conference call and webcast. As a reminder, all participants are in listen-only mode and the conference is being recorded. After the presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. To join the question queue, you may press star then 1 on your telephone keypad. Should you need assistance during the conference call, you may signal an operator by pressing star then zero. I would now like to turn the conference over to Jennifer North, Head of Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Please stand by. OK, I believe we have the presenters back on the line. Jennifer, please proceed. Sorry, please stand by.

All right, let's try this again. Jennifer, please proceed. Thank you, operator. Good morning, everyone, and welcome to the Avino Silver and Goldmine Limited third quarter 2023 financial results conference call and webcast. To join this webcast and conference call, there is a link in our news release dated November the 1st and in our news release of yesterday's date, which can be found on our website under news 2023. On the call today, we have the company's President and CEO, David Wolfen, our Chief Financial Officer, Nathan Hart, our Chief Operating Officer, Carlos Rodriguez, and our VP Technical Services, Peter Latta. Before we get started, please note that certain statements made today on this call by the management team may include forward-looking information within the meaning of applicable securities laws. Forward-looking statements are subject to known and unknown risks, uncertainties, and other factors that may cause the actual results to be materially different than those expressed by or implied by such forward-looking statements. The company does not intend to and does not assume any obligation to update such forward-looking statements or information other than is required by applicable law. For more information, we refer you to our detailed cautionary note in the presentation related to this call on our press release of yesterday's date. Please note that the full financial statements in MD&A are now available on the website under the Investors tab, then click on Financial Statements. As well, the full statements are available on Avino's profile on CDAR and on EDGAR. I would like to remind everyone that this conference call is being recorded and will be available for replay later today. Replay information and the presentation slides from this conference call and webcast will be available on the website. Also note that all figures stated are in US dollars unless otherwise noted. Thank you. I will now hand over the call to Avino's President and CEO, David Wolfen.

Thanks, Jen. Good morning, everyone, and welcome to Aveeno's Q3 2023 financial results conference call and webcast. Please note that the full financial statements and MD&A are now available on our website. On today's call, we will cover the highlights of the third quarter financial and operating performance, and we'll go over the work that we are currently performing, and then we will open it up for questions. I will begin with a discussion on operations for Q3, and then I'll turn it over to Nathan Hart, Avino CFO, to discuss the financial performance for the third quarter, and Jennifer North, our head of investor relations, for an overview of Q3 ESG initiatives. Please turn to slide five, where I have outlined the operational highlights. Our Q3 production results were released in mid October and we achieved production results of over 591,000 silver equivalent ounces, which brings the 12 month trailing total to 2.63 million silver equivalent ounces. We are currently pleased with the drill results released in July and September from a total of seven drill holes that included the best intercept in the company's history. In September, we reported four drill holes below level 17 at the ET area that included substantial widths at grades above our current cutoff grades. In July, we reported the best drill intercept in the history that showed 57 meters of true width of mineralization. Drill hole ET 2309 had exceptionally wide and very high silver, gold, and copper grades which is very encouraging for continued exploration of the Aveeno vein. I will expand further on the exploration program results later in the call. We have now completed our planned and budgeted drilling program for the year and drilled 7,545 meters in 13 holes. The pre-feasibility study on the oxide tailings project is currently underway and is expected to be completed early in Q1 2024. The dry stack facility is fully operational with the conveyor system installed, and we are now transporting the press tailings to the Aveeno open pit area. At the La Preciosa property, communication with the AHEDO group is ongoing, and we are fully committed to moving the project forward as it factors prominently into our five-year growth plan. Here on slide six, we show our Q3 production results. The production results from the Aveeno mine continue to be consistent. In Q3, we are mining in areas with lower copper grades and experienced lower recovery rates. The production results are as follows. Silver equivalent production was 591,000 ounces. Silver production was 237,000 ounces. Copper production was 1.14 million pounds. Gold production increased by 73% to just under 2,100 ounces. Mill throughput was just under 155,000 tons. Based on year-to-date production, the current timeline associated with processing material from La Preciosa, we have adjusted our internal production estimate for the full year to 2.4 to 2.7 million ounces of silver equivalent. Our five-year growth plan takes us from production levels of 2.4 to 2.7 million ounces of silver equivalent to between eight and 10 million ounces of silver equivalent by 2028. Turning to slide seven, I would like to touch on exploration results from the third quarter. 8,000 meters of drilling was planned for the year and we have now achieved 745 meters and the 2023 program is now completed. We released results of September 14th that included four drill holes from below level 17, and on July 5th, we also released three holes. Moving on to slide eight, the information from September 14 drill results are shown. As mentioned in the previous slide, we released the assays from four drill holes. We hit substantial widths at grades well above our current cutoff grade on all four holes. For whole ET 2313, there was 0.7% copper, 31 grams silver, and 0.21 grams gold, over 44 meters of true width. In addition, we have continued to define the hanging wall breccia, which is an offshoot of the aveno main vein that originates from surface. The access to the breccia is relatively easy through existing development works, and we are currently evaluating a mine plan to incorporate these resources into our medium-term plans. We were also surprised with the intersection of stockwork vein close to surface, which indicated the complex and distributed nature of the stockwork system that accompanies this thick main avino vein. The drilling completed in 2023 followed the continuity of the steeply dipping mineralization and helps in understanding the deep source of the mineralization. Aveeno has enlisted a number of world renowned consulting geologists to contribute to the geological understanding of the mineralization characteristics. The known depth extent to date of at least 750 meters of mineralization is significant. On this slide, you will see two images revealing the drill hole location and the cross section of hole ET2313, where you can view the substantial width of the Aveeno vein at the drill location. The full intercepts and drill data can be viewed in the news release, which is on our website. Moving to slide nine. This was very exciting for us. We reported the best intercept in the company's history. On July 5th, we released three holes from the program below level 17 at the ET area of the Aviano mine. And one of the intercepts drilled drill hole ET 2309 showed 57 meters of true width mineralization and is a step out of 50 meters to the west of Aviano's most westerly drill hole and 200 meters down dip below level 17. The whole assayed 296 grams of silver equivalent over 57 meters true width, including 407 grams of silver equivalent over 37 meters true width, and 2,866 grams of silver equivalent over 3.43 meters of true width. There are two images on this slide that the one at the top is the longitudinal view of the Aveeno vein showing the drill hole locations and the projection of the mineralization in red and the lower image is a cross section of the above mentioned hole ET23 and the down dip extension from the current mine workings. The exceptionally wide and very high Silver, gold and copper grades are extremely encouraging for continued exploration of the Aveeno vein and associated stock work. Breccia at depth and suggests a much more complex mineralization system. We are still open a long strike and at depth. At this time, I will now hand it over to Nathan Hart, Aveeno's CFO, to present Aveeno's Q3 financial results. Nathan.

Thank you, David. It's my pleasure to be on the call, and I would like to welcome everyone who has joined us and is viewing our presentation today. Turning to slide 10 for a review of the Q3 2023 financial highlights. All results from this quarter showed positive increases across the board in almost all key metrics. Q3 was the best performing of 2023 when it comes to revenues, mine operating income, EBITDA adjusted earnings and operating cash flow generated before working capital movements. Revenues for the quarter came in at $12.3 million, an increase of over $3 million from the previous quarter, as well as the comparable quarter in 2022. Mine operating income for this quarter was $2.4 million, with $5.3 million generated year-to-date. Cash flows generated from operations before working capital adjustments was $1.8 million, totaling $4.1 million for the full year 2023 so far. Adjusted earnings came in at $1.6 million, or $0.01 per share for this quarter, with the year-to-date total sitting at $2.6 million, or $0.02 per share. At September 30th, we did see an increase in working capital of $2.8 million, or 62%, bringing our total up to $7.4 million from the $4.6 million we had at the end of the second quarter. Coming to slide 11, I will walk you through some key additional financial results as well as the ones discussed in the previous slide. As noted already, revenues came in at $12.3 million, well up from the $9.1 million we showed in Q3 2022. As we move on from some plant operational challenges that affect the second quarter and part of the third quarter, we are looking for that trend to continue into the end of the year and on to 2024. We generated mine operating income of $2.4 million for this quarter, which includes non-cash depreciation and depletion, and is compared to $2.1 million in the third quarter of 2022. The increase is a result of higher revenues, which were offset by a very strong peso to US dollar rate when compared to the third quarter in 2022. On a cash basis, mine operating income was $3.1 million, representing a cash operating margin of 26%. Lavina reported the net loss after taxes of $0.8 million, or $0.01 per share, for the third quarter, compared to a loss of $1.1 million, or $0.01 per share, in 2022. EBITDA was $0.7 million for the quarter and adjusted earnings were $1.6 million, both showing significant increases for the same quarter year-over-year. Cash flow from operations for Q3 was $1.8 million before working capital adjustments, up from $1.6 in Q3 of 2022. Here on slide 12, you can see our cash costs per silver equivalent payable ounce for the third quarter were similar to last quarter at $16.90, with both quarters elevated over results from 2022. All unsustaining cash costs per silver equivalent payable ounce followed a similar trend, although we did see a decrease from the second quarter as it came in at $22.69. The increases for both metrics are in line with our messaging on our second quarter call, and as a result of lower production from mill recovery challenges, and lower grades arising from the planned mine sequence in the underground. On top of this, the Mexican peso appreciated up over 15% in the third quarter compared to the 2022 average. While we've seen an improvement on this front in the third quarter when compared to the second quarter, there has been an impact on our costs as the majority of all our expenditures are incurred in Mexico with local suppliers, employees, and contractors on site. We have put a number of measures in place for cost reduction, including lowering haulage rates to match the mill throughput, as we have generated a large ore stockpile over the last few months, as well as certain administrative and auxiliary personnel reductions. Now coming to slide 13, you can see our cash cost per tonne process for the quarter came in above the recent average as well, at 59.46. On an all-in basis, we were also up from our first two quarters, but we did come in below the 2022 average. Increases on a per ton milled basis are primarily a result of higher mining and haulage rates as we mined over 200,000 tons this quarter, which is about 30% higher than our milled tons of 154,000. As well, lower ounces produced per ton contributed to the increased costs as a result of the operational items mentioned before. So far in the fourth quarter, we have seen improvements to both grade and recovery, and controlling costs remains a key priority for Aveeno alongside our growth plans. At this point, I will now turn it over to Jennifer North, Head of Investor Relations, for an overview of our Q3 ESG initiatives.

Thanks, Nathan. Now turning to slide 14, we have listed our recent ESG initiatives for the third quarter of the year. These continue to build on Aveeno's efforts to incorporate the principles of sustainability and social responsibility. We have added members to the CSR team in Durango and the department is working to ensure that we continue meaningful conversations with the community that are close to the mine. The activities carried out during the third quarter under the new CSR management team were focused on improving relationships between each of the communities and strengthening the social bond while establishing a new social link between company and community. The activities carried out were as follows. In all of the communities, parents were offered summer courses for children aged 6 to 12. This summer program was developed to encourage and promote healthy ways to manage children's summer free time. Courses and workshops were offered in a number of different activities, including soccer, arts and crafts, drawing, taekwondo, and others. In total, 220 children from the communities of Panuco de Coronado, Zaragoza, and San Jose de Avino participated. In August, Aveeno's medical department conducted its annual first aid training for a period of six days with two sessions a day. There were 119 employees from the mine coming from different departments to learn and improve their first aid skills. As a high percentage of our employees come from the nearby communities, this training also benefits everyone in the adjacent areas. The goal is to ensure that all of our employees have the knowledge and skills necessary to be first responders in the event of an emergency. Also, the team put together several educational pieces to show our management of tailings, how we safely manage the tailings, what dry tailings means, as well as the testing process. Educational flyers and videos in Spanish and English have been posted to the website and shared in the communities. For environmental compliance and for educational purposes, water samples were taken at the junior high school in September together with the residents of the Panuco de Coronado community alongside company representatives to show Avino's sampling process. In addition, the company continues with its ongoing community roadworks and delivery of garbage drums and generally supporting in beneficial ways. In September, the company showed its commitment to the mental health of employees by commemorating World Suicide Prevention Day, where talks and support were offered. In addition, we are so pleased with the efforts of the CSR team in Durango as they were recognized for the second year in a row for the ESR distinction as being a socially responsible company. This designation is a reflection of the passion and dedication of the company and shows that not only do we extract minerals, but we sow knowledge to build a brighter future for generations to come. Every day, every action brings us closer to a brighter and sustainable future. The mine is more than a workplace. It is an example of responsibility and commitment to be in harmony with the environment. One of the top priorities for Aveeno is to provide jobs to those in the surrounding communities with the goal of fostering generations of enthusiastic and dedicated ambassadors of Aveeno. We currently have 448 direct jobs, which includes the workers at the mine site and in our Durango offices. This number of jobs will typically translate to three times the number of indirect jobs for services, consultants and suppliers in the surrounding communities and the Durango area. In September, I was fortunate to go to Durango and spend time at site in the offices talking about our strategic alignment goals that span across the company and communicating how we can work towards shared goals and vision. We have an action plan to inform, educate, and support all employees and community members to become ambassadors of Aveeno and that we will all benefit when community and company are aligned. The success of Aveeno is dependent on its people, profitable operations, community support, and a strong and sustainable future. I will now turn it back over to David to continue on with the presentation, providing our plans for the coming quarter. David?

Thanks, Jen. Moving to slide 15, you can see our plans for the remainder of 2023. We are now well into the final quarter, and the pre-feasibility study on the oxide tailings project is well underway. We expect to present the results to the market in Q1 2024. We are also focused on our plans for the Gloria and Abadancia veins at La Preciosa, with community engagement ongoing as we ready ourselves to begin development work. Equipment is being sourced and the environmental permit application has been prepared and we are finalizing it for submission. As we have mentioned previously, we are in talks for the social blessing with the HEDO group and this is something that takes time and patience. We will let the market know when this is finalized and in the meantime, we continue to negotiate in good faith so we may move forward with our plans. As mentioned earlier, our drilling program for 2023 is complete and we will be reviewing the results to determine next steps for 2024. Lastly, the main goal is to replenish the treasury from cash flow generation from the Aveeno mine as we look forward to the future development at La Preciosa and the oxide tailings projects. On slide 16, we want to re-emphasize the company's plans for growth we have three assets within 20 kilometer footprint totaling hundreds of millions of silver equivalent ounces on the same area we are operating a mill complex which is currently producing from the avino mine additional access to water power and tailing storage all ingredients to grow organically without the major capital investment required that would be that would expect if you were starting from scratch As you can see on this slide, our goal is to scale up by 2028 through the production from these three assets. Lastly, please move to slide 17, where we present our continued initiatives for growth, which are development, production, and optimization of La Preciosa, the tailings project pre-feasibility study, and eventual construction decisions. Developing next steps for exploration and drilling. Evaluating recommendations made by renowned structural geologists. We would now like to move the call to the question and answer portion. Operator?

Thank you. We'll now begin the question and answer session. To join the question queue, you may press star then one on your telephone keypad. You'll hear a tone acknowledging your request. If you're using a speakerphone, please pick up your handset before pressing any keys. To withdraw your question, please press star, then two. Our first question is from Heiko Ehle with HCWinrite. Please go ahead.

Hello, David. Hello to you, Gloria.

Good morning.

Good, thanks. Good morning, Heiko. Let's talk about La Preciosa for a bit. I mean, in our view that assets should really help grow for the firm in the immediate and also in the longer term, really. Given commodity prices, Mexican political climate, and just the general market sentiment that we're seeing, has your internal timeline for the assets shifted in any way over the past few months? And then just capital-wise, how much cash flow do you anticipate using for the site in calendar 2024, please?

Sorry, Heiko, you're not coming in very clear, I don't think. Can you repeat the question?

Is this better?

Way better. Thank you.

Okay, perfect. Let's talk about La Preciosa for a bit. I mean, in our view, the asset should really help growth of the firm in the intermediate and also in the longer term. Given current commodity pricing, the Mexican political climate, and just general market sentiment, your internal timeline for the asset shifted in any way over the past few months and building on that question just capital wise how much cash flow do you anticipate using for the site in calendar 24. uh well first of all the grade that we're going to be mining there is much higher than what we're mining now so we're excited about that the timeline

basically hasn't started until we get the blessing of the hitos which were we think we're in the eleventh inning we've gone back and forth they've been discussing at their assemblies so we think possibly before the end of the year we could have an agreement in place and there's above-ground stockpiles that we can start processing right away yeah on the on the cash flow side of things obviously as David mentioned we expect to generate a lot of cash flow from La Preciosa but as far as the development and paying for that

One of the nice things is we will be developing in ore as we start at La Preciosa, as we follow our mine plan. But as well, with Avino, we do project to generate cash flow in Q4 and continue into 2024. So we'll have some cash flow to invest in.

And the initial mine plan is on the Gloria vein, which is really close to the surface. So it's not going to be very expensive, and the above-ground stockpiles will pay for a lot of that.

There we go. The study on the oxide tailings project seems to be moving along quite well. I'm not sure if you can disclose any of this really, but have there been any impacts, positive, negative, anything, compared to what you had previously anticipated for the asset? I mean, anything that you've seen as the study is getting together?

Yes, Heiko, thank you for the question. A couple of things to note, actually. We have a lot of construction experience. That's something that we've done well with the expansion in Circuit 4 with the dry stack tailings. And that experience directly translates to accurate predictions in pricing for this plant. And that's going to be lower cost than typically what an engineering company would spec for this. We feel that we'll be accurate with our construction costs based on our experience.

And the big change is we went from looking at a heap leach to dynamic leaching, which is contained.

Yeah. So, I mean, if I just want to maybe summarize the changes that we've seen, you know, when we did that drilling, we also found a lot more material. You know, we increased our resource significantly, and that was updated in the resource. And certainly, you know, we'll have reserves here. that come out of this pre-feasibility study, and that will be forthcoming. I can't say too much on that. But that would be a big change. As David mentioned, the change in process from heap leach to dynamic leaching, and then finally our construction experience to really dial in accurate costs that are lower than industry average.

Fair enough. You may have noticed both of my questions related to things in the future. That's by design and not a coincidence, because I think the future potential is quite large. And with that, I'll go back to you. Thank you very much.

Thank you, Henko.

The next question is from Jake Sokalski with Alliance Global Partners. Please go ahead.

Hey, David, Nathan, and thanks for taking my questions. Come on, Jake. Hi, Jake. So just starting from a high level, I mean, the strength of the PESO is something that negatively impacted producers across the board in Mexico this quarter. I was just wondering if you can touch on that impact to cost and maybe on any hedging programs you have or you plan to engage in going forward.

Yeah, Jake Nathan here. So obviously you can see across all the producers in Mexico the impact this is having, even the developers or anyone really. So this is not something, you know, we did see this in the second quarter as well, probably worse in the second quarter actually, but then there's seen a little bit of an improvement in the third quarter. So we're actively managing kind of our foreign exchange rates, especially because, you know, we pride ourselves in spending a lot of money in pesos because we're with local contractors and suppliers and, you know, we have a 100% Mexican labor force down at site. So that obviously is something that does have a direct impact on us. As far as hedging programs, we do monitor and we are continuing to track projections for the peso. A lot of sentiment is that it will back off, but having said that, when we're going through our budget process for next year, we'll be looking at some alternatives for managing the peso, hedging being one of them.

Okay, that's helpful. And then just more of a housekeeping item, CapEx was just under $2 million in Q3. Is that sort of a baseline level we should expect going forward heading into next year? Or do you have any larger sustaining capital items that you see popping up over the next year?

Again, Nathan here. So for Q4, probably fairly light, ideally a bit lower. We do have some larger capital maintenance items we have to do, some overhauls of some equipment that'll be likely in 2024, but also looking towards La Preciosa, which, as you noted, isn't exactly sustaining capital. That's growth capital for us. We have acquired some equipment for that, but we will need more and as well obviously some of the cash flow generated from Aveeno is earmarked for development.

We got the most important piece of equipment, a new jumbo. Yeah, yeah. Driving the ramp.

Yeah, we have gotten equipment ahead of time, stuff that can be used at Aveeno in the meantime, but can be transferred over to La Preciosa as soon as we get the green light.

Okay, that makes sense. That's all from me. Thanks again. Thanks, Jake.

The next question is from Matthew O'Keefe with Counter Fitzgerald. Please go ahead.

Thanks, operator. Good morning. Thanks for taking my call. Just a couple of operational questions for you. First up on the, you mentioned you hauled out 207,000 tons to surface, about 3% more than you milled. What's the nature of those tons? Are they like low-grade, going to a low-grade stockpile? Are you building out a stockpile? Is it reflecting increased efficiency from the mining side? Could you talk about that a little bit?

Yeah, thanks so much, Matt. That's a great question. We have, so if you remember last quarter, we improved our ramp conditions and that's dramatically improved the ability to haul from underground. So we have been hauling, you know, the mine's been outperforming the mill, so to speak. And that's building a stockpile. And that would be actually high-grade stockpiles. The issue with some of this material, I shouldn't say the issue or the challenge with it, is some of those boulders are quite large. So we needed a rock breaker that is now on site to break some of that material. So in Q4, we look to be slowing haulage a little bit to draw down on those stockpiles, which will help improve our costs, certainly, as well as see some very good grade that go through the mill is what we're seeing right now.

Okay. Okay, that's good. And then just another question on the mill itself. I know you've made some modifications there, but in the last couple of quarters we've seen recoveries trend down both for silver and copper. Can you discuss that a little bit, and can we expect to see those recoveries move back up?

Yeah, I think the simple answer is yes, I think we can expect those recoveries and grades to move back up. And the reasoning for the decrease in grade is – We didn't have a piece of equipment, the rock breaker on site, to break some of the larger unoxidized material. And as a result, we had a higher percentage of the fine material was oxidized. So that has a two-fold effect. One, the grade's a little bit lower, and then the recovery rates are a little bit lower. And when you're starting with the lower grade, even if you have the same tailings grade, your recovery ends up getting hit a little bit. So it's kind of the double whammy. The nice... or the fact is that we are now through that material. We have the rock breaker. We're now breaking those larger boulders that have the higher grade material, and we're already seeing the higher recovery and grades.

Yeah, and the automation has worked well. It's just a few key pieces of equipment were delayed in arriving that affected certain circuits.

Okay. And is that oversized material common that you've had, or is that a function of? different ore or you need to work a bit more on some of your blasting?

That's a fair question. No, as far as blasting, we have a lot of rock mechanics consultants come in and we've kind of optimized the blasting. It's kind of the nature of the ET ore body is that sometimes you get some relatively large boulders in different sections. And so you need a rock breaker on surface to send some of that through.

The stock work systems, when they blast it, the shock goes down where the fractures are, and it just happens. We've had experts on site, as you said, and we've optimized it as best we can.

So we just get some slabs, to David's point.

Good. That's it for me. Thanks. Thanks for filling in those gaps. Appreciate it. Thank you.

Once again, if you have a question, please press star then one. The next question is from Richard Mangle, a private investor. Please go ahead. Please go ahead.

Good morning, fellas. Thank you for taking my call. I have a quick question in reference to wanting more color on the third group. And what happens if they choose not to sign? Does it go to arbitration or what actually happens?

Well, we're in the final stages of negotiations with them. Negotiations with them.

Pardon me, Mr. Mangold. Pardon me, Mr. Mangold. Could you please get your phone? We're getting feedback.

We're getting feedback.

Okay, sorry.

Is that better? Yes.

All right.

All right.

Yes. So we're in the latter stages of negotiation. They want the agreement in place, so it's just fine-tuning it. So it's eminent.

But I guess my point is if they choose not to sign, what happens?

They want to sign. They want the economic benefit, so it's happening. It's moving forward.

Okay. All right. Thank you.

This concludes the question and answer session. I'd like to turn the conference back over to David Wolfen for any closing remarks.

Thank you everyone for joining us on this call today. We're looking forward to a better healthy Q4, so stay tuned for some news from us. We'll have the pre-feasibility study completed in Q4, so hopefully we can get that news out to you before year-end. If not, it'll be early in January. So thanks again and have a great day.

This concludes today's conference call. You may disconnect your lines. Thank you for participating and have a pleasant day.