Gold Resource Corporation

Welcome to the Gold Resource Corporation's second quarter 2021 conference call. At this time, as a reminder, all participants are in a listen-only mode and the conference is being recorded. After the prepared remarks, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. I would now like to turn the conference call over to Ann Wilkinson, Vice President, Investor Relations and Corporate Affairs. Please go ahead.

Thank you, Holly, and good morning, everyone. On behalf of the Gold Resource Team, I would like to welcome everyone to our second quarter 2021 results conference call. Before we begin the call, there are certain housekeeping matters I would like to cover. Please note that certain statements to be made today by the management team are forward-looking in nature and as such are subject to numerous risks and uncertainties as described in our quarterly report. on Form 10Q and other SEC filings. On the call today, we have Alan Palmier, President and Chief Executive Officer, Kim Perry, Chief Financial Officer, and Alberto Reyes, Chief Operating Officer. Following Alan and Kim's prepared remarks, all three will be available to answer your questions. This conference call is being webcast. For those of you joining us on the webcast, you can download a PDF copy of the conference call slides from the materials tab under the Ask a Question tab. The event will also be available for replay on our website later today. Yesterday's news release issued following the close of the market and the accompanying financial statement and MD&A contained in our 10Q have been filed with the SEC on EDGAR and are available on our website at www.goldresourcecorp.com. Also, please note that all amounts mentioned in this call are in U.S. dollars, unless otherwise stated. I will now turn the call over to Alan.

Thank you, Anne, and good morning, everyone. I would like to thank the participants for taking the time to join us and to welcome Alberto Reyes, our new Chief Operating Officer, to the call. Following my opening remarks, Kim Perry, our Chief Financial Officer, will describe our financial results. I will then provide you with a picture of our plans for the balance of 2021 and a few closing remarks, and then we will be able to take your questions. Before discussing the operating results, we want to note that our operations team continues to demonstrate their ability to be nimble and adaptive operators, all while focusing on excellent environmental, social, and governance practices. Notwithstanding an excellent work culture, there were two lost time incidents at the Don David Gold Mine during the second quarter. While these incidents did not result in serious injury, measures are ongoing to reinforce adherence to safety protocols and to strengthen the safety culture. Accordingly, a series of programs are underway to improve the overall culture of safety. Turning to our infrastructure projects, We made significant construction progress on our filtration plant and dry stacks tailings project, which is targeted for completion in Q3. As we've noted, the dry stack tailings will accelerate reclamation of certain areas of the open pit mine, provide efficient storage of tailings, and importantly, reduce water consumption as approximately 80% of the process water will be recycled and available for use. During the quarter, we completed 156 meters of underground development on the northern and southern exploration drifts. From these exploration drifts, we completed over 3,400 meters of diamond drilling in 12 drill holes. Surface drilling on the Gila project is ongoing, with 2,069 meters of diamond drilling in two holes. Exploration activities were focused on the switchback vein system which extends for over a kilometer of strike length and remains open both along strike and down dip, as well as parallel structures to this system, most notably the Sandy Bane system, which is located between the switchback and Arista systems. Exploration drilling mainly targeted expansion and delineation of the principal Soledad Bane to define additional resources. As well, a step-out drilling on the parallel sandy system of Danes for resource expansion. Drilling is also targeting strike extensions of the Arista system beyond the current mine plant. We have also renewed our focus on near-mine exploration with surface geological mapping and rock chip sampling in the Cerro Colorado area, notably in the vicinity of the Kila open pit, and as well the surrounding area. with additional drilling planned for these areas in the second half of 2021. Turning to the second quarter operating results, I'm pleased to report that Gold Resource sold approximately 5,700 ounces of gold, 270,000 ounces of silver, 365 tons of copper, 1,200 tons of lead, and 3,200 tons of zinc. During the second quarter, we processed ore at an average rate of 1500 tons per day, compared to 1950 per day in 2020. While it was lower quarter over quarter, it was consistent with our mine plan for the year. The paste plant continues to provide substantial efficiencies by the returning of processing waste to underground workings as backfill. During the second quarter, we processed ore with average gold and silver grades 10 and 11% higher, respectively, in the same period last year. Overall, base metal grades were lower during the three months ended June 30th, 2021, as a result of a change in the mine plan necessitated by challenging ground conditions encountered in the first quarter. We are happy that these challenges have been overcome and our mine plan is back on track. With that, I will turn the call over to Kim to discuss her financial results.