Westwater Resources, Inc.

Thank you for standing by. This is the conference operator. Welcome to the Westwater Resources, Inc. first quarter 2021 results and business update conference call. 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 one on your telephone keypad. Should you need assistance during the conference call, you may signal an operator by pressing star and zero. I would now like to turn the conference over to Christopher Jones, President and CEO. Please go ahead, sir.

Thanks, Ariel. And this is Chris Jones. I'm the President and Chief Executive Officer of Westwater Resources. And welcome to our call. This is our Q1 results call. And joining me here today are Jeff Vigil, our CFO, and Dane McCoy, our VP Ops. On to slide two. I want to encourage everybody to read the cautionary statements. We may be referring to forward-looking information during this call. Slide three. We continue to ensure the safety of our employees in the communities where we work, and in accordance with local and CDC guidelines, we've reopened our office in Centennial. We continue to ensure that our employees are permitted and encouraged to take time off due to illness or the illness of those around them without penalty. On the slide four, we continue to work with our business partners to maintain our advanced battery graphite product development schedule. Our pilot program has now produced over 13 metric tons of battery graphite in multiple sizes over all three of our products. We continue to work to ensure adequate financial liquidity to support our key operations and business activities. We have a cash balance of $118 million as of March 31st. And Westwater continues to proceed in its case for compensation from the Republic of Turkey. Our hearing is scheduled for September 21. We are on track and we request $36.5 million plus fees. And Jeff, I'm going to turn it over to you.

Thank you, Chris. Good morning, everyone. First, let's take a look at our capital position on slide five. Our closing share price on Tuesday, March 11th was $3.88, and with approximately 32.3 million shares outstanding, our market capitalization stands at approximately 125 million. Share price began 2021 at $4.93 and ended the first quarter at $5.37. Average daily trading volume over the 61 trading days of the quarter was 8.9 million shares. During the first three months of 2021, our stock performance was largely influenced by the continued ups and downs in the capital markets due to the country's continued reaction to news about the COVID-19 pandemic and recently about inflation and supply shortages. Share prices for electric vehicle and battery material equities were boosted in February by President Biden's executive order reiterating the prior administration's declaration of a national emergency for U.S. domestic production of critical minerals, including graphite and vanadium. During the first quarter of 2021, the company utilized its ATM facility with counter Fitzgerald and its equity line of credit with Lincoln Park Capital who raised approximately $72 million from stock sales. By taking advantage of this opportunity to raise a substantial amount of cash at a low cost of capital, the company is now in a fundamentally strong position to execute its budgeted business plan through 2022, including funding for the construction of phase one of the graphite processing facility. On slide six, We provide a financial summary for the three months of March 31, 2021. Net cash used in all operating activities was $4.9 million for the quarter ended March 31, 2021, as compared with $3.5 million for the same period in 2020. The $1.4 million increase in cash used was primarily due to increased product development expenses mostly related to our battery-grade graphite pilot program, and a $300,000 increase in general administrative expenses. The increase in general administrative expenses was primarily due to increased legal and consulting expenses related to the company's KUSA graphite project. Also during the quarter, the company spent approximately $1.5 million on legal and expert consulting costs for the ICSID arbitration proceeding. The key hearing in this arbitration process is scheduled for September 2021, as Chris noted. The net loss from continuing operations was $5.4 million and $3.3 million for the three months ended March 31, 2021 and 2020, respectively. The $2.1 million increase compared to 2020 was largely the result of the increase in graphite product development costs, general administrative expenses, and arbitration costs, as noted earlier, offset by the elimination of $1.1 million in costs from discontinued operations from 2020. On March 31, 2021, the company's cash balances were approximately $118 million. The company had a working capital balance of $115 million. On May 7th, our cash balance was approximately $116 million. These cash resources will be used to fund ongoing operations, fund development of the graphite business plan, and again, provide the capital funding required to build phase one of the commercial production plan. Finally, I'd like to welcome Steve Cates to the Westwater Executive Management Team as our Chief Accounting Officer. Steve has been designated as WWR's principal counting officer. Steve is a proven financial manager whose skills and experience will be instrumental in the upcoming stage of anticipated growth and value creation at Westwater. With that, I'll turn it back to you, Chris.