BCI Minerals Limited

quarterly update webcast. All participants are in the listen-only mode. There will be a presentation followed by a question and answer session. If you would like to ask a question, you'll need to type your questions into the ask a question box below the webcast frame and click submit. I'd now like to hand the conference over to David Bossoff, Managing Director. Please go ahead.

Good morning, everyone, and welcome. I'm David Bossoff, and with me is our CFO, Steve Fierstad. we're pleased to be joining you today for this June quarterly update. Before we get underway, I'd like to highlight that today's presentation should be read in conjunction with our June quarterly report, which is available on BCI's website. As we move through today's session, please feel free to add questions to the chat function and we'll respond to those at the end. It's been a strong quarter for BCI. We've progressed with filling the ponds, commissioned the first crystallizers and made solid progress across construction. Importantly, safety and our community remained at the forefront of everything we do. We are excited about the milestones that demonstrated the momentum we are carrying as we progress towards first revenue. This success is driven by our people and our contract partners who brings our values to life every day. The team has truly exemplified our value of winning as one team, delivering together. We are laser focused on delivering salt production by 2026 and proving up SOP. We're committed to do what we say. SALT is now in full operations and set to deliver $286 million on EBITDA every year. The SOP pilot plant work is also progressing well, targeting $99 million of EBITDA once in full operation. Cape Preston West Port also offers additional upside with potential third-party revenue from the spare capacity. Māori is already Australia's largest solar salt operation and the third largest globally. It is also the most significant salt and SOP development in this country in 30 years. Strategically located on an established solar salt region, Māori offers a difficult-to-replicate asset base with port advantages, access and approvals, as well as land tenure. We're targeting production of 5.3 million tonnes per annum, of high quality industrial salt. With its scale, coastal location and integrated port, Māori is exceptionally well positioned to meet rising demand across Asia. Now I'll take you through a quick update of our progress this quarter. In safety, we've continued to strengthen key fatality prevention controls, verified through over 250 critical control verifications. We also recorded over 500 field leadership interactions this quarter, and our total recordable injury frequency rate also reflects our ongoing safe operations, with a 12-month rolling average now at 2.3. Construction continues to run on schedule and within budget, with the overall completion now at 70%. I'll share more details on that later. This quarter marked our successful transition to full-scale operations and performance tracking to plans. We're now pumping seawater from both the primary and the secondary inward intake stations, achieving 77% surface inundation and moving over 146 gigalitres of seawater to the end of June. Importantly, we remain firmly on track for our first salt on ship in the December quarter of 2026. On the corporate front, we continue to strengthen our leadership team. Mari Cameron was appointed as General Manager for Operations based in Karratha, and Elizabeth Shaw has also been appointed as joint company secretary. During the quarter, we held an implementation committee meeting with the Wirrawandi Aboriginal Corporation. We extended our university scholarships with the Paul Brock Kimberley University Centre and continued our partnerships with Karratha Senior High School through the Positive Behaviour Support Programme. I'll now hand over to Steve to provide an update on our financials.

Yeah, thanks, David. financially, BCA remains in a strong position. We drew $115.4 million in the quarter from our syndicated debt facility, taking total cash drawn under that to $236.1 million. The next drawdown will involve all members of the syndicate. And now that we've commenced full-scale operations, which provides a clear pathway to revenue, we've implemented our treasury management strategy. We've now hedged around about half of the US dollars that we will receive from the sale of salt in 2027 and 2028 at rates between 64.2 cents and 65.7 cents, which is well below our targeted rate of 69 cents. I'd also like to share a little on our drawdown process with you. Our funding is for a 45 day period. and prior to each drawdown, we are required to undertake a project cost reconciliation and provide this together with an opinion from our lenders independent technical expert. Now, this opinion validates to lenders that BCI remains fully funded to be able to complete the construction of the project, as well as having sufficient working capital requirements to operate beyond that. Today, we've received approvals under this process to issue five drawdown notices. Now this test gives us confidence as we continue delivering on our project that BCI remains fully funded. It is also pleasing to see that our share price finished the quarter at $0.34. Now this is up 39% from $0.245 that we closed at March. And the catalyst for this rewriting was largely the approval to move into full operations. Now, we've since seen our market capitalisation move to a billion dollars, but that is still below the $1.1 billion we've invested to date. On the 1st of July, we also received $34.1 million from Polaris Minerals, a subsidiary of Mineral Resources, following the completion of the Iron Valley sale as was announced in June last year. David will now share more detail on the operations and construction progress at Marty.

Thanks, Steve. As mentioned earlier, we've transitioned to full-scale operations this quarter, and we closed the process off with 77% of surface pond inundation. At the end of June, we had water through Ponds 1, all the way to Pond 6, as well as Pond 8. And just after the end of the quarter, we've commenced pumping water into Pond 7, following the commission of Transfer Station 6-7. Additionally, just this weekend, we've opened the weir gates from Pond 8 into Pond 9. So we now have water from Pond 0 all the way to Pond 9. We've commissioned also several key other pieces of infrastructure. This included the secondary seawater intake, It included the first crystallizer, which we started filling with water. Also, transfer stations 2, 3, 3, 4, and 5, 6. We commissioned the site-wide SCADA system that's now fully installed to allow remote operations from our village-based control center. We've also awarded the fabrication of our salt harvest to Campco Engineering right here in Perth. And the manufacturing of that capital infrastructure is progressing really well. I'm pleased with how we're tracking with construction. remain on schedule and within budget. At quarter's end, crystallizer construction was well advanced with 76% already completed. The marine package for our Cape Preston West port also reached 91% complete. Also with the Pilbara Ports access road, that's progressed to 82% complete. As it stands, only two major contracts are yet to be awarded. The first of those are for the salt wash plant construction and the second for the dredging. Both of these contracts are either under design or are nearing award. Steve will now take us through the all-important financials.

Yeah, thanks, David. Look, I'm really excited about what's happening in the market. Now, having recently visited Indonesia and Singapore, what we're seeing around the medium-term outlook for high-grade industrial salt is there's going to be strong demand coming through the Asian region. Now, this is largely being driven by the effects of high energy costs and high labour costs in Europe. And as a consequence, the Europeans are being forced to close a number of their chloralkali plants. Meanwhile, demand for the chemicals that are produced in those plants continues to grow in line with global GDP. So consequently, we continue to see new plants being commissioned throughout Asia, and that's replacing that capacity that is closed in Europe. In fact, during June, I visited one of these plants that has been constructed in Indonesia. The pricing data for the June quarter was still being submitted at the time we prepared this report. And so we had incomplete data set in the databases that we use for tracking. However, early indication is that salt prices have firmed a little since the March quarter. I do note that anecdotally, Some of the salt buyers that we've talking to remain relatively cautious in the near term, and that's really been driven by the current geopolitical landscape. As discussed in our previous orderly, VCI wholly owns the Cape Preston West port infrastructure. Now this is a multi-user port that has been designed to deliver approximately 20 million tons of bulk commodity capacity. And that can be through the delivery of salt, SOP, and other products such as iron ore. At our nameplate capacity, Marty's salt and SOP needs are only around 5.5 million tonnes. Now, this leaves us with surplus capacity of around 14.5 million tonnes per annum that we could be running across this infrastructure. Now, this could be an important solution for some of the mine developers in the West Pilbara region who don't currently have access to a port. Now, by the end of June, we'd completed a significant portion of that marine infrastructure, with it now being 91% complete. The work that we've completed recently includes the jetty piling, the installation of the ship loader tower, and the boom during the quarter. And in fact, in the last visit, I was at the top of that salt wash, at the top of the salt stacker. Work continues on the small boat landing module. And still to come is a relatively short dredging program, which will take around two months, and that's scheduled to commence around April next year. And this is an important precursor to transshipping operations being able to commence. David will now step you through an update on the SOP pilot plant.

SOP remains an important part of our future. As a by-product of our soft-top rations, SOP represents a high-value sustainable fertiliser ingredient that is especially important to supporting food security in our country. Our full-scale SOP production is expected to generate an estimated EBITDA of $99 million per year. The KTMS trial crystallises are nearing completion and we're almost ready to receive the first KTMS brines for the SOB pilot plant. The SOB pilot plant design is also taking shape with construction planned to align with the KTMS self-production. Steve will now step us through the cash flows.

With its infinite resource and low sustaining capex requirements, Marty has the potential to deliver long-term annuity style returns. Now, when solar is fully ramped up at 5.3 million tonnes per annum, it is expected to generate free cash flow that is the equivalent of around 6.8 cents per share. And when we produce 140,000 tonnes of SOP, this lifts that to around 8.8 cents per share. Now, this also excludes any potential contribution that may come from the Cape Preston West Port. Currently, we're targeting first dividends around 2029, and we're likely to be in a position to fully repay the debt facilities for the salt operations in around 2035. I'll now hand over to David to conclude.

Thank you, Steve. As we close out this quarter and financial year, we do so from a position of strength. Winning is one team. Marty is a premium large-scale operator positioned to address a forecasted supply shortfall amid rising global demand. With 62% of our site production already under offtake agreements for the first three years, we anticipate strong annuity-style returns over its 60-year life. Combined with a potential upside from Cape Preston West Port and SOP, BCI is well positioned for a short runway to profitability and long-term sustainable growth. This brings us to the end of our presentation. We now move to questions. If you haven't already, please submit those questions to the chat box.

Thank you, David and Steve. So our first question that we have here, in your presentation, we heard pumping commenced into Pond 9 over the weekend. Can you tell us how long will this take to fill up?

Yeah, absolutely. So on the weekend, we open the weir gates. That's the gates that allows water to flow through the culverts into Pond 9. Pond 9 is the last pond in our pond circuit, all the way from Pond 1 all the way through to Pond 9. And this pond, we expect by the end of August to be at capacity. That means that at that time, all our ponds will be at capacity and ready for the evaporation process to start in the summer season.

Lovely. And you also mentioned that there were two outstanding construction packages. Can you share a bit more detail on these with us?

Yeah, that's correct. So both the salt wash plant construction package as well as the dredging package is not yet being awarded. The salt wash plant is at 30% design through one of our contracted partners called Sedgeman. sediment is making really good progress we've already procured all the long lead items and the construction of that facility is yet to be awarded i'm expecting that the physical the s p construction to happen early in the new year we'll start with civil construction this year already on the dredging component we're still going through a last component of our approval as the as you might be aware we've had full approvals to do onshore dumping however it's more cost effective and environmentally friendly to be able to do sea dumping close to our location. We expect those approvals to come through later this year, ready for dredging to commence in April next year. Now, Steve mentioned it's a short dredging program. That's because we've been able to optimize the volume. So I don't see any risk in terms of the dredging be able to commence and be completed on time.

Now, Steve, do you have a progress update on your transhipper?

Yeah, thanks. So our transshipping strategy is to use two different transshippers. So in the first 12 months or so, we're using a transshipper called the Osprey. It's a transshipper that's already been built. It's in China at the moment having some modifications being done to suit the application at Marti. Those works will be complete early next year. It will then relocate to Marti In or around July next year, it will go through a commissioning phase. The pilots will be trained. So we have a pilot exemption from the PPA. So the skippers will be trained. And so that tranship will run for around about the first 12 months. Annual capacity of that tranship is around 3 million tonnes per annum. In or around July 27, our new transhipper will arrive. And that transhipper will be what services across the 21-year life of that agreement. And that transhipper has around about 6 million tonnes per annum of capacity. So the new transhipper final designs are underway at the moment. And I would expect in about the next three to four months, the first deal will be cut and construction of that will start to really come to life.

Thank you, Steve. And I'll just remind you to please pop your questions into the chat box if you have them. Now, we've got a question here on expenditure. How confident are you at maintaining your capital budget? And are you cutting any corners to make it happen?

Well, we've made a lot of progress on the construction. As the audience will be aware, we are nearly 70% done in terms of progress. A large portion of our money. Therefore, the remaining risks to capital. Two contracts, the dredging. On the construction again. So I expect that to come in well under. The efficiency we're able to get in terms of savings is mainly due to productivity savings on earthworks. As you would expect, the earthwork is a very large component of our construction costs. And the main cost savings has been by things that actually does not change any outcome in terms of physical construction, but reduces the cost. Simple example, if you run with a scraper, your circuits are shorter, find good material close to your construction areas, that reduces cost, but doesn't change anything in terms of the quality and the construction finish. So all our construction that we've done has been able to meet or actually exceed some of the specifications. And some of those savings has been applied to bring forward some of the capital construction we've actually had planned for future years.

I might just add in on that as well, if you don't mind. As part of our debt facilities, we also have the banks appoint an independent technical expert. Now that expert, on a quarterly basis, goes to site and writes a formal report back to the lenders to give assurance to the lenders that we're building in line with the scope that underpins the debt financing. If for whatever reason we ever do want to vary that, we need to go through quite a rigorous process to have that independent technical expert sign off that any changes we make will still maintain our capacity. Firstly, we're managing the project really, really well. But secondly, everything we're saying is being audited by the independent technical expert as well.

Lovely. Now, we've got some questions about the Cape Preston West Port here. One in regards to agrimen who have a plan to build a very long road to a remote port. As part of the 14.5 million tonnes per annum surplus capacity of the Cape Preston West Port, will this be available to make Agroman a more viable proposition?

Certainly. If Agroman can get the economics on their project to stack up through the use of our port facilities, then we would certainly welcome them as a potential partner.

And you mentioned some other interest in the Cape Preston West Port. Is there anything more you can share about this?

At this stage, it's too early to make any comments. Suffice to say that anybody that knows or understands that West Pilbara region, there is certainly a shortage of capacity, existing capacity, and the ability to get approvals and the cost to build another port in that area is very difficult. So I would expect as more people get to understand what our capacity is and as we get closer to completing the project, we'll see a lot more inbound inquiries around access.

Now, on those inquiries, for those interested in the area, what's the process to secure that capacity?

Yeah, I think if you come through to myself, I believe my contact details are on a number of our LinkedIn posts. But certainly I'd be the first point of contact.

Lovely. And now I've got a question here about what keeps management awake at night. What are you currently focusing on and is there anything that's not on schedule?

Well, I think certainly a lot less keeping you awake at night now than it used to two, three years ago. I feel like we've We've narrowed down the amount of risks. That's outstanding. The last one that I'm quite happy with how we closed is the jetty construction, as you would have seen from the slides. We've made really good progress. Ship load is on and final S&P work is well underway. The two items that's outstanding is the salt wash plant and the dredging. Those are the two items that I'm focusing on. The salt wash plant, as I mentioned, we are actually managing those costs really well. The construction team has done a really good job in making sure we are building a fit for purpose facility. On the dredging component, while we have full approvals to do onshore dumping, and even if we had to do onshore dumping, that is within our current budget. the opportunity to reduce that and make it more efficient is important to me. And so we really focus on getting that sea dumping permit, which is one of the subsets of that approval. So those are the two items I'm focusing on. Then thirdly is, of course, the ramp up in first salt on ship, which brings us to the first revenue. The ponds are progressing really well. The next focus for us in this next quarter is progressing a lot more on our crystallizer filling strategy. And I'll certainly keep the shareholders informed on how to progress on that.

Thanks, David. Now turning to marketing and offtake, we've had several agreements in place for a while now. So what is your plan for the rest of sales?

Yes, so our target is to hit a minimum of 70% of each year's production, having been sold under an offtake agreement Two reasons for that. Primary reason is our debt facility is required, 70% to be sold. Second reason is we do remain quite bullish around the prospect of sold prices. So we do want to be able to have some product that's going into the spot market because we do see an opportunity to take advantage of those prices as they move up over time to be able to use the spot market to take advantage of that.

Thank you. And so you've spoken about BCI remaining within schedule and on budget. Can you share more about SOP and the next steps in that space?

Yeah, absolutely. So currently we have almost completed the KTMS pilot crystallizer on site. Now these are scaled down crystallizers. It's actually built in location right next to where the final location for the SOP plant will be. So that's progressing really well. We expect to put our first KTMS brines in that from next month, and that'll then be ready for the summer season to start generating KTMS salts. Now, you might recall in previous updates, we have already produced KTMS salts on site, but that was at a much smaller scale, more like a laboratory-style scale. So this will be an important next step to demonstrate to the market that we can generate high-quality KTMS salts on site at Mali locations. The next step is also then to continue our design of our SOP pilot plant. I'm actually heading to China to go and visit some existing operating pilot plants in the next couple of weeks. That pilot plant construction I'm expecting to start early next year. And then we want to run that pilot plant for at least 12 months to be able to capture a full cycle of the weather up at Mardi and to demonstrate we can generate SOP off that. When we commence construction of the SOP pilot plant, we'll be sure to make sure the market's informed about that. And then we will continue to verify those test results and ensure we can get a good outcome. I think the important point I do want to make here is our SOP pilot schedule is based on outcomes, not time. That's an important distinction because I want to make sure that we've verified all those different chemical outcomes and testing outcomes we need to make sure so that we can be confident that when we invest in the full-scale SOP plant, that is going to be efficient, it's going to be productive, and it's going to deliver what it's intended to.

Speaking about engineering and design, can you give us an update on the progress with the salt wash plant?

Yeah, certainly. So I mentioned in one of the early questions that we are 30% complete. We've already ordered the four key long-lead items for the salt wash plant. The design is progressing really well. We're now in the final stages of the SMP and electrical design. Once that's completed, we'll then start to award the earthworks package first. I'm expecting that to be before this calendar year, before Christmas, for us to finish the earthworks. Then soon after that will be the footings and then the actual physical construction. This plant is actually quite small compared to other plants that have been involved in construction before. So we're really focusing on production efficiency, so construction efficiency that will include modularisation of some of the components, but also to ensure that we've got an efficient supply system for those components of the plant to decide.

And, David, with the design of the salt wash plant, when we originally had the approvals put in place, my understanding is we're going to put quite a large, complex structure in place, building, What does the final design look like now, and to what extent has that helped in terms of managing our budget and perhaps getting a better cost outcome?

Yeah, so the original design had a very large elutriator, approximately 30 metres in height, and the location was based at the jetty. The problems with that, of course, is you've got a single production stream, so you've got a single point of failure in the production system, which makes it quite vulnerable. Its location was also close to the jetty, which in our areas, they're cyclone prone, which means you have to do significant footings and construction design, which it begins at cost. So we've moved it to the first fly that was about two and a half years ago. Additionally, we've lowered the height of the plant and split the production system into two streams. So what that means is if you've got maintenance on one stream, you can still run the other stream. So you only have 50% of your plant down. Or if you have a breakdown, which of course happens with all plants, you'll be able to run one stream while you're fixing that. So it increases your reliability and reduces your cost.

Lovely. Thank you, David and Steve. That brings us to the end of the presentation. If you have any further questions, we welcome them at any time. Please reach out to us directly and we will see you next time.