Akobo Minerals Ab

the fourth quarter 2024 presentation for ACOBO Minerals. I have with me today Helge Rosfeldt, our head of mining and processing. Together we will take you through the latest updates from the company. Fourth quarter is some time back. We will try to focus more on the latest development and try to give you the information you're looking for. So, Akobo Minerals, what's new? Well, we are now officially an Ethiopian gold producer, a major step forward for the company. After 15 years of working on the project, so that's a great milestone and achievement for the company. We are the second operating mine in Ethiopia since the Legadembe mine opened in 1994. So that says a lot about what we have managed to do over the last few years. We've been there for 15 years. We have now a strong local foothold in the area. It's a nice place to work and we're operating on a daily basis every day all year round.

And again, the Segele mine is now in commercial production. Good morning.

Welcome to the fourth quarter 2024 presentation for ACOBO Minerals. I have with me today Helge Rosfeldt, our head of mining and processing. Together we will take you through the latest updates from the company. Fourth quarter is some time back. We will try to focus more on the latest development and try to give you the information you're looking for. So, Akobo Minerals, what's new? Well, we are now officially an Ethiopian gold producer, a major step forward for the company after 15 years of working on the project. So that's a great milestone and achievement for the company. We are the second operating mine in Ethiopia since the Legadembe mine opened in 1994. So that says a lot about what we have managed to do over the last few years. We've been there for 15 years. We have now a strong local foothold in the area. It's a nice place to work and we're operating on a daily basis every day all year round. And again, the Segele mine is now in commercial production. And it's based on the exploration and mining licenses that we have in the Gambela region and the Dima Voreda that you can see on the small map here, all the way to the border of South Sudan. A very nice area to work in. So the company has some strategic advantages. We have our exploration license with a world-class deposit potential. We still see a lot of potential within the area and more and more confidence as we explore the bigger and larger area around us. Of course, the high margin cash flow that we expect from the Segele mine is based upon our resource mineral estimates with an indicated part of 41,000 ounces. And as you can see, it's pretty good at 40.6 gram per ton. This is closest to the surface and it is the area that we are moving into these days. Total resource 68,811 ounces at 22.7 gram per ton. It's some of the richest gold in the world. However, of course, it's a small resource, but we are confident that we will be able to extend this over time. We do have a very modern and efficient processing plant established, and we do have in-house drilling capacity. So for the growth and the future of this company, within the mining license, we already see potential for expansion. That's something we will focus on in the near term to try to establish a wider area of mining. Of course, the Segele deposit, as I said, is positioned to deliver a substantial cash flow over the next few years. And in general, for us being the second producing mine now in Ethiopia, we are well positioned to become a key player in the Ethiopian mining industry. So for the latest key events, of course, the most important, our first ever revenue achievement and first quarter with revenues in our 15 year history. And coupled with that, the record gold price has a significant impact on the cash flow and the value of the Segele deposit from where we are right now. We have strengthened our cooperation with Sutton Global. They're working hard on progressing the vertical shaft project with the preparation for that, the design work and also the site establishment and it's all moving very well forward. We'll talk more about that later. We do have some leadership transitions. It's not unusual in our business that there are changes from time to time. So Helge Rosfeldt, he will pursue new opportunities outside of the company. Of course, I would like to extend my gratitude for all the hard work he has been doing. doing for the company over the last few years. It's not been easy, but he's been a strong supporter of the company, of the project and will continue to be so going forward. So we'll have to do some changes with that regard and what we're doing is bringing in Kobus Bilvelt. He has 40 years of mining experience and he's joining us from Sutton Global. He is already actively working in Ethiopia and I've had the pleasure of working with him in Addis for the last couple of weeks. It looks very very promising. Also some changes since we're moving from a project-based operation to a more steady state operation where we do the same every day and we're trying to improve on what we're doing every day. We have also decided to change our local general manager in ethnomining. So Tamir, who is a mining engineer, one of the first pioneers, actually, who started the mining in Ethiopia many, many years ago. He will take over while Tesfaye Medana, our general manager for the last four years, he will step down. I would like to, of course, commend his work of getting the Segele mine up and running. It's been hard work and it's very much appreciated. On the production side, we have produced 18.5 kilos of gold so far. We've started our cost covering, which of course is very important for us. Even though the first two months of the year was lower than anticipated, we don't see any reason to change or modify our overall ambitions. Helge will talk a bit more about this, but we're still in the early phase. We're still working to expand and open up areas on the ground. And with that, we will also be able to produce more efficiently and get higher grades out. On the financial positioning side, we are continuing our efforts to support the development on the vertical shaft. And we're focusing on securing funding for that. And we're looking at different options, being it strategic, industrial, off-take agreements, and more. So we will update the market once we have more information on that. I think it's worth mentioning now all the recent Ethiopian economic development. I've spent a lot of time in Ethiopia lately and it's an enormous development and activity that I see every day. This country is transforming itself again into what we thought it would be a few years ago, before the conflict in the north and before COVID. And I'm very, very happy to see the latest development, especially driven on the economic reform side. We've seen a successful currency flotation. That's not an easy achievement, but that has been, in my view, very successful. We've seen a huge reduction in inflation that is expected to continue. We've also seen the IMF and World Bank agreements coming into place that is also helping on upgrading and renewing the economics reform. There's a push for that. They have launched their own security exchange. That of course is in the early stage, but it will definitely enable future capital raising through equity and bond markets in Ethiopia and just expand the general economic activity in the country. Opening of the bank sector. Just last week, the new directive came. It's not possible for banks to get up to 40% foreign ownership. That will also strengthen the whole banking sector, connect it more to the national banking systems, and just improve the competition and financial inclusion that we see. Also important for us is the improved access to foreign currency. We are now able to pay our national suppliers from local currency being exchanged into dollars in the country and then pay them. This has never been possible before. So we are very, very positive with regards to the economic development these days. Even you see the economic growth here, estimate that some 7-8% last year in 2024. So of course, despite challenges, again, Ethiopia is making significant progress in economic reforms and creating more attractive