First Quantum Minerals Ltd.

Thank you for standing by. This is the conference operator. Welcome to the first Quantum Minerals Limited second quarter results 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 1 on your telephone keypad. Should you need assistance during the conference call, you may signal an operator by pressing star and 0. I would now like to turn the conference over to Benita To, Director of Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Thank you, Operator, and thank you, everyone, for joining us today to discuss our second quarter results. Before we begin, I will draw your attention to the fact that over the course of the call, we will be making forward-looking statements. As such, I encourage you to read the cautionary note that accompanies this presentation, our MD&A, and the related news release. As a reminder, the presentation is available on our website and that all dollar references are in U.S. dollars unless otherwise noted. Tristan Pascal, our CEO, is dialing in from Zambia and will provide an overview of operations and performance during the quarter, followed by Hannes Mayer, our Chief Financial Officer, who will review the financial results. Tristan will wrap things up, after which we will open the lines up for questions. And with that, I will now turn it over to Tristan.

Thank you, Vinita, and thank everybody for joining us today on our conference call. The second quarter of 2022 was characterized by increased macro uncertainty and an emerging global economic slowdown. This was most notable in China, where the continued zero COVID policy resulted in economic growth of only 0.4% through the quarter. The copper price, as a result, has declined substantially. It's currently down more than 30% from its highs in March. While I'm pleased to say that our debt position decreased by a further $476 million during the quarter and that our debt reduction target of $2 billion was also achieved, I'm very cognizant of the headwinds that may face the company with a looming economic slowdown. The debt reduction efforts over the last several years have placed our balance sheet in a better position to weather this slowdown. The company is in a considerably stronger position when compared to slowdowns of the past. And in order to build further resilience through these uncertain times, we will continue to target a further $1 billion reduction in debt in the medium term, which Hannes will speak more to in his presentation. We will also remain tightly focused on driving consistent operational performance, successful execution of our brownfield projects, and by taking a cautious and disciplined approach with our capital investments. This may include deferring on sanctioned projects if we deem it necessary. The brownfield nature of our current growth projects, combined with our in-house experience, will also serve us well, we believe, to navigate through these volatile times. After a slow start to the year, I'm pleased to say that we saw an improvement in production in the second quarter. We are making progress on catching up on the backlog of truck maintenance and mine development that was present in the first quarter as a direct result of COVID-19 towards the end of last year. This catch-up, however, will still take a few more months to completely resolve. However, we have made headway. In the second quarter, we produced 192,668 tonnes of copper. The second quarter increase in production was entirely attributable to Cobra Panama, which produced 90,800 tonnes of copper and achieved quality records in mining volumes, throughput and also in copper production, which was very heartening, highlighting the excellent operating performance of the asset. Increased plant stability and continuous improvement projects allowed for this record performance, and we remain comfortable with our annual guidance range of 330,000 to 360,000 tonnes of copper. Second quarter copper C1 cash costs averaged $1.54 per pound, 11 cents lower than the previous quarter as higher production volumes offset the impact of inflationary pressure for key consumables. It is also important to note that our exposure to spot thermal coal prices remains limited until the end of 2023 due to the coal collars in place. In Zambia, an extended rainy season into April and the lingering impacts of COVID-19 restrictions, while largely subsiding, did continue to impact both Sentinel and Kansansi during the second quarter. Here at the Sentinel mine, copper production of 52,447 tonnes in Q2 was essentially flat compared to the previous quarter. Sentinel's mine production was behind the planned schedule due to the extended rainy season and challenging ground conditions early in the quarter, which delayed stripping in the Stage 2 north wall and as a consequence prevented some access to higher grade ore. The second quarter was also impacted by low truck availability and a backlog of truck maintenance. However, the second half of the year is setting up to improve. Sentinel hit a record in daily mill throughput in July and progress has been made on preparing the pit for an improved second half of the year through exposure of good volumes of higher grade ore. We have maintained our annual guidance for Sentinel at 250 to 265,000 tonnes of copper, although production is expected to come in at the lower end of the range. C1 cash costs of $1.88 per pound in the second quarter was 27 cents higher than the preceding quarter, reflecting the higher input prices since the Ukraine crisis began. At Khonsanchi, copper production totaled 39,719 tonnes in the second quarter, over 2,000 tonnes lower than the first quarter. The extended raiding season did restrict mining deployments and required supplementing plant feed with low-grade stockpiles. We are currently installing additional pumping capacity, and water from the M12 oxide area is expected to be removed by the end of the third quarter of the year, which will provide access to the scheduled oxide and mixed ore beneath the water there. Additionally, we mine through a higher proportion of vanes material in the quarter, some of which comprise narrower and less mineralized vanes, resulting in higher dilution and lower overall grades to the mill. A new geological approach to these narrower and lower mineralised veins is expected to improve optimisation of the mine plan in the near term. Consanti is tracking towards the lower end of the guidance range of 175,000 to 195,000 tonnes for the year. Like Sentinel, Copper C1 cash costs at Consanti were impacted by price increases in key consumables. the lower quarter-over-quarter production resulted in a steeper increase in cash costs of 37 cents to $1.83 per pound. Speaking on costs, as noted in the last quarter call, the broader inflationary environment has been exacerbated by the Ukraine conflict. Resulting supply disruptions have led to an increase in most of our major input costs, and we have seen fuel, explosives, sulphur, freight, reagents and steel prices increased significantly, although they appear to have stabilised to varying degrees, albeit at elevated levels. Group-wide copper C1 cash cost averaged $1.74 per pound in the second quarter. For the first half of the year, C1 cash cost averaged $1.67 per pound, which is above the annual guidance range of $1.45 to $1.60 per pound. and costs in the second quarter averaged above levels assumed in current guidance. In recent weeks we have seen some of these cost pressures ease, such as fuel and sulphur prices, whilst electricity and explosive costs are tracking below our forecasts. Stronger production in the second half of 2022 should benefit on a per pound basis and as such we are maintaining our guidance from April. However, it should be noted that achieving costs within this range over the next six months will be dependent on the market rates for fuel and other key important supplies, and the market price of gold and our other by-products. Moving on to discussions in our host countries, it was very pleasing to announce that during the quarter, a VAT repayment agreement was reached with the Government of Zambia. First Quantum and the government successfully resolved all points of contention that have been stumbling blocks to progress the S3 expansion and the enterprise nickel project. This included reaching agreement in respect to the outstanding value-added tax receivable sum and an approach for repayment based on offsets against future mining taxes and royalties. With this agreement in place, the board approved the sanctioning of the S3 expansion project and the smelter expansion at Consanchi and the enterprise nickel project near Sentinel, which I will discuss in more detail later in my presentation. In Panama, there has been civil unrest in the country over increased cost of living and unemployment, which has led to protests and temporary highway blockades around the country over the last few weeks. Production at the Cobra Panama mine remains unaffected. We have been able to navigate regular supplies through roadblocks as they lift whilst perils to our site are unaffected. We also receive supplies, including fuel, through our wholly-owned international port, which has not been interrupted. With regards to our workforce, which has not taken part in the protest, we are monitoring labour relations closely and we have transportation plans in place to move our workers safely to and from site. We are also employing effective work-from-home arrangements for all support departments. we will continue to monitor the evolving situation closely. Whilst discussions regarding Law 9 are still ongoing, the finalisation of the agreement has been delayed to an extent as the Government replaced the responsible Minister of Commerce and more recently has been naturally focused on resolving the civil disturbances. First Quantum and the Government of Panama remain committed to a swift conclusion of the Law 9 discussions on the basis of the agreed principles and on ensuring that the new contract and legislation are both durable and sustainable with downside copper price and production scenarios. With the publication of our 2021 ESG report this quarter, we continue to deliver on our commitments on the development of the reporting on our ESG performance to our stakeholders. This is our fifth annual report on ESG and highlights the performance of the company across a range of environmental, health and safety, social and governance areas of our business. We also published our 2021 Tax Transparency Report during the quarter. This report underlines the importance that we place on transparency initiatives which provide stakeholders with clear information on the contributions that First Quantum makes to our host governments. I would also like to highlight the positive impacts that we've had on our community initiatives, particularly the EDGE program which was launched by our Trident colleagues in June. Parts of Africa have the highest rates of gender-based violence, and the goal of this program is to enhance each girl's access to education and training opportunities by helping them to stay in school. At the launch of this program, we donated thousands of essential feminine hygiene projects at Jeundu, and we will continue to do this and see that it is expanded to other schools in the surrounding communities. Working with our local communities continues to be a core value at First Quantum, and I'm proud of the trial team for this initiative. And with that, I'll turn things over to Hannes.