Perseus Mining Limited

Good morning and welcome to the Tertius Mining Investor webinar and conference call. All attendees are in a listen-only mode. If you would like to ask a question directly to the company, please use the raise hand function within Zoom. For those phoning in, dial star nine. Alternatively, you can ask a question in the Q&A panel within Zoom. I'll now hand over to Perseus CEO and Managing Director, Jeff Quartermain. Thank you, Jeff.

Thank you, Nathan, and welcome to Perseus Mining's webinar to discuss our interim financial report for the six months ended 31st of December 22. Now, I'm joined on this call today by my colleague, Leanne de Bruyn, our Chief Financial Officer, who'll take you through the details of the financial report that was released to the market yesterday. A little ahead of schedule, I must admit, but circumstances were such that we had little choice in that matter. Now, Leanne will also be available later in the call, as will I, to answer any detailed questions that you have about our financial results or indeed our comprehensive financial report or any aspects of our business come to that. Now, before passing to Leanne, let me just say that calendar 22 has been an excellent year for Perseus. In January, we reported our operational results in our December quarter activities report. In this report, we advised that for the December half year, our gold production had exceeded market guidance and our all-insight costs had come in lower than the market guidance. The financial report that was released yesterday translates that excellent operating performance into equally excellent financial results. And without further ado, I'll pass to Leanne to give you an overview of the results that have been achieved before handing back to me for some closing remarks and then a Q&A opportunity. Leanne, please take it away.

Thanks, Geoff. And it does give me great pleasure to present our financial results for December 22 half year. And obviously we've got the normal cautionaries and then we'll move on to the first slide. Gold production of 268,000 ounces this six months was in line with our target production rate of 500,000 ounces per annum. The 268,000 ounces exceeded the production guidance for the six months of 240,000 to 265,000 ounces. The all inside costs of US dollar 930 per ounce was below the cost guidance ranges for the six months to December of 1,000 to 1,100 US dollars per ounce. Our focus on achieving high gold price resulted in a gold sold at 1720 to four per ounce on average, which is largely in line with the average spot price for the six month period. And this continued good performance of the operations is obviously positioning the group well for future growth. Moving on to the fact that this all translated into strong performance across, excuse me, across all financial metrics. Revenue was up to $665 million Australian dollars, 22% on the previous comparative period. And this was attributable to sustained strong performance from Aoyare and Sasingi operations and a really strong improvement performance from EDICAN. It was also slightly helped by the 4% increase in overall price achieved of the 1724 per ounce. Profit after tax of 203 million Australian dollars was up 60% on the comparative period and was due to the increased revenues as well as our continued focus on maintaining costs in this inflationary environment. Operating cashflow of 300 million Australian dollars up 22% on December 21 and boosted by the strong operational performance at all three of our sites. net tangible assets increased to 1.4 billion Australian, up 38%, boosted by the increased cash and cash equivalents, which went from Australian 426 million to Australian $529 million. In addition, which we'll talk a little bit later, the Perseus Board approved an interim sustainable dividend. This then, solid increase in all our earning metrics, translated into growth earnings. Next slide, please. The revenue increase of 22% delivered a 40% increase in the EBITDA of 355 million Australian dollars. Gross profit from operations increasing 62% to 249 million Australian dollars, which included a 7% increase in depreciation and amortization on the comparative period. Profit before tax increase of 80% to 231 million Australian dollars. Income tax has increased during the year to 28 million, and this is largely due to the improved performance of our EDICAN operation, where taxes are now being paid, and dividends declared up on the Ivorian subsidiaries, which attract withholding tax. Our profit after tax is up 60% to 203 million Australian dollars. All of this delivering a basic earnings per share of 13.24 cents per share, up 46%, and an earnings per ounce, importantly, of 775 million, sorry, $775 per ounce, up 45%. Moving on to where we focus, which is on continued growth in cash flow. This year, we delivered a 22% increase in the operating cash flow of $300 million, which equates to operating cash flow per share of 21.95 cents, up 9.5% on the December 21 six-month period, and an operating cash flow per ounce of Australian dollar $1,117 per ounce, up 9.6% on the previous period. Our growth intangible assets, in the six months to December 22, cash and bullion position has increased 24% from 476 million Australian to 594 million Australian, or in US dollar terms from 328 million to 405, which included the repayment of $50 million to bring the debt position down to nil. Currently, we also have $100 million of undrawn liquidity in this corporate loan facility. The current balance sheet is strong and has total assets of 2.1 billion Australian and net tangible assets of 1.4, which equates to a net tangible assets of 1.03 per share. The trend of gold production remains attractive and as do our margins. And this slide sort of demonstrates the performance of Perseus and our operations over the last three, over the last couple of quarters. The 2022 calendar year was a record annual gold production for Perseus at 521,220 ounces with our operational teams at all three sites delivering to plan. The all inside costs pleasingly is 4% down year on year at US dollar $940 per ounce with our continued focus on containing costs despite the current inflationary environment we operate in. As I've mentioned, the average gold price was 1714 US dollar per ounce. And this in turn delivered a cash margin of 773 US dollars per ounce sold. culminating in notional cash flows of US dollar 402 million for the calendar year. Moving on to production and cost market guidance for the June 23 half year. Given consideration to the performance to date and for our forecast for the next six months, we've set our guidance for the next six months for the three operations, which overall is delivering production of between 498 to 528,000 ounces for the financial year end of June 23. And an all inside costs of between $1,000 to $1,100. US dollars per ounce for the financial year ended 23 with EDICAN and Yare offsetting the all inside costs for Satsangi as it transitions to its satellite pit operations, namely ramping up Fimbiaso and commencing the Satsangi stage four cutback. Then moving on to dividend declarations. The Perseus Board, in line with its dividend policy, has declared a sustainable dividend of Australian 1.06 cents per share, basically Australian dollar 14.5 million, equating to a 1% annual yield based on the closing share price at the end of December 22. In line with June 22, at the end of June 23 financial year, the board will consider special dividends above the 1% annual yield, whilst balancing capital structure and its capacity to fund corporate growth. That brings me to the end of the presentation. And I would like to pass on my thanks to our operational teams who have been the large contributor to this excellent performance. And I'll hand over to Jeff, our CEO, to close off.

Okay, well, thanks very much, Leanne. That was an excellent summary. I'm sure you'll agree. Now, before opening the floor to questions, I'd just like to make a couple of quick observations. The impressive financial results that have been reported, along with the similarly high quality operating results reported a few weeks ago, they don't occur by themselves. And we do have excellent teams of people deployed at all four of our operating sites in Africa. and in offices in Abishan, Accra, Khartoum and Perth. They're all staffed by people who've worked tirelessly to deliver these results and to do so day in, day out. Now, it is hard work and it requires a lot of tenacity, effort and sacrifice on their parts and on the parts of their families who support them, I might add. to achieve these outcomes. And I know that I speak for all of our shareholders and all members of the board when I publicly acknowledge the contribution that all employees have made. And I extend my personal sincere thanks to everybody. And I know a lot of our employees do listen into these webinars. Now, to my way of thinking, it's fairly clear that Perseus is in excellent shape as a company. It's true that it hasn't always been this way, but we have progressively transformed this company from being a junior explorer to a mid-tier gold producer, developer and explorer that consistently turns out high quality results. And we're building a very, very solid platform from which to face the future. Now, in this regard, not only do we expect to continue performing operationally and financially at a high level, as indicated by the market guidance that Leanne just mentioned, And certainly the results that we've delivered for the first half of this quarter support this statement. But we also expect that, you know, opportunities will come our way to continue improving, continue prudently moving along the growth path. I say prudently because there is no shortage of ways to invest our hard earned financial resources, but opportunities that create substantial value for shareholders are what we're looking for. And these are a bit harder to find. Now, we do intend to continue searching for these opportunities, though, and when the stars do align, we will execute as we've successfully done in the past. So Perseus has a very bright future ahead of it, in my opinion, and those of you who are existing shareholders, well done in backing your judgment thus far. And for those who aren't yet shareholders, Perseus is a company that warrants serious consideration if you're looking for a quality investment in gold. So thank you very much for your attention today. This brings our presentation to a close. And now Leanne and I are happy to take any questions that any of our listeners may have.

Thank you, Jeff. If you would like to ask a question directly to the company, please use the raise hand function within Zoom. For those phoning in, please dial star nine. Geoff, it looks like there's no further questions at this time, so I'll now hand back to you for closing remarks.

Okay, well, look, thanks for that. Hopefully the fact that there are no questions is an indication that our reporting is very clear and with no ambiguity. But in any event, thanks very much for your attendance today. And as I've said, we do look forward to continuing bringing you very solid results from this company going forward. Thank you.