Perseus Mining Limited

Good morning and welcome to the Perseus 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. I'll now hand over to Perseus Mining Managing Director and Chief Executive, Craig Jones.

Thank you, Craig. Thanks, Nathan, and welcome to the Perseus Mining quarterly webinar to discuss our September quarter results. Firstly, it's an honour to assume the role of CEO of Perseus Mining following Jeff Watermane's retirement, and he's left a lasting legacy at Perseus. And I'm joined here on the call today by our CFO, Leanne DeBuren. Thanks, Leanne. And also let me just start by acknowledging the exceptional efforts of our teams across the globe who worked tirelessly to deliver another strong quarter of performance for Perseus. So the September quarter marked another solid performance for Perseus in a year where all of our sites are transitioning into new mining areas. Amongst the change, we delivered strong operational results and continued to generate robust cash flows at the same time as marking meaningful progress on our growth initiatives. Firstly, our 12-month rolling average TRFIR is currently sitting at 0.6, which is a very credible performance. From a safety perspective, we're continuing to focus on our fatal risk management process and our safely home each day engagement program as the key pillars for our safety approach. Our gallop production for the quarter was just under 100,000 ounces at an all in site cost of $1,463 per ounce. So whilst our production is lower than the previous quarter, it's in line with our expectations and in line with our full year guidance. Combined gold sales from all three operations totaled 102,000 ounces, sold at an average sales price of $3,075 per ounce, delivering a robust cash margin of $1,612 an ounce, capitalising on strong market conditions. The notional cash flow for the quarter was $161 million and we continued to build on our cash position with the quarter ending with a net cash and bullion of $837 million. The September quarter marked significant transitions for mining locations at Yarrae and Etikamp. Yarrae transitioned from the CMA open pit to the lower grade Yarrae open pit, and Etikamp's focus moved to the higher grade Nkasua pit following the completion of mining at the Agee and Fetish pits. And I'll provide further details on this as we progress through each site's performance for the quarter. Starting with Yarrae. As mentioned, Yarrae goldmine operations have transitioned from the CMA open pit to the Yarrae open pit during the quarter. Yarrae open pit is geologically more complicated than CMA open pit, and there's been a strong focus on improving grade control practices to improve reconciliation to account for the shift in geology. We saw a significant improvement in reconciliation over the quarter, with September's reconciliation being in line with normal tolerances. For the quarter, Yarrow produced just over 55,000 ounces of gold, which was 21% down on the previous quarter, but in line with our expectations. This reduction reflects the lower-grade Yarrow ore consistent with the mine plan, and we can expect to see lower grades associated with the Yarrow pit for the remainder of the year. Production cost for the quarter was $829 an ounce, with an all-in-site cost of $1,110 per ounce. The all-in site cost decreased by 6% compared to the previous quarter, notably due to a decrease in sustaining capital associated with timing of ongoing works on the tail storage facility, which was higher in the June 25 quarter, FY25 quarter. 57,000 ounces of gold was sold at a weighted average sale price of $2,959 per ounce. which delivered an average cash margin of $1,829 per ounce. Notional operating cash generated by Yarrow during the quarter was $102 million, so continuing to generate strong cash flows at Yarrow. Mill run time was steady at 94%, with gold recovery remaining stable as per the previous quarter at 94%. Reconciliation between the block model and the mill for the last three months is 17% positive tonnes and 10% negative on grade for a 5% overall increase in contained ounces. A final goodbye cut was taken in the CMA open pit, with the pit now being used as the access for the CMA underground development, which began during the quarter. The CMA underground will be the first mechanised underground mine in Cote d'Ivoire. And I'll speak further to the CMA progress later on in the presentation. At Eddicam, during the quarter, Eddicam produced 33,000 ounces of gold. The majority of the mining during the quarter was conducted at the Anchor Sewer Pit, following the completion of the AG and the Fetish Pits. The land access of Anchor Sewer Pit was mostly resolved during the quarter, with mining of the footprint progressing. There were some challenging wet conditions, from sustained rainfall that impacted the ore handling and dilution. resulting in processing of some lower-grade stockpiles during the quarter. Stripping was higher due to face positions and access sequencing of the PIP as mining areas became available. Production cost for the quarter was $1,232 per ounce, and an all-in-site cost of $1,603 per ounce, which is $121 per ounce higher than the previous quarter, and the increase is mainly due to mining costs resulting from high waste stripping at Inkasua. 31,000 ounces of gold was sold at a weighted average price of $3,337 an ounce, resulting in an average cash margin of $1,734 per ounce and a notional operating cash generation of $57 million. Mill run time and recovery were 94 and 87.7 respectively, largely in line with the targeted key performance indicators. Reconciliation between the block model and the mill for the last three months is 11% negative on tonnes and 6% negative on grade, for a 16% reduction in contained ounces. And this is mainly associated with the commencement of the Anchor Soil Pit and some of the challenging conditions that were experienced during the quarter. Plans are progressing to commence further cutbacks at the Fethish and Aswaja North Pits in the next calendar year, consistent with the plans we articulated in the five-year outlook in June. During the quarter, Sasingi Complex produced 12,000 ounces of gold and the Sasingi Complex results were attributed to mining and processing operations at the Sasingi Gold Mine. and mining operations at the Thimby Assay Pits located 65 kilometres from the Sasingi Processing Facilities. Production cost for the quarter was $2,458 per ounce and an all in-site cost of $2,745 per ounce. The increase in oil and site costs was a combination of increased royalties linked to gold price and higher production costs resulting from scheduled mill railway line and surge bin apron feeder maintenance and an increase in waste stripping at Vindy Asso West, Susindi Stage 4 and Airport West to access high-grade oil. 13,000 ounces of gold was sold at a weighted average sale price of $2,953 per ounce, resulting in an average cash margin of $208 per ounce and a national operating cash flow of $2 million for the quarter. Mill run time was 91%, which was down from the previous quarter's 96% due to maintenance activities, and gold recovery improved marginally to 90.9% from 88.3% in the previous quarter. Reconciliation between the block model and the mill for the last three months is 4% negative on tonnes and 14% negative on grade, for an 18% reduction in contained ounces. The lower gold grade performance reflects the continuation of higher dilution than anticipated when mining the narrow, variably mineralised structures of Sasinghe Main, Fimbiasso West and Airport West pits. The six- to 12-month trends demonstrate improving correlation, with gold contained now tracking within 7% of the block model over an annual period, and work is ongoing on operational controls to minimise dilution. Oil grade is expected to increase with the mining of the Antoinette deposit at Bagway, which is scheduled to commence in Q2 of FY26. Construction of the site infrastructure is progressing well and remains on schedule. All major contracts have been awarded and key contractor mobilisation is proceeding as planned. So looking ahead for FY26, our guidance remains unchanged. Gold production will be in the range of 400 to 440,000 ounces with production weight to the second half of the year. Our all-own site costs will be between $1,460 and $1,620 per ounce. So our guidance includes Yarray production reducing from this quarter, as we mentioned before, with all of the ore now coming out of the Yarray pit. And Sasingi will increase production with access to the higher-grade material at Bagway. Eddie Quang will also increase in production with the main source of the ore from the higher-grade Encosilla pit. So now I'll pass over to Leanne and she can talk about the financial aspects of the quarter.

Thanks, Craig. And hi, everyone on the call again. As mentioned by Craig, we have ended this quarter strongly with $837 million of cash and bullion on the balance sheet, slightly up on the June 25 quarter. The balance is after operating margin generated by our sites of the US dollar, $170 million. We've also spent on continued investment in organic growth at the sites about $14 million. Capital expenditure was in the region of $67 million for the period, which included $48 million that's been spent on the progression of the Niyanzaga development project and about $12 million on the CMA underground at Yareh. There's been continued investments in our host countries through the payment of a US dollar $29 million dividend payment, which was made to our government partner in Ivory Coast in relation to Yare and their 10% shareholding, and ongoing payments of taxes in the country. Included in this cash flow was also $11 million in the previous share buyback program where we purchased back $84 million in total, Australian dollars in total, of the $100 million Australian share buyback commenced in September 24. The share buyback was renewed in September 25 for another Aussie dollar, $100 million. We remained debt free with the US dollar $100 million facility undrawn in place. Looking at our hedge position, as previously advised, Perseus continues to evaluate its hedging strategy in the current gold price environment. Our hedging program focuses on maintaining downside protection whilst retaining as much upside opportunity as possible while still observing, as we do, prudent cash management practices. giving consideration to the rise in gold price environment we're in. During the year, and particularly during the quarter, we have continued to roll off existing forward contracts, reducing our committed hedge position. Since the end of March 25, we have reduced our committed hedge position from 24% to 14% of our three-year forecast production. In addition, during the quarter, we spent US dollar $1.7 million purchasing uncommitted put options at a strike price of about $2,600 per ounce as part of our capital allocation strategy, which seeks to maintain balance sheet resilience under a range of trading conditions. With that, I'll hand back to Craig to now talk about our organic growth across the group.