St Barbara Ltd.

Uh, welcome to the podium, Andrew. Thank you. Uh, thank you very much. Um, so yeah, uh, good to be speaking at a quite transformational time for St. Barbara. Uh, I'll just flick through. Um, I'll be referring to statements from our pre-feasibility study. So please remember that we're talking about we've done our best work on the best information available, um, but they are forward-looking statements. So just a, just a, a few things to remember when you're thinking about St. Barbara now. So market cap's around about one billion dollars, uh, with one point two billion shares on issue. So we've got four hundred and twenty-seven million dollars in the bank, uh, at the end of August. And I'll come back to, uh, the announcement of our, of our transaction on Simberi in, in a, in a minute, wh-which will dramatically change that pro forma cash position. But just keep in mind, so one, one billion dollar Australian market cap as we walk through, uh, the value. So we've just recently, at the start of this month, announced, um, the sale of our remaining share of, um, Simberi. We announced earlier this year when we closed the first half, uh, the close of the first tranche of the sale. Um, we sold that for three hundred and eighty-nine million dollars, and that, that put us in a position to be fully funded to move the project forward. Um, since then, uh, Lingbao, our partner, came back-- came forward with another, another proposal to acquire the asset outright. So we'll receive another four hundred and fifty-three million dollars in cash, plus a two point seven five percent royalty on gold and silver produced from the future of the project. If you do an NPV on that at around four thousand dollars, that's about another two hundred million dollars of value. Um, so that, that-- As much as we love this asset, Lingbao loves the asset a lot, um, as well. It allows us to simplify our business and focus on the, on the, on the Nova Scotia development assets. But it certainly puts us in a strong position where we're more than fully funded for the-- uh, for our future aspirations. Um, so, so well-funded that we've actually indicated to the market with that when we close this deal, we'll add another thirteen cent per share, fully franked dividend, uh, on top of the five cent per share, fully franked dividend that we're paying out this month. So we'll be, uh, returning, uh, eighteen cents fully franked, uh, within a twelve-month period as a, as a project developer, which is, uh, makes us a little unique. We've still got a strong, a strong leadership team, uh, running this from Perth. So I won't go through everybody, but just, um, so we're not re-- we're not building a team at this stage. We've got the full support across finance, um, the technical oversight, and the exploration support. And I'll come back to, though, our Nova Scotia team later. So coming back to that cash position. So I mentioned at the open, so four hundred and twenty-seven million dollars in cash at the end of August. Four hundred and fifty-three million dollars of cash, uh, from the, from the Lingbao's, uh, transaction for the sale of our remaining half. So we're looking at pro forma eight hundred and eighty million dollars and thereabouts, plus, uh, plus the monetization potential value of, of our royalty. So that's more than we're gonna need for the, the Nova Scotia project. So, uh, as I said, we're, we're looking to just, um, to reward the shareholders with these dividends. Um, that'll make up about two hundred and twenty million dollars of that eight hundred and eighty, um, we'll be returning in fully franked dividends. We've also indicated that, you know, given that our, our pro forma cash position is pretty close to our market capitalization, uh, once we're clear of this, uh, of the-- having announced the updated PFS, uh, and update our quarterly for September, um, we'll be in a position to start that buyback program. So that leaves us with Nova Scotia. So we're really excited by Nova Scotia and the, and the simplified story we've got. Uh, for those not familiar, where it comprises the Tukoy restart. So we had to shut the Tukoy operation back in two thousand and twenty-three. Um, permitting situation in Nova Scotia has trans-- it's been transformed with the restructure of the regulator. Um, and it's something that took us two and a half years, um, of trying back in two thousand eleven-- Sorry, two thousand twenty-one to two thousand twenty-three. Um, this year we've been able to get that approval to restart operations at Tukoy in, in around about two months. So that's, uh, we had-- we kept the plant on fairly good care and maintenance, but now we're in a position to, uh, refurbish that quickly, and we'll be up and running by the end of this calendar year. But the bigger project and the bigger value concept is the Fifteen Mile mine, the old Mitchell mine, and the old Austin mine, and I'll cover those off as we walk through. So execution team, so always important. Um, lots of developers don't have the execution team in place. Uh, but we, we closed this operation back in two thousand and twenty-three, but kept, um, kept the key, the key people that could rebuild the project. So Craig Hudson on the left, uh, he was in charge of the devel-- uh, the construction of Tukoy back in two thousand and eighteen. And on the right-hand side there, Adam, uh, he was the plant manager for the, uh, for the Tukoy operation. So they were the two that, uh, both led the construction and then the commissioning. So they're in charge now of the, the recommissioning and then the relocation that we'll do of that Tukoy plant. Andrew Taylor was the general manager of operations. Uh, we kept him on during care and maintenance and the rehab program. And so he's, uh, he's still in place, so we've got the general manager to continue operations. Off-- Not on the screen, we kept the, um, uh, the superintendent of the mining. We kept the finance manager. Uh, so we've got, we've got a team that we could rebuild around, and so we'll be up and running by the end of December, uh, with that team. So this is the project status. Uh, we got the, uh, the Tukoy restart PFS completed earlier. We got the permit, so that's all up and running. On Fifteen Mile, just yesterday, we announced the processing hub, uh, PFS update, which I'll go through. And we also have been explaining our, uh, bolstered exploration pipeline. The upcoming milestones, so Tukoy restart, as I said, that'll be up and running by the end of December. Uh, we've got a, we've got a, um, an opening ceremony planned in November, so that'll be embarrassing for me if we're not already started throughput by then. And on the 15 Mile project, any day now, we're expecting an up- uh, an advice from the federal, um, federal government of Canada as to whether they will be, uh, requiring a, a parallel federal impact assessment. We're expecting, given the federal government's policy on, uh, one project, one review, um, that they'll be leaving this to the, to the provincial government to permit. Uh, and then next step for us, um, we've brought forward and accelerated the processing of the feasibility study. So we're now targeting to finish that in March. Um, and we're expecting the permitting, uh, the provincial permitting to go from, uh, January to as late as possibly June. Um, but we'll get the feasibility study done earlier just in case that permitting process, uh, runs according to their, their normal timelines. So on a, on a sort of concept, uh, uh, schedule chart, so just summarizing those, environmental impact assessment will start on 15 Mile, uh, in January. Um, we'll have our feasibility study done by March, and we're looking to final investment decision, uh, in the June quarter. Obviously, we've, we're fully funded for this project development, so we won't have any, uh, stopping and, uh, pausing for finance and debt considerations. We'll be, we'll be fully funded as soon as we get that environmental impact assessment. Um, we're then into detailed engineering. We only think construction's gonna be about 12 months because we're simply relocating the Tukoy plant up to 15 Mile. Uh, so no, not-- very limited long lead time items or, or disruptions there. So all going well, uh, by June 2029, we'll be, we'll be in operation at 15 Mile. In the meantime, uh, Tukoy restart will be running for about 12 or 13 months, uh, to get through the stockpiles. I'll move through-- So, so this one's worth, worthwhile noting in terms of, um, just the reserve increase. So obviously in January, sorry, in July, we announced the resource upgrade of about 24%. Um, we've now had the opportunity to translate that and rerun the pre-feasibility study with that new resource model. It's boosted our reserves by 17%, which has bolstered mine life out to 13 years. Importantly, it's also given us, uh, increased production in year two and three, so that's grown from about 100 and, 100, 105,000 ounces up now to 120, 130,000 ounces. Um, it's lowered the-- we've lowered the AISC. Um, strip ratio has come down with this latest, uh, reserve update, so it's now across the deposits, uh, average around 2.8 to 1. So the fundamentals of the project are, are, are even improved from what we had before. Um, post-tax NPV at $300 US, we're looking at $1.7 billion, uh, after tax and, uh, at $4,000 an ounce, it's, uh, 1-- 2.7, uh, billion after tax. So Gundill project, which we're now fully funded for, and with the new, uh, the new, um, functional re- uh, regulatory regime for permitting, uh, we're getting more and more confident with this timeline. Uh, presenting that in pictorially, um, so you'll see the three different colors, um, of the different ore sources. So we've got 15 Mile that we start with, then we bring on Old Mitchell and Old, uh, Old Austin mine as, uh, satellite quarry operations feeding the central processing hub. In the interim, you see there that we're expecting to recover about 38, 38,000 ounces from our stockpiles. So at about 4,000, current gold price around 4,000 US, we should make around about 120, 130 million, um, Australian or Canadian in that interim period. Then we go into f- you know, finalizing that permitting period into the construction period where we're relocating that same processing plant from Tukoy up to, up to our 15 Mile processing hub. I've been through-- I'll just quickly go through these. Um, in the background, we've been building up our, uh, our exploration pipeline. So the, the, the s- the graphic I showed you before was just on proved and probable. So we did our pre-feasibility study only on proved probable, no conversion of resources, no exploration targets. So we've got a 13-year mine life at over 100,000 ounces per annum at 1,100 US just on proved and probable. But here, you see here the processing hub, uh, in the center there, 15 Mile. So there's, uh, 25, 50 and 75-kilometer concentric circles around our processing hub. Um, we've got plenty of opportunities in there. We've picked up a lot of ground in the last three years, um, giving us 46 exploration targets that we've got in the pipeline just within 75-kilometer radius. Um, it's not as, not as easy to, to haul ore into a processing hub as WA, um, but there's a good network of roads, um, that support. A lot of these projects are potentially more underground style, smaller, higher grade projects, but that'd be perfect for a processing hub, um, business like this where we can bring those ounces in whenever they become available, um, and add, and add to our feed schedule. Um, I'm, I'm, uh, I'm getting fairly gray-haired, so I like the 1990s exploration pipeline slides. Uh, so this is, uh, converting that same map where we've got all the labels on our various projects across that 75-kilometer, um, radius. These are our projects, um, exploration and where they're at in the pipeline. Um, we'll-- I'll show you just a couple, um, the more advanced, the more advanced end. But, uh, we've got, uh, a, a nice stream of projects that are at different stages and over this 12-month, uh, period, we'll have, uh, five, possibly six drilled, uh, targets drilled. Um, and, uh, and, and, and then as we build up the exploration team, we hope to be able to then handle an even bigger drilling campaign next spring, summer. And I've just highlighted and we even, uh, we've put this announcement out on, uh, yesterday morning as well. So just to give one example, um, the old Austin mine is, which is actually in, in one of the mines in our, in our development proposal. So it's the smaller one, um, and it's one when we were reconsidering the designs and, and making this, uh, permit friendly, we shrunk this pit down. But we did notice that obviously we left mineralization behind 'cause we were limiting the scale of this, this open pit. And if you look at the, the some, some of the ore that we've had to leave behind below the ore reserve pit, um, four meters at 14.7, um, there's, there's some nice ore down there. But as we, as we got, um, through the 1980s drilling database, we've, we can see that there's continuity of this, of this mineralization at depth. So the deepest hole at the moment is around 300 meters. But you can see, uh, there's intercepts of, um, five and a bit meters at 66, five meters at, uh, uh, 5.9, uh, seven meters at 12. So there's a good consistent five to seven-meter zone here that extends that we'll now, uh, target with additional drilling and also see what the underground potential here is to extend, uh, yet another, um, addition to our resource inventory. And you can see on the right-hand side here that we've got, uh, again, going through the historic drilling around old Austin. We've got, um, a drill campaign, uh, done in the early 2000s. It hit six meters, 5.7, so it rings a bell, that sort of six meter, six-meter zone. Um, and there was no drilling followed up in that 700-meter zone there along strike. So that's one, again, we want to get the drill rigs in there next spring, summer. So these are a couple of the more advanced, more advanced targets, um, and the other, others range from conceptual target through. And I think I've, uh, left five minutes for questions, which, which I think is my job. All right. Great. Uh, any questions from the floor? I've, uh, I've got one for you in the interim, Andrew. Um, obviously the balance sheet looks, uh, looks pretty amazing at the moment. Mm-hmm. Uh, you'd have some, obviously some projects and some places to deploy that capital, which you've just spoken to. Can you maybe just outline, I guess a, a bit higher level corporate strategy, you know, where you'd like to take the business over the medium to longer term, given that, that balance sheet position? Uh, thank you. Yeah, it's amazing how quickly the questions go from where are you gonna get the capital from to what you're gonna do with the capital. Um, so w- the, the first and foremost, we'll obviously receive this money. It'll probably only come through around March, April, um, by the time we've got through the, the various approvals and conditions precedent. So we've already flagged that we'll be looking to do the 13 cent per share dividend and the buyback. So we've look, we're looking to buy back at up to 100 million shares of our 1.2 billion on issue. So that'll be, that current share price, that'll be another 80 or so million dollars. Um, and if necessary, we, we won't stop there while we're, while our share price is cash backed. Um, but yeah, w- w- with, given that we've got more than enough money to get the 15 mile initial growth capital done, uh, we'll, we'll look for further opportunities to distribute capital. But, uh, we're, we're not interested in getting distracted. Um, we're focused on the Nova Scotia asset and that exploration pipeline and bringing that into fruition. So, but yeah, once the ca- once the money's in the bank, then we'll look at opportunities to distribute further. Great. So yeah, distribution more so than, uh, than acquisition. Yeah. Yep. Everything's too expensive other than us. Yep. We have a question down here. Uh, thank you, Andrew. Could you please comment on relations with the Mi'kmaq or any native groups? Yeah. So good question. So one of the key things, uh, let me find the slide. So, um, our predecessors, um, had a, had, uh, an issue that came up with the First Nations relationship where their plan was different to what we've put forward. They, from the old Austin mine, the pit that we just talked about, the old Austin mine, they were gonna be directing the, that ore to, to Coey processing plant to the south, um, and co-process that with the low-grade stockpiles that we're looking at now. The problem with that proposal was once you go through how significant the haul road would need to be, um, and it was gonna be going through traditional hunting grounds, there was an unacceptable impost on, on, on the, on the lo- that local group. Um, I don't think our predecessors realized. They were, they were thinking they were gonna use forestry roads for hauling the ro- hauling the ore. But yeah, you can't do, you can't do forestry roads for haul- haulage. So our current-- our proposal, which we're bringing forward, is that the old Austin mine ore will go to 15 Mile, and so it's gonna be heading north. And by going north, we can use public roads. So we don't have that same problem of building, um, of building a haul road through traditional hunting grounds. So that's the fundamental improvement. The other improvement at old Austin was, um, there was some pushback in terms of the size of the open pit that our predecessors were looking at. And so we've shrunk that down dramatically, um, to make it more acceptable, obviously with the penalty that we lose some ounces at depth. Um, and that, that, uh, more than halved the surface disturbance and pulled back the distance from the, from the nearby river, um, substantially. So, but those improvements now have been presented. Uh, and Department of Fisheries and Oceans have been, have been, have, have, have had a look at that. So that's giving us a lot more support and a lot more, a lot more confidence that we've resolved those difficulties. The rest of the locations, um, haven't... They're, they're-- We're looking for a benefits agreement anyway. There hasn't been the same pushback in the same areas on the previous designs. Um, but that, that was the one where our predecessors had a, had a, had a glitch that we've now fixed with the project redesign. Um... Ah, so benefits agreement. We've t- uh, we've paused. There is an, an, a benefits agreement that's un- uh, that's been put forward and drafts have been exchanged. Obviously, as we're going through a permitting decision at the moment, we've got to hold back on those discussions just from anti-corruption rules. Um, but as soon as we've got this decision from the federal regulator, then we'll be, we'll be able to progress that, um, benefits agreement. But we've put forward a benefits agreement that's not tied to support for the project. So there's not a binding where if you sign the benefits agreement, then you, uh, someone... It's, it's a, it's a strict, uh, one-way benefits agreement that's if the projects go ahead, that a benefits applies. And, uh, of course, we'll, we'll be yet to go through the public review process which starts in January. Great. I think we're done. So thank you very much for that comprehensive response, Andrew. Thank you. [audience applauding]