Operator
Operator
Good morning. I would now like to turn the meeting over to Mr. Jamie Porter, Chief Financial Officer. Please go ahead.
Alamos Gold Inc. (AGI)
Q4 2017 Earnings Call· Fri, Feb 23, 2018
$40.86
-1.99%
Same-Day
+2.36%
1 Week
+2.36%
1 Month
+0.20%
vs S&P
+5.33%
Operator
Operator
Good morning. I would now like to turn the meeting over to Mr. Jamie Porter, Chief Financial Officer. Please go ahead.
Jamie Porter
Chief Financial Officer
Thank you, operator. And thanks to everyone for attending Alamos’ fourth quarter 2017 conference call. In addition to myself we have on the line today, John McCluskey, President and Chief Executive Officer and Peter MacPhail, Vice President and Chief Operating Officer. To address any questions with respect to our reserve and resource update we also have on line today Aoife McGrath, our Vice President of Exploration and Chris Bostwick, our Vice President of Technical Services. I would like to remind everyone that our presentation will be followed by a Q&A session. On this call, we will be making forward-looking statements. Please refer to the disclaimer on forward-looking statements in our news release and MD&A, as well as the risk factors set out in our Annual Information Forms. All forward-looking statements on this call are qualified by these cautionary statements. There can be no assurance that our forward-looking statements, even though considered reasonable by management based on information on hand, will prove to be accurate. Future results and events could differ materially. Technical information in this presentation has been reviewed and approved by Chris Bostwick, our Vice President of Technical Services and a qualified person. Also, please bear in mind that all of the dollar amounts mentioned in this conference call today are in United States dollars, unless otherwise noted. Now, John will provide you with an overview.
John McCluskey
President
Thank you, Jamie and good morning everyone. We closed 2017 on a strong note achieving record quarterly production of 120,300 ounces, record annual production of over 429,000 ounces and a significant reduction in cost. This translated into our best financial performance in years. We also greatly improved our outlook over the past years with various strategic initiatives, including the acquisition of the gold mine, the elimination of debt and the advancement of our growth projects. Operationally, we met or exceeded production guidance at all of our mines in 2017. We also met cost guidance with an 8% reduction in all in sustaining costs to $933 per ounce. This drove record mine site free cash flow to $78 million for the full year, up nearly 120% in 2015. This included a record $34 million from Young-Davidson, which had a breakout year achieving several new milestones. We expect the strong operational performance to continue into 2018 with the addition of our Island Gold. We are expecting gold production to increase further 16% to a new record. We expect production for 2018 to fall between 418,000 ounces and 520,000 ounces. Island Gold has solidified our operating base giving us a third core producing mine that will anchor this company well into the future. We expect to produce at least 500,000 ounces per year in 2019 and 2020 from our existing operating mines with significant cost improvement expected to drive improving margins and cash flow. We had a good year on the development front, highlighted by the construction of La Yaqui Phase 1, which came in ahead of schedule and on budget. We started development activities at Kirazlı and the completion of three positive feasibility studies. These studies outline more than 400,000 ounces of defined annual production potential and highlight the type of high…
Jamie Porter
Chief Financial Officer
Thank you, John. As John mentioned, our financial results continue to improve every quarter. We took a number of important steps in 2017 that helps us to achieve this result. Retiring the high yield notes and eliminating $24 million in annual interest cost, has dramatically improved our earnings. Higher production in Gold sales has improved margins resulting from the Richmont acquisition are expected to drive continued growth in both earnings and cash flow. Our financial results for the fourth quarter include about five weeks of results from Island Gold given we closed the acquisition in late November. In the fourth quarter, we sold approximately 127,000 ounces of gold in an average realized price of $1,275 per ounce for record quarterly revenues of $162 million. Annual revenue reached a record $543 million. Our margins continued to improve with total cash costs of $753 per ounce and all-in-sustaining costs of $902 per ounce in the fourth quarter, both down more than 10% a year ago. All of our operations were again free cash flow positive in the fourth quarter, generating $37 million mine site free cash flow. For the full year, we generated a record $78 million mine site free cash flow, more than doubling $35 million in 2016. Young Davidson was a big driver of this growth, the operation continuing to establish new records. We reported a loss of $4.7 million in the fourth quarter or $0.01per share. Our earnings were impacted by a number of one-time items, both of which related to the Richmond acquisition. These adjustments included $5.1 million of transaction cost related to the acquisition, a fair value accounting adjustment at Island Gold of $4.1 million and unrealized foreign exchange losses of $5.1 million. These adjustments total $14.3 million and impacted earnings by $0.04 per share. Note that…
Peter MacPhail
COO
Thank you, Jamie. Young-Davidson delivered a breakout performance with record quarterly production of 56,500 ounces and record annual production of 200,000 ounces, meeting the full year guidance. This represented an 18% increase from 2016, driven by hiring at our mining rates and grades along with higher mill throughput. Mine site all in sustaining costs were $859 per ounces in the quarter and $834 per ounce for the full year, the latter down 7% from year ago. Gold production at Young Davidson is expected to range between 200, 000 to 210,000 ounces in 2018, driven by further increase in underground mining rates, which are expected to average over 7,000 tons per day for full year. Alamos had another solid year producing 42,700 ounces of gold in the fourth quarter and 150,000 ounces for the full year, achieving the top end of our guidance. This included approximately 10,000 ounces from La Yaqui Phase 1 with initial production ahead of schedule and on budget by the end of August. Mine site all in sustain costs in the quarter were $798 per ounce and $835 per ounce for the year, a significant improvement from 2016, reflecting higher grade stock, a lower strip ratio and lower cost of production from La Yaqui Phase I. We expect production to be in a similar range of 150,000 ounces to 160,000 ounces over the next several years, declining costs in 2019 and beyond, reflecting the end of the 5% royalty and the installation of power grid Mulatos. Collectively, we expect these two items to save us nearly $100 per ounce at the current gold price. A key focus over the next year will be advancing development of both Cerro Pelon and La Yaqui Grande with production from these higher grade projects expected in 2020 and 2021 respectively. Including…
John McCluskey
President
Thank you, Peter. That concludes the formal presentation. And I will turn the call over now to the operator who will open the lines for your questions. Operator?
Operator
Operator
Thank you. We will now take questions from the telephone lines [Operator Instructions]. And the first question is from Rahul Paul from Canaccord Genuity. Please go ahead.
Rahul Paul
Analyst · Canaccord Genuity. Please go ahead
At La Yaqui Grande, it's good to see you continued reserve growth with the grade holding together. What is the strip ratio associated with the reserve that as it stands right now?
John McCluskey
President
It's in the range of 6 to 7, Rahul.
Rahul Paul
Analyst · Canaccord Genuity. Please go ahead
And then just a follow-up on that, I mean are you seeing the strip ratio coming down with additional drilling. In particular, are we seeing the pre-strip requirements coming down?
Peter MacPhail
COO
It came down marginally from the last run, and that's probably where it will be.
Rahul Paul
Analyst · Canaccord Genuity. Please go ahead
And then can you remind me as to how much metallurgical testing is done so far and what kind of results are you seeing?
Peter MacPhail
COO
So we tested all the materials that's in the resource and the reserve and we're seeing very good metrics very similar to La Yaqui Phase 1, which I think would be 75 continue to bit more.
Rahul Paul
Analyst · Canaccord Genuity. Please go ahead
And then John just in Turkey, has anything changed that gives you either greater confidence or lesser confidence that you will re-permit soon or is it still the same just waiting for a response?
John McCluskey
President
Nothing has really changed. As you’ve seen, we’re just waiting for them to go through their approval process.
Operator
Operator
The next question is from Michael Grey from Macquarie.
Michael Grey
Analyst · Macquarie
I’ve got a question for Aoife on down plunge southeast -- the main mineralization in Island Gold. Fairly bullish commentary in the resource update new zone having an area of potential and for mineral resources similar dimensions to the Phase 1 PEA expansion area. Aoife could you just expand on that a little bit in terms of what you’re seeing in that area and whether we’re going to be getting relatively regular updates vis-à-vis draw results?
Unidentified Company Representative
Analyst · Macquarie
When we look at the overall area of the PEA and we compare the area that we’re now drilling the southeast, they are very similar in size. And when you look at match out of results and they started drilling that out -- or back to even 2010 that we’re getting similar grades to what we're seeing in our results. The geology looks very similar we're in just like in the same bedding and alteration and it appears that it's continuing to down plunge the same way, it even appears from the very few holes that has -- we've drilled that and that is mix. There is one or two where we hit it in the slightly different place due to some drives coming across. But all the indications are that they continue pretty strongly there and plunge at the southeast. So we’re very encouraged by what we see.
Michael Grey
Analyst · Macquarie
And at a one point there was I think Richmont was interpreting some flatter veins in addition of steeper ones. Has that been resulted or is that a work in progress?
Unidentified Company Representative
Analyst · Macquarie
That's a work in progress. We’re doing a big -- we just commenced a big structural and alteration study up there and we’re getting -- and we trickling if you like the enquiry on the geology there at the moment, so that’s the work in progress.
Michael Grey
Analyst · Macquarie
And final question just on the 15 million 84 kilometers of drilling for Island. What's the rough breakdown on that in terms of infill versus expansion and where distribution? I know that you are going to do it for pass test on the 5 to 6 kilometer strike as well.
Unidentified Company Representative
Analyst · Macquarie
We have two exploration drilling and as opposed to delineation -- infill, that’s coming under more mine geology. We have 84,000 meters for exploration, of that 64,000 is surface and on Turkey are some underground. Most of the surface drilling or high proportion in surface drilling is going to be the steep directional, but the 50,000 of that that’s a long strike and hitting other targets other than the down plunge continuity superiority, the extension to be east and on strike 6 kilometers and a couple of other targets to the west.
Operator
Operator
Thank you. The next question is from Lawson Winder from Bank of America Merrill Lynch. Please go ahead.
Lawson Winder
Analyst · Bank of America Merrill Lynch. Please go ahead
Just first on the Kirazlı CapEx. So assuming no GSM permit, at what point in 2018 will that $20 million of capital spending for Kirazlı be complete?
Jamie Porter
Chief Financial Officer
So the $20 million is their not the GSM, so that’s the spending on some of the work that we’re doing currently on the road relocation on the reservoir construction on bringing power to site. So that will be incurred throughout the year but the majority of it would be done probably by the end of Q3.
Lawson Winder
Analyst · Bank of America Merrill Lynch. Please go ahead
And then on the YD cost per ton, it was $44 in Canadian dollars in Q4, so it was just a slight increase over Q3. And it would just be really helpful to get an idea for what kind of the moving parts were on that increase versus Q3 especially considering the throughput was up a little up.
Peter MacPhail
COO
So every quarter it will be up and down a bit based on how much of that came from development versus stoping, the stoping was cheaper than we felt it were. So it fluctuates from quarter to quarter but overtime it’s flat.
John McCluskey
President
Yes, I think our budget for 2018 is in around that $44 per ton level and then once we get up to a couple of years out we’re at 8,000 tons per day, we would expect to see that drop down to four year pretty below.
Operator
Operator
Thank you. The next question is from Kerry Smith from Haywood Securities. Please go ahead.
Kerry Smith
Analyst · Haywood Securities. Please go ahead
Peter, will we get some kind of an engineering study at some point this year on La Yaqui Grande?
Peter MacPhail
COO
No, I don’t think we’ll be putting out a study on it. We’ll treat it like we did La Yaqui Phase 1 and other deposits that we mine. In Mulatos, we pretty much set the mining cost. But I don’t think we’re planning on putting out 43-101 or anything like that. It’d be more may be we do something a tour or something like that, but I don’t think we’re putting it further.
Kerry Smith
Analyst · Haywood Securities. Please go ahead
I was thinking more like the ref 300 of high you might actually mine the deposit, not necessarily referring to 43-101 though?
Peter MacPhail
COO
Well, it’s going to be standalone heat bleach in the side at there, very similar to the Phase 1, but just bigger, nothing special.
John McCluskey
President
Yes, I think once we have all the detail around the capital spending and the throughput rates and everything else that would likely be disclosed in quarterly press release or more in the separate standalone press release.
Kerry Smith
Analyst · Haywood Securities. Please go ahead
And would we maybe see that this year that I guess is that I am wondering?
Peter MacPhail
COO
Well, we're going through the permitting on it. So we're doing it currently to support that permitting. So yes, probably by the end of the year we’d be in a position to give more detail.
Operator
Operator
Thank you [Operator Instructions]. And your next question is from Cosmos Chiu from CIBC. Please go ahead.
Cosmos Chiu
Analyst · CIBC. Please go ahead
I have an accounting question here actually. There was quite a bit of accounting noise in Q4 2017 in part related to the Richmont acquisition has resulted in a loss of $0.01 per share lower than consensus, I think that's a reason why share price is down today. I guess my question is, should we be expecting more counting noise in 2018 related to the Richmont acquisition? I don’t think so, given that I think I've looked into your financial statements, it looks like the purchase price adjustments being completed, you have a year to confirm it but I don’t think I would expect any more changes. And in comparison to your previous acquisition or the merger with AuRico, I would imagine this is a bit less complicated given that with AuRico you took on AuRico's books as a basis, but not this time around. But I just want to make sure in terms of potential for accounting noise in 2018 how should I look at it from the perspective for the Richmont acquisition.
Jamie Porter
Chief Financial Officer
You shouldn’t expect any noise related to the transaction or acquisition coming in 2018. It was all booked in the fourth quarter. And the transaction costs were split between Richmont’s books between the Alamos book and then between the production and the cash that came over, so little bit complicated but we did try to specifically outline what those adjustments were and what impacted earnings in the fourth quarter with the $5.1 million that's spelled out in the press release. The other -- I mean the major impact going forward from the acquisition is on our amortization with the addition of it when it carries higher amortization charge from $400 an ounce. So you'll see our blended overall amortization on a per ounce basis go up to in around 325 to 350 range.
Cosmos Chiu
Analyst · CIBC. Please go ahead
So that could potentially, given that you need to take depreciation on the higher value of the acquisition cost, you need to depreciate at a higher rate. So that could potentially impact the EPS, but Richmont model that into it.
Jamie Porter
Chief Financial Officer
Yes, that's exactly right. If you look at our financials, they are cleaner now than they have been in years. And going forward, we don’t have -- our interest expenses is minimal and there won't be any other accounting adjustments related to this stuff going forward other than just while standardized FX adjustments that go through every quarter, so those are typically adjusted out anyway.
Operator
Operator
Thank you. There are no further questions at this time. This will conclude today's conference call. If you have any further questions that have not been answered, please feel free to contact Mr. Scott Parsons at 416-368-9932 extension 5439. Thank you for your participation.