Operator
Operator
Welcome to chorus call.
Harmony Gold Mining Company Limited (HMY)
Q4 2024 Earnings Call· Thu, Sep 5, 2024
$15.63
-5.07%
Same-Day
-1.46%
1 Week
+6.61%
1 Month
+4.14%
vs S&P
-0.87%
Operator
Operator
Welcome to chorus call.
Peter Steenkamp
Management
Good. Can we start? Good morning. My name is Peter Steenkamp. I am the CEO of Harmony. And it's a pleasure to be here today presenting the Full Year Results for the Financial Year that ended on the 30th of June 2024. Please note that note of the Safe Harbor statement. And allow me to start with a short update on Harmony and our strategy. Harmony is a gold mining specialist with a growing international copper footprint. We also produce small amounts of silver and uranium and we have over 74 years of gold mining experience in South Africa and we have been operating for over two decades in Papua New Guinea. Our Mineral Resources and Mineral Reserve declaration of close to 137 million ounces and 40 million ounces of gold and gold equivalents, respectively, positions Harmony as a significant global mining company. Currently, our diversified portfolio of operating assets include nine underground mines, two open pit mines and a significant tailings and retreatment business. Surface retreatment is a great ESG story with a potential for another 100 years of hydro mining across South Africa. And at present, over 90% of our current production comes from South African gold. Now based on the current planning parameters, we expect approximately 20% of future production to be copper within the next 10 years. Now copper production will be from our Tier-1 Wafi-Golpu project in Papua New Guinea and the Eva Copper project in Australia. These copper projects will be transformational, moving Harmony further down the global cost curve and does diversify it into your future facing metal. Our excellent FY ‘24 results perfectly demonstrate the benefits and the value we have created for all our stakeholders. This is what we call Mining With Purpose. Australia is aimed at producing safe profitable ounces…
Beyers Nel
Management
Thank you, Peter. The strong results in this reporting period were due to our ongoing investment and commitment to operational excellence. This has underpinned our success and enabled Harmony to take advantage of the high gold prices. However, everything we do starts with safety and I must emphasize that is not negotiable. A safe mine we argue is a profitable mine. Harmony has a healthy organizational culture which we believe is a true differentiator amongst our peers. Operational flexibility and predictability in our planning ensure we consistently deliver the tonnes alongside higher quality ounces. We have achieved guidance for the ninth consecutive year now if we factor in the COVID revision. We are continuing to invest in productivity enhancements and infrastructure reliability to reduce stoppages and maintain momentum. Our underground recovered grades have improved remarkably and productivity enhancements would ensure we deliver the required square meters each month. As Peter said, Mponeng and Moab Khotsong and Hidden Valley outperformed in FY ‘24 on the back of excellent grades. We do however expect lower grades at Hidden Valley while Doornkop production will be lower after we revised our plans to ensure safe ounces. Our stable and predictable cost structure has moved us down the global cost curve. Not only have we benefited from having a Rand cost base. But the Five Year wage agreement ensures fixed labor escalations are predictable. Our power supply from ESCOM is also regulated with further savings expected from our Renewable Energy Program. The strong partnerships we have built with our stakeholders ensure we remain the partner of choice enabling us to continue operating successfully. Our substantial Mineral Resource base of almost 137 million ounces presents an abundance of opportunities to grow our Mineral Reserve through internal investments and Greenfields projects. Earlier, Peter touched on the safety…
Boipelo Lekubo
Management
Thank you, Beyers. Harmony delivered an excellent financial performance, and outstanding earnings growth in the FY ‘24 on the back of the information shared by Beyers and Peter. Group revenue increased by 25% to ZAR 61 billion on the back of the higher production and the excellent gold price. Net profit increased by 78% to ZAR 8.7 billion, while the rolling 12 month EBITDA increased by 54% to just under ZAR 19 billion. As mentioned in our trading update, Target North has been impaired by ZAR 2.8 billion. Adjusting for this headline earnings per share increased by 132% to 1,852 South African cents. Strong operating free cash flows resulted in our balance sheet shifting further into a net cash position and as at 30 June 2024, we had a net debt cash position of ZAR 2.9 billion. This is just how financials translated into dollars. Group revenue increased by 18% to $3.3 billion and headline earnings were up 122% to US$0.99. Harmony has a balanced capital allocation framework, which Focuses on five core areas namely ongoing safety and production, production optimization rather as we aim for zero loss of life, maintaining a strong balance sheet and a net debt to EBITDA below one times which is what we've done, organic and inorganic growth which improves the quality of our portfolio and returning capital to shareholders in line with our dividend policy. We've delivered a consistent increase in revenue over the past three years and headline earnings per share has also increased by over 700% in the past eight years on the back of our acquisitions and investment in quality ounces. Moving on to costs. The majority of our costs remain predictable and manageable. It is split between labor, consumables and electricity, sustaining capital represents only 10% of our total all-in…
Peter Steenkamp
Management
Thank you, Boipelo and thank you Beyers. And so in conclusion, let me just get the slides to move. Harmony has followed a conservative approach to planning. We believe this is proven given the nature and location of our operations. Most what we achieved in 2024 - of the FY ‘24 was due to Mponeng and Hidden Valley far exceeding the plans. As part of FY ‘25 planning cycle, we have guided in line with our mine plans. As we progress with our risk assessed life-of-mine plans, we believe that our orebodies can confidently deliver between 1.4 and 1.5 million ounces in FY ’25. Underground recovery grades are expected to be above the 5.8 grams per tonne. And all-in sustaining cost expected to be between ZAR 1.02 and ZAR 1.1 million rand per kilogram. So let's break down the cost guidance. This slide illustrates the drivers behind the higher all-in sustaining cost for FY ‘25. Now these include; lower guided production alongside with higher developed capital spent across the underground mines. And we also factored in annual inflationary increase of about the 8.7%. Using the original FY ‘24 all-in sustaining cost guidance of ZAR 975,000 per kilogram as a reference point, this increase is in line with the annual mining cost inflation. The FY ‘24 all-in sustaining cost was much lower than guided due to Mponeng and Hidden Valley exceeding their annual production plans. We believe that the guided all-in sustaining cost is realistic and we remain confident at Mponeng may well exceed these plans again this coming year. Harmony remains a solid investment and offers a compelling gold copper story. We have a lower risk profile and safety remains our top priority. ESG is embedded in our operational model through a clear sustainable development strategy. We continue developing our…
Q - Bruce Williamson
Management
Hi, Peter, good day and team, as well. Bruce Williamson, Integral Asset Management. Could you just share some thoughts on your underground operations where you had an improvement in grades? I mean, was that just naturally transitioning through higher grade or did you plan and target higher grade areas? Or is that just a bigger focus on cleaner mining producing stoping with and avoiding excess waste?
Peter Steenkamp
Management
No, I think the major drive for that was really acquiring much high-grade assets in Mponeng and Moab Khotsong. So that in itself was a - I think it was a right decision for Harmony to then buy it and then we also very grateful that we were able to do that at the time. The Mponeng, when we bought, it was at grades were not where it is today, but there was always this - we're going to mine and as you know, sequential extraction that we have you mine from one side to the other side. And we all - AngloGold Ashanti always told us that we're going to get into very, very good grades and we managed to get into that grades. And we're going to be there for that that period now for quite a number of years. So it is on the back of them actually mining into the higher grades, Moab has been the grades that we always had. But I think it's also a massive drive on quality and operational excellence that we try to put in place in all the operations. So we are obviously very strong. Harmony has got a great meeting on every operation every week and we all - our internal auditors just walked in and she's actually auditing it for us. So she making sure that we get - making sure that we actually do it and it is probably recorded. So we have a very strong grade discipline to get it right. So we don't drop the ball in terms of quality and stuff like that. But we are in a – these new mines that we bought was a game changer for us.
Leroy Mnguni
Management
Hi, Peter. Leroy Mnguni from HSBC. I've got a few questions, but I'll ask some of them and then just move to the back of the line. So, if you look at your FY ‘25 guidance, actually, if we take it a step back in FY ’24, you beat your initial guidance quite substantially. If you look at your FY ‘25 guidance, is there some optimism that there are certain parts in the portfolio where you are hoping to do a bit better than what you planned? So in other words is it how conservative is that guidance? And then, what Beyers was saying about the old tailings opportunity in the Free State 5.7 million ounces, that sounds pretty exciting. I wonder if you can give us just a bit of color. I know the study is ongoing but just high level, would you need to build another plant there? How do the grades compare to your current tailings, retreatment operations? And then the third question, your CapEx has increased quite substantially both for FY ‘25 and even more so for FY ’26. If you could please just unpack what the drivers are for the increases in your medium-term CapEx guidance?
Peter Steenkamp
Management
Okay, thank you, Leroy. So let me start with this. I mean, this slide actually explain it quite a lot. I mean, last year, we've guided when we started at 975,000 kilograms. We managed to get at 901 and the big driver for that was obviously better production. So it was higher grade and better the - 6% better than planned in terms of the production. Now we don't plan to stop trying to do that and we think we can. We obviously are – we’re very strict in our - on our planning parameters. I mean, we as Harmony never been in the thing that we overpromise and under deliver. We believe that we need to be conservative in our planning. But also be conservative in a sense of being stretched and making sure that people do the right thing. But then if you put all of that together, you get to this number and we don't want to guide now where we are in the beginning of the year that it will be a different number. But having said that, our production at the moment and Floyd is sitting here. He is the operations - Executive Operating Officer and we are in a very, very good momentum in all operations. We are doing well. We're doing as well as we did last year so far. And we talked about Doornkop, which we just choked back a bit because we just wanted to make sure that we have enough hoisting capacity. We will do all the project work and the hoisting of that, so that is a constraint that the bottleneck in Doornkop and we want to make sure that that is right that people don't - that we do all of that safely. So we floated back a…
Boipelo Lekubo
Management
16.
Peter Steenkamp
Management
16, let me try and get back to that because it's easier to talk off the slide because then we can unpack it properly.
Boipelo Lekubo
Management
And just I mean, Peter, to add before you unpack 25, just remember Leroy, 24 Mponeng deepening was not included there. So there's about a billion extra. I mean, yeah from 24 to through the 25.
Peter Steenkamp
Management
Yeah, so that's a billion. We already started now a little bit of early works, but I mean, it will the full swing will be in - this is in this year. That’s not a very fast thing. So let me try and get to that. There you are. But let's get to that one. I mean, you can see that and it's put in a Rand per kilogram terms. You see the sustaining CapEx, we talked about the sustaining CapEx the more development, the board of that compared to what we've delivered on in the previous year and obviously you look at the – it was about ZAR 4 billion to ZAR 5 billion. But the big jump is really that billion Rand that we're going to spend more on growth capital and that isn't the Mponeng extension. It's going to really well as far as the model is concerned. That will be steady state. The same we will keep on developing, developing the declines. And but then of course Mponeng extension will be a big number there. I mean, the rest is small as the same. I mean, they are even very capital is really just the first stripping just as what we plan to do in this year compared to the previous year. But the ZAR 10.8 billion I will say is a big number. And it is – even Harmony has never spent that amount of money in one year. But we think we've got the plans to do it because especially on the on the Golden side. And you can see last year we were managing our projects was very well managed with what the sit in the guidance and what we actually effect achieved was very much in line. And I'm very, very pleased with the work and Beyers’ leadership, but also Floyd and the way that we actually had put together our project execution of project office capabilities in Harmony at the moment, we've done a lot of work to improve and improve our skills and that is part of the projects. And I'm glad to see that our projects actually and I mean Mine Waste Solutions that we are going to start delivering put more in the first in October. It's a testimony to a very good project management project that we've put in place and actually building that in time and also in digest. So great, great achievement. So big numbers. So - we - but we are confident that we will be able to do it. Adrian?
Adrian Hammond
Management
Peter, yeah, I Adrian Hammond SBG Securities. Peter, you've been instrumental in reshaping this company probably key reason for its rewriting and others are just like to commend your disclosure and your guidance has improved substantially for especially for self analysis. Thanks very much. But you’re a lot of Key Man risk, I would say how long do you intend staying with the company and do that? What is your succession plan? And then, secondly, if there's something that's on your To-do list, what's the most important that you'd like to do complete before you leave? And then Boipelo you are sitting a lot of cash. What are your intentions with that cash? You're going to be generating some more. I appreciate you've got everything coming up but, you could also increase your liquidity through debts and how do you how do you think about the capital structure of this company going forward? Thanks.
Peter Steenkamp
Management
Okay, Adrian, yes. My intention is to step down at the 31st of December, so starting the New Year as a retirement person in time and we - I'm very we are well, and obviously it's about a four months still there to be done. So the Board will make a decision and actually bring it to the market at the right time. It’s well advanced in terms of finding my successor. I just want to make the point that we have - this was never a one man show. It is always a team effort and I've with a team that I've put together with myself and Beyers actually started together in 2016. You will recall at the time the CEO has retired and the Chief Operating Officer resigned at the same time. So we had to start from scratch as a team. And we've been a strong team together. And obviously also with all the other executives that we had, Marian has been here for a long time, Boipelo joined us later after Frank left. And we've been - Mashe who has been with us all the time. I mean, the team is so strong. I've got no. problem in my time that this team will take this company to flying heights going forward. So net effect I think, younger the better. What's the thing I still want to do before I retire? Wafi-Golpu permit. Wafi-Golpu permit if I can get that right. Then I would say that I have to dig every box that I wanted to dig that's the one. And hopefully we will we can, I don't know but we don't say a lot about that. But we really want to get over that line. But to get that mining development contract signed. And then we can start that massive, and massive, massive exciting project that is ahead of Harmony that we will have. We are now in a much better position we have ever been to be able to execute that project and to actually participate in that project. I mean, we dig down to 60 we most likely it was like a dream to participate there now we are in a position to do that. So that's what I would like to get right. And Boipelo you can maybe on the capital side.
Boipelo Lekubo
Management
Yeah, all the cash. I mean, yes, granted Adrian, we are sitting in a nice position of a ZAR 12 billion headroom that's cash and available facilities. One should appreciate that we're in a high CapEx phase. I mean, as you can almost ZAR 11 billion and we've also got either copper aluminum. I mean, if FID should be expected during next year. It's a two-year build, so it's short. The last time we were at the markets, CapEx was sitting at $600 million. Obviously, that was a year and a half ago. So the world has moved on inflation et cetera. So you will expect that that number is bigger. So before we can come to the market and commit on what that capital is, I think it's prudent that we maintain our dividend policy of 20%, which we've done. So, it's always a balance when you look at these things especially in our case. Yes the gold environment is favorable at the moment. But we have been through tough times. So, you always have to maintain that that level head around all these things.
Peter Steenkamp
Management
Any more questions? Do you have any online Jared?
Jared Coetzer
Management
Actually on the Chorus call we have any coming through there?
Operator
Operator
Thank you. We have no questions on the lines.
Jared Coetzer
Management
Peter, team I’ve just got a question from [Indiscernible]. Just can you unpack a little bit in terms of the grade evolution over the next 2 to 3 years?
Peter Steenkamp
Management
Yeah. We - one was – if you don’t look at a long-term plan for Harmony, I mean, we are in good grades now for Mponeng and the current life-of-mine before we go to the deepening part of that which is will be in the high grade or will be the same. More as long as we mine the middle mine, it will be a good grades and obviously when we are getting into the into the [Indiscernible] project as a as we get. And I think the first time it’s about two to three years home now. We will be in the [Indiscernible] project will be good grades again. Then we are actually supposed to mine out our high – low-grade assets. Like for instance, Masimong. Now Masimong had a two-year life-of-mine plan since I've started here. And it still have a two year life-of-mine. This year we signed another two year life-of-mine. So it is there. But I mean, it's going to be a day that we have to call it a day at Masimong. And that is the kind of lower grade asset that we have. The next mine is we've got a three life-of-mine at Kusasalethu. And we think it's possibility to add good grades to extend that because we've got some drilling results that’s fairly good provided that that creates a sustainable future for us. We can potentially extend that. But that's obviously a much higher grade asset. So yes. I'm quite confident that the grades that we have now we want above 5.8 underground grades will got sustained itself for quite a number of years now. So and we are developing the higher margins or the higher grade assets for the long-term.
Jared Coetzer
Management
Thanks Peter. Just question from Rene Hochreiter. I think you've answered the question on Wafi-Golpu already but which is in terms of timing. But perhaps on Target and thoughts on the project done there that's complete and when we see Target becoming cash flow positive again?
Peter Steenkamp
Management
Yeah, no, we got that project over the line and it was a difficult project to execute because of not necessarily the project itself, but because of Environmental conditions and other kind of issues that we run in. it is a - Target is a very difficult mine and you sense that way it was actually set up right from the beginning. And in the sense of how you ventilate it, how you cool it down. So we had to build fish plants and put fish plants on surface. Try and get this cooling down and making sure that we get the mine done. But it's all done now. The crashes is down at the bottom. It's working well. We are driving downhill now to do our crashes rather than four kilometers uphill. And we are in the process now of creating the flexibility to solid drilling to make sure that we get ahead of time and set to make sure that we have the things. But I'm very comfortable at Target will be a great mine going forward. Not high grade, but good volumes and a mine that we will mine going forward. And there is obviously a lot of potential to that block what we call block 12, which is the Old Paradise part of the fence that was many years ago it was part of the four different fence, that was part of the Anglo wall future, which we're going to get a part of that as part of our infrastructure. We will be able to mine it and but that's still a little bit in the future, but I mean Target can still have, currently, I think it's a six or seven year life potentially it can be a 10 year life going forward.
Jared Coetzer
Management
Thanks Peter. Question from [Indiscernible] Truffle Asset Management. On Uranium, is that FY ‘24 base sustainable and is there potential to do more from a uranium perspective?
Peter Steenkamp
Management
Yeah, the only uranium plant we've got is the one at Moab. So we use all the sources that we potentially can put through there to get uranium for us. Unfortunately, we don't have uranium plants on any of the other things at the end of the operations. Yeah, so, I mean, what we have at the moment is that uranium is also flexible in terms of where you are or what your mine normally is a very - highly correlated to the grades. Because of the good grades we are currently mining at Moab we also have good uranium grades. And so, we - but certainly for the next number of years it will be the same and as we go into [Indiscernible] we will be there's also uranium associated with that. Uranium became very significant because of the price increase that happened over the last number of - I think we bought Moab it was $26 of $23 a pound. Now it's sitting at close to $90.
Jared Coetzer
Management
Thanks, Peter. And then last question from [Indiscernible] Capital. In terms of new business and expansion opportunities, what are the plans for Harmony in terms of geography? And what projects could we potentially look at higher gold prices, internal projects or existing projects?
Peter Steenkamp
Management
Well, I think this slide actually shows it all as I've got no slide 18 there on. So people can looking at that. We showed you that we can potentially be about 1.4 million ounce producer for a long period of time. We got 20, 38, and I don't think many mining - gold mining companies got this profile ahead of them. Yes, we have to develop surface – SI surface projects but we own the ounces so we can develop them. So it's not that we don't have only and obviously it is also on the back of Eva and Wafi-Golpu being bought that's the part at the top there. So what we are trying to say is that we haven't lot of - enough projects in front of us to be able to sustain Harmony for the current production levels. And obviously we are, but we will also be - also looking at the opportunities that potentially can come away like Eva that we manage to buy. I think it’s a fantastic project. I think it's a fantastic project that came to us at the time. And I think we will be constantly looking for that. So our new business team under Johannes Van Heerden in the Brisbane office or constantly looking at opportunities for us to be able to do it. But I want to emphasis whatever we buy going forward need to be better quality. Now current average all-in sustaining cost of Harmony this year is at $1,500 an ounce. There's not a lot of assets above $1,500 an ounce available for sale. Neither are they are obviously usually expensive. So developing our own as property the right way to go and for that reason our project capabilities and delivering projects also keen for Harmony and which we - I think we are on the right track to set as far as that’s concerned.
Jared Coetzer
Management
Well, Peter, I think we are done. Thank you.
Peter Steenkamp
Management
Thank you. Thank you a lot for being here most likely my last results presentation. I still vividly remember the one in the other boardroom there the first one when I joined Harmony in 2016. It was a tough day. It’s much better today.