Thank you for standing by. This is the conference operator. Welcome to the IAMGOLD Fourth Quarter 2025 Operating and Financial Results Conference Call and Webcast. [Operator Instructions] The conference is being recorded. [Operator Instructions] At this time, I would like to turn the conference call over to Graeme Jennings, Investor Relations for IAMGOLD. Please go ahead, Mr. Jennings.

Thank you, operator, and welcome, everyone, to our conference call this morning. Joining us on the call are Renaud Adams, President and Chief Executive Officer; Maarten Theunissen, Chief Financial Officer; Bruno Lemelin, Chief Operating Officer; Annie Torkia Lagace, Chief Legal and Strategy Officer; and Dorena Quinn, Chief People Officer. We are calling today from IAMGOLD Toronto office, which is located on Treaty 13 territory on the traditional lands of many nations, including the Mississaugas of the Credit, Anishinaabe, the Chippewa, Haudenosaunee and the Wendat Peoples. At IAMGOLD, we believe respecting and upholding indigenous rates is founded upon relationships that foster trust, transparency and mutual respect. Please note that our remarks on this call will include forward-looking statements and refer to non-IFRS measures. We encourage you to refer to the cautionary statements and disclosures on non-IFRS measures included in the presentation and the reconciliations of these measures in our most recent MD&A, each under the heading non-GAAP financial measures. With respect to the technical information to be discussed, please refer to the information in the presentation under the heading Qualified Person and Technical Information. The slides referenced on this call can be viewed on our website. I will now turn the call over to our President and CEO, Renaud Adams.

Thank you, Graeme, and good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us today. Last year was a monumental year for IAMGOLD. It is a year in which the company reported record revenues of nearly $3 billion enjoying gross margin of over 40% and generating operating cash flow of over $1 billion, which is notable $702 million generated in the fourth quarter alone. Now everyone on this call is aware that this is a historic time in the gold market, as the gold price increased nearly $1,700 per ounce over 2025 and exiting the year at just over $4,300 an ounce, which is still more than $600 an ounce lower than where we are today. So while we're not along in realizing the gold market, we believe IAMGOLD is particularly well positioned to capitalize on this market for the benefit of our shareholders, stakeholders and partners. In 2025, IAMGOLD achieved significant milestones, including record quarterly productions across all sites. The first full year of production at Côté Gold, the establishment of a framework at Essakane that enables cash movements to be made at any time of the year, and the consolidation of assets in Chibougamau-Chapais, Quebec, to position the Nelligan mining complex as among the largest preproductions asset in Canada. On the financial side, we closed out the legacy gold prepaid obligation midyear, deliver the balance sheet through the repayment of the $400 million high cost term loan and established a share buyback program that pursuit $50 million in IAMGOLD shares in December and an additional $50 million so far in 2026, and we will continue to do so, driving up our per share valuations, all things being equal. This is a company that is taking a leadership position in the industry. IAMGOLD is a modern gold mining company that…

Thank you, Renaud, and good morning, everyone. It was indeed a transformational year for IAMGOLD, as our solid operating results, coupled with record gold prices helped to fast track our strategy to unwind the financial leverage put in place to both Côté and allowed us to also start returning capital to shareholders in December. In the fourth quarter, the company generated record mine-site free cash flow of $626.6 million, bringing the year total to $1.2 billion. On an asset basis, in the fourth quarter, Essakane contributed $340.4 million and Cote contributed $197.0 million of attributable mine-site free cash flow. The record mine-site free cash flow was used to improve our financial position as the company's net debt was reduced by $468.8 million to $344.4 million at the end of the year, while also returning $50 million to shareholders. On the balance sheet, we completed the repayment of the $400 million term loan and also paid $50 million on our credit facility, reducing the balance to $200 million as at the end of December. IAMGOLD at $422 million in cash and cash equivalents at the end of the year and approximately $446 million available on the credit facility, resulting in total liquidity at the end of the fourth quarter of approximately $868 million. Excess cash at this account is repatriated through dividend and shareholder account payments, of which the company receives its share on its ownership net of withholding taxes. The shareholder account structure was introduced in 2025 and functions like an intercompany loan and allows for the company's portion of the dividend to repay partly using cash generated in excess of working capital requirements. The new structure allowed for cash flow in the fourth quarter, resulting from strong operating results and record gold prices to be repatriated in record time,…

Thank you, Maarten. Starting with Cote Gold, as Renaud noted, it was a very strong end to the year for Cote with fourth quarter attributable gold production of 87,200 ounces of 124,600 ounces on a 100% basis. The success of Cote goes beyond just the fourth quarter. In its first full year of operation, Cote produced 399,800 ounces on a 100% basis, achieving the top end of our guidance estimates. . During the year, our Cote teams achieved success after success every day on many fronts, offering a stability, maintenance, environmental monitoring or workforce engagement. Cote Gold completed the ramp-up and demonstrate that nameplate throughput of 36,000 tonnes per day over a period of 30 consecutive days ahead of schedule in June. It was a very strong 2025 with Cote now adding strong 3 consecutive quarter in a row of the mine hitting its target in its trial. Focusing back to the quarter, mining activity totaled 11.1 million tonnes, 4 tonnes mined were a record of 4.5 million tonnes in the quarter with a strip ratio of 1.5:1. Mill throughput in Q4 totaled 2.9 million tonnes. Head grade for the fourth quarter was a record of 1.44 grams per tonne as a result of the combination of higher grade direct feed ore, a low strip ratio over the quarter and stockpiling of lower grade ore. The installation of the additional secondary crusher was completed in November and commissioned in December with both compressor tested and operating in parallel. As we discussed later, last quarter, we elected earlier in the year to bring in a temporary contractor aggregate crusher to supplement protest crushing capacity to improve the arability of the secondary crushing circuit. They allow the plan to achieve its throughput milestone but at a higher cost as well -- as…

Thank you, Bruno. I just want to take a moment to highlight the exciting development from the fourth quarter in which IAMGOLD acquired at Northern Superior and Mines d’Or Orbec consolidating their assets and properties with our assets in the Chibougamau-Chapais region of Quebec to form the Nelligan mining complex, which is now composed of the following deposit and high-value target. Nelligan, Monster Lake, Philibert, Chevrier Lac Surprise, Croteau Est. The Nelligan Mining Complex already has a significant mineral inventory of over 4.3 million measure-indicated ounces and 7.5 million inferred ounces, positioning the project among the largest preproduction stage gold project in Canada. . The close proximity of the primary deposit to each other supports a conceptual vision of the central processing facility being fed from multiple ore sources within the 17-kilometer radius. This year, we are substantially increasing our budget to allow for a comprehensive exploration program, which will look to expand and mineralized footprint of both Nelligan and Philibert while testing months lake at depth. In addition to a regional exploration program or high priority targets to further grow the potential of the project. Our teams are very excited for this project, and we will be putting the pedal to the middle to have a preliminary economic assessment on the Nelligan complex in 2027. With that, I want to thank our shareholders for your great support. We truly believe it will be an exciting year for IAMGOLD with significant value growth opportunities ahead and many catalysts ahead. And now I would like to pass the call back to the operator for the Q&A. Operator?

[Operator Instructions] And our first question today comes from Mohamed Sidibe from National Bank.

Maybe I'll start with Essakane and with the M&I increased year-over-year and the potential extension of the mine life of that asset. How should we think about Essakane within your broader portfolio? And specifically, has the license is potentially expiring into 2029, please.

I'll give some first comment, and I'll ask Bruno to complete more on the potential we have here. But -- we've been going really on the step by step. I thought we had a wonderful '24-'25, the team is working hard. You've seen the increase in the resources. We see more and more possibility of extension. The most important thing is what I would call the acceptance of all of it, right? So we understand the geographic and geopolitic and so forth. But the reality is we've been operating this mine pretty steady state, no interruptions for nearly 3 years now. We found and -- congrats Maarten and his team and Renaud found a very creative way to allow for cash flow. At those prices, we see a good opportunity of using this cash flow to reward our shareholders. So I think over the next few quarters, we just need to continue to be the drama and execute on our plans and continue to repatriate and reward our shareholders. And as we advance in '26, Renaud and his teams will complete some work. We definitely see an extension potential, which we need to continue to work and improve. But we're not there yet, but I think we've come a long way to make a kind of a very strategic element of our portfolio. Renaud, if you want to add any...

Yes. So thank you, Mohamed, for your questions. I've been at that again, like I started with IAMGOLD second in 2014, since then, the life of mine has not stopped getting extended. So should not come too much of a surprise. What is really good is we were able to find those additional resources within the fence north of Phase 7. So we have now Phase 8 and Phase 9 and 10 north of where we are currently mining. And South, we have the low pit that is also getting -- we're seeing an extension of the current level pit that also tried to connect south of the second main zone. So there's a saddle zone and now we believe those 2 connects together. So it gives us confidence that we could be targeting at another 5 years of life of mine. That's what we're going to be coming with when we're going to start engaging with the government. It shouldn't be like too much of a problem when we first met with the off the shows in terms of having the license to be extended by another 5 years, which would bring us closer to [ 2030, 2030 ]. So we're not, again, decision to be made probably later as we advance in a year in preparations for '27 plan. But meanwhile, we expect another great year and maximum free cash flow out of the asset repatriated and apply towards the shareholder program, share buyback. So more to come.

Maybe I'll switch to Cote specifically on the unit cost. I think, Bruno, you touched on the milling cost potentially improving $4 to $5 by the second half 2026, could you give us a little bit more color on mining costs and where you expect to exit maybe 2026 and what we should be thinking in terms of modeling there for Cote Gold?

Yes. So the mining costs for 2026, we are making adjustments. Some adjustments are taking time. So now we're implementing any one or some plan, there will be some testing. We should be at the year at around $370, $380 a tonne as we are getting. We brought new equipment, new drills. We are also doing the pushback, Mohamed. And by doing this pushback, there's several infrastructure that needs to be relocated like the towers for the and everything. So there's a lot of activities surrounding the mining activity, that's the reason why we see a diminishment and unit costs. However, it's going to take some time to see the long-term mining costs, not for this year.

So what I could add to this is like at the early stage, we've seen some -- yes, we've seen some deficiencies, some areas that need some improvement. We put more capital this year addressing on like Bruno just mentioned, if you want to optimize your mining costs, well, you need to optimize your OE, your overall performance. To do that, you need a larger pit. You need like maintaining -- this has all been taken into account. It may not be all achieved in '26, as Bruno mentioned. But as we file and as we present our long-term plan, we will, if needed, integrate some additional improvement in '27, '28. But the objective is over the next -- with a big chunk in '26, but over the next 2 to 3 years. We really see a path forward with the possibility of reducing the cost and bringing Cote into one of the best unit costs for this large-scale Canadian. And then when you combine with the average grade and the possibility to uplift that we've seen the grade this year and the low strip ratio of Cote everything is in place at Cote as we optimize the cost to make it a very attractive overall all-in sustaining costs. We've discussed the royalty -- there's not much we could do more than we do have a provision of buyback, which we would really pay attention to as we unlock our full potential of this scenario. So we're in a good position. We appreciate that there's a lot of work to do. Bruno and his team this year, but we feel very confident that we have a path forward and we'll try to make it as much as possible this year, but it may extend a bit in '28.

Our next question comes from Sathish Kasinathan from Bank of America.

My first question is on Cote. On Slide 11, you mentioned that the mine plan for Cote is likely to include stage capital. Can you maybe provide a bit more color on what it means? Are you still targeting the 50,000 tonnes per day run rate or maybe even more? How should we think about it?

I think that the reference to the stage capital here is to being capable to focus from expansion to tailings down the road, to opening Gosselin. So what we're saying is that there is nothing need to do everything on a day 1 to make an expansion at Côté Gold. As a matter of fact, you -- the Cote itself is enough to justify the expansions and eventually Gossan. So when we say stages, we see now [indiscernible], Bruno and his team is accelerating some aspect in the pit and opening the pit and so forth. So that's going to be in place by the time. And we say '29 is a focus on the expansion, '29, '30 and we have enough tailings capacity in place. So there would be a stage in fact. So we just want to clarify that. It's not like you need to build everything and have everything in based on day 1. The capital will be aged capable to be fully funded through the free cash flow of the asset.

Okay. That is clear. Maybe one question on Essakane. So you received $171 million of cash this year at the start of the year, of which $50 million was spent was already use of buybacks. And you still have $219 million left from the last year's dividend declaration. So for the full year, is it fair to assume like a minimum of $390 million of share buybacks could be achieved in 2026 and depending on how much dividend is declared for this year, we could see potential upside to the number?

So we had $408 million of the shareholder accounts outstanding at the beginning of the year. And as you mentioned, we already received $171 million, again that back. We expect that remaining balance to be repaid by the end of the second quarter, during the third quarter. But then when we get into that period, we will be declaring the 2025 dividend where the shareholder account will be related again. So based on our projection, there would be more than enough shareholder accounts available this year to continue with the program where we can move money out of Burkina Faso every month as the asset generates free cash flow above its excess working capital. And then -- so the free cash flow attributable to IAMGOLD this year should -- you should be able to match that to buy back shares in the program.

Okay. Congrats on the strong quarter.

Our next question comes from Anita Soni from CIBC.

Congratulation on strong quarter and strong year. I just wanted to ask a little bit more about Côté and Gosselin. I think you noted in the MD&A that there would be an update on the reserve -- another update on the reserves and resources for Gosselin in Q2. And my apologies if you addressed it in the opening comments, I would comment -- but...

Thank you for asking, Anita on this. So it's cutting here. So sorry about that. So go ahead.

I was just going to say, what were you expecting to provide with the Q2 update?

The -- thank you for asking this. As Bruno showed in his portion, Bruno talking about the mineral reserve and our resources. So not a surprise on the research side. It was just inflation as you know, like the big consolidating both Gosselin and Cote through. On the resources side, we've come quite a bit a long way and have delineated some but this is kind of an ongoing work. So to your point, we expect to complete probably late Q1 and maybe like we're talking about Q2 potentially, but the target is by the end of Q1, somewhere there. We would complete the resource update, if you call it, the final one that would serve for the plan. We're comfortably sitting in more than $18 million, but there is more drilling to be incorporated. There is a merge of the block models as well. We're still discussing the final price to be used and so forth, but we had this objective of the Saddle zone as well as Renaud just pointing out to me. So as you combine the block model, so you create that saddle zone that would drill as well. So it's not the final not to look at the resource update at Cote has the final word about our objective of $20 million, and we're still planning to discuss those results late Q1, early Q2.

Okay. And how much more drilling would that have incorporated versus what you just did? I think you converted 2 out of the 3 million ounces of inferred into M&I category. But how much more would that bring on stream. If you could just tell me like as a percentage of the drilling update? If you want to tell me they have the number of ounces that would be great to.

We still have 29 -- 25 holes to be included. And we have also the campaign on the saddle zone that needs to be included as well.

So enough -- and again, like the merge of the block model as well, like technically should also create some. So we feel very, very strong, Anita, if without giving a final number because we haven't seen it, but we feel very comfortable towards objective of $20 million.

Yes. And then I just want to follow up on the reserves and resources as well. I noticed the grade decline. Does that -- have you -- I'm just -- I guess, you've had positive grade reconciliation at the assets. How are you basically calculating your depletion at the asset? I'm just -- like are you just basically saying, okay, well, we -- we ended up -- we thought this ore body would be 1.2 and that being 1.5. So we're expecting the 1.5 off of the average. Is that the way you're doing it? Or did you include the positive grade reconciliation in the calculations. .

Yes. So the -- we changed the block model and the block model that we'll be using this year has taken -- we had to do some adjustments. But moving forward, the block model is going to be Côté Gold a little bit more conservative. Therefore, that's the reason why you see that we are going down. It does not exclude the potency that we will see faster reconciliation specifically when you get those higher grades on like we were doing in Phase 7. What we're trying to cap a bit in a positive reconciliation in our future resources estimate. So we have something more about then comes over.

Our next question comes from [indiscernible] from Scotiabank. .

Hello. Can you hear me?

Yes.

It's Tanya. Yes. Just first of all, just at our time getting on and hearing the little beat so that my question is in queue. I have a few questions, if I could. I just wanted to follow up on Anita's question on the reserves and resources that's coming out on Cote and in Q2. So just so that I understand, so we're still targeting that $20 million out overall number. What the reserves and resources and other will show is just more of a conversion or an upgrade into the M&I and reserve category with those additional 25 holes. Is that a proper way to think about it?

The way to look about it is we feel strong that when the exercise is done, we will achieve our objective of $20 million of MI and from which Bruno and the team will put the mine plan to it and convert as much as we can within an economic plan to reserve. So obviously, the reserve that we have release at the end of the year is only reflecting the all plan depleted. So we're moving from this to the new plant consolidated from which new economics might plan. So we're definitely going to see and expect a significant increase in reserve. We just need to complete the work. But the starting point will be hopefully a $20 million-plus MI resource base, and we feel very strong about the economics of those pits. So more to come, but we feel strong about a significant increase in reserves.

Okay. Okay. And then how should I be thinking about this capital because you talked about a lot of this capital now being spent with $85 million or thereabout at Cote this year. How should I be thinking of the study? And I think at one point, we were thinking of $100 million to $200 million in capital. How should I be thinking about the capital for all of this? .

I guess if I would have all the detail, Tanya, we would have probably been a little more because we're still in trade-off. So the way to look at it is I think the growth capital that we're going to be deploying over the next few years should normally bring the pit to a point of expanded capable to provide for the -- now the mill itself, which will be the main capital of '29, '30, we're still in the trade-off and so forth. No, I do not believe you build an expansion today for $100 million to $200 million total capital but we believe that it could probably be achieved below the $500 million, but we still have to do the work.

Okay. I'll take a look further in depth. Just on 2 other things. Bruno, I think you gave some guidance for how the year is panning out for us quarter-on-quarter stable for both Essakane and Westwood. What about Cote?

Okay. Fair question. Cote is going to be lower for the first half of the year because we have the maintenance plan for the HPGR change in March or April. That's going to be a 5-day shutdown. We will have supplement, find or material to feed the mill, but we're going to be running at a slower pace. We also have -- we did a very good end of the year 2025, and we took advantage of Q1 to take a lot of other maintenance. So overall, we need to expect Q1 and Q2 to be lower than Q3 and Q4. And generally, summertime at Cote is very good, like last year, Q2, Q3, Q4, we produced 36,000 tonnes per day, almost like 36,000 ounces a month in average. So that gives you a bit like the kind of seasonality that we have, like we have a seasonality due to winter conditions in Q1. In Q2, we do some planned maintenance on the HPGR, and after that, like, we are rolling until the end of the year.

Okay. So should I be thinking like a 45-55 or is that?

Yes. I guess, anywhere between like the zone of around 40, 45, as you say. Definitely, H2 will be much stronger, season-wise, second crusher fully up and running HPGR and plus any other optimization that's going to come. So yes, I think it's fair to think that our second half could be at the 55% of the year.

Okay. And Renaud, I have you on for my one final question. Dividend, I mean we had talked on one of the previous conference calls that you were potentially thinking that once all this is done, the dividend plan could be implemented. Where are you on that? .

I think we feel very strong that on the step by step. I mean, as Maarten discussed, I think the first thing first is on the share buyback. There is no doubt that let's call the Canadian platform would most likely be an excess cash as well in those prices, something we're going to revisit after with our Board at the end of Q2. I see how the share buyback goes. Is there an opportunity to increase the share buyback using a bit of the Canadian excess? Do we start in operating dividend. So I think we're going to have this conversation post Q2 for the second half as we realize the free cash flow on the Canadian side as well. So we feel very strong that is I can should only go towards share buyback. The question is after what is the next in a row. And I think we're going to postpone the decision for the second half of the year.

And this will conclude today's question-and-answer session. At this time, I'd like to turn the floor back over to Graeme Jennings for closing remarks.

Thank you very much, operator, and thanks to everyone for joining us this morning. As always, should you have any additional questions, please reach out to Renaud and myself. Thank you all. Be safe, and have a great day.

This brings to a close of today's conference call. You may now disconnect your lines. Thank you for participating, and have a pleasant day.