Earnings Labs

Taseko Mines Limited (TGB)

Q2 2025 Earnings Call· Thu, Aug 7, 2025

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Transcript

Operator

Operator

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by, and welcome to the Taseko Mines 2025 Second Quarter Earnings Conference Call. [Operator Instructions] As a reminder, this call is being recorded. With that, I will turn the call over to Mr. Brian Bergot. Sir, you may begin.

Brian Bergot

Analyst

Thank you, Jeannine. Welcome, everyone, and thank you for joining Taseko's Second Quarter 2025 Conference Call. The news release and regulatory filing, announcing our financial and operational results, was issued yesterday after market close and is available on our website at tasekomines.com and on SEDAR+. On the call today is Taseko's President and CEO, Stuart McDonald; Taseko's Chief Financial Officer, Bryce Hamming; and our COO, Richard Tremblay. As usual, before we get into opening remarks by management, I would like to remind our listeners that our comments and answers to your questions will contain forward-looking information, and this information, by its nature, is subject to risks and uncertainties. As such, actual results may differ materially from the views expressed today. For further information on these risks and uncertainties, I encourage you to read the cautionary note that accompanies our second quarter MD&A and the related news release as well as the risk factors particular to our company. These documents can be found on our website and also on SEDAR+. I would also like to point out that we will use various non-GAAP measures during the call. You can find explanations and reconciliations regarding these measures in the related news release. And finally, all dollar amounts we will discuss today are in Canadian dollars unless otherwise specified. Following opening remarks, we will open the phone lines to analysts and investors for questions. I will now turn the call over to Stuart for his remarks.

Stuart McDonald

Analyst · TD Cowen

Okay. Thank you, Brian, and welcome, everyone, to our second quarter results conference call. I'll start with an update on our operations and projects and then pass it to Bryce for a closer look at our Q2 financials. It's been a busy few months for us, and generally, I think we're making good progress across our business with a few significant milestones achieved at our projects recently. It's also been an interesting time in the copper markets globally, and the picture for U.S. copper tariffs is now clearer. I'll come back to that topic in a minute. But I want to start with a Gibraltar update. So as noted in our last quarter's earnings release, our mining rates at Gibraltar were impacted earlier this year by challenging conditions in the upper benches of the Connector Pit. In the second quarter, mining advanced into better ground and mine tonnages increased dramatically to a total of 30 million tons for the quarter. That's 31% higher than Q1, and in fact, the best mining quarter in the last 4 years. As a result, we continue to expect a strong rebound in production in Q3 and then even better production in the fourth quarter, continuing into 2026. In June and July, production was more than 35% higher than in April and May, as we started to access this higher-grade ore in the Connector Pit. Second quarter copper production was 20 million pounds, which was the same as the prior quarter and in line with plan. Copper grades were 0.20%, and recoveries were 63%. We're through the worst of a low-quality ore and steadily transitioning into better grades with less oxidation, which will also result in higher recoveries. Moly grades and recoveries are also expected to improve significantly in the second half. Total cash costs,…

Bryce Hamming

Analyst

Thank you, Stuart. I'll provide some additional details on the financial aspects of the second quarter. Sales in the second quarter totaled 19 million pounds at an average realized price of $4.32 per pound, generating revenue of $116 million for Taseko. Lower sales and a stronger Canadian dollar contributed to the lower quarter-over-quarter revenue. Net income for the quarter was $22 million or $0.07 per share, and that's mainly driven by unrealized foreign exchange gain on our U.S. dollar-denominated debt with the strengthening Canadian dollar at quarter end. On an adjusted earnings basis, we posted a net loss of $13 million or $0.04 loss per share. As Stuart mentioned, mining rates at Gibraltar in the second quarter were significantly higher than the first quarter. This increased total site cost to $117 million. Despite the increase in mining rates, strip ratio was lower as a result of a larger portion of the mine tons being oxide ore, and that oxide ore was placed on the heap leach pad. Stuart mentioned the positive ore reconciliations we've been seeing. Capitalized strip for the quarter was slightly lower. It was $31 million, and it remained elevated as waste tons as the sulfide ore tons were above the average strip ratio for the Connector Pit. We expect that strip ratio to decline significantly in the second half of the year now that we have opened up access to the ore in Connector. Cost on a per pound basis for the quarter were $3.14 per pound. That's based on copper produced. This was higher than the previous quarter, and it was due to lower capitalized stripping and lower moly production. It is also impacted by costs associated with the oxide ore that are added to the heap leach pads, which is left inside operating costs, for…

Operator

Operator

[Operator Instructions] Our question comes from the line of Craig Hutchison from TD Cowen.

Craig Hutchison

Analyst · TD Cowen

I was wondering if you guys could give us some commentary on what you're seeing in terms of the grades here for Q3, Gibraltar and also the recoveries.

Stuart McDonald

Analyst · TD Cowen

Yes. I guess, generally speaking, Craig, we're expecting both grade and recovery to step up meaningfully in Q3 back towards reserve grade averages or better, and then, probably better than reserve grade in Q4. So yes, that's probably as much as guidance as we'd want to give on a quarterly basis. But definitely, we're seeing now getting deeper into the pit higher quality ore and higher-grade ore. So that's a positive for the second half. And you should see that level, at least maybe not the Q4 level, but the second half averages kind of continue into the first few quarters of 2026 as well. So we shouldn't see any of the -- any more of the drop offs that we've had in the last couple of quarters.

Craig Hutchison

Analyst · TD Cowen

Is the higher oxide material you're seeing in the Connector Pit, does that create a risk for recoveries here, especially in Q3? Or do you feel like you're through that and recoveries are back up into the high 70s or low 80s?

Stuart McDonald

Analyst · TD Cowen

Yes. It's -- we're seeing it. The oxide oxidation, it's not a binary thing. It's not black or white. It's definitely a transition. We're pretty confident in our projections. We've got a good database of -- good geological database, and we're seeing the higher grade -- we're seeing flashes of the higher grade, the better-quality ore now and certainly expecting much more of that in the coming weeks and months. So...

Craig Hutchison

Analyst · TD Cowen

Okay. Great. And then on Florence, as you guys have mentioned on past calls, you're targeting, I think, production somewhere in the range of 40 million to 55 million pounds next year, if I recall correctly. Is that still the case? Or do I have that wrong?

Stuart McDonald

Analyst · TD Cowen

I don't know. I think the technical report -- year 1 of the technical report was around 40 million pounds. So that's the number that we have -- that technical report number is what we have out there so far. I think as I mentioned in my remarks, we are working through a detailed operating plan now going well by well and doing projections of how the ramp-up is going to go. So I expect as we get closer to start-up in the fall, we'll have more specific guidance we can talk about 2026. But yes, what we're seeing at this point is effectively what we have in the technical report.

Craig Hutchison

Analyst · TD Cowen

Okay. Maybe one last question for me. What kind of pricing are you guys seeing right now on sulfuric acid?

Stuart McDonald

Analyst · TD Cowen

Richard, do you want to talk about acid?

Richard Tremblay

Analyst · TD Cowen

Yes. Yes. Yes, not a problem. Yes, we're seeing in the low $200 range for sulfuric acid right now. We've been -- I think I mentioned before, we've been in conversations with a number of different suppliers and actually have secured supply for this year from 2 different suppliers. So we're seeing in that low $200 range.

Operator

Operator

[Operator Instructions] Our question comes from the line of Duncan Hay from Panmure Liberum.

Duncan Hay

Analyst · Panmure Liberum

A couple of questions from me. Just on the capital cost, what -- should we expect any more capitalized stripping in Q3, first of all, at Gibraltar? And then second of all, at Florence, is the remaining spend there, is that going to be weighted to Q3 and it will drop off in Q4? Or will there be a sort of reasonable -- will it be the same across those 2 quarters?

Stuart McDonald

Analyst · Panmure Liberum

Yes. Duncan, yes, no, it's definitely -- the remaining spend at Florence definitely weighted to Q3. Q4 is more commissioning and shipping into operations. So yes, you shouldn't see much capital left -- required after the end of Q3. There's always a bit of a lag when you're talking about cash flow, right, because we don't pay our bills immediately. But in terms of CapEx incurred, mostly it will be done at the end of Q3 at Florence. At Gibraltar, capital strip, no, that will really drop off in the second half. We are really going to be mostly an ore operating below the average strip rate, so I wouldn't expect to see much or any capital strip in the second half.

Duncan Hay

Analyst · Panmure Liberum

Yes. Okay. And just quickly on -- I missed what you said about the SX/EW plant at the beginning. You got some downtime there. Do you -- how much are you thinking production for the rest of the year and into next year from that?

Stuart McDonald

Analyst · Panmure Liberum

Yes. Look, I mean, we're seeing that this is potentially 6 to 8 weeks of downtime. It's just an issue that just arose, actually was just diagnosed really yesterday. So that's less than 1 million pounds of production impact here, but obviously, mostly will be in Q3. That operation -- the guidance we've talked about that operation in the past producing 3 million or 4 million pounds a year. It is a seasonal operation, so it will operate until November, December and then shut down for the winter in Q1 next year. The other thing that's happening at the SX -- at the operation is we actually have 2 leach pads and only 1 of them has been activated so far, and the second pad will come online in 2026. So you'll see a little step-up in the production in that operation next year, maybe 4 million or 5 million pounds-ish next year. That's how we're looking at it.

Operator

Operator

There are no further questions at this time. I will now turn the call over to the management for closing remarks.

Stuart McDonald

Analyst · TD Cowen

Okay. Thanks, everyone. Thanks, operator. And thank you all for dialing in to our Q2 earnings call, and we'll talk to you again next quarter. Thanks again. Bye.

Operator

Operator

Thank you for joining the call today. You may now disconnect.