IAUX - AMEX

Hello, and thank you for joining us for i-80 Gold's 2025 Third Quarter Conference Call and Webcast. Today's company presenters include Richard Young, President and Chief Executive Officer of i-80 Gold; Paul Chawrun, COO; and Ryan Snow, CFO. Before we continue, please note that some of today's comments may contain forward-looking statements, which involve risks and uncertainties. Actual results could differ materially. I ask everyone to view Slide 2 of the presentation, which is available on i-80 Gold's website to view the cautionary notes regarding the forward-looking statements made on this call and the risk factors related to these statements. Following today's formal presentation, we will open up the call to your questions. I will now hand the call over to Richard.

Ludy, thank you very much, and hello, everyone, and thank you for joining us today. Looking at Slide 3. The third quarter marked another solid quarter of execution with visible progress toward the key milestones within our development plan that we launched 1 year ago today. We continue to advance towards our goal of creating a Nevada-focused mid-tier gold producer. At Granite Creek Underground, project ramp-up continues. Mine grades and tonnages continue to reconcile well against the model. And groundwater is being managed with greater control, thanks to the newly improved infrastructure installed in Q3, while we make progress on a permanent disposal solution, which is on track for the end of Q1 2026. As a result, we expect to meet our 2025 consolidated guidance of 30,000 ounces to 40,000 ounces of gold. Importantly, gross profit continues to improve as we stabilize Granite Creek, moving from a loss a year ago to a small profit, still a long way to go. On the development front, in September, construction commenced at Archimedes as planned, which is an important milestone marking the start of our second underground mine. Start-up activities and decline development are tracking very well. The Lone Tree plant refurbishment study is substantially complete. At the same time, drilling programs, technical studies, and permitting activities also progressed across the portfolio during the quarter, keeping us on track towards our key project milestones. The prize here is to realize the net asset valuation of the 5 gold projects as outlined in the most recent PEAs, which indicate a total valuation of approximately $5 billion under a $3,000 gold price scenario. Looking at Slide 4. I believe that the company's success depends on its people and culture. In this quarter, we continue to strengthen both. Beyond geology, Nevada's skilled workforce is a key reason it remains one of the best mining jurisdictions in the world. We've hired quality talent over the past 3 months in key roles from engineering, geology, construction management to permitting and community engagement that will help drive project execution from the ground up. With our focus on long-term value creation, we continued with steps to further mature as a company. During the quarter, we advanced an initiative to refresh our mission, vision, and values and establish a sustainability strategy with ERM, one of the leading sustainability firms in the field based on our new development plan. In addition, we're in the process of expanding our focus on performance-based culture across the organization. All of these initiatives will be rolled out shortly, and they are very important as we look to attract and retain the best people in Nevada to execute on our development plan. As i-80 grows, we're building a company that reflects not only operational excellence, but the values that we stand for. We also continue to evaluate ways to accelerate value creation, such as the potential to bring forward a pre-feasibility or feasibility study on Mineral Point, our most valuable asset to enable earlier permitting. That leads me to the recapitalization plan. We're engaged with a number of groups and remain confident that we'll secure a financing package by mid-2026 to support Phase 1 and Phase 2 of our development plan as well as the engineering and permitting efforts required for Phase 3, which is Mineral Point. I'll now turn the call over to Paul to expand on the project updates. Paul?

Thank you, and hello, everybody. Turning to Slide 5. Operations at Granite Creek and Archimedes have made good advances over the quarter. There are many moving parts across the portfolio, but we continue to execute and derisk the plan with the necessary work underway. At Granite Creek Underground, mining activities continued to ramp up during the quarter with increased access to mineralized material from ongoing stope development, assisted by improvements to the dewatering infrastructure installed during the quarter. September was a particularly strong month for advancement of the main decline with record monthly development. Total mined ounces and tons continue to reconcile well on a level-by-level basis when compared to the current geological model. As we continue to ramp up operations, we continue to increase the drill density to improve ore control and the overall mining productivity. In the quarter, we mined approximately 15,000 tons of oxide mineralized material at a grade of about 9.8 grams per ton of gold. Note, we continue to encounter higher-than-anticipated high-grade oxide material at depth. We also mined approximately 20,000 tons of sulfide material at a grade of about 10.7 grams per ton, plus an additional 15,000 tons of incremental low-grade oxide material of just under 3 grams per ton of gold. Gold sold totaled 7,400 ounces and 16,400 ounces for the quarter and 9-month period, respectively. The stockpile of sulfide material, which is processed by a third-party autoclave was normalized by quarter end. Regarding the dewatering program, we've made significant progress and are now able to remove this from the underground workings as needed. A more reliable pumping system was commissioned during the quarter, enhancing operational efficiency and enabling more effective water management in the active mining areas. Of the 2 additional surface groundwater wells planned, one is now complete, and we are currently drilling the second. To support long-term groundwater management and future operating stability, installation of a second larger water treatment plant remains on track for completion at approximately the end of the first quarter of 2026. This plant is designed to enable the ultimate discharge of water to prevent it from re-entering into the underground workings. At Lone Tree and Ruby Hill, we continue recovering gold from the existing leach pads with a total of approximately 2,000 ounces recovered and sold in the third quarter. Moving to Slide 6. Drilling of the South Pacific

Thank you, Paul. Starting my review with Slide 12. Third quarter gold sales nearly doubled over the prior year period to approximately 9,400 ounces. In addition, the company had approximately 3,400 ounces of gold in finished goods inventory at quarter end due to the timing of sales. Total revenue from gold sales increased to approximately $32 million for the quarter, driven by higher ounces sold and a higher average realized gold price of $3,412 per ounce. Cost of sales for the quarter rose over the comparative prior year period, mainly due to higher processing fees from increased toll milling of sulfide material. As Richard highlighted, we have seen a swing in our year-to-date gross profit from a loss in 2024 to a gain in 2025, a roughly $24 million increase. And Q3 marks our fourth consecutive quarter of gross profit. For the quarter, the company reported a net loss of approximately $42 million or $0.05 per share, which is similar to the prior year period. This net loss reflects the development stage of the company and our current period of strategic investment. Also, under U.S. GAAP, which we transitioned to last year, predevelopment, evaluation, and exploration costs are expensed until we declare mineral reserves. Cash used in operating activities of approximately $15 million compared to about $24 million in the prior year as a result of higher gross profit and higher working capital, partially offset by increased predevelopment, evaluation, and exploration costs that were expensed. We closed the quarter with a cash balance of approximately $103 million, a decrease from the previous quarter due to development spending and continued investment in drilling programs to support our technical studies and development plan. This balance is in line with expectations in our recapitalization plan. Moving to Slide 13. We're actively moving our recapitalization strategy forward. During the first half of the year, we secured sufficient capital to fund just over $90 million in construction activities, drilling, permitting, and technical studies across all 5 gold projects as well as the Lone Tree plant from May 2025 through mid-2026. We continue to execute a strategy that is focused on funding Phase 1 and Phase 2 of our development plan, which could include a new senior debt facility in the range of $350 million to $400 million, a royalty sale, and the potential sale of our non-core FAD project. The positive response from lenders and capital providers to date reinforces the strength of our assets and the significant value creation opportunities we see ahead for i-80 Gold. With that, I will now turn the call back to Richard.

Well, thank you, Ryan. Looking at Slide 14, you'll see a number of catalysts on the horizon. We're entering a transformational period with a clear line of sight to major milestones over the next 12 to 18 months. During this time, we expect to complete the recapitalization to fund Phase 1 and Phase 2 of our development plan, complete the engineering study for the Lone Tree plant and commence the refurbishment, achieve steady-state production at our first mine, commence production at our second mine Archimedes and ramp up, and lastly, complete feasibility studies for our 3 underground mines as well as the Granite Creek Open Pit and possibly Mineral Point. These efforts will run in parallel with permitting and ongoing drill programs. From a valuation perspective, i-80 Gold continues to trade at a deep discount to comparable developers despite a significant resource base with a growth profile that few can match, all within one of the world's best mining jurisdictions. And at today's valuation, we think the market is only beginning to recognize the potential. That concludes my remarks. We'll now turn it over to Q&A. Ludy, please, can you open the line for questions. Thank you very much.

[Operator Instructions] With that, our first question comes from the line of Omeet Singh with SCP Retail.

Thanks for the update on the question. Congrats. I had 2 questions around Granite Creek specifically. So the first was, where are you mining now? And when do you expect to be mining from some of the longer levels in the South Pacific zone? And then maybe the follow-on to that would be, it seems like you continue to be finding oxides even as you go deeper. So what is your thinking around that? And do you expect that to be, say, impacting plans for the autoclave at all?

Yes. These are great questions. So first off, we're mostly in what's called the OG zone now. We have started the upper zone to South Pacific. And then next year, we're probably around 60% -- 60-40 South Pacific and then 40% on the OG zone. And then as time goes on, we'll be more and more on the South Pacific zone in the longer-term plans. And then regarding the oxidation, so it's primarily in the OG zone. There's a little bit of oxidation in the South Pacific. But fundamentally, what's happening is you get the surface water, the meteoric water and then it can oxidize some of the sulfide into oxide ore. And longer term, that represents an opportunity for us, as you point out, in the autoclave. But for the moment, we're feeding that off to our third-party processors, and we get slightly lower margins depending on the grade as the sulfide. So that's where we're at. And then would we stockpile? I think your question was, would we stockpile this ahead of our autoclave? Perhaps, and that's something we're evaluating.

Can you talk about the steps you're taking to put the oxide through the Lone Tree plant?

Yes. So the autoclave can be bypassed with oxide ore. And so we're evaluating, once we get close to commissioning of that plant, there's potential for us to feed that through.

[Operator Instruction] The next question comes from Don DeMarco with National Bank.

So looking at the recapitalization plan, you have a number of different options to increase liquidity. One of them is a potential disposition of the non-core FAD asset. And we saw recently that the research -- the high-grade resource that was published. But in light of this resource, are you reconsidering maybe not divesting this asset? Or has your expectations, in the event of monetizing it, has your expectations increased?

Don, that's a great question. We've always been aware that it's a high-grade resource. Unfortunately, when we look at the development plan, we will not be able to get to that until probably the end of 2030s, early 2040s. And so if there is an opportunity where we can get fair value for it, we will look at it as part of the recapitalization. But again, if we don't get a fair price, we paid $88 million for it 2 years ago in shares. It is a high-grade resource, both the polymetallic and the oxide at surface. So we'd consider it, but we are evaluating all of our options with respect to the recapitalization, and that is one potential source of capital that minimizes dilution for shareholders.

Then looking at the Lone Tree Autoclave engineering studies pending release later this quarter. Of course, we're looking forward to a decision in Q2. So I guess for the sake of our modeling, how should we think about CapEx for the refurbishment and also for Archimedes development in 2026?

So looking at the autoclave refurbishment of $400 million, to use a round number, we believe that roughly $175 million will be spent in '26 and the balance in '27. And with respect to Archimedes, we would expect the development to be roughly about $40 million in line with the PEA, and then there will be some ongoing development. The way we see our communities today, Don, is very much in line with the PEA in terms of the spend. While we did commence construction later than as disclosed in the PEA, the team does appear to be making up that ground.

Yes, yes. So in fact, if we may spend a little more in 2027 because we're advancing the development quicker. But for your model, I would use the PEA numbers. We're -- even though we started a bit later, we're more or less on track.

And I'm showing no further questions at this time. I would like to turn it back to Richard Young for closing remarks.

I'd like to thank everyone. I know it's a busy morning for conference calls. But as we close out the quarter, it was another solid quarter for us. And a year ago, we announced the development plan, and we've made great progress over the last 12 months. And we're very confident that we can execute on this plan, which will require the recapitalization, which is well underway. So we do believe that as we move into '26 and '27, we will be able to unlock the value of this significant resource base. But thank you, everyone, for your time. And if you've got further questions as you digest the materials that we've published yesterday, please give us a call. Thank you.