Americas Gold and Silver - Earnings Call - Q2 2025

Transcript

Speaker 1

Hello and welcome to the Americas Gold and Silver Corporation Second Quarter 2025 conference call. This call will be recorded and will be available for viewing from the events page of our website later today. Now, without further ado, I'll pass the call over to Americas Gold and Silver Corporation Chairman and CEO, Paul Andre Huet, so that we can get started.

Speaker 2

Thank you, Maxim. Good morning, everyone. I'd like to welcome you to our second quarter conference call. With me today on the call will be our CFO, Warren Varga, who will walk through the financial highlights of the quarter. Also with me on the call is Oliver Turner, our Executive Vice President of Corporate Development, who will take us through some important corporate highlights. I'll start out today by covering some key elements of our growth before turning the call over to Warren. Please note that we will be referencing a slide deck which is being shared through the webcast of this call. Over to slide three. The normal cautionary notes. Before I begin the presentation, I would like to remind you to please review our cautionary statements regarding forward-looking information and non-GAAP measures.

These statements can be found in our second quarter MD&A news release and in our presentation slides. Now, over to slide four. Let me begin by expressing our continued confidence in the path we're forging as a company and the strides we're making to achieve our goals. Throughout Q2 of 2025, the Americas team has been tirelessly focused on strengthening our foundation. We've bolstered our balance sheet, allowing us to invest in our business and begin to implement the operational enhancements we've identified to set up for sustained production growth. Our mission remains clear: to responsibly maximize the value of our assets through disciplined execution and strategic investment. This quarter, we've prioritized much-needed equipment upgrades across our sites, adding new jumbos, bolters, and scoops to our fleet. Additionally, renewed exploration efforts are already revealing high-grade opportunities near existing workings. Over to slide five, Maxim.

At the corporate level, we've continued to make great progress. In Q2 of 2025, we significantly strengthened our balance sheet by closing a $100 million senior secured debt facility with SAF, a world-class financial partner whose support underscores our value creation vision. Finalized in June, this term loan facility provides the capital we need to fuel our ambitious growth strategy, particularly at the Galena Complex. In addition to the term loan facility, we secured a five-year offtake agreement for 100% of Galena's production. As part of this agreement with Teck Resources and Ocean Partners, we also completed a private placement of $11.5 million at $0.95 per share, representing a significant premium at the time of approximately 14% to our 20-day volume-weighted average price. This agreement not only provides us with the revenue certainty, but also includes improved terms for byproducts such as copper, antimony, and gold.

Under this agreement, we will no longer be penalized for some of these byproducts. Instead, we will pave the way to begin being paid for them. This is a significant financial advantage that further supports our growth strategy and positions us well to achieve our goal of becoming a leading North American silver producer. The term loan facility is a cornerstone of our strategy to increase development rates, boost tonnage mined, and also reduce unit costs at the Galena Complex. It's enabling us to execute a multi-year growth plan that includes, and we'll just go over to slide six, please. First and foremost, something we're very excited about, the introduction of long hole stoping. We have developed and mined our first long hole stope at Galena. We've mobilized a brand new long hole drill at Galena, and now we're actively drilling and pursuing other long hole areas at Galena.

This method offers tremendous safety improvements, higher productivity rates, lower costs, increased backfill capacity, and reduces the amount of waste we have to skip out of the mine compared to the previous conventional underhand cut and fill approaches that we did with jacklegs. Just for example, we could be drilling one long hole stope that could have 7,000 tons, and that was our first stope, just under 7,000 tons. Historically, we'd been drilling and blasting with jacklegs underhand cut and fill. They were about 50 to 70 tons each blast. We're going from drilling and blasting 50 to 70 tons with a handheld jackleg to using the long hole method that can have stopes up towards 7,000 tons. A huge, huge shift in momentum for us. Number two, the expansion of our underground fleet equipment.

We've already acquired 10 new pieces of equipment, seven loaders, and three trucks, all supporting productivity gains and cost reductions as we start implementing and ramping up the long hole stoping. The third, and my extremely important thing, is the major infrastructure upgrades. We're advancing trade-off studies on materials handling to optimize underground productivity and hoisting schedules alongside major upgrades like the new hoist motor for the Number 3 Shaft, which is scheduled for installation in the second half of 2025. I'm actually quite pleased that during a recent site visit last week, we were able to see the components have arrived on site, and therefore, phase one of our shaft upgrades will begin in Q3. Phase two is scheduled to be done in the fourth quarter, which is setting us up for 2026.

This financing ensures that we have the balance sheet strength to sustain robust production growth over the coming years, positioning Galena as a key driver of our success. Over to slide seven, please, Maxim. Switching specifically to production, we achieved a standout performance in Q2. On a consolidated basis, we produced just under 700,000 ounces. It was rated at 689,000 silver ounces, a remarkable 54% increase from the 446,000 ounces in Q1. This leap reflects the dedication and skill of our teams across our operations, setting a strong foundation for the year. At Galena, we've seen a 34% quarter-over-quarter silver production growing to 420,000 ounces. This success stems from extensive operational enhancements, including time studies, engineering work, and productivity-focused projects. The introduction of the new equipment and the commencement of long hole stoping have been pivotal, delivering safer and more efficient mining methods.

Our team's efforts are unlocking Galena's vast potential, and we're on track to further increase output once our upgrades to the shaft are completed later this year. At Cosalá in Mexico, our team delivered an extraordinary 103% production increase over Q1, contributing 269,000 silver ounces in Q2. This growth reflects outstanding execution as we transition towards the high-grade silver copper EC120 Project on schedule for commercial production by the end of 2025. EC120 promises to significantly enhance our silver output and free cash flow, reinforcing Cosalá's role in our portfolio. These strong production results, paired with our fortified balance sheet, position us exceptionally well to meet our 2025 goals. We're building momentum across our operations, and we look forward to sharing more as we advance our development and drilling programs. Now, let's dive specifically into Galena, first and foremost.

At Galena and in Mexico, safety is the cornerstone of our operations, and I'm incredibly proud of our Galena team's unwavering commitment to this principle. Their outstanding performance was showcased at the recent May Mine Rescue Competition in Kellogg, Idaho, where the team earned first place in rope rescue, first place in benchman contests, and second place in the technician event. One of our engineers, Nicole Henderson, was honored as Benchman of the Year and tied for the Inaugural Central Mine Rescue MVP Award, recognizing her mastery of mine rescue protocols and leadership both on and off the field. These achievements highlight the strength and dedication of our Galena crew. As previously mentioned earlier on the call, Galena produced 420,000 silver ounces in Q2, meeting our internal expectations. We've advanced to 55.179 decline, opening access to new scopes and successfully mining our first long hole scope.

New loaders and trucks are boosting productivity, while ventilation improvements, including the first ALIMAK raises and ongoing second raises, enhance our underground conditions. The upcoming Number 3 Shaft hoist motor upgrades in the second half will further increase capacity, targeting our increased rate of approximately 110 to 118 tons per hour versus the 42 tons per hour that we actually inherited six months ago. Over to slide nine. Now discussing some of our recent test work with metallurgical breakthroughs, having potential to add significant value at Galena. In May, we reported that test work by SGS Canada achieved 90% to 96% recoveries on antimony and 98% to 99% recoveries from the tetrahedrite material. With concentrates grading 18% to 19% antimony and 600 ounce per ton silver, that's tremendous results that we're already seeing from this test work. This puts us on a pathway to potentially become the only U.S.

producer of antimony, a critical mineral for the defense and energy sectors, especially after China's September 2024 halt on incoming antimony into the U.S. Obviously, we're not stopping there. The next step in enhancing our value creation potential from antimony is through ongoing test work being conducted by Alahees Engineering, which is focused on treating our concentrate to produce multiple saleable antimony products. Historically, antimony was recovered from Galena ore, so we have strong technical precedent for recovery test work that's currently underway. Over to slide 10, please. At our Cosalá Operations in Mexico, we have a team of experts led by our General Manager, Gabriel Soto, who has been consistent with his standard of safety and productivity. During the second quarter, silver production was just under 270,000 ounces of silver, which was 103% higher than in Q1.

This was alongside 1.5 million pounds of zinc and 0.2 million pounds of lead. Higher EC120 grades drove this silver surge. Though base metal output dipped as we continued our transition from San Rafael, it is important to note that the higher lead and zinc base metal output of San Rafael, which will switch to a higher silver and copper as we move into the EC120, which is scheduled to happen in Q4 of this year. We're accelerating EC120 development toward its high-grade silver copper core with production increases expected through the second half of 2025, as I mentioned. San Rafael's remaining scopes continue to offset costs during this shift. EC120's pre-production contributed $8.3 million to revenue with 211,000 silver ounces produced. We're on track for commercial production by year-end, significantly boosting our silver output and, more importantly, our cash flow.

Now, before I hand the call over to Warren to go over our financial highlights, I'd like to welcome Shirley Interveld to our Board of Directors. Mrs. Interveld brings over 30 years of experience in senior management and board positions across the mining, renewables, and energy sectors. Her extensive background includes serving as a director for companies such as Westgold, Develop Global, and more recently, Karora Resources, where she was a director on our team, as well as leadership roles at Buru Energy and Alcoa in Australia. Her expertise strengthens our board and will be invaluable as we continue to execute our growth strategy. Over to slide 11, and now I'll pass the call over to Warren, our Chief Financial Officer.

Speaker 1

Thank you, Paul, and good morning, everyone. This morning, we released our Q2 2025 financial results. Our unaudited, condensed interim consolidated financial statements and MD&A for the three and six months ended June 30, 2025, are available on our website and under Americas Gold and Silver Corporation's profile on CDAR Plus and EGR. Revenue was $27 million, down from $33 million in Q2 2024 due to the noted lower zinc and lead production as we focused on the EC120 Project development, where we will see higher silver and copper output compared to the San Rafael mine. Silver sales grew with a realized price of $34.22 per ounce. We produced 689,000 silver ounces and 839,000 silver equivalent ounces, including 1.5 million pounds of zinc and 1.9 million pounds of lead.

Costs were approximately $28 per silver equivalent ounce for cost of sales, $26.64 per silver ounce for cash costs, and $32.89 per silver ounce for all-in sustaining costs, down almost $3 from last quarter's, with continued reductions expected as production volumes rise. Our net loss was $15 million, an increase from $4 million in Q2 2024, driven by our investment in the revitalization of the Galena Complex, the transition to EC120 Project at Cosalá Operations, increasing precious metal prices on metals-based liabilities, non-recurring non-cash corporate G&A expenses connected with the addition of critical technical personnel and the reconstitution of the board of directors, and lower net revenue from the decreased base metals production previously noted. This loss was partially offset by lower interest and financing expenses and higher foreign exchange gains, as well as very strong silver revenue performance.

The adjusted loss was $12 million, and the adjusted EBITDA was a $4 million loss. Our cash balance soared to $62 million this quarter, an increase of $53 million from Q1, mainly due to the first $50 million tranche of our $100 million term loan facility with SAF Group and the $11.5 million offtake financing with Ocean Partners. Working capital improved at $10 million from a $29 million deficit at year-end 2024. With that, I'll now turn the call over to Oliver Turner.

Speaker 0

Thank you, Warren. Hello everyone. I'm pleased to share some significant developments in our corporate strategy that are enhancing Americas Gold and Silver Corporation's visibility in the market and positioning us for continued growth. In July, we hosted our first external group analyst tour with nine different sell-side groups attending a two-day visit to the Galena Complex. The tour was very successful, and we were able to show the group many of the positive developments and productivity improvements Paul mentioned earlier as we execute this investment year into our Galena operations. Later this year, we also look forward to hosting our first buy-side tour and welcome inquiries from a very strong shareholder base. Over to slide 14. In terms of our results, I'd like to highlight a key achievement in this quarter. 82% of our revenue came from silver.

In fact, this surpasses our short-term goal of reaching over 80% exposure to silver by the end of 2025, demonstrating that we're well on track to becoming a leading North American silver producer. While this percentage will shift slightly over the coming quarters as we transition into new mining areas with variable base metals byproduct credits, it is a strong indicator of our progress and the effectiveness of our silver-focused strategy. No matter which way you cut it, investing into our company is one of the best ways you can play silver in this very exciting market that we're currently experiencing. Over to slide 15, I'd like to address our upcoming share consolidation, which will see every 2.5 Americas Gold and Silver Corporation shares exchanged for 1 Americas Gold and Silver Corporation share.

As previously approved by our shareholder vote on June 24 and approved by the board on August 6, this consolidation is designed to expand the investability of our stock to a wider audience. With a higher share price, the stock will now not only be eligible for more large institutional investors who have a minimum price threshold, but it will also enable margin trading for retail investors through brokers with share price requirements. This has the potential to enhance liquidity and allow our stock to be included in more investment portfolios in larger sizes, a positive and welcome outcome for all Americas Gold and Silver Corporation investors. We intend to file articles of amendment soon and expect the common shares to commence trading on a post-consolidation basis within the next 10 days following final approvals. We'll provide further updates as we move forward.

With that, I'll turn the call back over to Paul for some closing remarks.

Speaker 2

Thank you, Oliver and Warren, and actually, thank you to everyone who took the time to join us for this call today. Q2, without doubt, has been a tremendous quarter about momentum for us at both Galena and in Mexico. Galena has had operational, explorational, and metallurgical breakthroughs, some of which haven't been done for years. Cosalá continues to thrive and get into the EC120, and at the corporate level, with our $100 million financing, we're really set up to really deliver on those things that we've been working on. Overall, the first half of the year has been very exciting. It's been a lot of work. We're certainly not afraid of the work, and we're excited about what the second half is going to bring. Thank you to each and every one of you for taking the time to be with us here today and listening to our call.

If you have further questions, please don't hesitate to get a hold of any one of us, and have a great day. Take care, everyone.