Thank you for standing by, and welcome to the Evolution Mining FY 2023 half-year financial results. All participants are in a listen-only mode. There will be a presentation followed by a question and answer session. If you wish to ask a question, you will need to press the star key followed by one on your telephone keypad. I would now like to turn the conference over to Mr. Jake Klein, Executive Chair. Please go ahead.
Thanks, MJ. Good morning, everyone. Thanks for joining us. We really appreciate your time on this busy morning. On the call this morning is Lawrie Conway, our CEO, and Glen Masterman, our VP Discovery. I'll make some introductory comments before handing over to Lawrie, who today for the last time will be also acting as our CFO. Our new CFO, Barrie Van Der Merwe, starts on the first of March and was in the office yesterday and assured me he would be listening to the call attentively this morning. Special good morning to you, Barrie. I know there will be no one happier than Lawrie to see you arrive for work on the first of March. Starting on slide three, a gold business that prospers through the cycle.
For those of you that have followed our story, you will know that this has always been the purpose of Evolution, and the results we are presenting today are evidence of our team's success at delivering this for . The recipe is working. A concentrated portfolio of high-quality assets in Tier 1 jurisdictions operating at sector leading low costs are generating over $1 billion of operating cash flow on an annualized basis and allowing us to be investing in quality growth. Not growth for growth's sake, but growth that will again improve the quality and sustainability of our production base. Importantly, we are also succeeding with the drill bit as the Mineral Resource and Reserve update demonstrates. We now have over 30 million ounces in gold resources and 1.8 million tons of copper.
Ernest Henry has been a real standout with a 36% increase in gold and a 37% increase in copper resources, with substantial exploration upside still remaining. With an average mine life of 14 years, coupled with good geological upside in our district scaled positions in both Australia and Canada, we are excited about our future. This is underpinned by a strong balance sheet. We have generated strong operating cash flow, which we have invested into our growth projects. As we now near the end of this, we anticipate generating material net cash flow that will be available to both retire debt and support dividend payments to our shareholders. Our respect and recognition of the importance of this is demonstrated by the declaration of our 20th consecutive dividend today. Turning to slide four. Shareholder community and government expectations of mining companies are appropriately continuing to rise.
We are proud of the recognition of our work in this area as recognized by external ratings agencies. What better way to demonstrate the benefits of mining to these important stakeholders than turning Mount Rawdon, a mature gold mine, into a major contributor to Queensland's ambitious renewable energy targets? The feasibility study, which we are completing with our 50% partner, ICA, continues to de-risk the project and demonstrate a commercially attractive pumped hydro project capable of delivering capacity of 2 gigawatts. The picture on the slide shows the Mount Rawdon open pit that will ultimately convert into the lower reservoir for the pumped hydro project. Encouragingly, federal, state, and community engagement has been very positive, with all parties understanding the strategic and economic benefits of the project. Finally, great companies are built by attracting and retaining great people.
As the mining industry continues its quest to motivate young people to join the sector, we are incredibly proud that Evolution was recently named in the top 75 of graduate employers for 2023 and was in fact the highest rated mining company. This, in our view, is also the best way to also make our industry more diverse and inclusive. With that, I'll hand over to Lawrie.
Thank you, Jake, and good morning, everyone. Turning firstly to slide five for an overview of our business. We continue to believe that geopolitical risk is rising. This is not new, but a concerning and unfortunate long-term trend. From a business perspective, it underpins our view that operating in tier one jurisdictions like Australia and Canada, where the rule of law can be relied upon, is more valuable. We believe that this is going to be preferred by investors seeking a gold exposure. Growth remains a critical component of our strategy. This does not mean following the trend of most gold companies where this growth is measured by the number of ounces produced, but for us it means a focus on margins, mine life, and capital returns. A worrying trend is emerging in the Australian gold sector, where margins are being compressed and cash generation is declining.
Evolution is an exception. The quality of our portfolio delivers our sector-leading margins and operating cash flow. We continue to estimate our reserves at a conservative gold price of $1,600 per ounce. It is clear that Ernest Henry and Cowal are world-class deposits and operations. Red Lake is a world-class deposit and our challenge is to make it a world-class operation. There is no doubt that we will be able to do that. Likewise, as you will see in the presentation, we are being prudent and appropriate as we progress in unlocking the greatest value from Mungari. Moving to slide six, which summarizes the financial results for the period. Our statutory profit and earnings per share were up 10%-11%, while underlying profit was up 3%. This is a good result in the environment, I'll outline the drivers to our profit in the next slide.
Our EBITDA margin is solid at 39%, which declined modestly from last year. This is largely due to the acquisition of Ernest Henry, where we now have 100% of the costs, while last year, under the previous prepay structure of the joint venture, we only paid 30% of the costs. We obviously now receive 100% of the copper. Mine operating cash flow is the most important metric on this slide. It was around $477 million for the half year or $1,468 per ounce sold. Importantly, though, the December quarter operating cash flow was at an annualized rate of over $1 billion or $1,667 per ounce sold. This demonstrates the cash generation of the business, which should further increase as our production grows moving forward.
The capital investment at Cowal and Red Lake Underground Projects are the drivers to the higher capital investment and gearing levels. These remain on plan and budget. As they transition to commercial production, we expect to see the capital investment and gearing reduce in the second half. As mentioned by Jake, we've declared an interim dividend of AUD 0.02 per share, fully franked. Turning to slide seven, which shows the movement in profit between the two periods. Our profit lifted 11%. The main driver was the immediate benefit from Ernest Henry acquisition, which added approximately AUD 80 million of profit. A 5% higher achieved gold price generated AUD 35 million of additional revenue, while higher production at Cowal and Red Lake delivered an additional revenue of AUD 49 million and AUD 32 million respectively. Our operating costs, excluding Ernest Henry and Kundana at Mungari, increased by around AUD 48 million.
Overall, the drivers to this were due to an even mix of inflation impacts and volume-based activity. With regards to inflation, it impacted our costs by around 8%, but it is to be noted that the costs in the December 2021 half year did not have the full inflationary impacts as compared to the current half year. The higher depreciation amortization charge related to the fair value amortization for the Ernest Henry and Mungari acquisitions. Specifically at Ernest Henry, the amortization includes a fair value uplift for the previous joint venture amount, which was required to be revalued as a result of the December 2021 acquisition. This added around $18 million to the final DNA for the half year post the quarterly. On slide eight, we have our cost drivers and sensitivities.
Despite the cost inflation and high metal prices, discipline is still being maintained across the business to ensure we maintain our low cost position. Additionally, we've been able to maintain our cost guidance range, and our capital investment is under budget. We believe the cost inflation has stabilized, and with some recent cost contracts awarded, actually achieving lower prices. The charts on the right show our sensitivities to cash flow and costs. They demonstrate that metal price sensitivities outweigh the cost inflation impacts. We continue to ensure that these benefits from the higher than planned metal prices are banked. Overall, our cost structure has not materially changed, with labor being our biggest cost item at around 46%, and the movement in the period was in line with guidance. The top seven cost types comprising 87% of our cost base received the most of our attention.
Moving to slide nine and our cash margins. To me, this is the most pleasing part of our business in that we have set the leading margins with further improvements expected in the second half of FY 2023 and moving into FY 2024. Our operating cash margin or EBITDA is around 39%. As shown on the chart, this has improved quarter- on- quarter with 45% achieved in the December quarter. This is being underpinned by the high margin Ernest Henry and Cowal assets at 60% and 54% respectively. Red Lake is improving, and we expect further improvements in the second half. Our all-in sustaining cost margin is also increasing, with AUD 1,500 per ounce delivered in the last quarter.
We'll see these margins further improve when we commission the new underground mines at Cowal and Red Lake later this half. They will displace lower grade material. The strong commodity prices and benefit of the copper exposure provided from the full ownership of Ernest Henry also provide opportunities to increase our margin. Turning to slide 10. We repaid AUD 85 million of debt in the first half, with the level of operating cash flow able to service our debt. Approximately 60% of our debt is long dated with repayments not due until FY 2029 to FY 2032. This debt is at a very low fixed rate of 3.6%. A gearing of 31% is within our internal limits of 35% for periods of growth investment.
Based on the balance sheet position and the outlook for the business performance, including the reducing capital intensity, we have declared a fully franked interim dividend of AUD 0.02 per share. This will be paid on the 2nd of June. That is later than our normal payment timing, but it is to align with when we expect to be past the final stages of the peak major capital investment for this year. Shifting to slide 11, which provides an update on the future growth project at Mungari. The feasibility study completed at the end of December and has defined a compelling case to invest in growth at the operation at this time. Key items of the growth project are that it provides a pathway to 180,000-220,000 ounces per annum and a mine life of around 10 years post-completion.
It has a simple plant design to increase capacity to 4.2 million tons per annum, which will significantly lower processing unit costs and overall all-in sustaining costs. It will unlock a number of regional ore sources, making them more economic. The study outcomes confirmed a capital cost estimate of $250 million, which is in line with our previous estimates and capital guidance. It will have a 30-month build time from the date of approval. The board reviewed the project this week and approved an additional seven and a half million dollars of capital to continue additional work on optimizing the capital and operating costs, while at the same time commencing some front-end engineering design work to further reduce execution risk of the project.
The team will now complete that work in the coming months to confirm the final costings by the end of the June quarter. We expect to seek formal approval before the end of the calendar year. Slide 12 shows the growth potential at Ernest Henry. As mentioned at our December quarterly call last month, we have taken the decision to extend the PFS to incorporate the larger mine footprint in defining an optimal mine plan and the location of the underground infrastructure. This work will be completed by the end of the June quarter. However, I'll now turn over to Glen, who will outline the great success we have had in increasing the mineral resource at Ernest Henry and further across our business.
Thank you, Lawrie. Continuing on the Ernest Henry theme, in connection with our Mineral Resource and Ore Reserve statement issued, I'm excited to talk about the significant resource growth at Ernest Henry, which is a result of drilling programs up to the end of December 2022. Materially increases to our contained gold and copper resources, which when reported on a gold equivalent basis, represents an addition of 2.6 million ounces that were delivered at a sector-leading discovery cost of $5 per gold equivalent ounce. Importantly, this resource update does not include any of the drilling completed since the beginning of this year, there is further growth to come. I'd like to turn your attention to the Ernest Henry long section on slide 12, where we are looking at a side-on view of the ore body towards the west.
In our field of view, we see the open pit underground mining infrastructure and outlined in the blue shapes, the ore body defined at a 0.7% copper contour. The drilling program has focused on step-out and infill drilling at the main ore body, the Southeast lens, which is stacked beside and overlaps with the main ore body and at Ernie Jr. The black traces highlight holes drilled from surface, which commenced in April last year. The benefit of the surface drilling program is that it has enabled us to more accurately delineate the boundaries of the main ore body, which in many areas is wider than previously modeled. Gold and copper mineralization has been extended at depth across all mineralization domains. As well, infill drilling, particularly at Ernie Jr. and at the Southeast lens, has delivered great increases, which have considerably improved the outcome.
Ernest Henry remains our best opportunity for significant resource and reserve growth over the next 12 months. I spoke recently on our quarter end call in January about the excellent results we received from our ongoing surface and underground programs. These results are highlighted on the long section and illustrates the enormous growth potential we continue to envisage for the operation. I am also excited to describe a new development at Ernest Henry, named Bert, which is located stratigraphically below and adjacent to the mine portion of the main ore body in the open pit. Mineralization domains for Bert are highlighted at the top right corner of the long section in the diagram on slide 12. A short drill program completed late last year, intersected wide intervals of chalcopyrite in the first two drill holes. Full results from this program are expected in late February.
However, the significance of the recent drilling intercepts indicates Bert is a sizable mineralization domain that remains open down plunge and has potential to follow the main ore body mineralization to depth with potential to unlock incremental value in future drilling programs. I'd like to now move to the group consolidated Mineral Resource and Ore Reserve update, which we released in this morning's annual MRR statement, and which is summarized on slide 13 of the presentation. The standout result is the growth in gold and copper resources, which increased 2% and 22% respectively. As mentioned, the key driver was Ernest Henry. However, we also realized material additions at Red Lake and at Mungari, driven mainly by higher metal price assumptions, along with increases delivered in our drilling programs.
Our group discovery costs for the year were $34 per ounce for gold additions to the Mineral Resource and a very competitive $16 per ounce on a gold equivalent basis. Our Mineral Resources were reported within optimized pit shells or underground mining shapes, developed using a $2,200 per ounce price assumption for gold. The one exception is the Ernest Henry estimate, which is reported within the interpreted 0.7% copper envelope. Group consolidated Ore Reserves decreased 2% for gold, however, increased 4% for copper. The slight negative move gains we might have realized from assuming a conservative long-term gold price of $1,600 per ounce. The small increase at Ernest Henry was driven by additions realized above the 1,125 meter RL.
We expect the mine extension PFS at Ernest Henry, which will include mineral resources between the 1,125 and 775 meter RLs to drive a material increase in the ore reserve when the study completes in the June quarter. This will allow us to incorporate the larger mine footprint being defined in the ongoing drilling program. I'm going to conclude my section on slide 14, which highlights our impressive growth story since formation of the company. We have built our business through a series of creative and accretive M&A transactions that have provided the foundation for our business and from which we have been able to significantly grow our resources and reserves. along with modeling and optimization updates.
A key ingredient in our success is the identification and acquisition of assets in world-class geological addresses where we can continue to unlock value with our drilling programs. I look forward to being able to share further updates as our drilling programs progress, particularly at Ernest Henry. With that, I'll hand back to Lawrie for closing remarks.
Thank you, Glen. Hopefully, you have seen from the presentation today that Evolution is a high-quality gold company which is committed to having a sector-leading position, while at the same time having a disciplined approach to capital allocation and rewarding our shareholders at the same time. We will continue to focus on margin over ounces so as to sustain our low-cost, high-margin position. Our growth projects remain on schedule and budget, which will be the near-term catalyst to the next step up in operating cash flow. Two key projects in the pipeline, which will provide long-term benefits for our shareholders. The balance sheet is well-managed, and we have adequate liquidity to navigate through the current cost inflation, as well as appropriate sequencing and allocation of capital for our growth projects. This discipline is not changing.
We are adding high-quality resources and reserves underpinned by a conservative metal price assumption and the excellent results from the drill bit, as outlined by Glen. This gives us a group mine life of 14 years and have been able to maintain that with further opportunities to extend this going forward. Our full-year group guidance remains unchanged at 720,000 ounces at an all-in sustaining cost of AUD 1,240 per ounce in a range of ±5% for both. I'd like to take the time to express my appreciation and thank the finance, investor relations, and technical team for their considerable efforts in consolidating the full half-year accounts and our MROR. It is really appreciated. Thank you for your time this morning. I'll now ask MJ to open the line for questions.
Thank you, sir. If you wish to ask a question, please press star one on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. If you wish to cancel your question, please press star two. If you are on a speakerphone, please pick up the handset to ask your question. Your first question today comes from Mitch Ryan with Jefferies. Please go ahead.
Good morning, all. Thank you very much for the time. My first question just relates to, I believe there's an outstanding payment of roughly AUD 200 million to Glencore due in January of 2023. Are you able to confirm if that payment has been made? Then as a derivative of that, I believe that the undrawn revolver, as at the 31st of December, was roughly AUD 530 million. Has there been any change or draw of that? If you're prepared to comment on that.
Yeah, thanks, Mitch. The Glencore payment went ahead in the first week of January as planned, and to date, as at today, we have not used or drawn on the revolver.
Thank you very much. appreciate that. My second question is, again, it feels like we're only just speaking about the operational metrics at Red Lake not long ago, you know, less than a week ago. Any comments that you can provide on any change given the increased, you know, Bob being on-site and the management focus on that asset?
Mitch, look, pleasingly, January's performance was better than the finish to the December quarter. We're seeing good improvements in the key metrics continue through February. We are seeing the benefits of Bob and Jason spending time on-site. Thomas Lethbridge, the new head of operations there, will commence in the first week of March, which is another resource that we're looking forward to having on the ground.
Okay. Thank you very much. That's it for me.
The next question comes from Al Harvey with J.P. Morgan. Please go ahead.
Morning, guys. Just wanted to clarify, with the resource and reserve update, the metal price assumptions for Ernest Henry. Just noting those reserve revenue factors, for both copper and gold have moved up. I assume that gold's largely a realignment, following the transition of full ownership to Evolution. I'm just trying to get a sense of how much of the increase in reserves came from that, and then, I guess, taking a step back to the resources, if there was any changes in views around pricing there and, you know, how that's changed and flowed through to the 0.7% shell for the resource there.
Al, the 0.7% copper shell that we use to delineate the ore body is a geological boundary, but also serves as the boundary for the resource outlines. That's been basically generated to reflect, you know, essentially the historic gold and copper prices that have been applied at Ernest Henry. The resource growth that we've seen has not been impacted by the higher metal price assumptions for our mineral resources. It's been entirely done by drilling additions.
Great. That's all for me. Thanks. Thanks, Glen.
The next question comes from Alex Barkley with RBC. Please go ahead.
Good morning, everyone. At Ernest Henry, I get that you haven't been able to update the reserve with the study coming out. Is it likely any of the more recent drilling is going to be able to increase the resource as well when the PFS comes out?
Alex, yeah, Glen again. The short answer is yes. We will be able to incorporate some of the drilling that we're doing through this half year. We'll have to determine what the data cutoff date will be. What we're doing at the moment is really sort of infilling into the gap that sort of exists in information between the 1,125 and the 775. That particularly concerns where Ernie Jr. is sort of plunging down to connect with the deeper mineralization. There is an opportunity to add additional metal into the study area for consideration in the reserve estimate that we'll be completing through the completion of the PFS.
Yeah. Okay. It sounds like design factors could be an influence as well.
Yeah.
Just a follow-up question around the reserve price increase, just sort of what's changed in your outlook around gold and copper price?
Yeah, Alex. What we've done there is really just reflected, you know, the updates, to sort of be in line with, you know, pricing gold price and copper price environment. The idea being that, you know, we still, we wanna be able to sort of maintain exposure to that, which is reflected in the increase. It, you know, we also believe it's, you know, a fairly conservative long time and price assumption that we're applying.
Just on top of that, Alex, we've also, in doing the latest MRR, gotta take into consideration the rise in the cost position over the last few years. If we've got to factor those in, you've got to match it with the revenue side as well.
Yep. That's all quite fair. That's all the questions from me. Thanks, guys.
Thanks, Alex.
The next question comes from Alexander Papaioanou with Citi. Please go ahead.
Hi, Jake and Lawrie. Two questions from me. Just to follow on from Mitch's question, with the upcoming EHM stamp duty payment, Mungari CapEx expansion and EHM extensions, what are your plans on drawing your debt facility? Or in your projections, will these items be funded by cash flows?
Thanks, Alex. In terms of stamp duty, that's been factored into our plans. We expect that to come through in the next couple of months, both for Mungari and Ernest Henry. In terms of the capital for Mungari, I mean, we're not expecting to have decisions until the back end of this calendar year. When we look at the projects going into FY 2024 and beyond, we see that coming into our funding via the operating cash flows.
Yep. Thanks. Bob's been to Red Lake for another month-ish after the quarterly. Are there any other data points that you can share with how the operation's progressing from there?
Bob was back for the quarterly call and had a bit of time back home with his family, having spent a lot of time over there up until the end of December. He's been back on site for a little bit now. What we did see in January are the things around the meters and the tons, the processing plant stabilizing. The key metrics that we needed to see have happened. The commissioning of two new jumbos has taken place, and the decommissioning of old equipment has also progressed, which is therefore reducing costs, particularly around the maintenance and increasing our operating efficiencies.
you know, as I said, just earlier to Mitch was that January was a much better performance, and we've seen through to February a continuation of that improving trend. For me, six weeks isn't enough to claim victory, and Bob's of the same view that we've got to just consistently do that month in, month out.
Yep. Perfect. I'll pass it on.
The next question comes from Levi Spry with UBS. Please go ahead.
Good morning, Lawrie, Jake, and Glen. Thanks for the call. I just had a question on Mungari. Just this 30-month build time was probably a little bit longer than what I thought. I wondered if you could maybe talk through what's driving that. Is that by choice to, given what's going on in the market? I guess just the other part of to that was, can you help us sort of triangulate an asset here? You've talked to, you know, reduced unit costs and obviously a different reserve price, but how do we think about the margin on that at the 180,000-100,000 ounce run rate? Thanks, Lawrie, probably. Yep.
Yeah. Thanks, Levi, and sorry for the background noise. I just couldn't pick up your first question, which was around the build time. I mean, the team in finishing the study is looking really it's the long lead time items for the major pieces of equipment for the plant around the ball mill and everything that's, you know, currently sitting over, you know, over 12 months. That's really what pushes it into a 30-month build time. You've got to consider as well where this will be located, in putting the material and making sure we don't interrupt with the existing operations, and where we're going to place that means that you have to probably go at a slower build rate than you would if it was just a greenfield.
That's sort of what's happening in the build. In terms of the AISC, you know, our view at the moment, we're averaging $2,000-$2,100. We've got to see that get down, you know, towards $1,500 to make it a far greater cash-generating asset for us. That's what the study team's trying to work through. You obviously pick up the benefits on the processing capacity doubling, you also have to offset it now with lower grade material, this lower grade material is coming anywhere from 50-80 kilometers away from the plant. That's what the work in the next few months to do is to lock down the capital cost and optimize what that operating cost profile is gonna look like.
Excellent. Thanks. Thanks, Lawrie. Thank you.
Once again, if you wish to ask a question, please press star one on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. The next question comes from Andrew Bowler with Macquarie. Please go ahead.
Good day, gents. Strongly second half from Red Lake and Cowal. You've already answered on Red Lake. Can you just give us a bit of an update on how the underground's going on Cowal since the quarter, is that still remaining on track?
Yeah. Thanks, Andrew. It's certainly on track for first stoping ore in the June quarter. You know, the good thing is that through January and the first half of February, the weather has held up out at Cowal, that's allowed access into the pit. It's also importantly allowed the surface infrastructure around the village, the base plant and those projects to continue on schedule. In terms of the underground, it's tracking to plan.
Thanks. Just on Bert at Ernest Henry, just trying to get my head around the geometry there. It's a bit hard with that isometric view you've given us. Can that be drilled from the pit, or is that something that needs to be attacked from underground or surface? Where is that? Is that a long strike, or is it sort of, you know, below in the footwall of the, of the main ore body? Cheers.
Andrew, you're referring to the mineralization when I was describing earlier?
Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. That, that sits, you know, on strike of the ore body, so we're looking perpendicular to it in this view. It, it is actually situated, only sort of 60 meters from, you know, from the north wall of the pit. What it does is it, at the moment, we don't have a lot of information, obviously, at depth, but it's sort of tracking, parallel to the main, ore body lens and in the strike, same strike direction. It just sits beneath it. The idea is that we will drill it from underground. We have better, positions there to get the best angle of attack on, you know, getting the information we need to model it appropriately.
That's all for me. Thanks, guys.
The next question is from Jon Bishop with Jarden Australia. Please go ahead.
Morning. Thanks for taking my questions. Just two for me. Just regarding Red Lake, obviously sounding pretty positive, this calendar year. Are you able to sort of comment on rates of turnover, whether you've seen turnover of staff sort of stabilize a little bit or improve?
Thanks, Jon. Look, I mean, Red Lake, it's got over 80% of the workforce is residential and local. Turnover rate has not been too high. What we're more happy about in January and February is absenteeism has reduced. In terms of the workforce and the ability to keep that fully resourced is not a major issue for us at Red Lake at the moment.
Right. That absenteeism is just related to sort of COVID impacts? Just can I speculate better morale? Is that a fair follow on?
No. No. The absenteeism in that December quarter really probably related more to the holiday season and people taking holidays. It wasn't linked to COVID at all.
Okay, good one. Just around Ernest Henry, obviously the study's due at the end of this fiscal year. In terms of how the, you know, the sell side are thinking about CapEx, probably pre Ernest Henry Jr. and possibly Bert, and the backdrop of obviously inflation at the moment, is this sort of a major change in scope or CapEx that we should have in mind? Do you think, you know, with what you've seen out there and analyst numbers that within reason we're all in sort of the ballpark? It's a fluffy question, but I guess you can see where I'm going in terms of potential for major CapEx changes versus expectation.
Look, Jon, what we're seeing at the moment, we've got a contractor in helping with the mine development, getting some work done for where the infrastructure underground for the crusher and conveyor is going, and the costs that we've seen for that contract have been pretty well in line with expectations and the market position. We're not seeing any cause for concern around mine development costs. In terms of the crushing and conveying costs that the team has in the PFS at the moment, it's not a material shift from what they were expecting at the start of the study, noting that the concept study was based on a trucking movement system.
When we look at the sequencing, you know, for us, the great drill results that Glen's getting at the moment and the expanding mineralization both below and above the existing crushing area, says the timing of the capital, we can push that back a little bit so that we do sequence our projects appropriately between Mungari, Ernest Henry, Red Lake and the Cowal open pit continuation. The capital, the big capital for Ernest Henry would be at least a couple of years away.
Perfect. All right, thanks for that.
Thanks.
The next question comes from David Radclyffe with Global Mining Research. Please go ahead.
Hi. Good morning, everyone. Just a maybe a little bit more of a left field question. Coming back to, I guess, the business here and what your current hurdle rates are for capital investment, just thinking here about how disciplined maybe you'd be with Mungari, given that, you know, so much money's gone into that in the past, what you wanna see out of this study to then, give yourselves the confidence for putting more money in again?
Yeah, sure, David. I mean, with my current hat of CFO, as Jake said for today, the hurdle rates, you know, we wanna see them, you know, 15% plus is what we want for these projects and to invest in those. That's what Mungari's gotta target. I think, you know, what we do when we allocate the capital as well is we've got to balance it with what's happening at the mine, at where it's at at its stage of its life. You know, when we look at it right now, the underground from Frog's Legs, which is the highest grade underground material we had up until we acquired Kundana and the like, but the percentage of the high grade underground is lower than what it was three, four years ago.
Secondly, you're replacing White Foil open pit material with open pit material through these satellite ore bodies that's further away from the plant. It does make it a little bit difficult, but that hurdle rate still applies for Mungari.
Okay, brilliant. Thank you.
The next question is a follow-up from Alex Barkley with RBC. Please go ahead.
Thanks, guys. A quick follow-up on Mungari and that AUD 250 million. Just confirming if that's for the increased processing capacity and nothing around the mines. What exactly does need to be done to the processing plant? Is it more about adding incremental capacity above what you currently have, so we should almost be thinking about the cost as building an equivalent 2.2 million ton per annum mill or, you know, is that the right way to think about it?
Thanks, Alex. Good questions. The second question first is, yeah, you're basically replicating it, and it's really based on the land position and the fact that you've already got that plant in place. You know, you get another mill, you've got another crushing and conveying system. We've got to work out then the area for another cause. That's what goes into that project. The first part of the question, just remind me again.
The CapEx is just for.
Yes
... processing plant. Yes.
No. That allows everything that's required to convert to the 4.2 million tons per annum and the required supporting infrastructure around that. It obviously doesn't capture for opening up all of the satellite ore bodies.
Yeah
... it's really in and around the site. Okay. Yep, thanks for that.
The next question is from Daniel Morgan with Barrenjoey. Please go ahead.
Hi, Jake, Lawrie, and team. Just referring to slide 12 in Ernest Henry. When you look at Ernest Henry and the opportunities like Bert and the fact that maybe it's getting wider at depth, does that mean you might be able to produce more than the 6 million tons per annum that you're currently being mined? Or 6 million tons mining rate, is that the scale? Thank you.
Dan, it's Glen. Look, We're actually mine constrained at Ernest Henry with the shaft. That's always going to put a cap on the future production in the underground at that sort of 6 million- 7 million ton rate.
Just on that, Bert, you know, is very close to surface. Is there a way to mine that that wouldn't require coming up the shaft and therefore that wouldn't be a constraint?
The short answer is yes. The logical thing would be to sort of ramp into it from the pit, where we have some fairly, you know, ready access there. I think, you know, what that does, you know, as we sort of continue to delineate it, gives us sort of options to think about how we sort of transition from the trucking to conveying option and sort of keep that production profile fairly smooth as we do that. Be probably worth mentioning, though, that as we are getting deeper, and within that sort of study area window, we are seeing some areas where the grade's improving. That is the one lever that we do have.
If that continues to sort of play out like we'd hope, that can deliver some incremental production from the underground, that, you know, that would be coming up the shaft.
Makes sense. I guess more a conceptual question. I mean, how deep do you go with the infrastructure? You know, do you take a calculated risk and go big by going deep, centering the infrastructure, you know, below or well below the 775 RL and the PFS study? Like, could the PFS study area that you're contemplating expand? Thank you.
Yeah, it's a good question, Dan, and one that we're, you know, obviously, talking about internally. I think there's, you know, two things. We've got to continue to do the drilling to sort of, you know, delineate the geometry of the ore body and understand the grade, as it continues at depth, and then obviously do the work to sort of understand, you know, what, you know, how deep can we sort of, you know, contemplate, you know, developing the infrastructure. That's, you know, gonna be covered off in this PFS, but, certainly, you know, as we think about the future, that's what's on our minds.
The only thing I'd add there, Dan, is that what we've got to take into consideration is that at the current mining rates, how much time do we have before we have to then, you know, continue to truck up to the existing infrastructure, and what efficiencies do we lose from going down that path? The reality is that the study team in the next 3 months- 4 months will make a landing on where we've got to place it, and then we have to move forward on that basis.
Okay. Thank you very much. More a financial question. You just paid a dividend, obviously in a period where you're making heavy capital investments for the future. Presume that's a signal that you're not contemplating a capital raising or is that reflecting just near-term cash generation expected?
Dan, the answer to that is no. We're not planning a capital raise. I mean, you know, we are six weeks away from going into the June quarter, which puts us into a position where the... As I said on the December quarterly call, our major capital investment starts to decline, and the production from Cowal underground and Red Lake ramps up. Also, as we saw in the December quarter, when we can access fully the pit at Cowal, we're getting to that higher grade material, and so that also will continue into the quarter. We successfully completed the major shut for Cowal for this year, this month. That's done as well.
They have a clear run through to the end of the year. That's really what we're looking at the outlook. We believe the operating cash flows justifies a return for our shareholders.
Okay. Very clear. Thank you very much.
There are no further questions at this time. I would now like to hand the call back to Mr. Klein for closing remarks.
Thanks, MJ, and thanks, everyone, for participating. Great to hear the interest in the company. Particularly the questions around Ernest Henry and the interest there. You know, it's a good problem to have, that Glen and the discovery team are creating challenges to the project team, as they keep getting these great drill results and making the challenge and the size and scale and operation and where to put infrastructure an interesting challenge. That's a good problem to have as he discovers more. Thanks, Glen. We're looking forward to speaking to investors over the next couple of days. We'll be in Miami at the BMO conference, where again, we're looking forward to catching up with North American investors.
I would flag that we are hosting an investor day and site visits to both Ernest Henry and Cowal from the fifth to seventh of June. If you haven't received the save the date yet, please contact Peter O'Connor or Taleen Chua. Thanks very much. We look forward to speaking to you over the next few days and weeks. Thanks.
That does conclude our conference for today. Thank You for participating. You may now disconnect.