This is a live webinar that is being held via Automic's online meeting platform, which lets shareholders and investors participate by asking questions in real time. If you would like to ask a question, just press on the Q&A icon at the bottom right of your screen. That will open up a new screen, and at the bottom of that screen, there is a section for you to type your question. Once you have finished typing, just hit enter on your keyboard, and that will send the question through. Those questions, they can be asked at any time during the webinar. Obviously, if we get lots of similar questions on the same topic, I will not ask them all. That way, we can cover as many to pics as possible.
If we do run out of time, John has indicated that he will answer your questions in due course via email. As I said, you can submit your questions at any time. Now it is my pleasure to hand the reins to Fenix's Executive Chairman, John Welborn, for some introductory comments on the March quarterly announcement. John?
Very much, Mick. That is the June 2026 quarterly report we published yesterday, which also heralds the end of a very successful FY 2026 financ ial year, ending 30 June for 2026. Two things I would like to start today's quarterly webinar with. First of all is a thank you, and an appreciation to the entire Fenix team. One of the key things of the June quarterly was the launch internally of our One Fenix vision. Fenix is all about incremental development steps. At the end of the March quarter, we completed what had been a multi-year journey of integrating the management of our supply chain. We now have not only a mining business, a haulage and logistics business, a port business in Geraldton.
The quarter also heralded the commencement of our shipping business in the exciting joint venture between Fenix and Mira Bulk. Across those teams, our mining team, our haulage logistics team, our port team, our marketing team, our new shipping team, and our corporate functions of finance, HR, IT, and support. We have had an incredibly busy, incredibly fulfilling 2026. Congratulations to everyone at Fenix. That is what drove the record results. The quarterly activities report was heralded with record haulage, record mining tons moved, and record throughput at the Port of Geraldton, and a new record for Berth 5, which is behind me. The second thing I wanted to headline today's webinar is a shout-out and an equally powerful thank you to all of our partners at Fenix.
We pride ourselves on being a partnership business. One of the important announcements we have made recently is that we have secured all the key approvals for our next mine in the Weld Range, the Beebyn W10 mine. My appreciation goes to a range of partners who have been significant in our operations, particularly in Beebyn W10 and the approvals announcement, most notably the Wajarri Yamaji people, the traditional custodians of the land on which we operate. Our ability to mine successfully, and also appropriately go through the approvals process is testament to our strong relationship. To Big Yellow, to MACA, to our mining contractors, and to all of our partners. I am currently conducting this webinar from the Noosa Mining Conference.
In Brisbane yesterday, I had the great pleasure of touring the Volvo Trucks factory there, with Martin Merrick, Volvo Trucks and Volvo Group Australia President, and Tom Chapman, the Vice President. What an amazing facility. All of the trucks that we run at Fenix are Volvo and Mack, and they are all manufactured right from the steel, in Brisbane. I was fortunate enough to see some of our new trucks in various stages of their development through that amazing supply chain. A good example of the Fenix business. We again set some records in the June quarter. It was very pleasing because, at the end of the March quarter, the Mid West suffered significant damage from Cyclone Narelle, that had impacted our operations across the business.
We started the quarter with a unified commitment across the company to make sure that we recovered from the impacts of the cyclone, but also achieved our promised guidance. So record production of 1.3 million tonnes in the June quar ter. Shareholders of Fenix would remember that that was roughly our original annual production targets, only going back two years. That throughput during the quarter allowed us to achieve 4.4 million tonnes. The quarterly has, as usual, a number of really important highlight boxes. We finished with AUD 81 million in cash, and that is after a significant amount of investment. The quarterly report demonstrates that we actually had positive operational cash flow during the June quarter of AUD 31 million.
T hat is really important considering that we had a fuel price supply shock, which increased our overall C1 cash costs by approximately AUD 5 a tonne, in our mining and haulage business. We had an equally significant shipping price rise, largely the response of also bulk diesel fuel impact on shipping costs of even greater, probably around AUD 8 a tonne. So that very strong operating cash flow demonstrates the robust nature of our business and the ability of our supply chain across mining, haulage, port services, and now shipping to flex. That One Fenix management team, the ability to actually make decisions within, for example, the haulage business that respond to the mining business and the port business was really crucial in that positive quarterly performance.
We fly into FY 2027 in very good condition. Actually, at 30 June, we had 200,000 tonnes stockpiled at the port in the sheds you can see behind me. Those boats were delayed due to the impact of weather conditions during that June quarter. So we have had a great start to the July FY 2027 quarter. We have confidently guided an inc rease in total tonnages this year. Our guidance is 4.7 million tonnes to 5.3 million tonnes. Most pleasingly, we have maintained our cost guidance for FY 2027 at AUD 70 to AUD 80 FOB, free on board, Geraldton C1 cash costs. That compares to the AUD 85 we originally targeted in our feasibility study in 2019.
Maintaining that cost guidance at the similar cost levels to what we experienced in FY 2027 and in FY 2026 is a demonstration of the strength of our unique business model and the commitment of all of our teams to focus on cost reductions. Fenix is not immune from the double-digit cost inflation we're seeing amongst the majors. We've brought our costs down in an environment where all of our peers have seen double-digit cost inflation. That's the benefit not only of our increasing volumes, our incremental development steps, our application of capital in the business without equity dilution but also the increasing efficiency in our business. The integrated supply chain reacting to market circumstances and our ability to train and recruit an excellent team, which I referred to earlier.
I 'm really excited about the Mira Bulk joint venture with Fenix. It has a similar opportunity that we originally established with logistics joint venture. Ultimately, that became 100% own Fenix business when we could see not only the strength of that business, but knew that we could invest, build it and actually improve on it. You're seeing the improvement in our haulage logistics business quarter-on-quarter and particularly in the June quarter. We intend to demonstrate that ongoing improvement across the business in FY 2027. That's why we've been able to maintain our cost guidance. The Fenix-Mira Bulk joint venture moves our ability to control the supply chain beyond Geraldton Port into a key cost cent er for the business in terms of landed customer pricing. That is in our shipping costs.
We look forward to demonstrating the value of that business. At the other end of our business at the mine site, the June quarter saw us establish the Beebyn Hub. We're taking on responsibility increasingly for our crushing activities. We've invested capital and construction in that. That is part of our three-year plan to get to 6 million tonnes per annum. It prepares us for the very exciting opportunity to increase Fenix's total tonnes to 10 million tonnes per annum, as we identified in the scoping study published in December 2025. [Goran Seat] and his team are busily working on upgrading the scoping study to a definitive feasibility study. We look forward to publishing that towards the end of calendar 2026. We're very proud of the track record we've established since 2020. Incremental appropriate development steps.
We identify what our opportunities are, then we deliver them. This quarter, this entire financial year, FY 2026 is a positive demonstration of that. We're now very, very motivated to continue that in the next two years of the three-year plan we identified for FY 2026, FY 2027, and FY 2028. Lots of information in the quarterly. Mick, I look forward to questions.
Great. Thank you, John. Lots of positive news there. Now that I'm up to date in the right quarter, we'll start with some questions from the broker research analysts who do cover Fenix. First, we'll kick off from James Williamson at Bell Potter who says, "Can you run through the sales schedule at Iron Ridge and Shine as they approach the end of mining?
Sure. The pleasing news is that the bulk of the transformation. I've described the three-year plan, which effectively, if you take the midpoints of guidance, went from 4.5 million tonnes in FY 2026 to five million tonnes in FY 2027 and 5.5 aiming for six in FY 2028. It looks a very simple incremental growth profile. What was actually happening in the background, like a duck on the surface with the paddles beating very quickly, was a significant transformation from three individual remote mining operations at Shine, at Iron Ridge and at Beebyn W11 into one Beebyn Hub. That transformation has largely occurred from a physical material movement perspective by the en d of FY 2026 and into FY 2027, as demonstrated by the fact that we're now starting the mine process at Beebyn W10.
There are some more tonnes in FY 2027 from Iron Ridge and from Shine. We expect Shine to run through to December. We will get several shipments out of Iron Ridge in the first half of this year, we hope. However, that tonnage from Iron Ridge is not significant in our guidance. By the end of FY 2027, our marketing schedule will be greatly simplified because it will be purely Beebyn material. The important thing for that is that we now have a significant amount of tonnes underneath us. Although we've committed to and guided a three-year plan, independent of the 10 million ton per annum definitive feasibility study.
Fenix now has the confidence with the establishment of the Beebyn Hub, that we can mine at that five to six million ton per annum rate for a significant time out into the future in our existing business, with our existing mining fleet, our existing haulage capacities, and our existing port capacities. The 10 million ton expansion project is an opportunity on top of that long-term business that we've successfully built. Long answer to the qu estion. At the moment, we've got a number of different products in the market. FY 2027 will see us complete the final shipments from Shine and Iron Ridge.
This one's a bit of a two-parter. The quarterly outlined around AUD 110 million-AUD 120 million CapEx related to the Weld Range expansion plans. Can you elaborate on the specifics of what this will focus on and timing of expenditure? Is any of this spend included in the AUD 521 million CapEx estimate from the Weld Range scoping study?
Question. We split that capital guidance up between our previously guided sustaining capital over the three-year plan, which was AUD 35 million-AUD 45 million, and confirmed that we remain on budget in terms of sustaining capital. We also identified a significant number of discretionary capital items, which makes up the balance. Rather than go into the detail, the best way of describing that is it does remain discretionary. We see opportunities to lower our costs as well as prepare for the ultimate vision of being a much lower cost, much higher volume miner. The significant jump in operating cash flow, operating profitability demonstrated by the scoping study we published shouldn't be lost on shareholders. At very conservative iron ore prices, much lower than the current spot price. That generates an NPV of more than AUD 1 billion.
It is very important. To answer the question specifically, I think the guidance given in the quarterly is quite clear. The question about how much of that overlaps with the scoping study capital would be about AUD 20 million of the discretionary capital that we've allocated.
This one. We've had a couple of questions from the investors on this one as well as from James. We said, can you provide an update on the diesel situation and how Fenix has mitigated supply risks with the ongoi ng Middle East conflict?
Absolutely. The entire mining industry was put under huge pressure on the advent of the Middle East supply shock. Fenix, also, we were preparing to scale back activities based on the potential for supply shock. Fortunately, we never had to do that, and you can see that in the record numbers we generated in the June quarter. We fundamentally reassessed our approach to fuel. Where we've ended up is that we are negotiating long-term supply contracts with globally significant refiners and importers of fuel. We're very close to being able to announce what will be a very, very solid support base for Fenix's fuel requirements, both in terms of supply and in terms of price. What we saw generally in the business was a supply price shock.
Towards the end of the quarter, pleasingly, we saw diesel prices back down towards our budgeted level. Obviously, more recently, we've seen the Middle East escalate again, and we're starting to see prices rise. It has focused us, Mick, on other opportunities in our business. Decarbonization, where that can remove our reliance on diesel. We are a heavy diesel user in our mining business and most obviously in our haulage business and in our exposure in our shipping activities. We continue to look at ways that we can mitigate that. At the moment, the answer to that question is we're negotiating very preferential diesel supply contracts based on our current and expected volumes. We head into FY 2027 confident that we will have fuel supply in almost every circumstance.
The only reason Fenix will now not have fuel supply is if the entire Australian mainland continent is suffering fuel shortages, which we do not expect.
Yep, that's good news. David Brennan from Petra Capital, he's got a couple of questions. He says, "Some color on the likely move in the average discount to benchmark prices as production transitioned from Iron Ridge, Shine, Beebyn W11 to Beebyn W11, and Beebyn W10.
Thanks for that question, David. One of the things you would have seen during the June quarter is we had some very strong performance from Shine. The Shine iron ore mine is a lower grade mine. Generally, the products we ship from Shine are among our lowest grade. As we move and as we transition to the Beebyn Hub, we will replace that lower grade Shine material with higher grade material. That will mean that we will have lower discounts and in some cases, a premium. In fact, it's not just grade of iron that drives the discount and/or the premium to spot prices and the index price. It's also the size of the material, whether it's lump fines and the other deleterious elements in it.
We've actually had recent examples. It's a demonstration of the success of Fenix's own proprietary marketing business where we've achieved a premium on material that's actually lower than 61% iron, so lower than the benchmark, and we've then generated a premium. Generally, we obviously aim our mining mix and our product mix to price all of our products off the 61% index. We'll continue to look to narrow the gap on any discount between that index and our achieved pricing. Our ambition remains to get as close as we possibly can to index pricing. My guide to David would be, if you look at the average performance of our pricing over FY 2026, we'll look to continue that into FY 2027.
A follow-up question. He says, "Can you give some color on the likely move in the group haulage costs and overall C1 cash costs as production transitions from Iron Ridge, Shine, Beebyn W11 to Beebyn W11 and W10?
Good question. Again, Shine is closer to Geraldton. It's a couple of hundred kilometers, so that's been an advantage of Shine. It's one of the things that offset the lower grade material from Shine was the sho rter haulage route. There is a longer pathway to market for the tons we're replacing from Beebyn W10 and W11 that were being produced by Shine. However, that's offset by the logistic synergies around having one operation and one hub. We continue to see incremental improvement in our haulage business. I mentioned earlier that the efficiency gains about integrating the management team of the haulage business into the One Fenix model so that it can immediately react to the variations in our mining and also very, very importantly, our shipping schedules.
We expect that the reason we've been able to guide our costs maintaining the same level as FY 2026 and FY 2025 is because we are confident that we can incrementally improve the efficiency of our haulage business to offset both the rise in diesel prices that we're experiencing and the additional haulage route that we will occupy. That's something that investors and market analysts like David can look forward to monitoring our performance on.
The penultimate question from David. He also asks, "Can you discuss the benefits/cost savings using Mira Bulk? Will they be material?
We're hoping they will be material. It's something that we are investigating. It's a very transparent, open relationship. I mentioned it at the start of this webinar that we see ourselves as a strong partnership business. ResInvest have demonstrated that they are a great partner of Fenix. They believe in our business. They're a significant shareholder, shares they bought on market. We entered into an offtake agreement for Shine ores with them, and they've outperformed. We understand their significant longtime history in shipping and commodity trading. We've been exploring with them the opportunity of a joint venture in shipping for several years. We've carefully gone into the Fenix-Mira Bulk joint venture, Mira Bulk being 75% owned by ResInvest. That's why there's an associated increase in our marketing activities through ResInvest.
Also we've secured a very strong debt facility with ResInvest. The opportunities with Mira Bulk are, there's a number of different opportunities. One is our opportunity to preferentially allocate the best vessels appropriate for Geraldton Port. Panamax boats, wider Panamax boats that we can load up to 70,000 tons on berth five. Traditionally, our average has been closer to 60,000 tons. One of the things in the quarterly is a recognition that we set a record of 69,000 tons in loading the Nord Draco on berth five. That's a complete record for the entire Port of Geraldton forever. That's on e of the demonstration advantages of the Mira Bulk partnership. That leads directly through to an AUD 1 or AUD 2 saving in our shipping cost by getting those extra tons in the boat.
The other opportunity is increased efficiency and also the profit that we may experience in putting all of our shipping through that partnership. David asked how significant we think that's going to be. We've been quite conservative, so we haven't guided it. We know there'll be an efficiency gain by loading bigger ships. The opportunity for us to offset our shipping costs with profit from that joint venture is something we're going to monitor and advise on conservatively.
His last question, he says, "Any issues with the personnel/staffing? It seems to be an issue increasingly featured in WA gold miners' reports.
It's a huge challenge across the industry. We have the advantage in being based in the Mid West. The majority of our haulage and logistics and port staff live and work in Geraldton. We don't have a predominant FIFO workforce in the largest part of our business. Obviously, we have a FIFO workforce that supports our mining activities. We do an enormous amount of work to recruit and retain key staff, and I'm really pleased we've just gone through a process of a staff-wide survey. We're doing a lot of cultural work at Fenix. Geraldton's a great place to live. I encourage anyone who's looking for a career opportunity in mining and haulage and logistics and port services to have a look at our careers website. We are very, very comfortable.
The biggest challenge in our business as we've expanded from one and a half million tons to now more than 5 million tons per annum has been with the recruitment of that driver pool, the workforce pool, the skilled labor we need in our maintenance depot in Geraldton, the labor we need at the Port of Geraldton. We are now largely complete in that workforce. We continue to fleet, we're continue looking for skilled, committed people. The retention rates at Fenix are fantastic, and that's something that we work very strongly on. We're looking forward to continuing.
Excellent. Michael Bentley from MST, he says, "Shipping costs, they were higher in the last quarter. Can you give us an indication on what the shipping costs are doing now and how you see the next quarter?
Well, it echoes my comments earlier. Yes, they shot up. We saw towards the end of the quarter they came back down towards the average. We aim to lock in ships, if we can, at around $20 a ton shipping cost. During that June quarter, we saw shipping as high as $30. Fortunately, it didn't stay there for long. We're seeing global uncertainty around the Middle East, that's something that the advantage of, again, of the Fenix-Mira Bulk partnership will provide us some ability to curtail some of those cost rises. I think the answer to that question is difficult in the absence of being clear on exactly how the Middle East crisis is going to unfold. If things settle down, we'll see shipping rates at our budgeted rate. If things ramp up, we'll see them higher.
As we demonstrated in the June quarter, we're confident we can manage them and maintain profitability.
You've touched on this. Next one, he asks about the Fenix-Mira Bulk partnership. Is there any further details you can give on the levels of savings we might expect on shipping costs from this partnership?
Look, I'm actually very optimistic that we are going to have a significant saving in shipping. At the moment, as I've described earlier in the response to James' question, there's an obvious efficiency about that joint venture. There's very little downside from Fenix position. We're going to conservatively look at how we can increase the upside, and we'll report on it as we deliver it.
This one about shipping capacity. The quarterly note of the higher tonnage shipped from a single shipment. Is this something we can expect to see more of, and can you give us further updates on transit shipping at Geraldton Port?
Absolutely. The new target for our shipping team is towards 70,000 tons per vessel instead of 60,000. That's a direct per unit cost saving. We'll be aiming to break that magical 70,000-ton barrier. Every ship that leaves Geraldton is monitoring its draft levels on what is a relatively shallow channel for a bulk commodity exporter. Yes, we can expect to see an increase in our average tons per vessel and therefore a decrease in our prevailing shipping rates, whatever they are at the time. The back end of that question is around transshipment. Transshipment works at scale, so that's really an opportunity that we're looking at in parallel with the transformation to 10 million tonnes per annum.
That is a significant additional cost saving, which would go directly to our bottom line, and we're working again with CSL, a global transshipment company, and others, to look at that opportunity and report on it as we develop solutions.
We've touched a bit on staffing this and logistics. With the additional fleet required for higher tonnages, can you please let us know how the process of acquiring the drivers is going, and are there any issues with securing the trucks and trailers?
No. I mentioned that I've just toured the Volvo factory in Queensland and seen our trucks in the various stages of development. That fleet acquisition has been well planned for a long period of time and will continue during FY 2027. That supply line is very secure, as is our recruitment activities. Now we have the new depot at Geraldton is now well established. The workforce there is stable and operating, as you can see in our quarterly reports, at a very high level, and we expect that to continue.
Mic hael's last question on the iron ore market. Can you give us your views on the short and medium-term iron ore market?
I am really pleased at the stability we've seen over the last several years in the iron ore market. It's pleasing to be here at Noosa Mining Investor Conference and see the huge enthusiasm there are for a range of companies here, promoting largely their exploration and development plans in copper, in nickel, in vanadium, in titanium, in tungsten, in a whole range of metals which are attracting investor attention. One of the reasons they're attracting investor attention is that there is a strongly bullish case behind all those metals that I identified. My encouragement to investors here would be to recognize that if you're bullish on copper, if you're bullish on nickel, if you're bullish on tungsten, you cannot be bearish on steel, and you cannot, therefore should not be bearish on iron ore.
There's a magnificent opportunity, I believe, in a company like Fenix. Our fundamentals are incredibly strong. We have a team who demonstrated we have a track record of delivery, we have a pathway to a project that we think will have an NPV in the multi-billions, and we're confident we can get there without significant dilution on our shareholder base. Coming back to how the commodity supports that, we continue to look at a very conservative hedging profile. We believe our scoping study and our DFS has a very, very conservative iron ore price assumption in it. The upside in iron ore strength, which I think in a world where we've seen the China property market collapse. We've seen Simandou in Guinea get into production. At the same time, we've seen iron ore prices stabilize around $100.
In that environment, Fenix is wonderfully supported by a strong iron ore market. Our products are well accepted. We think investors should be looking at the confidence with the iron ore market and consequently at Fenix.
Great. Just a couple of questions from the investors. This one from Jen Piscopo, he says You've updated the market today that you have secured port access to 2054. Can you provide an update on whether the Geraldton Port expansion is progressing to plan to limit the effects of weather at port?
I'm not sure if the PMaxP project is progressing to plan. It was approved. It's an AUD 300 million investment by the state government into the port behind me. A key element which will assist Fenix is the construction of a new breakwater. The early stages of that project have commenced. In the meantime, we're managing the surge events, and you see that in the efficiency of our shipping, we'll be a huge beneficiary when that infrastructure is completed. The Geraldton Port has huge opportunities to expand, and we're working very closely with the Mid West Ports Authority. In terms of our lo ng-term commitment to Geraldton, we own the infrastructure you see behind me. We own Shed 5, Shed 4, and Shed 13 at Geraldton Port.
They're called sheds, but they're actually massive pieces of infrastructure, on-wharf storage facilities for iron ore. We own the only site-tipping truck unloader in Geraldton Port. We own the conveyor belts that connect those. We're doing a lot of work on dust suppression. We're spending AUD 8 million during the rest of 2026 to improve the connectivity of all of those sheds. That will increase our ability to control the environmental factors of our operation. That's all stuff we're doing. The Mid West Ports Authority are also advancing the PMaxP project. That'll see further incremental improvement.
The final one from Charles Lamport- Beale. He's from Fortified Securities in London. Nice to have you with us, Charles. He says, "After achieving record numbers this quarter, there's roughly AUD 110 million-AUD 120 million of potential CapEx over two years on top of ongoing Weld Range dividend versus operational growth funding, what's the realistic Weld Range financing path pre-FID?
Good question, James, nice to have an active and interested investor from London. I spoke earlier about our capital guidance program, the overlap between our growth profile out to 10 million tonnes and beyond, and the discretionary nature of those opportunities. You see us developing financial relationships and preparing for significant capital investment. The construction of a private haul road connecting the Weld Range ultimately directly into our Ruvidini rail siding has enormous opportunity for Fenix. It's also a significant piece of infrastructure for Western Australia and Australia. At Fenix, we believe very strongly that will unlock an entire region. The asset value of owning that piece of infrastructure shouldn't be lost on potential Fenix investors. That's the long-term capital vision.
In terms of the overlay on our capital allocation policy with our dividend policy, given that we've just ended the financial year, it's been a very positive one for Fenix, we did refer in the quarterly to the annual report that will be published in August, we also referred that any dividend that's declared by the board would have a declaration date and a payment date in September. That indicates to anyone interested the commitment that Fenix has to our existing dividend policy. What James is referring to is obviously the balance between the need we have to conserve our balance sheet and prepare it for hugely value-creative capital investment.
I would remind investors that the sustaining capital, the growth capital that we're investing will have similar stellar internal rates of return to the rates of return we've already demonstrated from the capital we've invested on behalf of our shareholders in this business. We last raised capital in 2020. It was AUD 15 million from our shareholders. We've since paid back to those shareholders AUD 70 million in fully franked dividends. As at 30 June, we'll have more than AUD 100 million in franking credits. That's a value increasingly in the Australian resident taxpayer market with the removal of capital gains tax relief. Franking credits remains a very advantageous opportunity for companies to return value to their shareholders. It's one that Fenix is committed.
Clearly, we'll be balancing the level of our dividends against the huge opportunity we have to build more value for our shareholders. I can understand and share the frustration that our share price is largely where it was a year ago. Although I'll point to the fact that we maintain a positive yield, we reward our shareholders with a dividend. Anyone following potential growth returns will recognize that those dividends, post our capital spend in two or three or four years' time, can be, and I would say will be, significantly higher than we've seen at any time in the company's history. That's our ambition going forward.
Yep. Good news. Are there any closing comments from you, John, before we close the webinar?
Again, thanks very much to our team, One Fenix. Let's keep it going into FY 2027, reset our targets, reset our motivation. Thank you. Thanks to all our partners across this business. Thank you to our shareholders. We will look to have another record year in FY 2027. Stay tuned for more from Fenix.
Fantastic. Thank you, John. We always appreciate your input and your information. That does conclude today's webinar. Thank you, John. Thanks for everyone for tuning in, and enjoy your day.