I would now like to hand the conference over to Ivan Vella, Managing Director and CEO. Please go ahead.
Thank you. Good morning, everyone. Welcome. Thanks for joining us today for our annual results call. I'm in Sydney with Kathleen Bozanic, our CFO, and I think it's probably worth calling out, it'll be Kath's last results call with me. She, as you know, is stepping down from her role as CFO later this year. We'll come back to that closer to the time in our next call, where I'm sure she'll join me as well. Moving on, look, it's a busy day for all of you, I'm sure, with lots going on across the market. We'll keep that comment brief. We'll jump into your questions and go from there. First of all, on safety and sustainability, just a couple of highlights to call out.
I talked at length about safety in the last quarter, so I won't restate all of the messages other than to again confirm or, you know, reemphasize the importance of safety in our business. As costly as it is, I guess in the sense of stable and in an engaged workforce that are operating well in our business and the improvements we're seeing are really encouraging. Overall, the headline TRIFR only moved down slightly, but underneath that, we've seen a significant reduction in the recorded injuries and serious incidents in the business. There's a lot of work going on, but I'm really pleased with the progress we're making, w e're really starting to show, that we're getting out, you know, an increase in maturity and performance across the business and t hat will continue as a key priority through this next year.
Other quick highlights, look, I think our focus on addressing our carbon footprint stands out at Nova. Having achieved net zero, all the others, you know, some cancellation of old accidents there. Real focus from the team, of all the things that are in their controls and to try and address their carbon footprint. Some fantastic work across that. We're starting to go in maintenance that obviously we expected that we would be able to complete the transactional data and that's in the final stages now. Still continuing to work around our environmental impacts, managing that with the local produce loans as well. More broadly, our ESG framework, which we talked about in the last quarter as well, stands well for the year ahead. If I look ahead, I'm sorry, look back on the FY 2025 on a whole, a couple of key things to touch on.
First of all, look, the results out of headline are clearly disappointing. We acknowledge that through the headline numbers. We've achieved a lot. It's been a lot of hard work through FY 2025. We've gone through a very disciplined review of our portfolio. I think positioned ourselves for the future, but that hasn't meant taking some very tough decisions that have impacted our people and stakeholders, and of course, our shareholders, through the year. The plateau at the beginning of the markets, and we know that both lithium and nickel have been subdued through FY 2025. Lithium is slowly remaining off about 65% from the year prior, and nickel down about 10% already coming off from its previous high. There's not much we can do around that. We're selling first markets, and certainly the lithium market will become more mature and more efficient as time goes on.
Ultimately, it's about focusing on what's in our control, and that's, you know, managing our costs, managing our operating performance, our safety, and so on. I think we've made good progress at Nova. We'll talk more to that, but e qually, supporting executive group, which is right, tells us now it's settled in and got a new management team around it and made some great progress on the improvements across that business. I guess I want to talk a bit about the significant advance that we've taken this year, further beyond Kwinana. I think it's recognition of the ongoing challenges of that asset, the issues that we see, those IGO in the cost structure. I guess ultimately our view that there isn't a pathway to acceptable long-term investment returns. We are ultimately accountable to you as our shareholders.
We've taken a lot of care, worked through the numbers, understand the assets technically, and in a smart context. We didn't take those decisions lightly. Clearly, if there was value to being had there, we'd be pursuing them. We're not silly. It's not something that we're going to make a rash call on. It's certainly not emotional. We've worked through that and ultimately come to those conclusions. Many of you will have seen recent comments in the media from our venture partner, Tianqi , around Kwinana, c learly, they have a different view on the viability and future of the asset. That's okay. As I said, it's not about what their opinion is. It's ultimately about us having our view and, as I said, being accountable to our shareholders as we work through that. We have discussed the range of options. We're working through that.
There's been some very good conversation with our joint venture partner, and there's a strong relationship there. I think that's example five of the decision that we joined the cook on trade too and how I'm going to align with the focus on Greenbushes, which is ultimately, we will continue those conversations and see if our department's acceptable for both parties. I don't think there's much more to say. I'm sure you'll have some questions, but there's not a lot more I could say while that's running. It's certainly not something we're going to work through in this call or in any other broader public forum. It's important that we do that diligently, respectfully. Once we've got some conclusion, we can then obviously share that more broadly. We also took, obviously, substantial improvement on our exploration assets and have really reset that whole team and our approach.
Quite a shift in strategy and a shift in the team, scale of the team that has impacted a number of our team members. As I've called out before, all credit to them for the work they've done. They were doing a great job at executing on the previous strategy. We've recognized that wasn't getting us what we need. We changed that and we've got the team refocused. They're already making some tremendous progress, and I'll talk more about that later in the call. I want to touch on Nova because I think that's a really strong story. You know that our first half was tough. We were getting into this company as an ore body, and it was difficult.
There was a number of characteristics that we had to work through in the way that the ore body presented, and the team had to do some very hard work technically, both in the mining and in the processing to manage that to get to a place where we were back on our peak, so to speak. Second half was fantastic. They really shone, really stepped up, and I saw that come through the results. We feel like we've got a very solid plan looking forward to the end of the mine life at the end of next year, so end of the 2026 calendar year. You focus on safe production, stable operations, and really getting the very best out of it, generating as much cash as possible. It's clear across the business. Everyone's very aligned and working diligently on that.
For Greenbushes, talk about the business, that mine just goes from strength to strength. Any asset that can deliver 66% of our margins at the absolute bottom of the cycle will be extraordinary. $1.5 billion of operating cash flow is just amazing, and you know, generating cash. Yes, we're still investing into seasoning three and other parts of the business. Despite all of that, still pouring out cash, it's just an amazing asset. The best part is, obviously, that full potential is still in front of us. We are far from having that business optimized. There's a very, very strong team in place around the role. He's doing great work at shaping and prioritizing that program of improvements.
I think, you know, as time goes, we're going to start to see that flow through in the performance of that business, driving into the assets to deliver their best, making sure we're getting the ultimate best returns we can from each bit of deployed capital that we have, that we've really optimized that ore body and thought about what its future is 10, 20, 30 years out. You know, we need to take a long-term view. I think most importantly, and again, it's not new news, I've talked about it several times, is making sure that we're a great local, that we're working extremely well with the community, with all of the local stakeholders that are contributing well to the region.
It's something that the broader region is very proud of, as one of the biggest contributors of lithium units across the world, supporting the energy transition and ultimately the strength of mining in WA. There's been a lot of focus there, a lot to do, but equally, we come off an extremely strong base, sort of a very privileged ore body and a great business. IGO will continue to play our role and support the joint venture however possible. We are working across a number of streams there, wherever the talents would see look for support. That's our first priority given just how important that is in the future. Through the financial year, we also refreshed our strategy, and I'll talk more to that in a minute. I think that has set as the foundation piece, obviously, Greenbushes and the folks there and equally our strategy looking forward.
I'll come back to that further. There's also been quite a lot of change in our organization. We turned it past Jonathon as one of the last slides that are there, but it's fair to say that that shift, you know, always takes the focus and some effort. It is difficult for the team to see. They feel that change, it can create some anxiety, so we're conscious of that and working through it. I look across the broader leadership team in IGO and I'm super impressed. Very, very strong talent working in a very aligned manner. We're investing in leadership development. We're investing in safety leadership and safety culture. We're investing in the integration of the lives of the team, and all of that started to really pay. It's a quick roundup on some of the key areas of focus across the FY 2025. Now lead into the numbers.
I'll turn it over to Kath to walk through the deadlines then.
Thanks, Ivan, and hi, everybody. As Ivan said, the overall financial results are disappointing. We reported a net loss of $955 million, which is impacted by subdued market and a disciplined review of our portfolio. We recorded impairments of $720 million, with Kwinana being fully impaired by $605 million and $150 million related to the rationalization of the exploration portfolio. In addition, we increased our rehabilitation provisions of our nickel assets by $58 million. We reported an underlying net loss of $43 million and an underlying net loss after tax of $173 million, which includes a $155 million contribution from Nova and a $58 million increase in the rehab provisions, which I've already noted. I noticed that a number of you were trying to reconcile our underlying EBITDA reported out quarterly with these results.
Our quarterly underlying EBITDA does not include the $58 million increase in rehabilitation provisions, and we guided to this being between $50 million and $70 million in that quarterly. As Ivan mentioned, Greenbushes' results this year were remarkable given the market context. 1.5 million tons of spodumene was produced at a $325 per ton unit cost, giving a 66% margin and $1.5 billion operating cash flows. Cash was invested in containing CGP freight, which is expected to be commissioned around the end of the year. Revenue of $520 million was down 37% on last year. This was due to several factors: lower volumes from Nova, lower realized prices, and substantially lower volumes from Boris Day and Cosmos this year after they were placed in paradise. The operational improvements at Nova helped deliver positive underlying cash flow of $140 million for the year.
Finally, our balance sheet remains strong with $280 million in cash, the same dividends of $197 million, and $300 million of undrawn facilities, which we've refinanced late this year. Slide five, I don't plan to talk to you very much because I've gone through all the numbers already. It just gives you a detailed summary of this year's results compared to last year. If we go to slide six, this slide steps through a bridge of our cash balance. We ended the year with $200 million. I have $218 million cash in the bank. There are only a couple of call-outs that I want to make. We've provided significant returns to shareholders during the year of $197 million. If you exclude this dividend, we had a marginal increase in cash.
Our corporate and exploration spend will be lower in about 2026, resulting from a disciplined reshaping of our business during the year. We've guided exploration expenditure between $35 million and $40 million for FY 2026, and you've seen the reduced corporate spend in our quarterly results. I'll now hand over back to Ivan.
Thanks, Kath. Okay, onto Greenbushes for a bit more detail. A couple of key points I want to call out here. Firstly, I mean, obviously, it's a fantastic orebody, great asset, delivered very, very low cost for the main SC6. And you know, now and again, there's conversations about pricing. Obviously, our pricing is formulaic depending on the four price reporting agencies. What you can see in the chart there on the left is, you know, not only does SC6 get a premium, which is no surprise, and it's great, but when you start adjusting or comparing that with some other peers in the market, we're actually doing pretty well.
That might be to the surprise of some people, the real-life pricing despite the fact there's no sophisticated marketing or effort to contract bits in detail. There are two big customers that take our product, and based on what the market's doing, we're actually realizing very good outcomes for the product that comes out of Greenbushes. Second key point I wanted to make here is really the positioning. Now, we know it's the lowest in the cost curve by a long shot in the hard rock space, and that's a definite function of that amazing orebody. I think the real challenge for Greenbushes and the excitement I have is seeing Rob for the sort of glistening side of it. He says, "I want to be the lowest cost lithium units on the planet by now." That's his aspiration.
That's how he started to talk and think, which is about challenging Greenbushes to challenge the best price in the world as well. You can work through what that might look like and what that takes. Given the scale of Greenbushes and the growth potential that's still in front of us, continuing to push those costs and challenge them and really hold the mirror up to ourselves and saying, "Where and how can we be more efficient, drive more production, drive better outcomes in the way we manage our capital and our operating costs?" is exactly the kind of narrative or kind of challenge that I think makes sense for that business. Very long-life mine, very good, very good team in place, and they're clearly pushing themselves to be the world's best performance. We'll keep you informed as time goes, but I think we've seen that shift through FY 2025.
Rob's come in, reset his management team's stance, put some different aspirations in front of them, and I'm delighted we're there to support and do whatever we can to help with that work. I think he's got the credentials in the background to do this, and we'll be able to then follow that journey of improvement quarter- by- quarter as the progress unfolds. Naturally, again, we talked about this, the focus on delivering full potential or full value requires a huge program of work, starting with the orebody, and deeply understanding that, profiling that, looking at the shape of the pit shell, the shed of your fleet, the application of that fleet, how we're getting the very best out of our operating assets, both in the mine and the processing. Asset management reliability is a huge opportunity that can grow throughput.
You can argue it's almost 3x , you know, just using the existing capital more effectively, or characterization and recovery and improving, you know, throughput and outcomes from that point of view is another key outcome. I guess we've talked, again, previously about, you know, when you have such high-grade material, capturing more of it or avoiding less of it going to tails, it's actually a very easy win. The team are thinking about that, how they reduce the fines and drive the coverage up further. General operational management, you focus on productivity and getting further cost out as part of that as well. I'm not trying to go through the detailed program. I did give you the designs, I think, a couple of quarters ago. We talked further on this.
It gives you a picture of the work that's ramped up, broader program of work that Rob's got happening to drive that improvement right across Greenbushes. From here, I just wanted to take this and pan out a little bit to, you know, reflect on our strategy. 2025 was a very busy and very difficult year. There were a lot of hard decisions. I mean, it really weighed on me at times, the amount of change that we've worked through. We've had a real effort to go through a disciplined review of our portfolio. Now, that's evident with the top-line assets that we talked about, Kwinana, Boris Day's man, obviously, earlier the piece on Cosmos and so on. There's also a number of other projects and things inside the business that aren't as visible, that deeply impact our people and momentum. That generates anxiety and uncertainty for our people.
Working through that, trying to maintain engagement and maintain focus is, of course, a challenge. Going back to our strategy, which has been released in the last year, we've just put a challenge here to refresh everyone. That absolutely drives our focus, and we still are convinced that we're on the right path. Our focus on lithium is there with Greenbushes and getting the very best out of that. Beyond that, we know that, and we've said this in Australia, lithium is a difficult commodity. It's very ubiquitous in the world. You need to be extremely cost-competitive and very strong in the hydro space to be competitive and work through the cycle. That really informs our thinking, and Greenbushes obviously is a key point there. Copper remains a strong area of focus. We think that provides very effective diversification for lithium because of the volatility.
Nickel, we're still in the business of nickel, and Nova is one of those fantastic T1 ore bodies. Unfortunately, we don't have another 10 years, but there are very few nickel sulfide mines in the world that are operating and generating cash. Certainly, none like us at the end of mine life when it gets very difficult, and that's the credit to the operating team and the technical team for managing the complexities of that. It's easier to say, oh, it's just a year and a half ago. The extra complexity and challenge is significant as you get to those expanding to the ore body, and they're working through and managing that extremely well. Beyond that, I really struggle with seeing a lot of upside in nickel, and that's just a return to focus.
How does that compare with other options given the benchmark for us allocating capital and thinking about Greenbushes and the amazing returns there? That's always top of mind. We are doing a lot of good work to position ourselves for growth for the future, getting our portfolio in shape, getting our business in shape, driving our costs down. All part of that, making sure that Greenbushes is on that path to full potential, and that sets us up for further growth. Taking on the following slide, which I think sort of draws us out a little bit further. I talked about organic, inorganic is always out there, but internally, if we look at our capabilities, they continue to be delighted. I mean, our exploration setting really is impressive. We've got outstanding talent there, incredibly strong in the field, but also in a generalist space.
The work that they're doing on lithium targets in Australia is excellent and very prospective ground, t hey're working through that as we speak. We're drilling several of them through this year. The copper, we're looking internationally, and there's a number of opportunities that we're busy working through, and they're very exciting. More and more, it's just focused on very, very commercial and very exciting focus of exploration, making sure that we extend our dollars very widely. The focus on actually drilling known mineral data and driving out what is going on. Is there an economic resource there or not i s all part of it. A big shift from where we were, which was very large belt scale greenfield exploration, which was very clearly very long dated and, for me, just wasn't going to deliver the sort of outcomes for our shareholders.
A significant shift, and I'm confident we'll be reporting some positive outcomes from our work through the coming financial year. Secondly, our technical capability is extremely strong, and it's indeed that expertise in our team in this space, looking at critical mineral metallurgical processing, mineral extraction across these key commodities that are in our focus, that include copper, lithium, and nickel, but others as well. I think these capabilities are helping us unlock other opportunities that we see there for growth. Again, it's more that I'll talk about through the next that will be coming financial year. Lastly, inorganic growth, look, we've talked about that on a few calls. It is not a primary area of focus. I'm the first to call out just our part of it to do that well or generate value for shareholders. So many deals in this space don't, and we're extremely disciplined.
Our clear focus, if we are doing anything, is at an asset or project level where we can add value, where we would be a great partner, the right owner or part owner, and bring something material to the table other than trying to win a battle with our management and shareholders. Looking forward, we'll get to some Q&A in a bit, but the priorities for 2026, I've talked to a little bit. Greenbushes, I'm not going to go over the ground again. There's a lot to do there. The team's working hard and making progress, and we're there to work with them and support them. Kwinana, you know, our focus is on making sure that we're not spending money that isn't value-add, working with our data department to make sure while the business is running in its current form, that we're managing that as prudently as possible.
More importantly, we're continuing conversations with TLEA on what's the right future outcome there for both parties. Nova, we'll focus to drive as much value as cash out of safe and stable operations through this year. Exploration, I've just talked to, and I'll bring more as we come in quarters. A real fail-fast mentality. Get in, understand what's there. Don't necessarily drill it out fully. Let's make sure we understand where we're adding value. If we see more, we'll pursue it. If we don't, we'll move on. A strategy growth I just talked to. Before I wrap up and send out the questions, I just thought I'd also reflect on the team and send a couple of people in particular, Sam Retallack's now wrapped up in Nova.
She was with us 13 years and made a huge contribution to our business, through FY 2025 and obviously in the years leading up to that. She was tremendous support for me and helped me settle into my role. I thank Sam for all her work and we share the wealth in this next endeavor. Kath will leave at the end of the year. I'm going to miss her. I'm sure she'll miss me at times, but she's smiling. We're well progressed with our recruitment processes and we'll update you on that for the success that is taken from Kath. In the same year, obviously, Marie and Brett joined the building the piece and Karen not long after. Suzie starts in a couple of weeks' time as our Chief People and Sustainability Officer.
They're very high quality, very capable and experienced leadership teams that have worked internationally, worked across multiple commodities and have a lot of operating experience. Stand as well as you look forward into the future. With that, let's turn over some questions and we'll come back and wrap up at the end.
Thank you. If you wish to ask a question via the phones, please press the star key followed by the number one on your telephone keypad. To ask a question via the webcast, please type it into the ask a question box and click submit. We ask that questions be limited to two per person. Please rejoin the question queue for any follow-up questions. The first phone question today comes from Matthew Frydman from MST Financial Services . Please go ahead.
Sure. Thanks. Morning, Ivan and team. Ivan, I know you made some comments around this in your introductory remarks, but I was wondering, in relation to the TLEA CEO's recent comments, I think he alluded to the fact that IGO hasn't made any proposed or proposed any variations to the JV arrangement as of yet. Is that the case? Have there been any proposed changes to the JV arrangement made? If not, as Mr. Ha suggested, then why hasn't IGO proposed any changes to the JV structure? Thanks.
Okay, thanks, Matt. Like I said, I don't want to get into a broader conversation about those discussions. They are active and ongoing. We're working through the range of issues. Of course, there's a different view of Kwinana. I stand by our economic assessment. It's pretty, I think it's just straightforward, at least in my spreadsheet, to work back to what you have to believe for this to make any sort of return whatsoever. To make a return that warrants putting further capital in, I really struggle with. That's our view. TLEA holds a different view. That's their prerogative. We're working through it. There is an open conversation. It's very constructive. We're working through it diligently. We have been for some time. I just don't think it's helpful to comment further on the media.
No, I appreciate that. Thanks for the commentary. Maybe moving over to, I guess, the FY 2026 guidance that you previously provided around Greenbushes and the CGP3 ramp-up. Just wondering if there's any more clarity around that outlook and the budgeting timing of when the JV will actually decide on 2026 numbers. Can you give us an indication of when that actually will be? In that context and noting that I don't believe Winfield paid a dividend in the fourth quarter of FY 2025, what's your expectation of how the JV is going to think about that cash position in Winfield currently and how that changes as volumes ramp up and CGP3 spend rolls off into 2026? Thanks.
Yeah, okay. A couple of points again. I didn't say I'm a digital cash person. I think it's just that it's exactly the other thing, sitting in the bank. You know, as you've seen, IGO 's not about hanging on to cash and our capital demands certainly ramp down through FY 2026. You know, that'll roll out. Of course, for me, that's really not a big issue. There's nothing more to see there than just how we're managing the business and being prudent as that flows through. Naturally, the drag on any dividend that's paid from IGO to TLEA is the demand that Kwinana places on, which is why it's in focus for us. We're working through that with a sense of urgency. We're being diligent. We clearly understand our accountability to shareholders there, and we're working on that as quickly as possible.
Then you've got that flowing out to the two shareholders at TLEA. I know it's something everyone wants certainty on, and we'll provide that as quickly as possible. Coming back, thanks, to Greenbushes and where they're at. I think the driver plants across here are running service. The industry now, they've run all through it. They're building a bit of a stockpile, going well. Westland is still in construction and still progressing to the end of the year. Look forward to that as we signpost it. Every project has different issues. There's some weather in the last few months that put winters being a little bit, maybe more normal, but certainly unusual for the last few years with the amount of rain that they've had, which is very good.
Ironically, a year ago, we were talking about dam levels and water levels at Greenbushes, and now we've got a different problem. The team's working hard, getting through it. Commissioning teams are set up and running. They hopefully will get through a lot of that work and allow more of the team to transfer over to Westland as that comes out through Vendava. The intent is to run that plan up as quickly as possible. I don't even try to play the movie crystal ball in the lithium market. It is far, far beyond me. I think every month is a different view from the experts. All I think we need to do is chase value. The main, at the end of my voice and my analysis, suggests that every tonne we produce out of Greenbushes is value created.
Getting those assets online early and running it well also manages your costs better. I think, from my point of view, I'm fully incentivized to steer for that, to drive about. That's the plan. The team will ramp up that asset in a thoughtful and safe manner, but as quickly as possible. Normally, the year of work to get an asset like that online and running well, and that's, I guess, the ball of luck. As we get a bit further into it, we will give you more details in the upcoming quarterly.
Okay, got it. Thanks for your comments, Ivan, and thanks, Kathleen, for your contributions.
Thank you.
Thanks, Matt.
Thank you. The next phone question comes from Levi Spry from UBS. Please go ahead.
Good day, Ivan and team. Thanks for your time. Sorry, I might have missed some of the detail on that last question. In terms of the optimization process that's ongoing at Greenbushes, what's the deliverable timeline for us, I guess, in terms of starting to sneak out some detail into the market?
The first key deliverable is, of course, just low cost and increased terms, which Ross is working on. That work's happening right now. They are delivering and focused month to month on improved productivity across the business. They're focused in the mine, as you can imagine, and focused in the producing plants as well. We see lots of good momentum, but equally lots of upside. The broader piece of work that sits behind that, which is more complicated in these cases of time, is the overall optimization of the all-body, thinking through what's the best way to manage that resource and convert it to a reserve and get it out of mine and process it into our customer's hands, and optimize the value accordingly. That work's happening. As we get through the developments, we'll be able to report, obviously, in our actuals to show performance.
You know, we get to a logical point. We'll work that through with the JV partners and see how best to share that with our more important market. I don't have a date, as I sort of said before, or some particular milestone that we're pursuing. I don't want that to take away or that you'll be the impression that the team aren't working flat out on and making good progress.
Okay, thank you. In terms of the rehabilitation, and specifically thinking about nickel, but maybe elsewhere, when does that turn into cash? Should we be modeling some cash flow here for rehab?
Let me comment briefly first just on the broader picture and then in a more specific, so there's three parts to that provision. Obviously, Nova, Forrestania, and Cosmos. Let's start with Forrestania first. We increased the provision for Forrestania, albeit that will get adjusted back if we're going to complete the transaction with MLG. It's just prudent. When we've gone through, done an assessment, made the adjustment, we could have left it out. I think it just shows the sort of integrity of our finance team and our process team in looking at these things. Cosmos is much more long-dated, and we've got to think about the nickel there. We're in the final steps of taking a view on our nickel mine at Cosmos, but there is other prospectivity in those elements. It's not like Nova, which doesn't have neighbors or doesn't have other inherent value in rehab.
The likelihood of that coming to closure in some suit is very low. We will complete relevant continuous rehab where it makes sense, and we'll continue to adjust and revise the closure and rehabilitation estimates for Cosmos, but it's a lot further out. I think the takeaway of this, to fit into your question on cash, it's pretty negligible over the interim. The real area for focus is Nova. That's the mine where we see that finishing at the end of next year. There are no more orebody extensions or other options or other things nearby that we can see. If someone finds something in the meantime, that's great. We think that's unlikely. We intend to go straight to closure, not via care and maintenance and waste money on that sort of holding pattern. That planning is underway. The feasibility is underway.
We've got a very good team on this doing a great job of assessing how best to do that. Some of the assets will be sold or turned over. There's the great paved runway out there. It's probably the most easterly runway in the southwest of WA. The camp is in good shape. Obviously, the assets are all around 10 years old, so they're actually in pretty good order. We'll work through that. We've made an adjustment, as you can see, in that space, and we'll tighten that up as we finish the feasibility. In terms of converting that to cash, you would expect that you would start to see some spend from now, but that will ramp up through 2027 as we get into the closure work. Ultimately, there's activity that we don't expect.
You've done it all. All right, thank you.
Thanks, Levi.
Great, thank you. Thanks, Kath. That's all.
Thank you. The next phone question comes from Kate McCutcheon from Citi. Please go ahead.
Hi, morning, Ivan and Kath. Just a quick accounting question for Kath. I guess we don't see peers take those rehabilitation provisions and equity gain losses in underlying EBITDA. Maybe what is the rationale for that for a non-accountant, please?
Let me just make sure I got the question. You were asking about the rehabilitation provisions and why we didn't adjust our underlying, is that right, Kate?
I was just making the comment that peers don't, we don't see them include those rehab changes in the EBITDA, and same with the equity revaluations?
Okay. We're pretty prudent and strict with our accounting application. Our movement in the provisions is part of EBITDA for us, as well as shared, you know, movement in shares. If you actually look at the definition of the value of EBITDA, it's aimed for interest, appreciation, and amortization. Movements in provisions and movements in equity are part of our business, and that's then off appreciation, interest, or amortization. I have sympathy for other people doing it, but we're just getting used to the way it works from an accounting perspective.
Okay.
Thank you.
Sorry to reinforce Kath's main point previously. Obviously, we did signpost this in our quarterly. With the adjustments, we get it arranged. We just had to finish some of the work, and it'll be a fight as we go, but we've now obviously taken that pretty enough. The adjustment that you said here is either done and a differential from quarter four indication, and you know, we'll continue to refine that. Obviously, there's a likely adjustment in the end for Forestania in the other direction, and it will tighten up. No risk we go.
Thank you. The next phone question comes from Hugo Nicolaci from Goldman Sachs. Please go ahead.
Morning, Ivan and Kath. Congrats on the full year. Presume then, just following a few previous questions, the Greenbushes optimization study is probably more a second half FY 2026 than calendar 2025 thing. I might push that one too much, but I guess to the extent today, given the bounce we've seen in lithium prices, does your budgeting factor in a return to dividends from the JV this half? How do you think about the timing of distributing that to your own shareholders, just given your capital management framework has that liquidity?
Yeah, I think I look, I can't guide on dividends. I'd love to, and when I can, I will give you that. You can see the cash that's accumulating in Windfield, and that's only going to improve or increase the rate as both the capital burden comes down, but equally as the lithium mine with money. It's some signs of recovery, albeit I suspect that might be modest. To be honest, at $1,000 a ton, that's the light bulb growth in this location, which is, you can't see such fantastic margins. The flow-through, look, it's pretty determined, really. Windfield will obviously work through its dividends. There's no cause to hold accounts there. TLEA, obviously, with the only other burden or other reason to spend money in TLEA is Kwinana. You guys can take a guidance and work through what that's likely to be.
The rest of the money comes out of the dividends to us. With our power management framework clear, we will turn that into returns for our shareholders very quickly. We're not going to sort of sit on it. We've, I think, taken a prudent view with our dividends this year to not issue or release any further dividends. We've got a modest cash balance, still some uncertainty on the lithium market. I think that just leaves us in a strong position with that balance there. As the money starts coming through and we start seeing some more sustained recovery in the lithium market as we're about to change.
Got it. Thanks for that, Ivan. Just one broadly on strategy. Obviously, in the year, you've divested Forestania. You've withdrawn from Fraser Range. Nova's obviously coming to an end. How do you think about sort of extracting value out of the Nova and Cosmos infrastructure? On the exploration portfolio, is there anything that's starting to firm up as a prospect there?
Yeah, no, look, I mean, there's nothing more to see out of Nova other than what we've guided. I think you've got a lot of incentives at the terms and passed through to the end of life. We've given you some direction on the closure. That'll get tightened. That's really just, you know, rather than perform well to the finish. The side of Cosmos is prospective. It really isn't an element. Very, very suitable part of the world. As you know, our northern neighbor, Lightsounds Catherine Valley, literally you can see it probably borders that property. You can see the mine from the top edge of our tenement. Belleview on the other side, there's gold. This is a, you know, this business ball. The dividends are high on those tenements. We are working through that. It's not about, you know, our immediate focusing commodities.
If we service gold, that's relatively valuable there, then we'll find a way to monetize that. I'm not suggesting we're going to be a gold company, but we're also not going to leave that value on the table. That's all work that's underway right now. As we have more clarity, we'll give updates. More broadly on exploration, look, there's some really good work happening. Nothing that I'm going to report on further. I mean, there's some material in the annual reporting suite that's worth a read. It will give you some guidance as to where our fund money is going, where we inverted some potential value. The only thing that's probably not really discussed in my steps is our focus on generative activity for copper outside of Australia.
Thanks, Ivan. I'll pass on.
Thanks, Hugo.
Thank you. Once again, to ask a question via the phones, please press star one on your telephone. To ask a question via the webcast, please type it into the ask a question box and click submit. The next phone question comes from Austin Yun from Macquarie . Please go ahead.
Thank you. Morning, Ivan and team. Just one quick question. I note in the presentation you highlighted that inorganic growth is one of the three key pillars for the growth going forward. I'm keen to understand, given that you're still kind of working through these challenges at Kwinana, is that a condition that you'll need to resolve Kwinana before you can pivot into more growth? Thank you.
No, I don't think so. I mean, yeah, the work with Kwinana is just, you know, it's a critical priority. Greenbushes is number one. That's number two. You know, we absolutely need to finish that work, and that's going to be the focus for some time. Inorganic growth is extremely hard and low likelihood. As I said earlier in my comments, we think about asset project level type investments where we bring value, where we could do something that a partner who we see can't achieve on their own. That's the kind of value-adding activity that we have focused on. We'll be able to continue that work as IGO has over many years. IGO has delivered some very successful outcomes through its 25-year history. That's always out there as an option, but it's certainly not the top priority.
Thank you, Ivan. I'll pass now.
Thank you. At this time, we're showing no additional questions. I'll hand the conference back to Ivan for any closing remarks.
Great. Thank you. Look, we got through all the questions inside the hour, which was fantastic. Sure, that lets some of you drop off to other calls and a busy day ahead. Thanks for listening. I guess I want to take a moment and just thank our shareholders for their support through this period. I've been in the business just over 18 months now. It has been hard. There's been a lot of challenging decisions to take, a lot of issues to work through. I think we've demonstrated real discipline in how we work through the portfolio, projects, and work to reduce our costs and position ourselves for the future. We've got a very clear strategy, and the team that are working on it are doing an outstanding job. I have a huge amount of conviction and confidence in the work that's underway.
I think that's going to bring us some really very positive outcomes for the future. The priorities around Greenbushes are absolutely clear, and the value there that we can unlock is extraordinary. It's just so nice when you have such a world-class orebody, but with so much upside, still beautiful potential. Many of our peers are running extremely good operations and have a good job, but it means that there is limited potential upside in terms of productivity terms and so on. All of that ability to unlock those options at Greenbushes is very exciting. Kwinana, we talked about it. I won't go over the ground to death, but we do stand by our economic assessment.
If you stand back and do some quick maths on it, it's pretty hard to believe that you can generate a profit return out of that asset under any conditions unless you're believing the $5.40 target for your load of lithium, which we don't. If you take the price test and roll it forward, if you take the cost, even if you halve the cost, you still, you know, struggle to get close. That's our second priority. Beyond that, working through our growth. I'll ramp up there, and thank you for your support. I look forward to sharing the results through FY2026 as we make progress. Thanks for joining.