Thank you for standing by, and welcome to the Nickel Mines Limited March Quarter results webcast. 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 the number one on your telephone keypad. I'd now like to hand the conference over to Mr. Justin Werner, Managing Director. Please go ahead.
Thank you very much, and thank you everyone for your attendance today at the mid-March 2022 quarterly results call. If I could just ask the operator if you could just move to page number two. Sorry, the next page. Thank you. March quarter, excellent quarter, record $81.7 million EBITDA from operations, 11,166 tons of nickel metal. We're starting to see a meaningful contribution from ANI with the first lines commissioning in January, and we expect all four lines to be in operation by the middle of May. I'll talk a little bit more about the ANI performance a little later on.
That resulted in record RKEF EBITDA of $72.8 million, which includes a $1.7 million EBITDA level loss from ANI. Pleasingly this quarter we saw significant margin expansion despite, you know, continued cost and inflation pressures. Our margin expanded to $7,386, up from the $6,028 a ton in the December quarter. We also saw a record Hengjaya Mine EBITDA of $8.9 million and record production of over 1 million net metric tons, which is a mix of saprolite and limonite and record underlying cash generation from operations of $8.12 million.
As I said, record quarter on a number of fronts and a very good result in the face of challenging conditions globally. As I mentioned, ANI that's commissioning and ramping up very nicely. On the corporate front, we completed the acquisition of a 10% interest in the Oracle Nickel project, which is under construction within IMIP. We received confirmation of tax concessions for both ANI and ONI. These have an increased tenure to 10 years of zero tax up from the seven years that we currently enjoy for HNI and RNI and declaration and payment of a $0.02 per share final dividend. If I could just move on to the next slide, please.
Just going through some of the headline numbers. As you can see, realized NPI price was up again in the March quarter to 19,368 versus the December quarter of 18,545. I should make a note that the April contract pricing is close to $21,500. Again, you know, already for the start of this quarter, we're seeing that increased NPI pricing continue and, you know, that's almost $2,000 above or it is $2,000 above the March quarter average price. We're continuing to see increased NPI pricing. RKEF EBITDA 20% above the December quarter. As I said, that's it, an excellent result.
That margin expansion, which is also up 22.5% from $6,028 up to $7,386. If we could just go to the next slide, please. Pleasingly costs are down around 3% from $12,347 in October to $11,969 in March. You can see the costs chart there and what we saw in terms of the cost breakdown, modestly higher nickel ore prices. When I say modest, I'm only talking about about $1 from the March quarter to the previous quarter. Pleasingly, thermal coal and power costs were down from about $.10 Last quarter to $0.088 cents.
Coating and reductants costs were sort of mostly stable during the quarter. Again, a reflection of Tsingshan's ability to manage their costs through centralized procurement and through the large stockpiles that they carry, which enables smoothing. An example of this as well is April ore costs. Obviously with the spike in LME pricing and the benchmark Indonesian ore cost price pinned to the LME price, Tsingshan was able to negotiate with some suppliers supply of ore for April using the March costs. To give you some idea of what that means, you know, the average for the 1.75 ore in March was around $46.
We could have possibly been faced with a cost of $75 for April. As I said, that's been largely avoided by using March costs. We will look at May, which has declined. You know, a similar tactic may be employed, but again, you know, all points to the ability of Tsingshan to manage their costs. Once again, I would point out that even if we see an increase in the ore costs, it's more than offset by an increase in the NPI price. As I pointed out earlier, for our first contract in April, we've already seen an increase in our realized pricing of around $2,000 a tonne.
The other point to note is that rising ore costs drive higher NPI pricing. Given that NPI pricing is still set in China between a willing buyer and seller. Again, if you were to compare current Chinese ore costs, which are about $127 CIF for 1.8, versus our costs in March of $46 for 1.75, that's where that significant advantage and benefit lies. That's why we're able to see this margin expansion. If we could just go to the next slide, please.
In terms of the EBITDA per tonne, as I said, pleasingly, despite global inflationary and cost pressures across the whole commodity complex, if you look at where we were last year, March 2021, we're up from 4,943 - 7,386, an almost 50% increase in EBITDA per tonne margin. Again, just highlights the industrial nature of the operations, but more importantly, our ability to manage costs, and I've just gone into that in some detail in the previous slide. If we could just go to the next slide, please. If you look at the gross margin numbers here, you know, around 40% and 42% for the March quarter.
Again, these are industrial type margins, and again, just highlighting the industrial nature of our RKEF operations. If we could just move to the next slide, please. In terms of our EBITDA to cash flow conversion, you know, 99%, you don't see that sort of cash flow conversion in a mining company. Again, you know, we are more of an industrial company. This is delivered through minimal sustaining CapEx and obviously the long-term tax holidays that we enjoy. If we could just move to the next slide. Angel Nickel, pleasingly, first NPI was tapped on the 25th of January, months ahead of the contracted date.
Line one over the last 10 days has actually operated at 130% of nameplate capacity. Demonstrating the ability to achieve this result. That will reduce as the fourth line comes on. What we're expecting moving forward until the power plant is commissioned in August, we will see Angel operating at about sort of 66% of nameplate capacity. Once that power plant comes online, we then expect that to ramp up to, you know, in excess of 100% of nameplate. As I said, it's pleasingly been demonstrated through the last few days of performance out of our first kiln. If we could just move to the next slide, please. Oracle Nickel progressing very well.
Construction at about 60%. You can see from the aerial picture there, coming together very nicely. That's well on track to tap first NPI, you know, before the end of February 2023. If we could just move to the next slide, please. On the corporate front, completed an equity raising to institutional investors of $106 million at AUD 1.37 a share. That was very strongly supported by both new and existing shareholders. The conditional placement to Shanghai Decent of a further $106 million, also at the same AUD 1.37 share price.
Pleasingly, we've just, as announced this morning, received further approval and will be going to shareholder approval at an EGM within a week. The SPP was withdrawn due to market volatility, but that was extremely well supported, you know, up to sort of $55 million. In terms of Oracle Nickel, we've already secured a 10% interest upon shareholder approval, which we don't see any issue with receiving. Shanghai Decent will be taking a further $106 million of Nickel Mines shares. That will increase our company ownership in ONI to 30%.
That will also increase Shanghai Decent's interest in Nickel Mines, and we see that as a very strong signal and endorsement of Tsingshan in terms of, you know, their willingness to take scrip instead of cash, and obviously further closely aligns the interests of the two companies. The material tax concessions I mentioned pleasingly have both been received for Angel Nickel and Oracle Nickel. Just an update on nickel matte. We're just finalizing the minor capital modifications to enable us to produce nickel matte. Those should be completed by the middle of May. The decision as to when to switch from NPI to nickel matte, that'll be determined by sort of the prevailing price relativities between each product.
Given the current very strong NPI margins and the fact that, you know, in terms of the LME market, it's trading sideways. It's not really a real market as yet. We probably see more price downside than upside in the LME and ShFE markets, which is what nickel matte would be linked to. As I said, there has been no decision made as yet. You know, we'll base our decision based on where we can see the strongest margins. Finally, as mentioned earlier, final dividend declaration and payment of AUD 0.02 a share, bringing the total paid for 2021 to AUD 0.04 a share. If we could just move to the next slide, please.
ANI and ONI and just reinforcing the tremendous growth that Nickel is undertaking this year. If you look at the top chart there, you can see our production for financial year 2021. The green is the nameplate. The blue is the overproduction. Forty thousand four hundred and ten tons on a 100% basis last year. That delivered us an EBITDA of $225 million. That's set to more than triple with ANI now ramping up and Oracle progressing very well and coming online in less than 12 months. That will deliver a you know more than threefold increase in our EBITDA and our production profile. You can see there, you know, will put us at above 100,000 tons of nickel production per annum.
That you know firmly cements us among the top 10 global nickel producers. Remembering that this has been achieved in a little over three years. If we could just move to the next slide, please. In terms of summary, again, as I've just highlighted, Nickel Mines has a compelling growth profile. If you look at most of our listed peers, they're achieving growth through M&A, not through new growth. Our new growth is coming with CapEx guarantees, nameplate guarantees, time frame guarantees. Going to the second point, it's growth that doesn't rely on inflated commodity prices. We sit at the very bottom end of the cost curve, which is demonstrated and delivered quarter on quarter.
We have a partner who has an unrivaled track record of project delivery. All of our projects to date, including ANI, have been, you know, 8-12 months ahead of schedule with a proven ramp-up profile. You know, if you look at it, Tsingshan now built over 75 RKEF lines within Indonesia. It's a tremendous result. As I said, our partner, Tsingshan, global leaders in the nickel industry. We're delighted for them to, you know, come closer and align their interests more closely with Nickel Mines as they, you know, increase their shareholding.
The production of nickel matte, which as I said, will be made at the appropriate time, that will allow us to be a diversified producer of Class 1 and Class 2 nickel, which again, makes us unique. We would be the only listed nickel producer that would offer sort of exposure to both Class 1 and Class 2 nickel production. You know, in summary, to quote an investor this morning, you know, this quarter was a straight flush. You know, lower costs, higher production, and expanded margins, which have delivered a record quarter for us. With that, I'd like to hand over for Q&A.
Thank you. 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 request, please press star two. If you're on a speaker phone, please pick up the handset to ask your question. Your first question comes from Hayden Bairstow from Macquarie. Please go ahead.
Morning, Justin. A couple from me. Just on that chart where you sort of got the implied increase in long-term guidance, can you just give us an idea of what is a sensible NPI grade to use in the medium term? Because the NPI volume numbers have been okay. It's more the grade have been better than what the original guidance was set at. Yeah, look, that number sort of between 12%-14% is probably the number that we've been working towards. Certainly I don't think in excess of 14%, but you know. Perhaps on the higher side, closer to 14%, but yeah, the sort of range between that number.
Just on your costs, I mean, we obviously saw pretty punchy increases in global PCI prices and thermal coal prices in Indonesia. What exposure to that do you have? Can you just give us an idea if we break down your costs at sort of $12,000 a ton with the movements we've seen in those commodities and nickel ore prices, what's the sort of mix now in those three key inputs?
Coming sort of firstly to thermal coal prices and power prices, that's actually reduced from $0.10 last quarter to $0.088 this quarter. Reductant coal and again, I mean, this speaks to Tsingshan's ability. They are able to substitute some other elements. For example, nut coke in place of coking coal or coke can be used so that, you know, they are able to source sort of cheaper alternatives. That's actually resulted this quarter in a reduction in our reductant agent cost. We saw a sort of slight increase in our smelting coal costs, you know, up about sort of $10-$12.
Yeah, again, it speaks to, you know, a very large centralized procurement team buying in volumes who are, you know, very good at what they do in terms of procurement. We're not beholden to the spot market. I think it's a very key point, you know, that these guys are part of a very large team that is able to deliver exactly what they've done this quarter, which is, you know, smooth pricing. In fact, you know, we've even seen a decrease in pricing.
In terms of the cost breakdown, you know, again, we've sort of seen this quarter nickel ore costs is the greatest percentage at around 36%, followed by power at 29%, smelting coal, reductant coal at sort of 26%, and then, you know, labor and others on top of that. If you look in the, that table's actually in the quarterly on page five, you can see, you know, it moves around a bit, but it's pretty steady in terms of, you know, the cost breakdown. As I said, probably the biggest cost pressure that we're facing now is probably gonna come from nickel ore, given its linkage to LME.
You know, that increase in nickel ore will also drive higher NPI pricing, given that the pricing is still set in China, and you know, Chinese NPI producers are currently sitting at around a cost base of around $19,000-$20,000. If you look back historically, NPI prices sort of tend to be set at the Chinese cost plus a margin to keep them in business. You know, while there is some pressures that may come through on ore costs, we've already seen a significant increase in NPI pricing for the first month of this quarter.
You have a natural hedge on the ore cost anyway with the mine production, or is there a difference in the realized price you get out of there versus what your input price is?
No. Exactly, we do. You know, we've seen a record quarter in terms of EBITDA from the Hengjaya Mine, and given the increase in ore costs that we expect may continue into this quarter.
Yeah. I'll leave it there. Thanks, Justin.
Yep. Thanks, Hayden.
Thank you. Your next question comes from Chun Mui from Arkkan Capital. Please go ahead.
Hi there. Congrats on, you know, pretty solid results. A couple of questions on the cost to just follow up, what was just asked. Number one is on the self-sufficient percentage of nickel ore from Hengjaya into, you know, your input. How, what's the current percentage? And I guess number two is, you know, the, you know, obviously we're seeing a lot of cost increase in, you know, in nickel ore, coal, and I think you've made reference to that. You know, things should be relatively smooth. You know, I'm just curious if that is going to be a timing lag, right? Like, you know, for this quarter, obviously margins have actually expanded despite those costs going up.
You know, is that gonna be, you know, just because of inventory, time lag and going forward, are we expecting higher costs?
In terms of the first question, our HNI and RNI operations, you know, use roughly 3.6-3.8 million tons of ore per annum. Our Hengjaya mine is currently delivering more than 800,000 tons of saprolite ore per quarter, so in excess of 3 million tons per annum on an annualized basis. You can see, you know, there's a natural hedge over, you know, sort of at least 75% of the ore cost. In terms of rebuilding an ore load between the Hengjaya mine and IMIP, once that's completed, we'd be looking to sort of ramp that saprolite ore production up to somewhere around 5 million tons per annum.
On the second question, look, really the biggest cost pressures that we see coming through for this quarter will be from ore costs, given their linkage to the LME nickel price. As stated, the April costs have already been managed, and that's been achieved by applying the March price. April was, well, March, which is when the April price is set, that was when we saw the significant spike in LME pricing. May ore costs will be elevated. Again, coming back to the earlier point, it is yet once again offset by the increases in the NPI pricing, remembering that Chinese NPI producers are facing exactly the same ore pricing pressure other than we benefit from a lower recovery factor, which is used in determining the price.
Any increase in LME price will always see the Chinese ore price increase at a significantly faster rate than the internal Indonesian, ore cost. You know, that's what helps to drive that margin expansion is that, you know, NPI prices are set, which are set out of China, are forced to increase to keep Chinese NPI producers in business.
I guess, you know, it you know, in a rising cost environment that we're in, are you actually expecting further margin expansion?
Well, I think we've seen almost 50% margin expansion from this time last year. In terms of further expansion this quarter, look, I don't think we are sort of expecting to see significant increase, but I think, you know, what we are expecting to see is maintaining the significant, you know, gross margins of greater than 40%. So, you know, it doesn't get any better than that.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Could I just ask the operator? Hello? Could I just ask the operator, we do have Mr. Huang Weifeng who has joined the call. He's in the waiting room. Are you able to let him in?
Yes, certainly. I'll just place him in a talking mode in the call.
Thank you. call. He's in the waiting room. Are you able to let him in?
Yes, certainly. I'll just place him in a talking mode in the call. Pardon me, we now have Mr. Huang in the call.
Thank you. To make the
Yes. One time.
Place him in a talking mode in the call. Pardon me, we now have Mr. Huang in the call.
Okay. Huang Weifeng.
Okay, look, everyone, I'd like to welcome Mr. Huang Weifeng who's just finally joined the call. He is the vice chairman of the Tsingshan board of directors, chairman of Shanghai Decent, Nickel Mines' largest shareholder, and also a non-executive director of Nickel Mines, and he's kindly made himself available to answer any questions that people may have surrounding mine operations and Tsingshan's wider operations.
Also, a Non-executive Director of Nickel Mines, and he's kindly made himself available to answer any questions that people may have surrounding its operations and Tsingshan's wider operations.
Your next question comes from Mr. Rob Willis from Bell Potter. Please go ahead.
Hey, Justin. How are you, mate?
Yes, thanks, Rob. How are you?
I'm good. Well, congratulations on a cracking quarter. A couple of things I wanted to ask. Just back on nickel matte. Have you had a look at, I mean, the traditional sort of, you know, NPI to nickel matte conversion's been about $3,000 a ton, right? You know, at Vale and so on in Indonesia. I mean, given that, you know, the park makes its own sulfuric acid and the rest of it, does that.
Can we think about the nickel matte price conversion, you know, that conversion price being a lot less than or significantly less than the traditional with that, it's also pretty old, right? What is your year-end mix going to be or, you know, you're gonna be totally driven by market forces? How quickly can you swap, you know, to deliver nickel matte into the market, you know, should there be a disparity between that and the NPI price?
Secondly, have you been advancing or had any more thoughts about a potential foreign dual listing or secondary listing in one of the Asian markets, given the difference in multiples of Nickel Mines and, at the very least, its Indonesian peers?
Thanks, Rob. Yeah, look, in terms of nickel matte, there's some interesting dynamics playing out in the market at the moment. What we're seeing is nickel sulfate prices, which is the result of taking nickel matte or nickel briquettes and upgrading it to nickel sulfate, are currently sitting at a significant discount to both LME and ShFE prices. We are seeing a switch from Chinese nickel sulfate producers buying briquettes to nickel matte. We're seeing sort of expanded volumes coming out of Indonesia. In fact, Tsingshan has already brought lines within IWIP online to also produce nickel matte. The payables for nickel matte, given that discount between the ultimate end product, nickel sulfate and LME, are quite low.
We're talking sort of, you know, low to mid-80% payability. At this point in time, the margins between NPI and nickel matte are quite similar. In terms of an end mix, we ultimately would like to get to a point where the company is sort of has a higher production, which is, you know, NPI, nickel matte, and then MHP from future HPAL collaboration that we anticipate on taking. The question of how quickly the sulfuric acid adding devices are being fitted and they'll be up and completed sort of middle of this month. It's about one to two weeks to sort of change from producing NPI to a low-grade nickel matte.
You know, that conversion can happen relatively quickly. Look, we you know we'll be a swing producer where we see periods of opportunity and diversion and margin opportunity in, say, nickel matte, we'll switch to producing nickel matte. To the second question around dual listing. You know, we have done some exploratory work, very early stage in just in terms of looking. I would point out that Tsingshan is in the process of listing its sort of battery side of the business on the Hong Kong Exchange. Look, that's something that, as I said, very exploratory at this point in time.
You know, it's something that we're certainly aware of and have done some initial inquiries into where and how that might be achieved.
Yeah. Thank you, mate. Through.
Thanks. Thanks, Rob.
Thank you. Your next question comes from David Coates from Bell Potter Securities. Please go ahead.
G'day, Justin. Pardon me. G'day, Justin. Well done on a good quarter. Some pretty nice metrics in there. I'll just follow on those questions from Rob, just to be clear, when do you think you guys will be producing nickel matte and what proportion of your production is that likely to be over the course of this year? That's my first question.
Yeah, look, we at this point in time, margins between nickel matte and NPI are quite similar. You know, we given the sort of the conversion of 1-2 weeks and you know, a small disruption that it would create a period of sort of production of an off-spec product, which is still saleable. You know, we're not in a rush to produce nickel matte, given that it predominantly looks like it will be for ShFE rather than LME. That the payabilities, as I mentioned, sort of potentially in the low-to-mid 80s%. We don't really see any price upside in LME or ShFE. In fact, we see more downside risk.
At this point in time, it's not something that we're in a hurry to rush into doing. Yeah, it's something obviously we'll monitor market conditions. Nickel matte pricing, you know, can change. You know, contracts may improve on that payability. You know, we may even do contracts in the future linked to nickel sulfate pricing rather than LME or ShFE. We have the ability, which is a positive, and you know, we will sort of wait till we see the right market signals and are confident in achieving.
You know, ultimately the aim of producing nickel matte is to try to sort of achieve greater margins where we may see a bifurcation between you know nickel matte LME pricing and NPI pricing.
No. Okay. Thanks, Justin. That, I'm glad I asked that. I got on this, the second smelter firing up pretty shortly. Rob did ask about the costs. I think I recall from previous presentations that the indication was that the cost for you guys to produce nickel matte would be pretty similar to your NPI production. Do I recall that correctly?
That's correct. Yeah. Yeah.
Okay, cool.
There would be on top of those costs, we have a conversion cost.
Yeah.
You know, Robbie's indicated, you know, values around $3,000, it would be significantly lower within IMIP, but there is a conversion cost on top of that that needs to be considered.
Okay, the questions I originally had, just quickly on, you know, your limonite production's ramped up. What can we expect for that over the balance of the calendar year is my first question there.
Yeah. Probably where we're sitting at the moment, it's about 100,000 tons of limonite ore per month. We don't expect any change in that until that ore load is completed later this year. We're targeting sort of a significant ramp up in limonite somewhere in the order of sort of 3-5 million tons per annum.
Right. Okay. Okay. You just touched on it with one of those earlier questions around collaboration on MHP with the HPALs. Without getting twisted on that, can you sort of be able to give us an update on how those HPAL production ramp ups are going?
Yeah. Huayue Nickel Cobalt, who is a buyer of our limonite ore, they had sort of successfully commissioned three out of four lines, and they're all ramping up. For this quarter, they've already produced, and this is still in a commissioning phase without the fourth line in operation, 4,000-5,000 tons of nickel in MHP. We expect that ramp up to sort of maintain plateau to be achieved second half of this year.
Excellent. Thanks very much, Justin. I'll hand it over.
Thank you. Your next question.
Sorry, people, may not have heard because of the echo, but we do have, as I mentioned, Mr. Huang Weifeng on the call. As I said, Vice Chairman of Tsingshan Board of Directors and Chairman of Shanghai Decent, our largest shareholder and a non-executive director of Nickel Mines. Sydney, if there is any questions for Mr. Huang, when he is answering them, if you would just ask him to just to mute his webcast, while he's on the phone, just to avoid the echo, which I think happened last time.
Yes, I think, Mr. Huang is aware of that now.
Thank you. Sorry.
Thank you. Your next question is from Patrick Collier from Credit Suisse. Please go ahead.
Hi, Justin. Just back on the cost lags that a few others have asked about. Can you ever talk about how the central procurement process allocates costs to Nickel Mines, just, you know, with regard to stockpiles and, you know, whether you're paying prices from potentially, like, a few months ago or are you paying the most recent price or is it somewhere in between?
Given that it's a centralized procurement department which, you know, we obviously don't manage. If you look at their performance to date, you know, they've continued to deliver thermal coking coal at significantly lower prices than we're seeing in the market and also, you know, been able to smooth where we've seen sort of periods of significant spikes. You know, it is a large industrial park. I mean, that's part of the Tsingshan advantage is their experience, their size in terms of procurement and management of procurement, and that cost allocation.
I mean, if while they're not published, if you look across other RKEF operations, costs are very similar across, you know, all of the industrial park. You know, they, you know, we effectively are paying the same price for coal and other elements as our other tenants within the industrial park. You know, that cost allocation, as I said, is sort of consistent and, you know, it's the same across the whole park.
Okay. Thank you. I guess just one more on the accounting rather than consistency across the park, like, is it a first in, first out type arrangement or last in, first out, or are you not privy to that from the park?
Sorry.
No. Look, it was Chris. Yeah.
No. Go on, Justin. Sorry.
No, yeah, Chris, yeah.
Sorry, Patrick, it's Chris Shepherd here. Look, we're not entirely privy to it. It's not one of the things we face this every quarter. Every quarter we get it. We have people worried that our costs are going to go up every single quarter. We have demonstrated that we maintain our margins through the cycle as costs are going up. It's the margins that everyone should be focusing on. If you're worried that, oh, we're using inventories from six months ago, and there's no inventories left, well, you only need to go back to the quarter leads and compare the inventories across Hengjaya and Ranger, and you'll see there's been a very slight drawdown on the inventories of raw materials across those two entities.
I really think this focus on future costs and are we, how is it being managed. It's sort of missing the mark of the industrial nature of our business.
Yeah. Sorry, Justin.
Okay.
Thank you. Your next question comes from Jim Lennon from Macquarie Bank. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Hi, Justin. Just a quick question on the limonite ore sales. Has it been determined what the limonite ore price will be? And is that gonna be related to the same formula that the Indonesian government uses for saprolite ores? And secondly, just on the electricity price, you said that the electricity price had come down during the quarter. I note from the government website the coal price went up, the thermal coal price went up. How, why did the electricity price come down? Could you give some clarity on the mechanism behind electricity pricing? Thank you.
On the first point, limonite ore, the Indonesian government is contemplating a benchmark price, which is similar to the saprolite pricing. That hasn't as yet been decided, but you know, it will, as similar to saprolite ore, have a recovery factor which will be linked to the LME, which will determine a final limonite ore cost. Interestingly, it may also take into consideration cobalt credits, which would apply to a limonite ore price. I mean, we see upside mostly in the pricing of our limonite ore. That's yet to be determined by the government as to whether they will introduce a benchmark limonite ore price. The discussions are certainly underway. We do think that we will see an outcome on that relatively soon.
To the second question around, you know, our power costs, I think, again, you know, people tend to look at different markets and, you know, different references of, you know, what spot price is at the moment and what spot price was over a period of time. I think it's important to note, again, coming back to ability to manage stocks via, you know, the fact of the size of this, the ability to negotiate. Particularly if you look at ore costs for April, the ability to negotiate a March price when, you know, you're potentially looking at ore costs in April of $70-$75. The same applies to the procurement of thermal coal, given the significant volumes that they procure.
You know, it's again, looking at the spot sort of coal price for our business, it just doesn't work. As Chris said, you know, sort of time and time again, we've delivered or demonstrated the ability to manage costs, where if you look at, you know, an index price, you know, it would indicate, you know, increases or volatility. You know, Tsingshan is able to manage this in a way that no other operation is, and that's size and scale and buying power.
Okay. Just on the limonite side, will there be a cost of producing limonite ore, or is that incorporated within the saprolite cost?
Most of the cost is. Well, all of the mining costs are incorporated in the saprolite cost. The only cost would be the transportation cost. Once it's mined, you know, delivering it from mine stockpiles to the IMIP, which is, you know, just a, it's a couple of dollars.
Yeah. Okay. Okay, thanks very much.
Thanks, Jim.
Thank you. Your next question comes from Dmitry Chinov from Fosun Eurasia Capital. Please go ahead.
Hello, Mr. Werner. Thank you for the additional quarter. I'd like to ask you a few question because we are your bondholders. My first question is about cash cost expectation. There was in the presentation, in the information that nickel ore costs were offset by electricity, and that's very fine. What are your expectation about the next quarters? This is my first question. My second question is about Oracle acquisition. In particular, how would you expect to raise additional funds to acquire the rest of 40% of Oracle? That's my second question.
The third question about Tsingshan collaboration, because market in general, and we in particular as your bondholders, we're concerned by Tsingshan short squeeze. As it is number one, your shareholder, and NPI offtaker, what could be the potential pressure on your day-to-day operations and financials, including debt? My first question was about the costs expectation. My second was about ongoing acquisitions, and third about Tsingshan. Thank you.
Thanks, Dmitry. Going through each of those questions. Next quarter, as I've highlighted, we do expect to see some increases in ore costs given currently elevated LME costs. We believe though that will be offset, as I pointed out, by higher NPI prices. The April contract is already $2000/ton above the average for the March contracts. You know, that offsets any increase in ore costs. We don't expect to see any significant changes in thermal or coking coal across the quarter. That's, you know, our outlook for costs across this quarter. Yeah, we don't see any significant impact, which again, quarter-on-quarter we haven't seen.
The reason for that is you have NPI prices rising faster than costs are rising. On the second question of the ONI acquisition, you know, we had $130 million cash on hand at the end of March. We've stated to the market our intention to fund the acquisition potentially out of a mixture of debt and internally generated cash flow. The payment schedule. Our next major payment is not due until the end of this year, so we have a significant period of time during which we expect to see first sales from ANI in May, when we receive our IUP.
We've already built up, you know, over sort of close to 1,500 tons there of nickel. You know, that is still being evaluated. We have time and we have flexibility in terms of how we fund that. Thirdly, I'd invite Mr. Huang just to answer that question and perhaps give an update in terms of operations and, you know, as you said, these operations are unaffected, as you can see from this quarter. Perhaps Mr. Huang would be able to provide some more color. Xinmei, if you are able to translate for us.
Mm-hmm. Okay.
Justin, could I.
Thank you. You don't expect any pressure from the financial terms, including debt, from Tsingshan, right?
That's correct. Xinmei, are you on the call or?
Yes, Justin, you want to direct the question to Mr. Huang?
Yeah, if you could. Yes.
Could I trouble the investor to repeat the question again? I'm sorry. For Tsingshan.
Yeah. The question was, what could be the potential pressure from Tsingshan on your financials because Tsingshan has some short squeeze and it's your major shareholder. What do you think?
Right. Mr. Huang's response to that is that, you know, Tsingshan's, you know, operations are as per normal, as Justin has mentioned. He does not expect any, you know, financial impact to Nickel Mines. Mr. Huang then went on to say that, you know, the operations of Tsingshan is separate from, you know, its futures, its activities on the futures market. The operations are as per normal. You know, it's as we can see from Nickel Mines performance, you know, there's no impact on that. With regards to the activities on futures, I think, Mr.
Huang refers, you know, the audience to the only statement that has been made by Tsingshan, which is that they have entered, they have come to a sensible agreement with the brokerage bank, and is in the process of orderly, you know, dealing with the matter, which includes the orderly, you know, exit of certain positions. These are on two different tracks, and they are not, you know, interrelated.
Okay. Thank you. My last question to you is about your dividend policy and as your cash flow is likely to grow in the near future as new operations continue. What are your expectations on dividend policy and what would be the shareholders remuneration in terms of cash flow or maybe net income?
Yes. While we don't have a fully enunciated dividend policy at this stage, given the growth that we're currently in the midst of. We did release to the market that, you know, our intention is to maintain at least a dividend of AUD 0.03 as a minimum. You know, that we would provide guidance if that was to change. Obviously, last year, we paid AUD 0.04 and so, you know, in terms of the dividend going back to the earlier statement, that would be the intention moving forward. You know, we would obviously notify the market if that was to change.
Okay. Thank you very much.
Thank you.
Thank you. Your next question is a follow-up question from Chun Mui from Arkkan Capital. Please go ahead.
Hi. So I guess first question is, I think the sales efficiency of the Hengjaya Mine, you said, is the production there increasing from 3 - 5, right? So if we perform at the five, and when Angel comes online, how sufficient will that be? You know, kind of after Angel becomes full production. I guess second question I think for Mr. Huang is the coal procurement of the parks to produce the captive power. Are those prices on kind of term contracts, term price contracts, or how much volatility is there to kind of spot market, you know, for the coal that they procure, you know, for the parks?
Thanks. I'll take the first question. The Angel Nickel RKEF lines are located on a separate island on Halmahera. They're not close to the Hengjaya Mine. So Angel will be fed from a number of suppliers in and around operations, the largest being Weda Bay Nickel, which is supplying already some sort of 8 million tons and ramping up into the IWIP Industrial Park. That 5 million tons of saprolite that I've mentioned will see HNI and RNI 100%, you know, hedged. Then a portion of Oracle Nickel as that comes online also hedged through the Hengjaya Mine's production.
As announced to the market, we are actively in the process of acquiring new nickel resources and, you know, we hope to continue to build on the nickel resource base to increase, you know, nickel ore supply as a hedge. Not only that, resources are becoming more valuable and obviously margins in the mining business continue to grow. On the second question, to me, if you could just perhaps translate-
Sure.
That question for Mr. Huang around coal procurement and term price contracts and sort of volatility to spot pricing.
Sorry, can you just repeat the question, please, our investor from Arkkan Capital. It's the CFO here.
Sure. The question to Mr. Huang is, we would like to get a little bit of insight as to, you know, the coal procurement, you know, into the parks for the, you know, captive power generation, right? Does-
Mm-hmm.
You know, does the parks or, you know, Tsingshan have, I guess, captive coal mines so that, you know, prices is not, you know, subject to spot movements? Or, you know, do they have long-term contracts and with long-term pricing? I guess, how much spot volatility is there in terms of kind of their coal costs?
Yeah. Okay. I'll let Xin Wei translate, but I would expect that the answer is going to be that these are, that you're delving now right into the operations at the industrial parks, and they are private matters. But I will allow Xin Wei to translate that.
All right. Thank you, Chris.
Uh,
我来说一下是吧，他要我说一下是吧。这位。
对，他想问的就是园区的煤炭采购一般是多数是长协，是有一个固定价格呢，还是会被那个现货市场的价格所影响，导致那个园区的电价可能会有波动。
园区的煤炭不适用长协价格。园区煤炭供应商，我们是长期还是伙伴，以长期还是伙伴为主，但是货是现货价格，现货价格。所以煤区，园区电的价格，随着煤的价格的变动而变动。但是由于它是先戳先进、后戳后进，平摊的，所以它的电的成本跟煤的价格有滞后，有滞后。这位我，我说清楚了吗？嗯。
好 的 。 Mr. Huang explained that, you know, in the industrial park, they generally work with long term suppliers. But having said that, you know, the prices will be, you know, on spot basis. That's why I think Mr. Huang said that the power price do get affected by fluctuations in coal price. He further explained that, you know, the industrial parks for coal procurement at least works on a first in, first out basis. There will be an expected delay in passing through a coal cost.
That's helpful. Thanks. Thank you.
园区的价格是工厂所有的工厂联合起来买的，所以它这个价格的谈判是统一的谈判，所以它是不同的电厂买来的，在同一时间买来，价格基本是一样的。补充一下。
Mr. Huang adds on that the coal procurement is conducted uniformly or, you know, centrally, across the industrial park. The various power plants will, at any one point, be, you know, subject to the same procurement price. Having said that also means that they have the bargaining power, you know, collectively, due to the entire demand from the industrial parks.
Thank you. Thank you. There are no further questions at this time. I'll now hand back to Mr. Werner for closing remarks.
Thank you everyone again for your time. Just to reiterate, you know, again, a very pleasing quarter. Number of records across the EBITDA generation of our RKEF assets and our Hengjaya Mine. The continued growth and smooth ramp up of Angel Nickel and excellent progress of Oracle Nickel. I'd sort of like to close with thanking Mr. Huang for making himself available again to, you know, to reiterate his comment, you know, no impact on production, which we've seen this quarter.
You know, looking forward to delivery of another strong quarter next quarter as we continue to see increased nickel production from the ramp up of Angel Nickel and also first sales, which will help to deliver a significant revenue and EBITDA boost for the upcoming quarter. With that, thank you everyone for your time and we'll sign off here.
Thank you for participating. You may now disconnect.