Good morning. My name is Joanna, and I will be your conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to the Capstone Copper Q3 2022 results conference call. All lines have been placed on mute to prevent any background noise. After the speaker's remarks, there will be a question and answer session. If you would like to ask a question during this time, simply press star then the number one on your telephone keypad. If you would like to withdraw your question, please press star followed by two. Thank you. Mr. Jerrold Annett, you may begin your conference.
Good morning. I'd like to welcome everyone to Capstone Copper's Q3 2022 conference call. Please note that the news release and regulatory filings announcing Capstone Copper's 2022 third quarter financial and operational results are available on our website and on SEDAR. If you are logged into the webcast, we will advance the slides of today's presentation, which is also available in the Investors section of our website. I'm joined today by our CEO, John MacKenzie, our President and COO, Cashel Meagher, our Chief Financial Officer, Raman Randhawa, and our Senior Vice President, Risk, ESG, and General Counsel, Wendy King. Following our brief remarks, there will be an opportunity for questions. Please note that comments made on the call today will contain forward-looking information within the meaning of applicable securities laws.
This information, by its nature, is subject to risks and uncertainties, and actual results may differ materially from the views expressed today. For further information on the risks and uncertainties pertaining to our business, please see Capstone's most recent filings, which are available on our website and on SEDAR. Finally, I'll just note that all amounts we will discuss today are in U.S. dollars unless otherwise specified. Now I'll turn the call over to John MacKenzie.
Thank you, Jerrold, and good morning, everyone. This was our second full quarter as Capstone Copper, and I'm very pleased with the progress of our integration efforts following the closing of the Capstone Mantos transaction earlier this year. Last week, management and our board visited both Mantoverde and Mantos Blancos, and we're extremely pleased to see the advancement of the Mantoverde development project and the progress and potential for additional upside at Mantos Blancos. In the third quarter, we produced a total of 45,700 tons of copper at consolidated C1 cash costs of $2.76 per pound across our four operations. Despite lower than planned throughput at Mantos Blancos, the mine delivered substantially lower sulfide costs of $2.17 per pound, and this should further improve once the mill achieves its target run rate in the fourth quarter.
As for the cathode business, all-time high sulfuric acid prices contracted during the second quarter and delivered during the third quarter were the main driver that impacted costs. Specifically, both Mantos Blancos and Mantoverde operations paid over $260 per ton for acid over the quarter. However, we're currently securing significantly lower prices to be delivered during the first half of next year, with contract pricing in the $120-$140 per ton range. Overall, despite the inflationary pressures, I'm pleased that we managed to keep our operating costs in line quarter-over-quarter with similar production to Q2, and our C1 cash costs came in lower this quarter. On the right-hand side of the slide, we show the first of four Komatsu electric rope shovels that was commissioned at our Mantoverde mine in September.
Transitioning to electric equipment at Mantoverde will not only help reduce our environmental footprints, but will also increase the mine's productivity, driven by the larger loads that these new shovels can handle. The second shovel will be commissioned imminently, and the final third and fourth to follow. Turning to slide six, we show our nine-month production and cost guidance between April 1st and December 31st, which remains unchanged, reiterating our consolidated range for copper production of 136,000 to 150,000 tons, with C1 cash costs trending towards the upper end of our guided range of $2.55-$2.70 per pound. We expect improved concentrate throughput levels in Q4 at Mantos Blancos as well as at Pinto Valley. The ramp-up at Mantos Blancos is progressing well.
The mill operated above the designed 20,000 ton per day throughput level over 20 out of 27 planned operating days in October, with copper recoveries in line with expectations. Now I'll pass over to Raman for our financial results.
Thank you, John. We are now on slide seven. Our Q3 financial results were meaningfully impacted by the sharp decline in copper prices that began in late Q2 and continued into and through the third quarter, resulting in negative provisional pricing adjustments that have impacted earnings across many of our base metal peers. Our realized price for the quarter was $3.29 per pound, which was $0.22 per pound lower than the LME average for Q3 and approximately $1 lower than the LME average in Q2 this year.
Our lower realized price for the quarter was due to 29,700 tons of copper priced at an average of $3.75 per pound at June 30th, which finally settled at lower average prices during Q3, and by 34,600 tons of copper provisionally priced at an average price of $3.45 per pound at September 30th, which was lower than the average price in the third quarter. Adjusted EBITDA in Q3 of $34.1 million was impacted by a realized provisional pricing loss of $32.5 million, as well as continued inflationary pressures felt across our portfolio. Particularly with respect to sulfuric acid within our cathode business, as John mentioned earlier. The $32.5 million relates to Q2 provisional pricing. Thus, excluding that amount, EBITDA would have been $66.6 million.
Our adjusted EPS of -$0.02 per share was also impacted by incremental $22.5 million in realized provisional pricing losses. Going forward, we aim to minimize the impact of provisional pricing through our recently implemented QP hedging strategy, which I will describe in more detail in the next slide. Moving on to slide eight. On the left-hand side, we summarize our available liquidity, which was $711 million as at September 30th, including $196 million of cash and short-term investments, $405 million of undrawn amounts on our $500 million corporate revolving credit facility, as well as $110 million of undrawn amounts on our $520 million Mantoverde Development Project facility.
Further financial flexibility exists within the $100 million accordion and the undrawn balance of our $60 million cost overrun facility with our Mantoverde partner, Mitsubishi Materials Corporation. As at September 30th, we had drawn $22.9 million on the cost overrun facility, which we are contractually obligated to do so regardless of our operating cash balance based on the previously announced capital increase from $785 million to $825 million in Q2, which remains unchanged. On the right-hand side of the page, we highlight the proactive steps we took in Q3 to protect downside risk with additional 2023 copper hedges as we approach the final years of construction of Mantoverde. In summary, 85,000 tons of copper production next year is hedged at a weighted average price of $3.45 per pound.
As previously mentioned, in late Q3, we commenced a QP hedging program, which utilizes derivative contracts to offset copper sales with the objective of fixing revenue at the time of shipment, thus eliminating significant deviations in realized copper prices from the LME average. Our recently implemented QP hedging program also enables better liquidity management, especially in periods of falling copper prices, to protect our business plans going forward and our balance sheet. We remain well-positioned to fund the remaining CapEx in MVDP, a project that will be transformational to our portfolio once it's commissioned in late 2023. Now I'll hand it over to Cashel for the operations review.
Thanks, Raman. Now on slide nine, Pinto Valley produced 14.1 thousand tonnes of copper during Q3. Mill throughput averaged approximately 48,000 tonnes per day and was impacted by unplanned downtime of the water pumping system at one of our large makeup water sources, combined with a thickener rake failure, impacting the ability to run at full rates. The mill is currently operating at normal throughput levels as we have reestablished normal operation in these areas. C1 cash costs of $2.60 per pound were on the upper end of our nine-month guidance range and $0.22 per pound lower than last quarter. As for PV4, we continue to work on engineering detail and network, which has the goal to increase the mine life with additional tonnage from 2039 to beyond 2050. Moving to slide 10.
During Q3, Cozamin achieved good grades and throughput levels, yielding solid copper production of 6,400 tonnes at C1 cash cost of $1.20 per pound, both in line with guidance. The pace backfill and dry stack tailings project continues to make good progress and will facilitate the mine's planned long-term sustainability, with project completion expected in Q4 and ramp up in the first half of 2023. To date, we have invested $41 million of the total $55 million budget for the project. Cozamin's exploration program continues to focus on testing the Mala Noche main west target from surface and underground. Testing of other targets along the San Roberto mine commenced in Q3, and the results of the ongoing exploration program will be incorporated into an updated mineral resource estimate in the second half of 2023. Moving to slide 11.
Throughput is steadily improving at Mantos Blancos, averaging above design levels over 70% of the planned operating days in October. Multiple sampling and testing programs around the new Mill A indicate that it is operating at better than expected grinding efficiency. Specifically, this new mill is operating at 15%-20% above design grinding efficiency and drawing 10 megawatts out of the 13 available of motor power. Our operations team are actively engaged with the mill vendor to increase the mill speed and draw more power, while at the same time increasing the throughput of the fine crushing plant to take advantage of the higher efficiencies. We are very pleased with the results and are confident that the front end of the plant can achieve higher than design throughputs.
This is evidenced by October's production performance, where the mill averaged above the design throughput level over 20 out of 27 planned operating days. The highest daily milled throughput was just under 25,000 tons. In August 2022, we filed for the required environmental permits for phase II, which is an additional 35% expansion over phase I. The feasibility study for this expansion has moved to the first half of 2023 as we are incorporating recent operating performance and fresh understanding of where bottlenecks lie. Now on slide 12. Q3 cathode production at Mantoverde was 11,600 tons at a C1 cash cost of $3.87 per pound.
As John said earlier, this was impacted by record high sulfuric acid costs, which have peaked, and we have secured acid supply for delivery in Q1 of 2023 at less than half the prices paid in Q3 of 2022. Last week, I was at Mantoverde, and I'm very happy with the momentum and progress of our MVDP project, which remains on track for construction and completion and wet commissioning in late 2023. As of September thirtieth, we achieved an overall progress of 67% and construction progress of 37%, having spent $490 million of the $825 million capital budget for the project. At this point in the project, with most major equipment delivered to site, I feel that the areas of possible capital escalation are greatly reduced.
With reference to the next four slides, 13 through 16, construction activities are really ramping up, currently 40% complete with the principal concrete foundation work near completion. As we can see from slide 13, the primary crusher and the concentrate thickener and filter building are well underway. Slide 14 shows the grinding and flotation areas. On the right side, you can see the ore stockpile and reclaim infrastructure area. Slide 15 shows the work at the tailings thickener and the trenching and wall construction for the tailings storage facility. On slide 16, you can see a photo of a mill shell. As of now, all major components for the wet and dry circuit have been delivered to site. You'll also note the electric rope shovel.
This is number one of four and has been operating on the pre-strip for a number of weeks now, with the second to be commissioned imminently, and the final third and fourth to follow. Work progresses on all fronts of the Mantoverde Development Project, and we look forward to hosting our Chile tour in just two weeks' time. Finally, on slide 17, work on the Mantoverde Santo Domingo District Integration Plan continues. The plan will outline how we utilize our existing and future planned infrastructure to maximize value creation across the district. Our goal is to create a world-class district capable of producing 200,000 tonnes of copper per year at low cost and with the additional benefit of a leading cobalt business, which would be one of the largest outside of the DRC and China.
We continue to mature the overall strategy for the district, balancing the potential revenue opportunities with cost-saving synergies. We know that the desalination plant, the electrical infrastructure, and the operating team, and the project delivery team will all benefit Santo Domingo greatly. Conversely, the port and future cobalt plant and the potential additional oxide leach production from Santo Domingo will benefit Mantoverde. We look forward to discussing this in more detail soon when this plan is released, and we can discuss it during our site tours two weeks from now. Now over to Wendy King for the sustainability review.
Thank you, Cashel. We're now on slide 18. We're proud that Mantoverde and Mantos Blancos formally became participants of the Copper Mark Assurance Framework in August. In the 12 months that follow, they will complete a self-assessment and an independent assessment against the Copper Mark criteria. Our greenhouse gas emissions target-setting process continued in Q3. We worked on establishing the business as usual forecast that will become the base case for our decarbonization pathway. We've also started reviewing Scope 3 emissions at our Chilean sites and will begin to assess broadly across Capstone in 2023. We have set our initial ESG priorities, which are on the right of slide 18, and we're developing and rolling out our goals, including our emissions targets very soon. Mantoverde inaugurated the first of four electric shovels, which will contribute to reducing the site's Scope 1 greenhouse gas emissions in the expansion phase.
Pinto Valley hosted its annual Old Dominion Days event, which is a celebration of the history of mining in the region. It provides a valuable opportunity for broad stakeholder engagement and for members of the surrounding area to take guided tours of the site. Pinto Valley also completed its People's Pond construction project with a liner installation and pump system to support water conservation and reuse. We are in discussions with some key corporate partners to support community investment projects in Chile and Mexico to further enhance our social impact in these regions. Cozamin have advanced the remediation of the historic Chiripa tailing site, securing a final permit for the confinement cell. Chiripa is an important example in the industry as it's one of the few historic remediation projects in Mexico.
Finally, Mantos Blancos successfully submitted its environmental impact statement for increasing the concentrator capacity for the phase II expansion. Now I'll turn it over to John for final remarks.
Thank you, Wendy. Finally, on slide 19, our nine months production and cost guidance range is reiterated. We expect to produce around 185,000 tons of copper over 12 months in 2022. We remain focused on the execution of our near-term growth profile, growing copper production by 40% to approximately 260,000 tons by 2024, with the completion of the Mantoverde development project, which remains on time and on budget. Following this, we have a fully permitted transformational project with a tax stability agreement in place to advance at Santo Domingo, which unlocks an additional 45% of copper production growth to 380,000 tons per year, with further upside and expansions across our portfolio, including an exciting cobalt opportunity at Mantoverde and Santo Domingo. With that, we're now ready to take questions.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, we will now begin the question-and-answer session. Should you have a question, please press the star followed by the one on your touch tone phone. You will hear a three-tone prompt acknowledging your request. If you are using a speakerphone, please lift the handset before pressing any keys. First question comes from Dalton Baretto at Canaccord. Please go ahead.
Thanks. Good morning, everybody. John, I'd like to start by asking you for your thoughts on the proposal from the Boric's government on the new mining royalty regime last week. Thanks.
Hi, Dalton. Yeah, thanks. Thanks for the question. Maybe just starting off, talking about obviously there have been two processes going on. One is the constitutional referendum, and the second is the sort of new royalty legislation. I think we obviously saw that the draft constitution was rejected by a very significant majority, 62% against 38%, a few weeks back. I think, you know, about a year ago, 80% of Chile voted in favor of changing the Constitution. I think we believe it's most probable that the Constitution is going to continue to be adjusted and adapted and changed.
I think it seems to be heading toward a process that should end up with a far more sort of measured outcome, and that process is currently being discussed in parliament. I think with regards to the royalty proposal, certainly the new proposal is a very significant step in the right direction. I think the previous proposal would have made Chile sort of an outlier. I think this new proposal moves it sort of very much back closer toward sort of where I suppose other jurisdictions' tax rates are. I think in our view, it's still work in progress. It will still, in its current form, act to make Chile sort of less competitive than it would otherwise be. I think so we will sort of certainly continue to engage with the government and seek an outcome that's sort of is a win-win for both Chile and for mining companies.
Great. Thanks for that, John. Maybe I could switch gears a little bit for my second question. The integration study that's coming out next week, can you tell us what level of detail we're gonna see?
Yeah. I think, Dalton, for that, I might just pass you across to Cashel, who's obviously been very close to that study. Across to you, Cashel.
Yeah. Hi, Dalton. I think what we need to realize is, since the integration of the two companies, what we've seen is a tremendous amount of opportunity, that's sort of uncovering itself at the various operations, whether it's Mantos, you know, Mantos Blancos, Cozamin or Pinto Valley, but specifically to the integration area between Santo Domingo and Mantoverde. As we dig, we find more. With that, you know, knowing that, Santo Domingo, the last technical report was 2018, and that now it's gonna greatly benefit from the infrastructure already installed at Mantoverde, that there's a considerable amount of engineering work to bring up to that quality.
I think what you can view is that you would get an idea of the scope and the benefits of what the current infrastructure is, while we will lay out the timeframe for some of the more detailed work and more of the feasibility work, which is what is the cobalt flow sheet? You know, when do we expect to have, like, oxide delineated at Santo Domingo? And those types of things. But we can surely sort of give more detailed color on what the expectations or what the value might be for the addition of a port to Mantoverde or the addition of the desalination plant or some of the electrical power infrastructure.
The difficulty really comes with, you know, with that technical report being dated and with new information arising, you know, it's not a deduction of what the previous CapEx was due to inflationary pressures and some design considerations and optimizations. What we hope, what we, well, what we're going to lay out is this sort of optimized pathway going forward, and that, you know, there are some key infrastructure integrations that materially affect Santo Domingo's efficiency going forward.
Thanks, Cashel. Maybe I can just squeeze in one more. On PV four, as you're working through it, are you just contemplating a mine life extension or will there be a production expansion as well? Thanks.
Fire away, Cashel.
Yeah. We're always evaluating the expansion opportunity. There are expansion opportunities, and right now we have them sort of in what we would call an evaluation or a trade-off or value engineering process. The base case is a life expansion, obviously, with bringing in the reserves and coming up with suitable tailings options. With that, also we're evaluating the opportunity to expand the operation. There are several of those trade-offs underway. I would say again, the base case is additional reserve to mine life, but there is opportunity for some expansion there that is being evaluated. You know, the jury's out. We don't have the scorecard in yet.
Perfect. That's all for me, guys. Thank you.
Thanks, Dalton.
Thank you. Next question comes from Orest Wowkodaw at Scotiabank. Please go ahead.
Hi. Good morning. I'm just following up on Dalton's questions about the Chilean operations. I'm just wondering where the thinking is right now with respect to Santo Domingo, just given the uncertain market environment for projects and for the copper market itself, whether you still envision the construction of Santo Domingo starting shortly thereafter the completion of Mantoverde or can we anticipate more of a pause and kind of a rebuilding of the balance sheet before you'd start another big project?
Yeah. Orest, thanks for that question, and it is a very good question. I think, as you know, we have sort of stated previously that we have no intention of running two major projects in parallel. Clearly our first objective is to complete and ramp up the Mantoverde project. As you know that project will be completed and sort of first ore will be through sort of towards the end of next year. To an extent, that gives us a little bit of time to actually assess the macro environment. With that gives us sort of I would say overall, we are rather conservative in terms of how we look at sort of our balance sheet management and how we look at our sort of future commitments.
I think the timing of Santo Domingo will clearly sort of take into account the ramp up of Mantoverde, the buildup of cash within the business, and the current macro environment, and that's on both the side of sort of copper prices and the inflationary environment. We're using this time to advance the studies and move the studies forward so that we remain flexible, that we can pull the trigger on that at what we regard as the optimal time to do so. Obviously that's that question is sort of there are multiple parameters we need to take into account.
Clearly, in an ideal world, one would want to pull the trigger on Santo Domingo, sort of during a period when perhaps the market is somewhat weaker and capital inflation is somewhat lower, rather than sort of wait until copper prices are sort of really booming. I think we'll take all those factors into account, but I think ultimately it'll depend very much on sort of our confidence around sort of maintaining a strong balance sheet.
Okay. Thank you for that. Just as a follow on then, when I think about sort of your projected startup timeline and then a ramp-up for Mantoverde, you know, that would suggest to me that sort of the earliest timeline would be kinda call it second half of 2024 for the sanctioning of that project. Is that the right way to think about it?
I think that's a fair comment, Orest. I think as I say, I think sort of once we have completed construction and put ore through, I do think we're fairly hopeful that the Mantoverde ramp-up will proceed fairly smoothly. It's a tried and tested design that we've got, tried and tested equipment, and the team from Ausenco who we're working with has sort of over the past few years ramped up in a very impressive form several of these sort of almost identical concentrators before. I think we're fairly optimistic about the ramp-up timeline.
Clearly we wanna be in a position where we can sort of assess sort of cash build in the business, and the macro environment, and then we'll take into account sort of what represents the optimal sort of point to pull the trigger on Santo Domingo.
Okay. Just on Santo Domingo itself, before the merger, there were two infrastructure transactions that were being contemplated to reduce the upfront capital, port rail. Are those still part of the new plan? Can you maybe give us an update on what's happening with those two proposals?
Yeah, certainly. For that, I'll pass across to Cashel. Certainly those are sort of both under detailed investigation or study.
With this combined entity now, we sort of rather than rushing forward with these, as you've sort of pointed out and John just so eloquently put, we were sort of waiting for the right economic conditions to move Santo Domingo going while not trying to increase our complexity or workload by running two projects at the same time. We still have a full Santo Domingo office of engineers and business people that are evaluating the different options in the integration. You know, it becomes more complex when we start talking about, you know, the possibility of cobalt not only from Santo Domingo but also from Mantoverde and the possibility of oxide from Santo Domingo over at Mantoverde to fill some of the unused capacity at the SX-EW.
At the same time, we're focused on that other large revenue generator at Santo Domingo, of course, which is the iron ore. Really the iron ore is what is the catalyst to major port consideration, which is the port of Santo Domingo or the idea of trade-offs still continuing on this idea of trade-offs versus you know of slurry and filtering at the port location versus transport by rail. Those trade-offs are still continuing simply because of the integration of the two assets, the return water, the quality of water, where the pumping stations are, what the electrical infrastructure are. They seem very simple on the outset, but when you start getting into the detail, there is a right answer and we're working towards it.
We still keep those partners and those partnerships, engaged in what those trade-offs are. They keep continuing to evaluate with us what is the best scenario for the shareholders of Capstone. We work with our joint venture partner at Mantoverde and updating them and incorporating them what is the best option for the Mantoverde joint venture also. Invariably it always turns out to be what is best for Capstone Copper and, Santo Domingo is also best for Mantoverde and sharing in all those optimizations. All those conversations, all those relationships and all those evaluations are still part of this value engineering exercise and trade-off, process.
Will this become clear with the integrated study that's coming out next week or is that something that we have to wait for the updated feasibility for?
I think what it does is, the next couple weeks, what we'll be able to disclose is what we're working on specifically and what the merits of each are, but we won't have a final evaluation of that. That will come with more detailed engineering and trade-offs of those as those mature. Yeah, it's about laying out the pathway and the map more clearly, and then those evaluations in time will reveal themselves.
One more question, if I could squeeze it in. Just on the Mantoverde sulfide project, how much contingency is built into the $825 million CapEx? And of that, how much of it has been consumed to date?
I think what's important is, you know, just looking at that overall figure, what it comprises of, and I think you heard in sort of Cashel's presentation a little bit earlier, it's really made up of several categories now. The one is the EPC sort of lump sum turnkey project with Ausenco. A very large part of that is all fixed price. There's an element of it which is on the sort of some of the earth moving on the tailings facility. However, that part of it now sort of is pretty close to being sort of cast in stone. The other major cost elements are the mining equipment.
Now all of that mining equipment is actually priced and the vast majority of it is already delivered. Then the kind of remaining portion of it is the pre-strip. Obviously the sort of previous increment we reported was sort of primarily around that. That was a result of sort of increased diesel and explosives prices and the impact that had on the pre-strip. We have, I would say sort of a small contingency that remains in that $825 million number. That's sort of a handful of million dollars. At this stage we think there's sort of relatively limited scope for further cost slippage.
Thank you.
Thank you. Next question comes from Ralph Profiti at Eight Capital. Please go ahead.
Thanks, operator. Good morning. Thanks for taking my questions. Maybe a couple for Raman if I can. Raman, on the QP program, is the goal to hedge out completely provisional pricing? You know, there's still disclosure in the MD&A about open pounds for Q4. Just wondering how long would you expect the QP program to be in place? Could we see sort of it coming off when we get to higher copper prices?
The QP hedging program will just, it's gonna continue to roll. We started it, first month was September, so that's why there's some open exposure on the MD&A there for a couple of months of Q3. You'll see that kind of flush out here in Q4 now. That should be our last quarter of really having provisional prices. Essentially, with the concentrate business, you got a three-month kind of floating price out there. We're kinda swapping that for a one-month kinda near term fixed price. Locking in a price closer to it versus having that exposure out there.
Essentially, when you move to this, Ralph, we just stay on it 'cause what we noticed, I think we discussed with you a little bit, is when the price falls, it falls hard and you lose a lot of money. When it goes up, you don't, you know, it doesn't move up as fast.
Mm.
You know, this essentially allows us to achieve LME average each quarter, but you'll probably start seeing that in a full quarter in the first quarter, Q1.
Okay. Yep, that's helpful. Second question, just you know how good is the liquidity in the sulfuric acid market to lock in those Q1 2023 prices sort of into you know into later quarters? You know do you have a goal in terms of the proportion of sulfuric acid exposure that you're aiming to be hedged on?
Yeah, I mean, it's a fluid strategy that's actually discussed at the Exco on a weekly basis, I'd say. Typically, the fourth quarter is when you kinda make a pivotal decision on how much do you wanna fix versus float, let's call it, for the next year. As we talked about, we have started fixing into Q1 for Mantoverde. That's, you know, pretty really good prices of $120. Based on our market intelligence, then we can decide if we wanna fix a bit more here in the fourth quarter heading into next year or leave a bit more open for spot. We'll be working through that strategy here in the fourth quarter, and that'll be baked into our 2023 guidance then.
Thanks, Raman. Appreciate it.
Yep.
Thank you.
Thanks, Ralph.
Next question comes from Stefan Ioannou at Cormark Securities. Please go ahead.
Yeah, thanks very much, guys. Just wondering on Pinto Valley with the throughput being down on that sort of 48,000 tons of level in the last quarter, you know, versus sort of PV3, I think it was trying to get up to around 58,000 tons a day. It sounds like you spent some money on some water retention and water infrastructure. Should we read into that that there's a seasonal issue here or just consideration going forward? Like with the new infrastructure, do you think we'll actually be able to keep it at 58,000 tons a year throughout the entire calendar year? Or is it gonna be a summertime thing when throughput does go down just because of water?
Thanks, Stefan. I'll pass that question across to Cashel.
Yeah, Stefan. There is no doubt there is a seasonal nature, and it's no mystery. You know, it's quite hot in Arizona then. Much of our water or much of our makeup water is actually from ground sources. It gets affected by a recharge per year, so it's less affected on the immediate drought on the recharge and getting that additional makeup water. The infrastructure items we indicated with some of the thickener issues at the rake and some of the water infrastructure was actually individual breakdowns that limited our ability to gain some of that recharge water. That's sort of on us in our infrastructure management and asset management going forward to limit that exposure. That being said, certainly one of the major sources of water also is reclaimed water.
It's recycling and reuse of water, and that happens within our principally in the thickeners and our tailings dam where we take water back. When it's dry, we suffer in the sense that in that natural reclaim of water from wherever the spigoting is to where the reclaim pumps are, it is reduced in those seasonal areas. What we do at a local level is we sort of plan out the extra production. If you recall, I recall it was before my time in Q4 of 2022, they had very good production in Pinto Valley, and that's because the reclaim was very high, and they were able to reutilize the installed capacity in the mill to achieve, you know, higher than 58,000 tons per day.
Mm-hmm.
So the idea probably going forward is to sort of format that. I still think we're looking at and we're going through the detail exactly where we'll be with our late January guidance as we put out in each year what is expected out of Pinto Valley. At an average, it'll be in the high fifties. You know, seasonally, we'll have to profile that water dependence on that reclaim while also having much more confidence in our ability for the freshwater makeup with a greater focus on asset integrity for 2023.
Okay. No, that's very helpful. Thanks very much.
Thank you. Next question comes from Ben Nittingnes at Clarksons Securities. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Hi, guys. Thanks for taking my questions. I don't really have much left, but I'll ask one on the premiums we're reading about. I think in the last couple of weeks, there's been several news reports on premiums for European and Asian customers kicking in in 2023. That's quite a bove the levels we've seen today. Is this something you'll be able to leverage on?
Thanks. Thanks for that, Ben. I want to pass you across to Jerrold, who has also recently taken over marketing responsibilities. Jerrold, across to you.
Thanks. Yeah. I think you're referring to the cathode premiums.
Yes, that's correct.
Okay. We have a third party marketing our cathodes, and it's under contract till the end of 2025. Right now we don't have exposure to the higher premiums, but post 2025 we will. We're looking forward to that day that we can realize the upside to the premiums.
Okay, thanks. I'll return to you.
Thank you.
Thank you. Next question comes from Craig Hutchison at TD Securities. Please go ahead.
Hey, good morning, guys. Just one question for me. Just with respect to the Mantos Blancos Phase II, take it from 7 million tons to 10. There's a note that you guys applied for the DIA application in August 2022 here for the environmental, I guess, permitting. Can you just talk about, you know, what's involved with permitting phase II, how onerous that process is? Thanks.
Yeah. Certainly I'll have a first crack at that, and then I'll pass it across to Cashel. You know, in Chile, there are three different levels of permitting. You get what's called a pertinencia, which is just a sort of minor adjustment to something generally within a plant. There's a DIA, which means there's sort of some additional throughput or scale or more material is gonna go into a tailings dam. Then there's the EIA, which is sort of the fully fledged environmental permits. Our belief is that, and which the authorities have accepted, is that this expansion at Mantos Blancos is the one in the middle, the DIA. Hence is basically a relatively straightforward process.
It really just means some additional processing infrastructure within sort of an existing brownfields plant. Obviously the main reason why it sort of triggers a DIA and not just a pertinencia is because we'll be actually growing the amount of reserves that will be processed and will go into the sort of tailings facility. What we are doing is doing that sort of within sort of tailings facilities that are already permitted and which we believe should be fairly straightforward. I think our expectation is that this is a relatively straightforward permitting process, but obviously we do need to make sure we sort of you know dot all the i's and cross all the t's with it. Cashel, do you have anything further to add to that?
No, no. I think that explains it well, John.
Okay. Thank you.
Thank you. Next question comes from John Tumazos at John Tumazos Very Independent Research. Please go ahead.
Thank you for taking my question. Congratulations on the large derivative profit. Do you have the flexibility to collapse derivative positions and just take the profit? If you do you want to?
John, thanks for the question. I'm gonna pass you across to Raman for that to respond.
Hey, John. Good question. When you look at our mark to market on our hedge book, it's kinda broken out into two parts. Some of it is corporate hedging that we do up here. Yes, we're in a profitable position that we could potentially close out if we wanted to. Part of the hedge book is tied to the project financing. It was a requirement of the Mantos Blancos development project facility. Those hedges are in place, you know, in relation to that debt structure that we have put in place. That would require a bit more discussions with lender consent if we ever want to do that or unwind that.
Do you have a general philosophy about hedging? Sometimes prices recover and it turns against you.
I think, John.
Yeah. Go ahead, John.
Maybe if I can just give a sort of before passing back to Raman, just sort of a high-level view is our philosophy with regard to hedging is really sort of a defensive strategy. Obviously, at this point, we have significant sort of capital expenditure on our projects. We have some high-cost cathode production. In our view, it sort of remains sort of sensible and prudent to sort of whether we're locking in on the cost or the revenue side to be doing so to sort of ensure our sort of balance sheet strength through the construction. I think as we transition to lower cost operations, I think we'll be sort of revisiting at that stage our sort of hedging philosophy.
Obviously there are things like sort of on capital projects where we have a fairly standard view, which, you know, when we move across to Santo Domingo, for example, if we raise the financing in U.S. dollars, we will look to, for example, hedge out any peso exposure within that capital, and ensure that sort of at the end of the day, we're able to sort of manage the capital expenditure. I do think sort of while we're in this particular phase, we are very much sort of focused on sort of a strategy to sort of protect margins during our major construction. Sorry, Raman, I don't know if you would like to add to that?
No, I think that was well said. I mean, essentially our hedging strategy, we look to hedge away input costs, which are FX and interest rates, and lock those in from a guidance cost perspective. Copper is only viewed in a risk management perspective. As for, you know, John said during the build of MVDP, typically we have been actually unhedged on copper historically. In the QP hedging that we mentioned that we've introduced, which will be small, but is very, you know, short-term looking out.
Do you reject other risk management strategies like selling equity or taking a partner?
I didn't think sort of we certainly don't reject those strategies. I think what we do is we look at sort of what are our financing options, we look at our balance sheets, and then we typically sort of prioritize what are our sort of preferred sort of modes of finance. I think at this stage, we remain comfortable that those steps are not sort of either desirable or necessary. That said, you know, as we move forward, when we look at the sort of Santo Domingo project, we'll be obviously looking at it in the context of both the sort of base case project but also potentially the oxides and the cobalt.
I think at that stage we'll look to see whether, for example, a sort of equity partner in the project makes sense.
I just interject that one of my concerns is that we're in a highly inflationary period. When you fix your selling price and you don't fix your cost, you're vulnerable to the unanticipated inflation. That's all.
Yeah.
It's a different form of risk.
John, you're absolutely right. You know, we try and take a sort of very thoughtful approach to that. You know, on one side, we do try and, for example, where we have our high-cost cathode business, we do try and make sure that we are sort of locking in our sort of biggest cost component, for example, the acid price around the time we're sort of locking in our copper price. That said as well, you're absolutely right. You know, if copper goes up to $5 a pound, you will see cost inflation in a number of other areas. What we do look to do is make sure that we're not over-hedged on the copper, and we can be sure that sort of the net benefit from that higher copper price will outweigh any sort of other inflationary increase on any unhedged parts of our sort of cost inputs.
Thank you for taking my questions.
Thank you.
Thank you. There are no further questions. I will now turn the call back over to John MacKenzie for closing remarks.
All right. As we discussed earlier, we're working hard to deliver the Mantoverde Santo Domingo district integration plan and to host our Chile tour in two weeks. We look forward very much to seeing those of you who are joining us and to showcasing the exciting growth opportunities that we have underway and in front of us. In January, we'll announce the date for the release of our year-end results. Until then, stay safe and feel free to reach out to Jerrold or Katina if you have any further questions. Thank you for your continued support, and have a good day.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, this concludes your call for today. We thank you for participating, and we ask that you please disconnect your line.