OR Royalties Inc. (TSX:OR)
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Earnings Call: Q4 2021

Feb 25, 2022

Operator

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the Osisko Gold Royalties Q4 and year 2021 results conference call. After the presentation, we will conduct a question-and-answer session. If you would like to ask a question, please press star followed by the one on your telephone keypad. Please note that this call is being recorded today, February 25, 2022 at 10 A.M. Eastern Time. Today on the call we have Mr. Sandeep Singh, President and Chief Executive Officer, and Mr. Frédéric Ruel, Chief Financial Officer and Vice President, Finance. I would now like to turn the meeting over to our host for today's call, Mr. Sandeep Singh.

Sandeep Singh
President and CEO, Osisko Gold Royalties

Thanks very much, operator. Hopefully you can hear me okay. Thanks everyone for joining us this morning. I know it's a busy end to the week, a lot of people reporting, so thanks for taking the time. We'll try to go through the prepared materials reasonably quickly, leave enough time for questions. Please note if you don't already have it, the deck that I'll be walking through with Fred is on the website, and we will be making forward-looking statements as we talk through it. Jumping to slide three, just in terms of a very high-level recap, we had another exceptionally strong quarter. Our assets continued to perform well, and provide significant catalysts that are playing out, which we'll touch on some of them as we go through the document.

In 2021, 80,000 GEOs earned, gold equivalent ounces, as you know, that was pre-released. That includes contributions from Renard, which again, we will talk about later as coming back online this year, resulting in record revenues of just shy of CAD 200 million, record operating cash flows as well. You know, this year we expect significantly more ounces. We'll still have a very high and frankly peer-leading margin at around 93%. That coupled with, you know, still a strong gold price here today, certainly volatile, but higher than the CAD 1,800 an ounce we averaged in 2021 should lead, we expect, to continued records on an annual basis. There was a little bit of noise in the financials, mainly resulting...

Sorry, stemming from a non-cash impairment in Osisko Development to the tune of CAD 48 million in the quarter. Really, those were legacy assets in the James Bay area, Coulonge, and in Guerrero. Exploration-stage assets that the company is not focusing on and felt it relevant to take that down given their focus is on their other two main assets. Taking that aside, we earned adjusted earnings of CAD 0.14 a quarter in the quarter and $0.56 for the year, and Fred will walk you through some of the details of that later on as well. As you know, we increased our dividend amidst the volatility in the middle of the year.

We followed that up with a pretty significant NCIB program, buying back over CAD 30 million at CAD 14.64 per share on average. We'll continue to look for those opportunities. The company's in great shape. Cash flow will grow this year, and we'll continue to balance that between dividend growth, buybacks when there's volatility in the market that affords us cheap opportunities to buy stock and growth. Subsequent to Q4, we did announce through Osisko Bermuda Limited an acquisition of a stream with a range of CAD 20 million-CAD 40 million, and on the high end 5%, on the low end 2.5% of the metals from the Tintic property that Osisko Development is in the process of acquiring.

Sean, who's been our chairman, is also on the line and in the Q&A if there are questions that drift over to the other Tintic side that I cannot answer, he'll be available to help with that. So that's just a quick snapshot. On slide four, you know, graphically depicting what I said earlier, which is an asset base that is outperforming our expectations and really just humming at this point. As I mentioned, the 80,000 GEOs for the year, and to the traditional split that you've gotten accustomed to seeing from us of about 75% gold, silver making up most of the remainder. That's obviously when we exclude the diamond ounces from Renard. That was at a 97% margin.

It also was right in the middle of our guidance. That's not a typo. It is pretty much exactly 80,000 GEOs right in the middle of our guidance previously reported. I think that's worth stopping on or pausing on a little bit. I think that frankly was a good result, especially in Q4, where we saw not just our operators, but operators across the sector having continued issues with supply chain. We certainly felt that with one of our mines in Yukon. Obviously, the Omicron positivity rates skyrocketing for mining companies as they have for the population at large. So that has added complications with respect to quarantines and absenteeism.

It didn't feel like the foot was on the gas. In Q4, in the mining sector, still having achieved the midpoint of our guidance certainly felt like a win. On slide five, we have come out with our 2022 guidance as well as a five-year outlook for the first time in our history, which we hope will be helpful to people as they understand the kind of growth embedded in this company. On the guidance side, on slide five, first and foremost, we are guiding to 90,000-95,000 ounces of GEOs for the year at a 93% cash margin. We're adding some more streams to that mix than last year, again, with the reinstatement of Renard.

That takes the margin down a little bit, but still quite high, which implies 12.5% to each side, 20% growth for the year. Pretty material step change for us. I would say we expect Q1 will hopefully be the last quarter where we hover around the 20,000 ounce range, excuse me, where we've been for most of 2021 before that growth really kicks in. The reasons for that are pretty obvious. We've got the expansion at Mantos that's underway. It's tying in as we speak, so clearly they have to kind of go through that tie-in process. Then there's also, as you heard me say a number of times, delays of a couple months there in terms of when they produce and when we receive.

Once that flows through, then we're off and running. You'd also remember that for Eagle in the Yukon, Q1 is always a lighter quarter from a winter perspective. They're gonna eventually get through that and have a bit more consistency. We do expect that to be the case, especially given some pretty extreme weather this year on the West Coast. We also have some smaller assets like San Antonio and Ermitaño, which are ramping up. We have the San Antonio stockpile, which is producing and will start generating ounces up at [Inaudible] this year.

The biggest other contributor to that skew in Q1 and the rest of the year would be Renard, where we're not switching back that stream until May 1. Not giving ourselves the credit for those ounces or those GEOs in Q1 primarily. Again, hopefully that's you know kind of a Q1 that's in line with what you saw from us last quarter, maybe a little bit higher, but we'll see. Significant growth starting as early as Q2 and for the rest of the year, which should bode well.

I think just on a couple points maybe Renard related since that is a big addition to this guidance versus last year, and we're very pleased to be able to bring that back into the fold. We've said it was a priority for us. You know, I think now is the time where we can credibly do that, and have the mine and the operator continue to be in a healthy position. To point to that or emphasize that, in December, I believe it was late in the year, Stornoway paid back, you know, half of the working capital facility to its partners, including us. Our piece of that was just shy of CAD 4 million.

We expect the rest of that working capital facility to also be paid back in the near term, but just done in a staged manner for prudence. Some of you may have picked up in our MD&A that the latest selling price was quite high, $170 per carat roughly. We're not pricing that in with the for the restart, if you will. That was quite a bit higher than the reserve price, which was more in line with previous sales. I think you're seeing quite a bit of demand increase, especially on the smaller scale diamonds, which helps us and frankly, perhaps quite probably some speculation or more than some speculation, which is more of a short-term phenomenon.

Either way, very pleased with the health of that business right now. It's the right time to turn things on. We'll see if what sanctions, which I was just reading about at Alrosa, which currently are more about providing equity and debt, what sanctions overall mean for diamonds. You know, likely a boost there as well in the near term. Frankly, I think that's second and third order. It is, I'll point out, quite sad seeing what's happening in the Ukraine, especially given the strong and proud Ukrainian population in Canada and Toronto. Hopefully that doesn't end too poorly.

It's again not to go on too much of a tangent, first time in my young kids' lifetime where they're old enough to ask questions about war. Those are all pretty sad conversations. I'm sure you're having some of them as well. On slide six in terms of our outlook to turn more positive, this is our inaugural five-year outlook, and it's exceptional growth in our minds. You know, a 10%-12% CAGR for the five years dating starting from last year as the starting point is pretty massive for a company our size. Worth pointing out, if it wasn't obvious, that that is all organic growth. We're not including any potential acquisitions in there. All that would be external and additional.

You know, other things I would point out, and we've tried to guide, you know, what assets we see coming into those. It's not exhaustive. I mean, for instance, in 2022, there is that San Antonio stockpile. It's just not in the bar. There's a couple of other things. Same for 2026. There are some other assets that are contributing there, but the chunkier contributors are shown. Then beyond that, there's a significant amount of optionality left in the business. I think frankly, the back half of our decade is also spoken for.

You know, the other things I would say is when you look at the contributors we've included in this timeframe, San Antonio and Cariboo obviously held by ODV, Windfall and OSK, Back Forty, those would be the biggest chunks there, other than increases from our existing mining assets. One of the lenses we use or the screens that we used was that certainly there's permitting timelines that are embedded into those assets coming along. We've tried to be conservative. It's always a slippery slope, but we've tried to be conservative in terms of delays there. But what we haven't done is overlay financing risk with permitting risk. There's other assets, other partners of ours who have guided towards being in production by that timeline.

Where we felt that permitting risk was compounded by, you know, a financing plan that wasn't yet crystallized and needed more time for clarity, we left those aside to let that play out, and we felt that was prudent. We certainly expect there's other things that will happen. Five years is a long time that will start to shift some of these assets around, hopefully in our favor. You know, last year was a year we saw a number of our assets end up in bigger counterparties. We expect that trend to continue given the quality of our asset base. There can be movement, but either way, we thought this was a pretty impressive growth profile and that we're quite proud of.

Other things I'd point out in that optionality bucket, and we can come back around to those in the Q&A later. You know, I'm gonna speak to that movement, if you will. You know, just yesterday we were reading and haven't had a chance to follow up with them. There's a lot of news in that Agnico Eagle portfolio, in Agnico Eagle press release to sink your teeth into. You know, one of the things that we took away is not their guidance, but their view that in 2024, there could be another 100,000 ounces of additional production coming from things like Amalgamated Kirkland, Akasaba West, which is obviously a Goldex satellite, excuse me, and Odyssey Internal Zones.

Those are all assets that we have in between a 2%-5% NSR on. That's not embedded into our thinking yet, until we get more visibility on it. Casino, another very chunky asset for us where the timeline is a little bit unclear as of yet, but significant progress being made, including the government of Yukon committing to spending CAD 30 million on road construction that benefits the mine over the next couple of years. When you look at Hermosa, where the feasibility study fell late last year, finally after a bit of a delay, they're guiding to a mid-2023 production decision and 2027 production. It's just on the other side of that. That's another 5,000 GEOs that can come into focus, even excluding the Clark deposit.

Pine Point, we expect the feasibility study this year, and the timeline there will come into focus. Upper Beaver, waiting for what the synergies mean between Agnico and Kirkland now that the merger's closed. Clearly that was one of the emphasis of their press release yesterday. A lot of good news. Some other assets there that we haven't included, be it Hammond Reef, Altar, Oracle Ridge, where there's some pretty sexy drilling on the copper side in Arizona going on. Frank, I feel like we have an abundance of riches here that are gonna take shape over the coming years.

On slide seven, just again, this is not new to you, but worth pointing out that a lot of that growth, most of that growth is still in the Americas, still in the right countries, if you will. This is always important in mining. Frankly, given what's happening this week and generally happening around us in the mining sector, I don't know if there's ever been more so. Certainly we feel comfortable with where that growth is, and who it's being unlocked by, frankly. On switching to some of our assets on the Canadian Malartic side, obviously that story continues to get better. 2021 was a record from a production perspective. Sorry, it exceeded guidance, I should say. I have to go back and check if it was a record.

Certainly based on this GEOs chart, pretty close if it wasn't. So that's good news on the open pit side. You know, we've factored in importantly the guidance that we had already received from Yamana and updated yesterday from Agnico, where there's a slight dip over the next couple of years before things rev up again. That is worth pointing out as in our guidance. More importantly, on the Malartic side, on slide nine, you know, the underground story continues to strengthen. From a pure progress perspective, the headframe is complete, the collar is complete. The shaft sinking is meant to be starting later in the year. It will then take four or five years to finish the shaft and to do underground development.

Obviously, there'll be production as early as 2023 from the ramp. All that's progressing well and on schedule. There was a small increase in resources this February, about 1 million ounces. Importantly, they were the first indicated ounces as well. Most of the work last year was on infill drilling and some extension work, so we weren't expecting a big increase. What we would expect is with another kind of similar amount of drilling as last year, another 137,000 meters this year, 15 rigs currently spinning. We would expect, you know, a lot of work to underpin resource growth in 2023, a year from now, and the operators, at least one of them, are certainly guiding to the potential being likely for an updated and increased mine plan thereafter.

A lot of good news expected on this asset. Our flagship's already good for until 2039 based on less than half of the current resources. This is a story that continues to strengthen. Then when you think about the camp that our founders kind of restarted here between 2011 and 2021, there's been almost 7 million ounces produced. When you think about kind of the 1930s onwards, that's closer to 14-15 million ounces. Today there's 20 million ounces there almost, and it's growing and will grow in leaps and bounds. You're looking at a camp that's produced and currently sits at 34-35 million ounces with a lot of growth, which puts it in pretty rarefied air in terms of mining centers in the world.

On slide 10, with respect to some of our other assets, we'll try to go through the next slides quickly, but I did mention I'd try to be quick. On Mantos, that's another really good story for us. You've heard me talk about it. The ramp up there from 4.3-7.3 million tons is being tied in as we speak. That will take our GEOs from about 9,000-10,000 ounces a year gold equivalent to 16,000. This year we're kind of expecting half of that, a bit less than half of that increase, given the dynamics I mentioned earlier from a ramp up perspective, and then next year, it's off to the races.

You've also heard me say that the only thing that asset was lacking was visibility. With the merger with Capstone announced in late November, meant to close I think in late March, that visibility is now on there, including you know a first technical report in modern times and a lot of positivity around that asset, including you know the combined group now talking about another expansion. The first one's not done or the current one's not done, and they're talking about another one to 10 million tons for a pretty de minimis amount of CapEx. We would expect and certainly wouldn't be surprised to see some of that commentary play out as soon as the deal is closed in March.

That would take our ounces up significantly and turn this into another flagship behind Malartic, which I touched on earlier, you know, nice to see the ramp up in H2, in the second half of last year. Expect that to get finished this year. They're already moving on to Project 250 to get to 250,000 ounces during calendar year 2023. We look forward to them getting back to the exploration side of things in a more earnest way. Yesterday they announced the first round of deeper drilling since I think it was 2017, on the pits themselves, which were quite interesting.

You know, some intercepts to point out 175 m at 1.2 g from 150 m depth, 50 m at 0.8 from 400 m depth. You know, early days, but nice to see the grades increasing at depth. We've always thought there's the potential to expand the pit deeper. That's on top of the satellite potential at properties like Raven, which we think are quite productive and prospective. There have been backlogs from an assay perspective, but we think Victoria is on the cusp of catching up with some of those backlogs and coming out with some pretty interesting drill results. El Indio, I would like to see the reserves increase after kind of resetting the bar over the last couple of years.

Nice to see them growing back with a 44% increase in reserves. CV likewise, net of depletion, an 18% increase in reserves. Feeling light, certainly based on their commentary, that they're gonna be getting ready to talk about growth at CV, whether it's mine life extension or on top of that. That asset looks like it's in good shape. Past 11, but I think the story would be the same if you talk about Island, you talk about Lamaque, talk about some of our other assets, in the interest of time, I will move us to slide 12. Comment on some of those growth assets underpinning that five-year outlook, starting with the assets within Osisko Development, Cariboo and San Antonio.

Some of you have listened to Sean's calls just ahead of ours. It's a milestone-rich year for us, on the ODV side, with Cariboo going through feasibility study, permitting, bulk sample that will be done through the ore sorter. All that tracking really well with respect to timelines, with the usual kind of to-ing and fro-ing. It's a big acquisition we're all quite excited about. Certainly the catalyst that it's provided to help finance the entirety of the asset base is quite impressive with, I think by the time it's done, over CAD 230 million, which will have been raised. That will dilute our ownership in Osisko Development as we did not contribute from 75%- 45% pro forma when those deals closed.

Importantly, it's dilution for the right reasons. We're quite happy to see that asset come in, the funding that followed, to now go after those assets, you know, in a meaningful way. On San Antonio, I mentioned earlier that the stockpile is now under leach or starting to be under leach, so that will start to trickle some benefit to us and to ODV. The work there that's gone on over the course of 2021 and that's continuing now and the news flow that will stem from there kind of underlines and underscores what the group thought we would see there in terms of potential, both oxide and sulfide. We look forward to that story playing out over the coming months. All that bodes well.

The next key milestone there will obviously be the permit on the bigger Cariboo project, which will drive timelines from there. Hopefully, that is something that can happen second half of this year. Windfall within Osisko Mining is a pretty stellar asset. You know, it's the size and grade combination there with 3.29 ounces of M9 at 10.5, almost 79 ounces total. Still growing, still new discovery being had. Like Golden Bear, which they've started to poke into. That's a pretty special asset in the right location. We're looking forward to the feasibility study adding more meat on the bone again this year.

You know, the endorsement from Northern Star on that convertible financing was obviously a shot in the arm. You know, the joint venture itself obviously has been terminated, but I think what you see there is a market that's frankly changed. You know, the scarcity value of an asset like Windfall, and I don't know what other assets are like Windfall, is pretty special. We look forward to seeing that story continue to grow and evolve and take shape over the course of this year. With Upper Beaver and AK or the Kirkland Lake camp, which was within previous Agnico, will now be benefiting from the new Agnico infrastructure that came over from the Kirkland side. There's a lot of good things happening there.

Again, as I mentioned earlier, we look forward to seeing the Upper Beaver synergy timeline so that we can factor into where it fits in. Is it in the next five years? Is it just on the cusp or on the other side of it? You know, that's what we're waiting to see there. They've talked about in their presentation yesterday, I think they described it, well, I think it's on this page, as a 150-200 thousand ounce per annum type asset, so three four thousand GEOs for us. They also talked about AK eventually being in production as early as 2024, so just drifting over from Macassa at the 40,000 ounce per year rate. That's another 800 GEOs for us we haven't factored in anywhere.

As I mentioned, you know, just a lot of good news there as they get their feet under them as a new Agnico and emerged Agnico Kirkland. We look forward to that story unfolding for us. On Back Forty, which is a significant contributor to us, on the current closer to the back end of that five-year outlook, expecting a feasibility in 2022. We agree with the plan that Gold Resource is following of a smaller open pit, bigger underground, less of an environmental footprint. We look forward to seeing them go through those steps. As I mentioned to you earlier, we think we've embedded enough potential delay to still be on the right side.

I'll jump ahead, just to get things over to Fred a little bit. You've seen these transactions from us on slide 13. We think they're all really good contributors. Spring Valley, you know, we've now seen Waterton sell one of their assets in Nevada for $200 million. This is bigger, and I think, they've unlocked a lot of value on this asset. We look forward to some more clarity, maybe even as early as this year. TZ, we're very happy to have gotten in on that asset, and have G Mining advancing its with a construction decision this year.

The West Kenya royalty that we picked up on kind of north of 1 million ounces of very high grade, looking forward to an exploration update there in the very near term as well. Last slide that I will talk through on 14 is that Tintic acquisition. I think you've heard from both Sean and I on it quite a bit, so if there are more questions, we can deal with it in the Q&A. Quite happy to have that asset within the Osisko Development portfolio here in the near term. Happy as well to have structured a stream on it. We gave a range and then obviously the equity financing thereafter was upsized quite a bit, so we'll see where we fall within that range.

Either way, 2.5%-5% of the metal stream there, which we think will be a significant contributor. You know, obviously the disclosure needs to catch up. It was held in private and they didn't need 43-101. They just were mining it. The new high-grade, ultra-high grade discovery there in the T2, T4 zone is quite special. We look forward to seeing it kind of evolve. When you think about 2,300 samples collected over a 200+ meter strike length, returning nice assays on gold plus a lot of silver, so that all bodes well. Adding some capital, adding some modern mining techniques, the technical team behind ODV to that, I think is gonna take this asset, this mine, to the next level.

We look forward to seeing the news flow and the picture be painted in. Frankly, not just the Trixie portion of it does sit on 17,000 acres, 14,000 of which are patented in a very productive mining district. A lot of head frames. This T2 zone was, I think, something like 44, 45 feet away from Kennecott Mining in the mid-1990s, and they never stumbled upon it. There's a lot of head scratching to do and a lot of revisiting of that land package, both from this mine's perspective, from a high-grade perspective, base metal polymetallic potential, as well as copper porphyry potential, which is what Ivanhoe Electric is chasing on the boundaries.

That's turned out I talked longer than I expected to, which is kind of normal. With that, I'll pass it on to Frédéric, on slide 15 to walk you through a couple more details on the financial side, and then we'll conclude with Q&A.

Frédéric Ruel
CFO and VP, Finance, Osisko Gold Royalties

Thank you. Thank you, Sandeep. Good morning, everyone. Thank you for joining us today. As discussed by Sandeep, 2021 was a very good year for us, in line with our expectations. We have met our guidance with strong deliveries from our partners, despite some challenges with COVID for some operators.

Our results have led again to record revenues, cash margins, and operating cash flows from our royalties and streams business. If we go to page 15 of the presentation, we recorded record revenues of CAD 199.6 million in 2021 compared to CAD 156.6 million in 2020. Cash flows from operating activities were CAD 106 million on a consolidated basis. For the royalties and streams segment alone, cash flows from operations have reached a record CAD 153 million compared to CAD 114 million in 2020. On page 16, we present a summary of our net loss and adjusted earnings. The consolidated net loss of Osisko shareholders was CAD 23.6 million or CAD 0.14 per share, compared to net earnings of CAD 16.9 million or CAD 0.10 per share in 2020.

The consolidated net loss was due to non-cash impairment charges and mining operating expenses incurred by Osisko Development in 2021. On a consolidated basis, adjusted earnings were $59 million or $0.35 per share, comprised of adjusted earnings of $94 million or $0.56 per share for the royalties and streams segment, and an adjusted loss of $35 million from Osisko Development or $0.21 per share. On page 17, we have a summary of our quarterly results with additional details for the royalties and streams segment, including 19,830 GEOs in Q4 for a total of 80,000 GEOs in 2021. We generated gross profit of $35 million in Q4 to end the year at $139 million compared to $104 million in 2020.

Operating cash flows of CAD 35.1 million were generated in Q4 by our royalty and streaming business for a total of CAD 153 million in 2021. On page 18, we have a breakdown of our cash margin for Q4 and the years 2021 and 2020. In Q4 of this year, the cash margin on our royalties reached CAD 34 million, and the cash margin on our streams amounted to CAD 12.7 million, for a total of CAD 47 million in Q4, which brings the total cash margin for the year to a record CAD 187 million. On page 19, we present the progression of the dividends paid to our shareholders since the creation of Osisko Gold Royalties.

Over 184 million have been returned at the end of December, in addition to CAD 85 million used to repurchase a total of 6.7 million shares under our NCIB programs. Finally, on page 20, you will find a summary of our financial position. Our consolidated cash balance was CAD 116 million at the end of 2021, including CAD 82 million for Osisko Royalties and CAD 33 million for Osisko Development. Osisko Royalties held investments having a value of CAD 255 million at the end of December, in addition to our investment in Osisko Development, valued at over CAD 400 million. Our debt was stable during the year with over half a billion dollars available under our credit facility, which was increased in last July and extended until 2025.

We have also acquired a total of 2.1 million shares under our NCIB program for CAD 21 million in 2021. We have also acquired an additional 250,000 shares in 2022 for CAD 4.9 million. In summary, 2021 was a year where our main assets have continued to perform strongly, and we have seen several of our partners announcing great exploration results and expansion programs for their production. I will now turn the call back to Sandeep for closing remarks and questions.

Sandeep Singh
President and CEO, Osisko Gold Royalties

Thanks a lot, Fred. I think we can forego the closing remarks and operator open it up for any Q&A, please.

Operator

Certainly. If you'd like to ask a question, please press star followed by the number one on your telephone keypad. We'll pause for just a moment to compile the Q&A roster. Once again, to ask a question, please press star followed by the number one on your telephone keypad. We do have a question from Mike Jalonen from Bank of America. Please go ahead. Your line is open.

Mike Jalonen
Managing Director and North American Senior Precious Metals Research Analyst, Bank of America Securities

Oh, hi, Sandeep and Sean, everyone. Sandeep, I was just wondering, with the Windfall with Northern Star not participating as a joint venture partner, and John Burzynski was on Bloomberg saying that he's gonna build it on his own. Does this have potential for a streaming deal to help finance a project for Osisko Gold Royalties?

Sandeep Singh
President and CEO, Osisko Gold Royalties

Hi, Mike, good morning. Look, certainly even before and certainly after that announcement, the team there at Osisko Mining can build this mine themselves. They're certainly capable of it. You know, in terms of, and they can finance it in a wealth of different ways. I think there's, you know, John has always been quite prolific from a funding perspective. He has a lot of equity, a lot of cash on the balance sheet. The number obviously will come into focus with the feasibility study later this year. He has a lot of opportunities in which he can go. Short answer to your question is I certainly hope so, but not gonna hold my breath either.

I think there's a lot of potential for John to fund that through the equity as more equity debt, et cetera. If stream comes into focus there, certainly we'll be eager. It's a pretty exceptional asset and certainly we trust the team that's currently pushing it forward. Too early to tell, I guess, Mike, but no shortage of options for them as they move forward.

Mike Jalonen
Managing Director and North American Senior Precious Metals Research Analyst, Bank of America Securities

Okay, thanks. I got a second question on the Canadian Malartic. On the Yamana call, they said the potential for a second shaft on a project, possibly, I guess, to the east. As you know, you can see it on your slide, mineralization plunging to the east. I was just wondering what you think of that. That should be positive for your royalty, more production.

Sandeep Singh
President and CEO, Osisko Gold Royalties

I like it. No, this might be the only conversation, I guess, I missed it by that, but I usually do mention that. I mean, look, what I was trying to guide to is just that, this year we expect the ounces to grow significantly or over the course of this year. Last year, the focus was infill drilling. There wasn't enough extension drilling closely enough to add to those ounces. We think they'll complete that exercise. You know, when you think about the infill drilling, it's gonna unlock more of the resources that currently are in the mine plan. Remember that only half of the current resources are on the mine plan, less than half now. That will add, at the very least, mine life.

When you add in that extension work, especially from East Gouldie, that will add ounces, we think, in bunches of millions given the continuity there. So I think, you know, yes, every time we've heard at least one of the operators talk about it, there's a comment that at some point, you know, you're gonna stop just adding decades to mine life and sink another shaft conceptually and put more through the mill that will only be at a third full. So yeah, that's something we certainly look forward to. If I had to guess, I'd say, you know, this year is a resource growth year. Next year, that gets put into a revised mine plan. Either way, there's success coming there.

It's either coming in the form of material additions to mine life, but more likely than not, it's coming in the form of additional ounces. When you think back, you know, what is it, a year and a half now, maybe not, maybe a bit more, you know, the story was uncertainty as to whether the partnership would build the underground. It was, you know, is there a gap year or more between the open pit and the underground. That's now gone. It turned into a little bit of a dip. I think if you fast-forward a year again, that dip will turn into at least flat production where the mine continues to produce at its current types of levels.

Yes, short answer is I like what I hear there.

Mike Jalonen
Managing Director and North American Senior Precious Metals Research Analyst, Bank of America Securities

Okay. Just lastly, if I can put to Sean your work. I wasn't on the OR conference call or the talk already. I don't know. Just wondering, Sean, what do you envision for production from Cariboo and San Antonio? Thanks.

Sean Roosen
Chairman, Osisko Gold Royalties

Sure, Mike, I'll jump in. You know, the profile right now is that BL2 on the Cariboo project is in production. We expect 20,000+ ounces this year. The QR mill is up and running. We have a bulk sample plan to go underground starting in Q2. Then the transition, we're looking for the EA approval and early work permits to come out probably by the end of 2022 for the larger Cariboo project. We would start the portal and hopefully get underground at Cow Mountain and have some transitional material going to the QR and continuing to optimize our ore sorter.

We'd be looking to have the full concentrator built and at full by 2024 and set the table for at least the PA production of 280,000 ounces a year coming out of that. As you know, we increased that mill production from 4,000- 4,750 tons a day for this. We are setting the table for a larger project there, Mike, and we continue to see that evolving and certainly the work that we did in 2021 has encouraged us. There's 152,000 m drilled in there. This project continues to strengthen San Antonio. We're in production right now with the stockpile.

We have 16,000 ounces and a 1 million-ton stockpile we wanna recover in the short term. The full permit for the Sapuchi open pit is underway, and we hope to have that permit available to us by the end of Q4 this year. We have a 15,000 ton a day plant that we purchased earlier that's on site. We'll be looking to ramp that up for CAD 10 million-CAD 25 million investment, depending on how aggressive we get in the early days. You know, two small-scale productions on the go there, plus the Tintic asset. Hopefully, we'll close that up in this quarter, or in Q2. They're in production as we speak.

We would have three small-scale producers by the end of 2022 transitioning to much larger production through 2023 and 2024. I think we set the table pretty good for that one, Mike.

Mike Jalonen
Managing Director and North American Senior Precious Metals Research Analyst, Bank of America Securities

Okay. Well, thanks for that. Well, see both you guys in the lobby bar next week. Thanks. Take care.

Sean Roosen
Chairman, Osisko Gold Royalties

All right.

Sandeep Singh
President and CEO, Osisko Gold Royalties

Thanks, Mike. Safe travel.

Operator

Our next question comes

Sandeep Singh
President and CEO, Osisko Gold Royalties

Look forward to seeing you all.

Operator

Our next question comes from Puneet Singh from iA Capital Markets. Please go ahead. Your line is open.

Sandeep Singh
President and CEO, Osisko Gold Royalties

Hi, Puneet.

Puneet Singh
Equity Research Analyst, iA Capital Markets

Hi, good morning. Just at Renard, since they're gonna contribute again, I see last year they sold about 1.8 million carats. Is that the run rate for production on an annual basis we should look forward to? Also, if I'm recalling correct, most of the production was coming from those higher grade R2, R3 areas, and then it would go lower grade later. Is that still the plan there? Or what's the latest update now that that asset's doing better?

Sandeep Singh
President and CEO, Osisko Gold Royalties

Yeah, look, I think I would say you know, some variability is normal, but I think that run rate that you're looking at for 2021 probably about right, at least for the next few years. You know, they're down, I think it's around the 600-foot level. You're right as well that as they get lower there, the grade will drop a little bit. I don't have the numbers off the top of my head right now, but I think for the next several years, we've got kind of a mine plan that will be pretty steady.

Thereafter, I believe, you know, we'll see, you know, they'll see what the diamond price looks like and decide where to take the development from there. There's also still some exploration upside there, frankly. I think for the first part of your question, yes, probably relatively steady. The biggest change will frankly be the biggest variability will be how we turn those carats into GEOs, if you will. But we've tried to be conservative. Then thereafter, you know, our primary focus is turning the machine back on, which is job one, and then with the cash they're building up right now, they can start to look forward to the future.

It's been obviously tough for them, kind of living hand-to-mouth for a little while for the last two years, so it'll be nice for that team to have some more flexibility.

Puneet Singh
Equity Research Analyst, iA Capital Markets

Okay. Do you think they'll do more larger scale exploration probably in the next couple years? Let it run for a little bit, get more cash, and then go from there?

Sandeep Singh
President and CEO, Osisko Gold Royalties

Yeah. Look, I think the idea is, yeah, walk before you run. But I can tell you that even with the diamond prices that they were benefiting from before, there has been or there currently is some exploration work going on. So when you zoom out a little bit, you know, they paid back half the working cap facility last, you know, end of last year. They'll probably pay back the rest of it this quarter. In process, they've also been doing some, you know, not major, but some exploration work in particular into those lower zones to firm up those grades and hopefully tighten up some of those grades. So yeah, they're doing a lot of good things.

Certainly the mine is night and day from where it was when you know pre-COVID when diamond prices hit a low of you know were averaging like CAD 70 a carat hit some lows in the mid-60s. You know what a difference a couple years makes.

Puneet Singh
Equity Research Analyst, iA Capital Markets

Yeah, definitely. Glad to see it going to contribute again. Thanks, Sandeep.

Sandeep Singh
President and CEO, Osisko Gold Royalties

No problem. Thank you.

Operator

Our next question comes from Josh Wolfson from RBC Capital Markets. Please go ahead, your line is open.

Josh Wolfson
Director, Head of Global Mining Research, RBC Capital Markets

Thank you very much. Good morning, Sandeep. Had a question on the guidance for 2022. The numbers, at least relative to our forecast, were a bit better. You know, part of that's Renard and the diamond pricing. I was wondering, you know, what the remainder components would be. Mantos presumably is a portion of that. I'm just wondering if you could maybe reference what contribution year over year change you'd expect from Mantos given it is a ramp-up year. If there are other key assets, you know, that would be helpful for us. Thank you.

Sandeep Singh
President and CEO, Osisko Gold Royalties

Sure, Josh. Good morning. Yeah, look, I think there's a few things going on in 2022 versus 2021. One, to just take a step back, to take a step lower before we talk higher, you know, we've, as I said earlier, we've taken into account the guidance from Agnico and Yamana on Malartic. It's actually a touch below, so you know, based on their numbers, we expect you know, about 3,500 less GEOs in 2022 versus 2021, just the normal variability and mine sequencing of that mine. So we gotta get those assets back first before we get to the growth. So it's pretty impressive that we can have this guidance in front of you.

Yeah, look, Renard, even from May onwards, is a chunky contributor to that growth, which is great to have back. Mantos, you point out, is, you know, we haven't given an exact, it's not an exact science, so we haven't given an exact number, but we're kind of guided to halfway between that current run rate and the 16,000 ounces post-expansion of GEOs. That'll fall in between. There's also the additions of San Antonio, sorry, first Santana and Ermitaño, which are small, but hopefully will work their way towards their 1,000 ounce per year steady-state contributions. The stockpile from San Antonio will contribute. The Eagle ramp-up, we think will conclude.

There's a number of things, many of which are kind of on existing assets, but then some new assets that are starting to contribute, as well as, some BLT ounces in there. That's generally the makeup of that, of that difference, and we feel pretty excited about it.

Josh Wolfson
Director, Head of Global Mining Research, RBC Capital Markets

Okay. Maybe specifically on San Antonio, is there any ways you can kind of quantify what would be reflected within the guidance for that asset?

Sandeep Singh
President and CEO, Osisko Gold Royalties

Well, I think not to put words in his mouth. I mean, I think you know, the stockpile is kind of currently starting to percolate, talk about first gold pour, Sean, in Q1 early Q2. So we'll see what the ounces are there. It's not gonna be a major contributor to us, but it will certainly be nice to get from that stockpile. Sean, I don't know if you know, you're obviously on, but what was the number? I think it was kind of-

Sean Roosen
Chairman, Osisko Gold Royalties

Yeah, the 16,000-

Sandeep Singh
President and CEO, Osisko Gold Royalties

Big wall that can go in that stockpile.

Sean Roosen
Chairman, Osisko Gold Royalties

Yeah, the 16,000 ounces recoverable in that stockpile at present. Hopefully we'll be able to get that done. If we can get some early contribution from Sapuchi, the main pit, you know, we've got an option to maybe put a little more on the pad, but that's where we are right now until we have a permit on Sapuchi.

Sandeep Singh
President and CEO, Osisko Gold Royalties

Yeah. It's a nice contributor, just the stockpile alone. Obviously the bigger milestone there is the permit. The timing of that will drive when the Sapuchi ounces can start to contribute, which are obviously much larger.

Josh Wolfson
Director, Head of Global Mining Research, RBC Capital Markets

On the TZ acquisition or stream funding, you know, there was a range that was provided, you know, which I'm assuming was contingent on what funding ODV would raise. With ODV's funding, you know, having better visibility now, is there any sort of perspective you have on what OR's contribution would be towards that stream?

Sandeep Singh
President and CEO, Osisko Gold Royalties

Well, look, I won't put Sean on the spot. I think from our perspective, we were quite happy with as much as we can get. Even on the lower bound, I think it's a great result for us that Odev was able to go out there and raise as much as they did. We thought the asset, once people started to understand it, would resonate. It certainly happened a little bit quicker than I think any of us expected. You know, regardless of where it is, obviously you're right, it is more equity raised. Wouldn't be shocked to be on the lower end of that.

Regardless of where it is, we're very happy to have that contribution to us, which we think will contribute for a lot of years once the picture gets filled in. Then obviously the bigger impact for us is on our equity ownership in ODV, which we're also quite pleased about. That'll come into focus as the transaction gets closer to close. You know, you're kind of thinking along the right lines I suspect, Josh.

Josh Wolfson
Director, Head of Global Mining Research, RBC Capital Markets

Okay. Thank you very much.

Sandeep Singh
President and CEO, Osisko Gold Royalties

No problem. Thank you.

Sean Roosen
Chairman, Osisko Gold Royalties

Just from my side, I think any royalty on that property is gonna be important.

Operator

Our next question comes from.

Sandeep Singh
President and CEO, Osisko Gold Royalties

Go ahead.

Operator

Our next question comes from Don DeMarco from Paradigm Capital. Please go ahead. Your line is open.

Don DeMarco
Precious Metals Equity Research Analyst, Paradigm Capital

Hi, yeah, Sandeep. Apologies if I have something you covered, I tried to give you a slide. You know, with the consolidation of ODV in your results, you know, currently obviously drags down the performance of the royalty business. Now that this financing has diluted you under 50%, will you be reviewing whether or not to unconsolidate ODV in your financials?

Sandeep Singh
President and CEO, Osisko Gold Royalties

Hi, Don. No, we did in fact cover that, so it's new ground. Look, I think first things first, we're not diluted today. It's been lacking.

Don DeMarco
Precious Metals Equity Research Analyst, Paradigm Capital

Yeah.

Sandeep Singh
President and CEO, Osisko Gold Royalties

Just to point out, we still own 75%. The transactions are kind of closing or leaning toward third closing in late March, maybe drifting into April, but that order of magnitude. Thereafter, we'll be down, as you point out, to the 45% level. This is kind of what we had always said is we were gonna let the market finance ODV. Obviously, you know, quite happy to get a stream on a new acquisition. That's our business model. Overall, let the market finance ODV. Sean's been very prolific at that in his history and certainly with ODV. With that, we'll be miles ahead of where we were, if you will.

You know, at 75%, it was tough to talk about that, although we talk about it internally. At 45%, I think we're a lot closer. I've been clear, I think with everybody as well, that there's no bright line at 50. Sorry about that. There's no bright line at 50, nor is there a bright line anywhere. It's a combination of things we talk about with our auditors and among ourselves, but a lot closer. I think that's something that we'll continue to talk about internally and when the right time is, we'll come back and tell you. Certainly we know that that's a hiccup to say the least. It does provide a bit of noise.

At the end of the day, we've done our best to segment that information. I fully realize, Don, that until we can cut that tether from a financial's perspective, it's gonna be an issue. Certainly you can expect that all of us on the OR and Odev side are cognizant a little bit about it.

Don DeMarco
Precious Metals Equity Research Analyst, Paradigm Capital

Okay. Excellent. No, but it's you have definitely been doing what you said you were gonna do in terms of letting ODV you know finance itself become a separate entity. Definitely good to see that and heading in the right direction. Thanks.

Sean Roosen
Chairman, Osisko Gold Royalties

Maybe just a couple of pieces of color on that one, guys. You know, with the financings that are underway close, plus the cash and the equity book, ODV should be sitting at about CAD 320 million plus, between the proceeds of the financing cash on hand and the equity book. My goal, Don, will be to turn ODV into a dividend paying company. You know, hopefully we can turn that viewpoint around over the short term to near term.

Don DeMarco
Precious Metals Equity Research Analyst, Paradigm Capital

Excellent. No, it's the equity could be a very important component for sure.

Sandeep Singh
President and CEO, Osisko Gold Royalties

Thanks, Don.

Don DeMarco
Precious Metals Equity Research Analyst, Paradigm Capital

Thanks.

Operator

Our next question comes from Trevor Turnbull from Scotiabank. Please go ahead. Your line is open.

Trevor Turnbull
Global Director, Gold and Silver Equity Research, Scotiabank

Hi. Sorry about that. I wanted to ask about one of the projects that's in the five-year guidance and one that isn't. I guess the first is Back Forty. I could probably dig into it, but I haven't had a chance to see what Gold Resource Corp has been saying. Are they pretty confident, I guess, that they will be up and running within that five-year window? Or maybe just give us some color, Sandeep, on why you're putting it in the five-year window, why you feel confident in that project.

Sandeep Singh
President and CEO, Osisko Gold Royalties

Yeah. Happy to, Trevor, and good morning. I'd say, look, that is obviously one that's gonna be a bit trickier, but we think we've built in enough conservatism there on the permitting, and that's the major item there. You know, Gold Resource and ourselves see the asset in the same way. We were very happy to see them come in as our partner, as our new partner last year. They've got a very similar asset in Mexico that they're currently mining. They want this to be their growth asset for a longer life kind of view as what they're currently mining, but they have the market cap, cash, access to capital to build it. That's why we felt comfortable that they're the right group to do this with.

Clearly the permit is the hurdle. There's a feasibility study that's on track for this year, and that will form the basis to go through that permitting exercise again. Obviously, there were setbacks in 2021, frankly, with a plan that we always disagreed with, but ultimately it had to be run to ground with a larger open pit and a smaller underground. I think you know the view was they were too far down the track to change. You know, that's why pencils have erasers. We're happy with the current track. You know, smaller open pit, less underground, no need for a wetland permit, which is where they got bogged down last time. With that in place, we think we've added enough buffer, you know, that they can certainly build it within that timeframe.

That'll be one that you can continue to test us on as the permits picture unfolds over the course of next year. We felt it was especially given that it's earmarked. It's not like, you know, we didn't highlight it. All of us, I think, will be tracking that progress over the coming year, 18 months.

Trevor Turnbull
Global Director, Gold and Silver Equity Research, Scotiabank

Yeah, it certainly helps that they're sidestepping the wetland issue if they can. My other question was really with Falco and the Horne 5. That's potentially a very material project when it does come to fruition. Just wondered if you could maybe talk a little bit or maybe Sean can talk a little bit about some of the kind of next steps and what we're really watching for to feel better about when that, you know, putting a pin on the timeline on that.

Sandeep Singh
President and CEO, Osisko Gold Royalties

Yeah. No, Trevor, it's a good point. I think frankly, you know, both Horne 5 and Pine Point, which are assets that we quite like in our family of companies, you know, we put them out for the time being. You know, with respect to Horne 5 specifically, and this is kind of what I said earlier, including in our family of companies and others, when there was permitting risk, we tried to account for it. Obviously all these assets in the development space have permitting timelines, and we try to factor those in. What we didn't wanna do is overlay permitting risk with financing risk.

You know, that's kind of what I was getting to, whether it's Back Forty or certainly whether it's Osisko Development OSK, as those chunky assets move forward, we see the line of sight to how financing comes together. When there's companies that have a financing hurdle that's a multiple of their market cap, we didn't think it was, you know, reasonable for us to take a stance on until there's more clarity. We do have in that optionality category companies that are guiding production within the next five years, and certainly we hope they will. We wanted to wait until we had that visibility before putting out, you know, inaugural guidance or not guidance, but outlook on that, on that five-year basis. That would fall into that category.

Timeframe would be another. There are several, frankly. As there's more clarity, we're happy. We'll be very happy to shift those answers forward, but we just felt we should wait. Specifically with your question on progress at Horne 5, look, I think there may be meaningful progress certainly on one of their two issues, which is the governing relationship with them and Glencore who have the smelter on surface. They're working through what they call an OIA, which is an operating license. I forget the I, but agreement. And they've made progress on that, but it's a pretty inventive document. It's gone from term sheet to final documentation, taking a little bit longer, but that's one key hurdle. I think everyone is driving towards the same goal there.

Eventually that will get cleared, and then they'll, you know, they'll move forward to looking to craft the financing of that. Frankly, 9 million ounces of gold equivalent is important. In Québec, it's important. It's even more important. You're right. It's a chunky contributor to us. Again, to have such a chunky contributor, whether it's them or Casino, you know, those are 25,000 ounce a year contributors, assets that I believe deserve to be built. It's just a question of when. When you have those types of things in your back pocket, needing only one of them to work, and we have a list of them, that's a pretty enviable position to be in.

Trevor Turnbull
Global Director, Gold and Silver Equity Research, Scotiabank

No, I can appreciate that. I guess you kind of touched on what I was getting at with Horne, and that is you're still Falco is at the table trying to kind of hammer out the final arrangements with Glencore. I know it's always hard to talk for other companies, but do you have a sense of is this something that Glencore seems focused on? Or do you feel like this process is at all backburnered by them? Or how would you characterize their intentions with Horne at this point?

Sandeep Singh
President and CEO, Osisko Gold Royalties

I think it is the former. Like, this is important to the health and, you know, future of what is a very important asset for them at the Horne Smelter, which is what leads to delays and long timelines. It also, I think, leads to an ultimate positive result. Even in my, you know, my limited interactions there, I would tell you that I do believe they are focused on it, and it's important to them. Same token, it's a very large organization, and they have a lot of other things to do. Many, you know, most of them take precedence. I would say despite that, I've been very pleasantly surprised as to how much effort goes into this file.

I would assure you that it is important for them and for us.

Trevor Turnbull
Global Director, Gold and Silver Equity Research, Scotiabank

Well, good. Yeah, it's better to get it right than to be rushed on it. I appreciate it. Thank you.

Sandeep Singh
President and CEO, Osisko Gold Royalties

Pretty complicated. No problem, Trevor. It is a pretty complicated piece of business, and you're right, you wanna do it right the first time.

Trevor Turnbull
Global Director, Gold and Silver Equity Research, Scotiabank

Great. Thank you.

Operator

We have no further questions in queue. I'd like to turn the call back over to the presenters for any closing remarks.

Sandeep Singh
President and CEO, Osisko Gold Royalties

Well, thank you, operator, and thanks for taking an hour with us on, again, what is a pretty busy day. A great kind of day for us, a great kind of phase for us, one where there's an important amount of growth in the company and some of the best development assets in the business. Whether it's growth on our core existing mines or growth in the development pipeline, I think the cash flow generation and the diversification that will come with it in this company is gonna be pretty special over the course of this decade and every year in between. Thanks for your time and be well. Thank you, operator.

Operator

This concludes today's conference call. You may now disconnect.

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