Silvercorp Metals Inc. (TSX:SVM)
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Oct 2, 2026, 4:00 PM EST
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Mining Forum Americas 2026

Sep 29, 2026

Summary

Significant portfolio diversification is underway, with new gold and copper projects in Ecuador and Kyrgyzstan advancing toward production by 2027–2028. Revenue growth, operational expansion, and a shift to institutional ownership support a positive outlook.

Lon Shaver
President, Silvercorp Metals

This is the eighth time I've had to talk about today. Looking at the presentation last year, realizing there's been some significant changes in the company, what it allows us to do is shift a little bit how we tell the story and focus on some of the new and exciting things. Hopefully, you can appreciate us talking about these growth stories and some of the pictures, because as they say, pictures tell a thousand words. Before I get going, I just highlight that I will be making some forward-looking statements. To kick things off, talking about the Silvercorp investment case, one thing that hasn't changed is our strong operating base. We've got profitable silver operations in China with a run rate of approximately 7.5 million ounces of silver equivalent.

We're just talking about the silver and gold, because on top of that, we're also producing roughly 90 million pounds of lead and zinc on top of that. These are good assets. We're producing on a trailing 12-month basis. Our all-in sustaining cost to produce an ounce of silver was $15. At the Ying Mine in particular, we could see a path forward to growing our production through increased mechanization. We're building a new mill, and we have a satellite deposit that we're bringing on stream, and we have the resource base that can convert into reserves to go beyond the existing 17-year mine life. What is new is our actionable growth pipeline. When I was here last year, I was able to talk about the El Domo project, which was in construction at the time.

We're now a year later, and we're also roughly one year away from getting this into production. That's something that is new for the company, and it takes us into a new jurisdiction. Since that time, we've added two other new projects, the Tulkubash Gold Project and the Kyzyltash Gold Project, both of which are in Kyrgyzstan. Even though we closed this acquisition in January, got access to the site in May, we made phenomenal strides towards moving Tulkubash into construction and targeting to bring that into production late 2027. Lastly, on the slide, you see the Condor Project, also in Ecuador, that we got through the acquisition that brought us El Domo. We see that as being a gold growth asset that is in our pipeline we can move forward.

Another thing that hasn't changed, though, is the fact that we still represent compelling value in terms of peer-leading margins, return on equity, and leverage to silver, but are trading at a discount to our peers on multiple metrics, including price to NAV. When I was here last year, we were able to put up on the slide, on the left-hand side, a view of the revenue profile from our existing mines in China. You can see growing from roughly $470 million in revenue, and you can see the silver is the predominant contributor to that, to between $500 million and $600 million in revenue over the next few years.

We were able to put up the El Domo column showing that project that was in construction, adding on a stub year, $ 200 million, but you can see on a full-year basis, well north of $360 million, and adding an interesting component of diversification in copper in terms of into our mix. What's new is adding the three columns to the right, Tulkubash, the first of two gold projects in Kyrgyzstan, in construction right now. The Condor Project, where we completed a PEA at the tail end of last year, and Kyzyltash, which has the potential to be a significant gold producer. Let's jump into El Domo. This is Ecuador's next mine, and it's going to be our first mine outside of China. CapEx estimate, $ 284 million. We're going to be doing a big spend this year in terms of this fiscal year, $ 160 million.

Of the $284 million, our partner, Wheaton, is contributing $ 175 million towards that. So far, we've drawn down $ 88 million. Right-hand side, you can see the technical report features in terms of 11 and a half year mine life, production rates. It's actually not a very big mine, but it's a very profitable mine because of grade, and you can see that come out in the economics at the bottom at an 8% discount rate of $ 571 million NPV. On the left-hand side, we speak to the progress update in terms of what's been accomplished in construction. I think the key takeaway is we're still looking towards commissioning this in July of 2027. Rather than use all the words, I think let's have a look at some of the pictures. The top picture here is showing the peekaboo view on the right of the process plant area.

Off to the left, around the corner of the hill, is the initial stripping of the open pit. Bottom left, you can see that in close-up. What we're doing here is targeting some particular areas that have higher quality rock that we can use for construction of other infrastructure on the site. The contractor has brought in 60-ton trucks to be able to move a lot of material, which will have to happen here in the next months leading up to July of next year. Some more views of the open pit areas that have been opened up. Bottom side, you can see some of the pictures. You can see some of the road infrastructure that's been added to the site. Left-hand side picture, a view of the tailings dam that's been started construction. Another view of that on the picture on the right-hand side.

Also, we have waste dump areas for the saprolite, so this is the soil and the waste rock that's on top of the open pit that's being stripped, and as well as the areas where we're putting plant infrastructure. That is well underway. Then very importantly, the general layout of the plant with the ore storage shed, the blue building in the back, and then you can see the process flow with the crusher, the ball mill, flotation cell areas, and then also the load-out zones. Other pictures here, you can see the primary crusher in the upper right, fine ore bin on the bottom left, and the location for the grinding and flotation plant that is well underway. The mill equipment has been ordered. It's on a boat on the ocean right now. It'll be landing in Ecuador.

We will truck it into site, and we've lined up the contractor to put it all together. Finally, a big picture view of what the site looks like. It's really starting to come together and look like a mining site with that process plant area and the ore shed on the left-hand side. Back left is the camp area built to accommodate all the workers, tailing storage facility and the waste dump in the middle, and in the upper right is the explosives magazine storage area. Now I'm going to jump over to Kyrgyzstan. This was an acquisition we announced in January. We paid $92 million to a U.K. company, which was a developer advancing these projects in Kyrgyzstan. That was to acquire their interest.

We also negotiated with the Kyrgyz government to turn this company into a joint venture company where we would have a 70% interest and be the operator. Kyrgyzaltyn, the state gold company, would have a 30% interest. We think this is an unprecedented acquisition cost to get control of a 6 million ounce gold resource. A bit later, we paid the government a $60 million progress payment, which was tied into the reissuance of a new mining license and pushed out the mining license from 2032 to 2062. What we now hold through this entity is a 100% interest in a mining license that's roughly 7 sq km. That's the pink shaded area at the bottom. Within that, there are two basically known projects, Tulkubash open pit heap leach, and then the Kyzyltash, which is the blue, which is a sulfide project.

Surrounding that is an exploration license, which is roughly 27 sq km, and that has some other known deposits that we feel will be mine life extensions, in particular for the open pit heap leach. Tulkubash is the first phase, and we've budgeted $160 million. The scope of the project was based on a number of studies, including a feasibility study done in 2018 by Tetra Tech to the JORC standard, and that was improved and updated in 2021 by larger project of South Africa and Ausenco to the JORC standard. What we feel is this, what is initially scoped out as a four-year open pit of roughly 110,000 ounces of gold per year could be extended by some of these satellite deposits by maybe two or even more years.

As I mentioned, we've already started construction with open pit stripping and the heap leach pad area, as well as the solution ponds and recovery plant area underway. That is what this picture is. You can see towards the south in the back is the leach pad areas. As you work your way forward are the zones for where the crushing plant will be. We'll have conveyors bringing the ore to the heap leach pads, and then in the foreground are a series of ponds for the pregnant leach solution. Just at the very bottom and off the picture is where the actual plant will be located. As I said, all of this has been accomplished since July.

On the mining side, the contractor has put in the mine haul road, which you can see going up across the mountain. Just over the side is the area where the stripping has begun. When I visited the location a couple weeks ago, they have already exposed some of the ore zones. We are really ready to start mining this once the pad area is complete. As I said, we are looking to be stacking ore on the pads, potentially pouring gold in late 2027 or potentially early 2028. We are really moving forward very dramatically, very quickly. As part of this development, we put in a camp, and this will allow construction activities to continue over the winter. I stayed in this camp. Great accommodations, all prefab, brought in from China. Excellent infrastructure, and again, very quickly.

Now, the second stage of the projects in Kyrgyzstan is the Kyzyltash project. It has the potential to be much bigger. We are scoping it at between 200,000 ounces and 230,000 ounces a year for roughly 18 years initially. Right now, our focus here is on advancing the drilling, and we have budgeted $30 million over the next two years and roughly 100,000 meters of drilling.

Some of the first drilling has put out some really promising results. You can see on the left-hand side, over 200 m at 1.7 g, 47 m at just under 4 g. What is really important to note, and looking on the lower right picture, is the entire resource had been known in structures 1 and 2. What this drill hole identified was structures 3 and 4, which had previously not been hit. We think the ultimate resource size on this project can be bigger.

The other positive from this drilling is that from a geometry standpoint, to the extent that the ore zones become broader, more of this could be an open pit before we transition to underground, which should have a positive impact on throughput and mining economics. We have 16 rigs currently drilling between the main zone, which you can see in the upper picture shaded in blue, and the contact zone, where there are six rigs in the magenta. We are targeting to complete a PEA on this project in 2027, then taking it to feasibility study in 2028. I would be remiss if I did not talk about Condor, our gold project in Ecuador. This, we believe, will be our second mine in Ecuador.

We completed a feasibility study late last year, which was focused on two deposits with some high-grade gold intercepts and a roughly 2.5 million ounce resource. The PEA contemplated a 5,000 tonne per day underground mine that would produce approximately 113,000 ounces of gold over 13 years, and a very modest initial CapEx of $300 million. You can see the highlights of the PEA on the right-hand side, with an NPV of just over $500 million at a 5% discount rate, but a very modest $2,600 gold price. Our plan here is to move forward, really looking at staging this, and we are looking at securing permits for smaller scale mining initially, and we will plan a 1,000 tonne per day mill and associated infrastructure like the tailings facility.

What this would also allow us to do is to treat some ore from some of the local mining operations that currently are in production in the area and that have to truck their ore sometimes up to 300 km. We think this plan will get good support from the local community. What this will allow us to do is to avail ourselves of an easier small mining permit, which will also allow us to drive two tunnels into the ore zones, where we will be able to complete some additional drilling, drill out the resource, transition in production, and ultimately grow the operation to the targeted 5,000 tonnes per day, but using out of cash flow. Also, just to speak to one of the expansion programs we have in China. This is at our Ying Mining District, and it is the third mill that we are currently building.

It is a little bit of a mirror image to mill number 2, which you can see at the top of the page. Similarly, we are availing ourselves of topography. The ore trucks come in in the road that cuts across. There will be an ore storage building similar to that blue building you can see. Ore gets brought into the crushing plant, works its way down to the ball mill, flotation cells, and load out.

We are building this mill, 3,000 tonnes per day of capacity for roughly $30 million. It should be operational by mid-next year, and it is all part of our growth plan at the Ying Mining District. With all this growth ahead of us, we still find ourselves in a position where we are undervalued relative to our peers. This is trailing objective multiples, looking at trailing EV to EBITDA, price to earnings, and price to cash flow.

We think that some of this is attributable to the fact that we are currently a single asset, single jurisdiction company. As I pointed out to you, we are rapidly looking to change that, and we think it will offer our shareholders a re-rate to more larger, diversified company-type multiples. Another thing that has changed and is different over the last year is the addition of some new shareholders to our list of shareholders. Won't go through it in granular fashion, but I think what we have seen and what is the key takeaway from that chart on the bottom right, we have basically flipped it. Last year, we were roughly 60% retail and small institutions and family offices. Over the course of the year, based on this new growth story, we have now achieved 65% ownership from demonstrable institutions with retail roughly 30% and insiders at 4%.

I will wrap up here, just speaking to what our near-term catalysts, as I pointed out. We are rapidly moving towards completion of El Domo construction, targeting startup of operations next July, August of 2027. We are rapidly advancing construction of the Tulkubash heap leach project in Kyrgyzstan and advancing through drilling our understanding of the Kyzyltash project. We are looking to continue growing our production of silver at the Ying Mining District and permitting so we can advance that development program at the Condor project. I haven't really spoken to it at all, but we have a 28% stake in a silver company with two undeveloped projects in Bolivia. We see some key catalysts both on the permitting and technical fronts, and we think that both projects could be in a position for advancement by the end of 2027.

Not on this list, but we have announced the intention to seek a Hong Kong listing. We have made the initial filing as of May this year, targeting it listed sometime early in 2027. With that, I will wrap up with a picture of our existing number 2 mill at the Ying Mining District, which we also expanded in 2024, bringing up our capacity to be able to produce high-quality lead concentrates containing silver and zinc concentrates. Maybe I will stop here and see if there are any questions.

Operator

Thank you, Lon. We do have some time for a couple questions. If anyone has a question, feel free to raise their hand. Lon, thank you for detailing the path forward in diversifying from a single mine to a diversified multi-jurisdiction, multi-mine portfolio. We certainly see from that bar graph earlier in the deck that there is significant revenue to be generated by some of those mines down in the pipeline. I am looking at the Kyrgyz assets. It appears you got a good price on these, and there is good opportunity here. How would you characterize the Is there risk associated with this? Kumtor is maybe in the distant memory for many of us, but is the risk non-zero with respect to following that same path, or how would you talk about that?

Lon Shaver
President, Silvercorp Metals

Well, I think first off, I would say there are risks everywhere, whether that is technical risks, government community risks. We certainly see that in all jurisdictions. I think what we have found in looking at the Kumtor case, and do not want to be overly critical, but I think what we have chosen is a bit of a different path here, a different spirit of partnership with the government where they are participating in the direct economics of the mine rather than at the top co-level. We also negotiated this agreement not just with the vendor but with the government to structure and realize that they had a veto right over this transaction, and in waiving that veto right, we agreed to accommodate their new model of development, which involves the government having a stake in the projects going forward.

What we found is in the negotiations, the documentation, the government has looked at really trying to employ Western best practices in the contracts, in the agreements. The way this was explained is they are looking to use this as an example for attracting other Western investment to the country. I think that some of the perspective has changed, the model being employed has changed. I would say more generally, Central Asia has undergone some transformation, has become a bit of a destination for capital, Western investment, and mining companies looking in not just Kyrgyzstan, but Kazakhstan, some of the other countries. I think we have found a good opportunity to go forward here and recognize that we will have a lot of discussions and negotiations, but so far, we have seen a lot of support.

Operator

Okay. Thank you, Lon. That's helpful, and good luck with El Domo and the rest of the catalysts over the next 12 months.

Lon Shaver
President, Silvercorp Metals

All right. Thank you, Don.