Good morning, all. Welcome to Aura's third quarter earnings call. We have together here with us Rodrigo Barbosa, CEO, and Kleber Cardoso, CFO, who will be presenting today. After the presentation, we'll have a Q&A session, and you can share your questions at any time during the presentation or after with the Q&A button of the Zoom. The presentation, earnings release, MD&A, and financial statements are already available on our IR website. Rodrigo, the floor is yours.
Thank you, Gabriel, and thank you all for attending this quarter. I'll go through the main highlights of the quarter, including the production, and then Kleber will go in more detail on the results. I would also like to invite all of you to participate in our Aura Day that we will cover in more detail the whole strategic agenda of the company, which will happen next Thursday at 8:00 A.M. Eastern Time or 10:00 A.M. Brazil Time. Please participate on that because we will be able to update the whole market investors about our strategic agenda. Few things that's already happening. I will go in broader terms here in this presentation, and then we go in more detail. We give in this presentation some forward-looking statements, so please read our cautionary statements.
This is on our website and in this presentation as well. In terms of production, the quarter we were projecting to have a stronger quarter compared to Q2. As most of you know, when you're mining, sometimes you encounter lower grades, higher grades, higher recovery, low recovery, so it's normal to have some fluctuation from quarter to quarter. In Q2, we had a challenging time in terms of recovery in Honduras, where we reached sulfates and mixed ore that lowered our recoveries while we were projecting to increase in Q3 and Q4. We had a very strong quarter in Aranzazu. Again, we had over 313 tons at the mill.
After the ramp-up that we concluded last year, we were able to reach 100 tons per month, 100,000 tons per month. Now we are above this. Aranzazu is on track and on budget to meet the guidance for the year. What we have is lowered some guidance because of the lower copper price, which I'll explain later. EPP, as we also were disclosing to the market during the second semester of this year, reaching higher grades at phase II in Ernesto Pit. This is already happening in the Q3, and we'll intensify more in Q4. With that, we could increase in Q3 by almost 40%, almost 50%, 48% increase production in EPP, and we should continue to increase during Q4.
On the other hand, in San Andrés, Honduras, we had a challenging, more than expected quarter, mostly because of two reasons. Number one, excess of rain. We have 70% excess of more rain compared to the historical values. Two, as we are doing in all our mines, either in Brazil in the beginning of the year, in Aranzazu last year, changing contracts, changing specifications to try and better offset inflation. We saw an opportunity to change the mine contractor in Honduras, which we did during Q3. But during the transition, we lost productivity. That, combined with the excess of rain, we had a lower production compared to what we were projecting.
As we are now moving to Q4 and recovering productivity in Honduras, entering the higher grades in Brazil and maintaining a high production in Aranzazu, we project to have a very strong Q4 to have around 70,000 ounces-75,000 ounces of gold equivalent production, compared to 58 gold equivalent production in Q3. That's a significant increase. As you can see the production that we had either in September and also in October, around 22,000 ounces-23,000 ounces per month and now ramping to a higher, we are very confident that we will meet this guidance. In terms of, we are updating the market in terms of guidance for the whole year.
When you include the 70,000 ounces-75,000 ounces of production Q4, together with what we already produced during Q1, Q2 and Q3, we project the market to have 245,000 ounces up to 250,000 ounces of gold equivalent. This is lower than the last projection that we've had of 260-275, mainly for two reasons. 8,000 ounces comes from lower copper price. As the market knows, we have gold and copper production. Copper in Aranzazu and gold in all the other our mines. Around 75% comes from gold revenues and 25% of copper. We translate the production of copper into the gold equivalent.
Depending on the copper price, if the copper price goes down, that means that there will be a less gold equivalent ounces. When you do the adjustment of price into our projections, that would be 8,000 ounces, a lower gold equivalent ounces to the full year. The other reason is this, lower than expected production that we had in Honduras for different reasons in Q2 and now in Q3. There was also, that Kleber will explain to you, some influence of non-recurring losses during this quarter, mostly because of lower copper price as you adjust the copper price of the concentrate after 120 days since the day that you ship.
When the copper price goes down, you have to adjust after 120 days to the new copper price. That impacted negatively $10 million in our EBITDA. Our EBITDA for the quarter was $17 million or $27 million if we were not adjusting for the copper, this one non-recurring adjustment. On the other hand, a very important quarter on the strategic level of the company, we invested $81 million, mostly the acquisition of Borborema, the construction of Almas, and a few other exploration and mining rights.
With that investment, we are consolidating our agenda in terms of growth that we are now giving a new long-term guidance to the market that we are not only able, with those projects, to reach over 400,000 ounces annualized by 2024, but to be over 450,000 ounces by 2025. This is a significant growth that we are creating to our shareholders in a portfolio while we can maintain a good and healthy cash flow from operations, which will allow us to maintain a good dividends. I would just an update in Almas. We bought Borborema. We are advancing Almas. Almas, we are close to 80% advanced in terms of construction. This project is on time, on budget.
We start operation by April next year and full production, ramping up into the full production by Q3 2023. The Borborema project, we are now updating the studies. This was done by Australian rules and JORC. We are now converted to NI 43-101. We should release a new feasibility study during next year. This project already comes with 1.9 million ounces measured and indicated resources. Matupá, during the quarter, we also released a feasibility study of this project. Now, just reminding our investors, Matupá is a project that, when we acquired by Rio Novo, it came with the geology not fully explored, but enough for us to have a very interesting return.
Our idea during last year was to convert the resources to reserve and publish a feasibility study as fast as we can to get into production as fast as we can, while then we continue to do exploration. Only with the 300,000 ounces of reserves, this project is already giving a payback of 2.3 years and a leveraged return up to 50% per year with a seven years life of mine. However, we are now on drilling campaign, as we published during the first semester, interesting intercept at 3.89 grams per tonne for 81 meters, over 3.14 for over 50 meters. Those give us confidence that we'll be able, together with the construction of Matupá to increase resource and reserves.
We'll go in more details about this on Aura Day. During the quarter, we also continued to do our share buyback. When you add the last 12 months of share buyback and dividends, you can see that we are paying a 7.8% as return, a dividend yield, including share buyback to our shareholders, giving evidence that we can continue to grow, invest in our projects, and pay dividends within our policy. As a result of all the new strategic and all the improvements we've done in Aura, we won again number one performance in TSX. When you compare the TSX30, which is the performance of the shares in the last three years, we won that in 2021. We won that in 2022.
Although we are still discounted compared to our peers, and very few companies can present this growth coming from 250,000 ounces to over 450,000 ounces by 2025. We are also aiming to improve the awareness of this company in the North American market. That's why we joined OTCQX, the over-the-counter market in the U.S.A. so that we can broaden the awareness of a company case. Number one performance in TSX, number one the highest dividend yield in the sector in the world. And yet very few investors is aware about Aura in the U.S. and Canada, giving us a very strong opportunity to increase awareness and bring new investors to our portfolio.
Next slide, please. In terms of safety, we had one lost time injury in EPP in Brazil. It was a pinky finger that was hurt during a maintenance. The person is already fully recovered and will not have any kind of problems in the future. While in Aranzazu, Almas, San Andrés, we had a zero lost time injury period. We continue in terms of stopping COVID. We are now phasing out a lot of the schedule and a lot of the process that we had to contain as this is already going down in terms of contamination. We had less than 1% of workforce during the quarter contaminated with mild or no symptoms.
In stability of the structures, as you know, we have third-party auditors, consultants checking our structures. We do have internal program that we follow up with all the structures on the monthly basis, on the high level, on the weekly basis and more detail level together with third party and that is auditing and giving consultancy for us in terms of how to improve our operations. We had a GE21 Consultoria Mineral. It's a well-known company and consulting company in Brazil. They visited our operations in Honduras. They visited our operation also in Aranzazu during this quarter, and all the geotechnical structures are on satisfactory level.
In terms of production, as you can see in this slide on the left side, we are coming from 58,000 ounces of production in Q3, going to 75,000 ounces of production during Q4, which is less than Q4 2021. However, we have a lower AISC also, higher copper price, so we are going up to historical high levels of production during Q4 2022. With the results that we had in September and then now October that we are disclosing to the market, we are very confident that we'll be able to meet those. When you compare, going into more detail on the right side, per mine, you can see EPP with a significant growth. That is Ernesto, as we were projecting, coming in with a higher grade.
San Andrés, we had this higher range and also, the transition of, a mine contractor that we lost productivity. We had a decrease in San Andrés. Aranzazu, as we were projecting, maintaining 26,000 ounces of gold equivalent as a production. Very much in line. Aranzazu very much in line. EPP, San Andrés, yes, we had a more difficult quarter, but we are now moving toward the last quarter where we are gaining more productivity and also the results of changing the mine contractor with high productivity and also a lower cost should be coming in Q4 and then in 2023. In terms of cash cost, we had a Q3 lower than Q2, as we were projecting.
We were projecting significantly lower, not at $971. The most change we have that is affecting our guidance from $800-$853 per ounce to now $875-$899 is by San Andrés changes in recovery in Q2 and lower productivity in Q3. EPP and Aranzazu, we are very much in line with the guidance that we gave during the year. Even though EPP, we had a less favorable exchange rate, but improvements that is going on at the mine, again in some a little bit in grades above expected and also being able to reduce the cost to offset this also exchange rate impact.
We are also today, as I mentioned with the quarter, that we made a significant step towards consolidating our long-term agenda. Now, we are updating here, including the projection of Borborema, the project that we acquired during the quarter. We will go into more details on this slide. We will be able not only to reach over 400,000 ounces annualized by 2024, but now with the 450,000 ounces of gold equivalent by 2025. Still on the strategic agenda, this is some information about Almas project. On the left side, you can see the pictures that we are quickly moving forward now with the construction. We are already 79% of the construction completed on time, on budget.
Civil works is according to action plan. Assembly and erection is ahead of the schedule. There are a few things that was also ahead of schedule. That most of the CapEx is already negotiated or paid. We have 91% of total CapEx and 99% of the service equipment materials are already committed. We do not expect yet any kind of cost overrun during the construction. We are now reminded that we are building this. We started construction early this year. We should start production April next year with $74 million of CapEx. Kleber, now you, Kleber, you're gonna share more about the details on the results.
Thanks, Rodrigo, and good morning, everyone. Thanks for being with us this morning. On this page, as usual, we have a summary of the main financial KPIs the company reports for this quarter, the last few quarters, and accumulated the last twelve months at the end of each reporting periods. Starting with net revenues on the left side and top of the page. We are reporting net revenues of $81 million this quarter. As Rodrigo was explaining, there was no recurring impact related to the offtake agreement between our Aranzazu mine and Trafigura as a client.
The agreement provides that there is a price adjustment four months after the issuance of the first invoice, because there was a strong decrease in copper prices between February, March, and April in Q3. There was a $10 million price adjustment in favor of the clients, which hits our revenues in the quarter. If copper prices remain where they were in the third quarter, we shouldn't see this impact in the future. Actually, if the copper prices stay where they are today at around $363 per copper, we should see some gain already in the next quarter.
Of course, copper price goes back to where they were at the beginning of the year, we should see the ten million impact coming back to ours in the future. If we excluded the $10 million impact, our revenues would have been at $91 million, closer to the revenues we reported in the previous quarter, despite lower copper prices, which were 19% lower in Q3 compared to Q2, and lower copper and gold prices, which were lower 9% between the third quarter and the second quarter. The increase in our production partially offsets the decrease in metal prices in this quarter. Still on the top of the page, if we go to the right side, adjusted EBITDA, we're reporting $17 million in this Q3.
It's the same story, adjusted EBITDA was impacted by lower metal prices in this quarter, and also this $10 million offtake price adjustments in Aranzazu. If it was not for this non-recurring item, our adjusted EBITDA would have been $27 million this quarter, closer to the number we reported in the previous quarter. Again, despite lower metal prices, due to better production this quarter, and also a lower cash cost, which we already saw in Q3 compared to Q2. Moving to the bottom of the page, net income was just above zero, a $0.1 million positive this quarter. Next page, I'm gonna go on the details of the net income for the third quarter of the year.
Finally, in terms of net debt and cash, we closed the quarter with $80 million net debt. The increase in net debt this quarter was already expected, as the company invested over $80 million in the growth of the company, mainly the acquisition of Big River, but also the acceleration of construction of Almas, mineral rights acquisitions by Apoena and some exploration CapEx and exploration expenses. For Q4, we expect to see a reduction again in the net debt as we'll not have some of these items. Most importantly, there will be no asset acquisition on Q4. As Rodrigo has explained, it's gonna be the strongest quarter in terms of production. Next page.
On this page, we bring the bridge between the adjusted EBITDA and net income, explaining the net income for the quarter. On the left side of the page, as I was explaining, what would have been the EBITDA in the quarter without these non-recurring price adjustment impacts. The EBITDA would have been $27 million. Taking into consideration the price adjustment impact, we're reporting adjusted EBITDA of $17 million. Amortization and depreciation of $9 million and the financial results of $2 million. Those two items have been pretty much consistent with what the company had been reporting in the previous quarters and according to our expectation. On this quarter, we reported a non-cash effects loss of $4 million.
This is related to the depreciation of the Brazilian real in the quarter against the U.S. dollars. When there is a depreciation of the Brazilian real, that's good, it's positive for our Brazilian operations as they get more competitive and lower their cash costs. Accounting-wise, there is a negative impact of translating the cash we're holding in reais in the working capital. We're holding reais in Brazil when we translate it to our U.S. dollars accounts. Income tax expenses of $5 million. Finally, on this quarter, we are reporting a gain of $4 million related to the Serrote promissory notes. Just as a quick reminder, the Serrote project was sold by the company a few years ago.
As part of the payments, the company received a $10 million promissory note, which would be payable subject to certain conditions. Many of the conditions have been met to date. The construction of Serrote project was completed. The owners of the Serrote project have secured the project finance. Recently, Serrote declared commercial production. Because of all those facts, the expectations and the chances are it's gonna recover the full $10 million amount have increased. Therefore, we're booking another $4 million gain this quarter in our accounts receivable. Next page. Here we bring a detailed analysis for the changes in the cash and equivalents of the company throughout the third quarter of the year.
On the far left side of the page, we see the cash position at the beginning of the quarter of $280 million. The initial cash position was above the historical cash that we would usually hold here at Aura, because we're prepared for all the investments that we're expecting to make during the third quarter. Here on the left side of the page, what we call the adjusted free cash flow to firm, which is the free cash flow to firm generated by the mining operations on a recurring basis, excluding positive or negative non-recurring working capital items. Although it was a more difficult quarter, because of both metal prices and the price adjustment impact in Aranzazu, the mining operations generated positive cash flows of $7 million.
Here in the middle of the chart, we highlight how much was invested in growth by the company in the quarter. The total was $81 million. The main item, the Big River acquisition of $54 million, exploration, expansion CapEx of $23 million consumed cash in the quarter. Most of that, almost $20 million for the construction of Almas. As I mentioned also, there was mineral rights acquisition by Mineração Apoena, which we expect is gonna help us increase the life of the mine of Apoena. Also, we had investments in exploration expenses. Finally on this page, we bring exactly the same analysis but for the whole year, for the nine months of 2022.
We see again on the left side of the page the adjusted free cash flow to firm a more robust number, $34.39 million. Then, in the middle of the chart, the most significant users of cash, the investment for growth total $110 million for the first nine months of 2022. Brownfield position in Almas were the main items, but also a significant portion of cash used for exploration activities, such as in Matupá and Aranzazu, and other mines which are gonna help us increase the life of mine of our operations. On the right side, then some other proceeds and uses of that.
A part of those investments were financed with debt, and also we returned $10 million in dividends and $9 million in stock repurchases to our shareholders so far this year, bringing the cash to $121 million at the end of September. With this, we end our presentation. We are open to questions. Thank you.
Thank you, Kleber. The first question is from Edgard Souza with Itaú BBA. Edgard, your mic is open. You can ask.
Okay. Hi. Hi, guys. Thanks for the question. The first question about this impact of the offtake agreement in Aranzazu. Should we expect additional price adjustments in from this offtake agreement in the fourth quarter? Then the second one, which copper prices do you consider for the 400,000 gold equivalent ounces targets of 2024? Thank you, guys.
Thank you. Kleber, go ahead.
Yes. Thanks for your questions, Edgard. Your first question, this price adjustments, if copper prices remain where they are today, we don't expect to see a negative impact. To the opposite, we should see some, not the $10 million, but we should see some positive impact on Q4 because the adjustments, it happens, it can be positive or negative. You know, we had a strong decline and quick decline of copper prices during Q3 and we're seeing some recovery. With copper prices where they are, we should see some gain actually on Q4. If copper prices go back where they are at the beginning of the year, we should see the full $10 million amount back to the company, a positive impact.
Of course, if copper prices go down and go to $3 for example, then we should see some additional negative impacts. Overall, if they stay where they are, we're not gonna see positive or negative impacts. Your second question, we are using consensus metal prices for 2024, 2025. It's around $3.65. We use a report from some investment banks, and the assumption is $3.65 if I'm not mistaken for long-term copper prices.
Okay. Thank you.
You're welcome.
The next one to ask is Conrado from Safra.
Hi. Good morning. Thanks for the call. I'd like to start with some questions on the exploration side. First on the new mining rights in EPP, if you could tell us if these areas are close to the ones you are currently exploring, and when do you expect to start exploration or any works on the new areas? Also, if you can tell us if there's any news regarding Serrinhas prospects, and if we can expect even higher return rates there, considering the proximity to X1 and the infrastructure that's already there.
Just as another one on a different subject regarding inflation, I'd like to know if you leave any room in the CapEx estimates of your new projects for contingencies and possible increase in costs. Thank you.
Thank you, Conrado. Now I'll get those questions. First, you made is about the acquisition of mineral rights that we did in EPP, and you asked that if it's close to the mine or the current mine or the plant. Yes, this is very next to our pit, Japonês. It's less than 5 km from the plant. The reason that we bought is once we mined in Japonês, and we have some information of this new area as well, we see that the mineralization is moving into that direction, so we are very confident that we'll be able to start drilling very soon. We are now in the process of closing the whole acquisition, and then we can start drilling by the end of this year, early next year.
We project to have an updating resource and reserves in that area until the end of next year and putting our mine plan already by 2024. The other questions you made was about Serrinhas. Serrinhas, what is going to happen with X1, we are building the plant very close to X1 deposit. Serrinhas is close to 20 km far from X1. You still can truck, so we are not planning to build a new plant close to Serrinhas. What is going to happen is once you have the resources and reserves there, we're just gonna truck and use whole infrastructure that will be already in place for X1. Serrinhas is gonna add return on the top of Matupá project of the X1 investment.
I mentioned that we are already at the 50% of leverage return in that project. Once we move forward and improve Serrinhas, then we'll go on top of this 50%. That's why we're confident that's gonna be above 50% of return on equity on that project with a significant increase of life of mine. Then you asked about contingency. Yes, we have contingency in all the CapEx that we project. Depending on the stage of the project, you can have 15% contingency. As you're moving more to feasibility study and going into construction, then it is 10% or sometimes less than 10% of contingency. Yes , we do have a contingency in all of our CapEx, and the number that we publish already assumes some contingency.
Okay, great. Thank you very much.
The next question is from Caio Greiner at BTG Pactual.
Hi, good morning, guys. Two questions on my side. The first one, thinking about the 2023 production, I mean, if we're thinking about the production guidance you guys set out for 2022, I mean, we saw the higher range you guys initially reported at nearly 290,000 ounces that for 2022. I was trying to understand how to think about that for 2023. I mean, the ex-Almas operations, I mean, they're supposed to be nearly that range. We could have thought about nearly 300,000 ounces if we used old copper price references.
Now, since you guys mentioned that you needed to downgrade the expectations on around 8,000 ounces, we can round that out to 10,000 ounces. I mean, we can think about the higher range of the production ex-Almas nearly at 280,000 or 290,000 ounces for 2023. Does that reasoning make sense to you guys? When you add Almas, you guys mentioned that it is supposed to ramp up and get to full productivity by the third quarter of next year. I mean, we can think about adding another 20,000 ounces. When you add all that, I mean, can we think about, does it make sense to expect another around 300,000 ounces of production from Aura in 2023?
Is there anything else that we're not considering here in our expectations? I know you guys are probably gonna release that in the Aura Day, but maybe if we can get just an idea of what you guys are thinking about, and if all that reasoning just makes sense. I'll ask the second question once you guys answer this first one. Thank you.
Caio, thank you. I will have to apologize, but I cannot answer that because we are now working all the projections for 2023, and we cannot provide you this guidance until we publish as a press release. What you can do is, of course, we have the plan to start Almas by April next year, ramping up to full production by during Q3 next year. Of course, then you should add on that production into our growth. Yet I cannot talk about the guidance for 2023.
All right. No problem.
Okay.
No problem. My second question is about the new contractor in San Andrés. Two points here. Just I was just trying to understand if this lower ramp-up impacting third quarter volumes was already expected. Was this already planned for when you guys hired that contractor? The second point is that what is the productivity gain that you guys are expecting from this new contractor in terms. Maybe if you can talk about it in terms of costs, in terms of volumes, that would be helpful. Thank you.
Okay. I'll start answering. Kleber, if you have the cost per ton that we can also just Caio, we're changing some $ per ton and now we'll have a lower cost. I think we will decrease by 10%, but Kleber gonna check. Your question about the challenges. We always project some inefficiency when you're changing contractors because there's new equipment, new employees, and a whole new structure affects productivity. We knew there was some challenges. It was more challenging than we thought, right? Honduras, that is not a place that you have plenty of contractors. Mobilizing all the equipment took more time. Hiring new employees took time.
Ramping up and training, productivity, all of that has jeopardized our production. We do not expect that to continue to the Q4. Actually, we already see improvements on the productivity. Kleber, do you have the price per ton? If we don't, then we should insert an answer right there.
Yeah. I don't have it here. What we know is, it's significantly below what we had and now is above historical prices. We don't see the old inflation passing with the new agreements.
Yeah.
We can check the specific numbers.
Yeah. It's close to 10% reduction on the mine contractor in terms of price. We also expect to have some productivity gain when it stabilizes compared to other one. Once the equipment and the trucks are larger and more capable of dealing with excess of rain, actually. Right? Those equipment works very well when you have a more wet condition .
All right. Thank you very much, guys.
Next one to ask is Román Rossi from Canaccord.
Good morning, guys, and thanks for taking the questions. I have two, if I may ask them sequentially. The first one is related to the construction of Matupá and Borborema. You're assuming that you will start constructing both mines next year based on your disclosure. I just wanted to know if you have any CapEx guidance and particularly if you are expecting to take on new debt for the construction of these mines.
I did not understand the last question. Particularly if we are?
Trying to take new debt. For the construction of the mines.
We plan to start construction of both next year and not simultaneously. One during the first semester, the other one in the second semester. Most likely the decision is not taken yet, but we are moving to have first Borborema and then Matupá. Still a lot of studies and simulations going on. The idea is one starting the first semester, that we will enter in production by second semester 2024. The one that we start in the second semester of next year, we will start production by 2025. That's why now we can update the market with the 2025 projections. In terms of CapEx, we do not have yet at the Borborema.
What we have is the number that was produced by them, which we are now updating, analyzing the opportunities to optimize the return on that project. For Matupá, it's $104 million investment. We, Román, our strategy normally is to finance at least 50% of the CapEx with the debt and the remaining part on equity. Of course, if we see opportunity to optimize that relation, we will do so, but normally when we project, we have 50% on debt and 50% on equity on those projects.
Perfect. The second question is regarding your guidance in EPP. For the first nine months of the year, you have produced around 44,000 ounces, and to reach your midpoint guidance, you need to produce around 26,000 ounces. Can you give us some color on how you're expecting to reach that production in the fourth quarter? Are you expecting higher grades? A higher feed to the mill? Any color on that would be helpful.
Yes. It's higher grades mostly. Historically, we mine 1 gram, 1.2 grams per ton. We are now at 3 grams per ton, 2.80 grams per ton. Of course, that will combine with the other areas that with the lower. We'll see. I know you already seen a significant increase in grades that it's moving our production to over 10,000 ounces per month in some of the month.
Okay. Fantastic. Thank you very much.
Thank you.
That's all for today.
Okay. Thank you all for participating. Again, I invite you all to participate in Aura Day next week, Thursday, 8:00 A.M. Eastern Time, 10:00 A.M. Brazil Time. There's a lot going on the strategic agenda of the company, a lot of improvements in operation as well that we'll be glad to disclose to you. Thank you.
Thanks, everyone. Thank you.