Akobo Minerals AB (publ) (AKOBO) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Good morning, and welcome to Akobo Minerals First Quarter of 2026 Presentation. I will take you through the latest developments of the company and the operations. I'll just start with a short introduction for any new viewers and not familiar with Akobo Minerals. We're a Scandinavian-based gold producer and explorer. You can see from the right-hand side here on the map, we're based out of Ethiopia when it comes to our operating assets. On the border of South Sudan called Segele mine via Akobo River area, very nice and peaceful place to work. We've been there for 15 years and still trying to expand and use this area as a hub for the future of the company. So you can see here, we are operating a gold mine, Segele mine. It's a high-grade operation, looking at the category here on the right-hand bottom side, you can see a bit what we're talking about. The average grade of an underground mine is about 5 to 8 grams per tonne, what you would call a high-grade deposit is above 8 grams per tonne, while our Segele mine is around 22 to 40-gram per tonne. So it's a really high-grade Bonanza mine. It's a production that's been ongoing for 1.5 years now. We have a steady production of around 7 to 8 kilos a month from current gold price or tunnels that go from the surface into the underground ore body. If you look at that from a revenue perspective, at current gold price around $4,000 per ounce, we're talking about around $1 million per month our EBITDA breakeven is around 5 kilos per month. Of course, that will vary with the gold price also. So we have some processing advantage here. We do gravity processing. You can see that we get 86% gravity recovery. That's without using a carbon in leach or CIL system. We also do have a very high grade or not grade, but purity of the gold we're producing. So we're around 22 to 23-carat doré bars produced at site. So we have a very good plant set up with a strong team that delivers high-quality gold doré bars out of our own processing plant. So just on the corporate side, we have transitioned from discovery to production during these 15 years. That's a huge milestone in itself. We are currently a flagship project in Ethiopia being the first modern mine or national gold mine to establish itself in Ethiopia since 1993 and were listed today on the Euronext growth in Oslo, the Stock Exchange. So move back to production and operations. Q1 strongest quarter-to-date. We produced around 23 kilos. At that point, we had 96 kilos of doré produced year-to-date. That is end of March. And if you look at the graphics on the left-hand side here, you can see that we've consistently improved months quarter-by-quarter. And if you look within the red square here, obviously, gold price is affecting the revenue side and the EBITDA side, but also you can see here on the development in number of kilos produced, it's increasing quarter-by-quarter and we get to the end here by adding a Q2 '26 estimates, which we expect to be another record quarter, beating previous quarters with quite a significant amount. We're expecting around 35 kilos to be produced now in Q2. That includes 8 kilos now for June. So for those of you who've been following us, knowing that we had temporary shutdown of operations for a couple of months due to diesel and fuel supply issues in Ethiopia. This is a very strong quarter. And I must say that the team has been exceptional in producing and delivering this. So by the end of Q2, which is around today, we should have produced around 131 kilos all in all. We do still actually have a significant stockpile at site, 650 tonnes. It's a lower grade ore, but still very high. compared to what you see normally going back to the previous slide around 10-gram per tonne. When it comes to our cash position, we have around $4.2 million which includes the June production estimates in cash and cash and liquidity positions. During the quarter 1 and quarter 2 we started repaying monetary metals on the debt facility, and we have paid back around $4.1 million during the last 2 quarters. We also see that given the development of the company and the production and the cash flow and what we see going forward with the new vertical shaft. There is an opportunity for us to restructure the current debt we have. We have in each the process, we think it's possible to lower the interest rate and also extend the maturity profile, so that will fit better with the current operations and our ambition and our interest in expanding our operations in Ethiopia and also within the current license area. Just to highlight, you can see here the average grade that we're producing at. It's consistent high grade around 20-gram per tonne, seeing it up to 30-gram per tonne in Q2, and that supports the narrative and what we've been telling and saying all along and what we believe is in the ground. It's a high-grade mineral resource, and we see it every day when we're producing. So on the operations side, we've had stable mining operations, and we have continued access to ore. It's not always the fact that you have access to ore when you're developing, but the nature of this ore body is in such a way that it's within the boundaries of the ore model and the ore body, it is gold spread out consistently through the deposits. So it's possible to access ore more or less everywhere. And as we said, we have a strong processing performance, high grades, recovery and purity. And going then down to the development highlights. We have completed around 50% almost of the 120-meter plant shaft, the new vertical shaft, around 65 meters remaining. We have 7 to 10 meters left to get to the first lateral drive, Level 1, that will give us access to the ore. We do not know when we hit the ore body, but we see that the ore body is extending beyond what the geological model is saying. So we might hit it sooner rather than later. Only time will tell there. We do have to do more ground support now in the beginning of the shaft. We've hit some softer sections that will not delay as such, but it's part of mining operations. It means that you can't blast that aggressively while you're actually fixing and supporting these areas. As I said, we have indications of mineralization beyond the current model. So this is exciting. From the mining, we've gone beyond the current model, and we see it. So we do have now an underground serving on way to site to see what this looks like. So it will be exciting to see what kind of serving and the results we get there. So for the future, we do need our TSF, the tailings storage facility, and that construction is progressing well. So I'm very happy to see that before we can start any CIL production later. We need the TSF up and going. On the exploration side, trenching geological work is advancing -- and that's what we'll call ahead of the next exploration phase. We do have some good indications that the Gilo license is soon to be finalized. And you can see here from the bottom that the operations again resumed following fuel shortage. Production on site has been normalized. And the Gilo license here it's been approved by the local administration, in the area called Abobo, and it's just pending final verification to make sure that the coordinates are correct. And then hopefully, within a very short period, it will be finalized and approved. And then we can start really looking into how to attack that area and develop that over the next 5, 10, 15 years. We've also delivered a water supply system to the local village and it's been handed over. That's been a big milestone, getting fresh water to the local village something they've never had before. So just to summarize, operations are normalized. We do have indications of the mineralization extending beyond the current model. So that will be exciting to see. Shaft development time line. We are advancing. We will split this into 3 phases. We're continuing the sinking and as I said, we're progressing then dependent on ground conditions. And depending on that, it will be a bit slower or a bit faster. We need to stabilize where we need to, and we can't take any kind of risk when it comes to developing this shaft. We expect then to access the lateral on September, October, and get head gear and main winch installations done and the commissioning of the hoisting system. And at that point, we'll see initial ore hoisting from the lateral one access. Where it will hit the ore body, we do not know. We think it will be sooner rather than later when -- based upon what we've seen, but that's too difficult to say exactly. But this is the time frame we're working on. And then going all the way down and the lateral 2 axes and production ramp-up will happen in October, November. And then this shop will be in production. So I think it's important to mention now that Akobo now has an established operating model with a clear path to scale. We've been producing consistently for 1.5 years. We see stable grades recovery and purity. We've also demonstrated the ability to convert gold production into U.S. dollar cash flow by repaying monitor metals and international suppliers out of local currency converted into U.S. dollars in Ethiopia. That says also something about the development of the financial sector and the reforms happening in Ethiopia, a lot of positive news coming out of Ethiopia these days. When you look at the shaft, the processing plant and design capacity, there is no bottleneck there. The plant and the hosting capacity system can do 4,000 tonnes a month. if you do 20-gram per tonne on average, that should give us a potential of doing 80 kilos a month of gold production. And we do have the gravity recovery in operation with the CIL to increase the recovery from 86% up to maybe 90 plus something. So it's really not an issue with the technical side. The capacity is there. So what we have to work on and which is work in progress, is to get the mining underground to get enough areas to work on simultaneously, and we need a number of active phases to support the tonnage to be hold out. So that's the main work now is to plan for that. The financial performance, operating leverage, you see here an improvement on the sales and EBITDA side. It's driven by some higher production volumes, but also -- of course, a strong gold price seen lately, especially in Q1. And you can see the EBITDA achieved as revenue increased. We do have a relatively fixed cost, even though we have added some more in Q1 related to the development of the shaft, obviously, that is requiring a bit more money going into the operations. And just so that it's said, the sales figures do not necessarily represent the actual sale. It's -- the sale might happen in the month or the quarter after, depending on, but it's a fairly good estimate based upon what we've seen and what we're selling to the national bank locally. On the equity and debt development side, it is what it is. The gold loan is developing, and it's also fluctuating with the gold price. And the same goes also then for the cash flow of the deposit, the future cash flow deposits. So it's still a natural hedge there. And the negative equity it reflects, again, the development phase on historical investments in building the Segele operations. And now going forward, we will see that turning towards more positive equity as operations continue to deliver positive results. On the corporate structure side, no major changes, top shareholders still with us, long-term supporters and I don't think there's any changes in the top 20. We still have a Swedish holding company, a Norwegian operating company and ETNO Mining in Ethiopia that holds all the licenses and all the assets. We have around 238 employed locally, we have a strong team in Addis, a leadership team there, but also a very strong operating team at site. Of course, they are the ones delivering all the results every day. So it's hard work and we have a very, very good team here. And we just got another strong asset to the company here through Ermias Eshetu. He has been elected as the new Board member. And he has joined the company. He has extensive experience from the African financial markets and the Ethiopian markets. And it's someone I've known for several years, and I'm very happy to have Ermias on board, strengthening our corporate governance side, but also someone that is able to help us locally and help develop the company on a local basis. Worth mentioning, we have strong support also from the government being -- we're seeing the Ethiopia Sovereign Fund as our fourth largest shareholder. So that's a very good thing to see. In general, these days, very strong support to the mining sector. That, combined with all the financial and other economic reform seeing in Ethiopia. I believe that Ethiopia is going to be a very attractive place to invest and to take part of their future development over the next -- well, not even the next few years, but for a very, very long time. And with that, what are we looking at? How can we build value here? Well, we're scaling production. We're getting cash flow we are going to increase that cash flow from the new vertical shaft. We're going to reinvest parts of that into growth and development. And what does that look like? Well, we do have of course, the lateral developments in the current mine and extend that, but also extend at debt. We know the current ore body is open at debt. We see a continued geological upside and optimization potential here. We do have a lot of target still within the near area of the mine. But then going further, we are, of course, now going to extend the platform, especially with the new Gilo license that we expect to be awarded very soon, but also the Gingibil quartz is there within the existing license area. That's something we're targeting and we've been working on for quite some time now and where we see a big potential. So what will this look like in a few years? Well, it will be a multi-asset company. Gilo as a second production hub. We were also looking at other exploration targets in Ethiopia and might have over time, selective expansion into new opportunities in Africa. So this is not just about the next 6 months or not the next year. This is a long-term development plan that will build value step by step. The financial side, I will leave that for you to look at. There is no cash flow this quarter just due to time constraints after the annual reports were delivered here last month. But let me know if you have any questions with regards to the financials. And let's see if there are any questions here.

So I think I've answered most of them. The obvious one is, of course, a time line around the shaft. When we will hit the ore when we will start hoisting and producing? So going back to the slide where we -- where I presented the time line, we're progressing every day, depending on rock stability depending on how much we can blast every day, -- we're looking at -- we're looking at accessing this ore, as we said in September, October from the lateral drive #1. And at that point, it will be in production. And that, combined with the wins until we shut those down, will give us an increased cash flow from that point out. So it's all progressing. It's all there. We do not see any issues on the procurement side on the equipment side. So now it's just a matter of blasting as much as we can within the limits of the rock and the safety side for our team. And that's really it. It's moving every day. And no further questions, most of them were related to the shaft. So I think we've answered most of that. So I'd just like to say thank you all for joining and listening in. If you have any questions, please reach out, and I will get back to you on that. Thank you.