Chrysos Corporation Limited (C79) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Thank you for standing by, and welcome to Chrysos Corporation Limited C79 H1 FY '26 results. [Operator Instructions] I would now like to hand the conference over to Mr. Dirk Treasure, Managing Director and CEO. Please go ahead.

Thank you. Good morning, shareholders, and thank you for joining us for our first half FY '26 results presentation. As usual, I'm joined here by our CFO, Brett Coventry. Today, we'll take you through what has been a very strong half for Chrysos, with continued global conversion of miners to PhotonAssay, record sample volumes, accelerating utilization across our fleet and meaningful operating leverage emerging in the business. Slide 3, please, operator. We continue to prove that PhotonAssay is the mining industry's most innovative assaying solution. We deliver faster, safer, more accurate and environmentally-friendly gold analysis and we do so through a lease-based commercial model that provides long-term contracted revenue with direct upside exposure as utilization increases. We are converting a large global market with a superior technology that is now endorsed by Tier 1 miners and all 4 major laboratory partners. Next slide, please, operator. This slide captures the strength of the half. Revenue for the period was $43.3 million, up 49% year-on-year, EBITDA was $14.3 million, up 152% with margin expanding to 33% compared to 20% in the first half FY '25. Operating cash flow was positive at $8.6 million, and we ended the half with 43 deployed units. But stepping back, we're seeing a combination of two powerful forces. First, ongoing global conversion to PhotonAssay, which continues to grow our contracted and deployed base, and second, a strengthening industry cycle, which is now driving materially higher utilization across that base. The result is what our business model is designed to deliver in a strong market. Higher revenue accelerating additional assay charges and expanding margins. Next slide, please, operator. PhotonAssay sample volumes continue to be the clearest leading indicator of our rate of adoption. We're now processing volumes approaching 1 million samples per month with consistent growth of between 50% and 100% year-on-year. Additional assay charges or AAC, now represent 27% of total revenue up from just over 11% in the first half of FY '25. When industry activity strengthens our utilization rises and Chrysos captures that upside directly. We see this operating leverage coming through clearly in the numbers. Gold price remains elevated and exploration and production activity continue to improve, which provides us the confidence that elevated sample volumes are likely to continue. Next slide, please, operator. Turning to deployments and new lease agreements. We deployed 4 units during the half with 1 unit reaching end of lease. Our deployments included our first XN generation units with SGS in Perth, Pantoro's Norseman mine sites with Intertek, a second ALS unit in Thunder Bay, Canada and ALS' seventh Western Australian unit. We're also in the process of upgrading MAX unit 1 our first ever unit, which is in ALS' Canning Vale facility in Perth. On the contracting side, we signed 8 new lease agreements during the half and a further 6 post period, bringing total contracted units to 72. We've had a step change in sales momentum in recent months with 14 lease agreements signed, and we are looking to accelerate our deployment schedule in 2026 and beyond. Next slide, please, operator. Our success in sales is intentional and builds upon the strong foundations. We operate through 2 complementary strategies. Firstly, our hub-and-spoke laboratory partnerships where labs actively market PhotonAssay to their regional customers; and second, our direct-to-mine site strategy, where PhotonAssay becomes embedded in the operating heart of the plant. These direct mine site deployments are particularly powerful. They create deep engagement with geologists, metallurgists and mining engineers, and they unlock incremental value beyond simply replacing fire assay. Importantly, as more Tier 1 miners adopt PhotonAssay, it creates a blueprint for others to follow, and that halo effect continues to build. Next slide, please, operator. This slide highlights our footprint and ongoing adoption. Over the past 18 months, we've achieved several important milestones. SGS installed our first complete XN unit, Bureau Veritas entered into its first PhotonAssay lease, meaning we're now partnered with all 4 major global labs and will also be operating across 4 key global regions, Newmont after signing their master services agreement, subsequently entered into an agreement for its second deployment, and OceanaGold deployed PhotonAssay to the Macraes Gold Mine under a direct lease agreement with Chrysos demonstrating the flexibility of our sales model, which is designed to best support these mining companies. We now have engagement with approximately 70% of the top 20 gold miners. For a conservative industry that has historically relied on a 2,000-year-old analytical technique, fire assay, we're pleased with that level of penetration. And yet, we still represent only around 5% of the global opportunity. So there's plenty of runway from here. Next slide, please, operator, and I'll pass over to Brett for an overview of financials for the half.

Thanks, Dirk. And operator, please, please make sure we're on Slide 10. Thank you. Revenue for the half was $43.3 million, representing a 49% growth year-on-year. This growth continues to be driven by the expanding deployed unit base and materially higher utilization across the fleet reflecting ongoing adoption of PhotonAssay globally and market activity. Looking at the regions, APAC delivered strong growth, underpinned by fleet expansion and improved utilization. EMEA and the Americas continue to demonstrate sound growth as deployment scale. More than half our revenue now comes from outside APAC, demonstrating increasing diversification of the business and validating our global rollout strategy. A significant portion of our revenue for the period was generated from Tier 1 laboratories and miner relationships. And while we continue to diversify geographically and by customer, these long-term partnerships provide strong volume stability and revenue visibility. Next slide, please. This continues to be one of the most important graphs in the deck as it demonstrates the forecastable underlying revenue generated by the minimum monthly assay payments or MMAP, the yellow section of the graph. MMAP was $31.5 million for the half, up 22% year-on-year and continues to scale directly with our deployed unit base, providing a strong contracted revenue foundation for the business. The other section, additional assay charges was $11.7 million for the half and now represents approximately 27% of the total revenue. That uplift reflects materially higher utilization across the fleet and demonstrates the operating leverage embedded in our model. For our existing deployments, particularly international laboratory partners, there remains further upside should the industry activity acceleration continue. With January processing volumes exceeding 950,000 samples, we are seeing sustained utilization and momentum into the second half, a growing contracted base combined with accelerating upside. Next slide, please. This half represented a clear step change in profitability. Revenue increased 49% to $43.3 million while EBITDA increased 152% to $14.3 million, with EBITDA margin expanding to 33%. The highlight for me is that revenue growth has materially outpaced expense growth demonstrated that with the global platform we've been building is now delivering operating leverage. Our PhotonAssay gross profit margins remained strong at approximately 76%, consistent with prior periods, reflecting the quality and resilience of our revenue base. Depreciation increased in line with the expanding fleet and higher unit deployment base, which is expected as capital investment translates into revenue-generating assets. We also delivered statutory profitability for the half with NPAT of $700,000, marking an important milestone as the business transitions towards sustained profitability. Next slide, please. With that growth, our cash flows continue to improve, reflective of higher EBITDA and improved cash conversion. Operating cash flow for the half was $8.6 million, up on the prior corresponding period. Capital expenditure of $30.3 million primarily reflects continued investment in the fleet expansion and the timing of payments to major suppliers in line with contractual terms. The first generation unit deployments continue to remain consistent around $4 million, a great result given the inflation over the term of the contracts. Receivables increased in line with revenue, while approximately $10 million was over terms at period end, over $4.5 million has subsequently been collected and impairment provisions remain conservative. Overall, we are seeing operating leverage translating into cash generation. Next slide, please. Our balance sheet remains strong and well positioned to support continued growth. At 31 December, we held $21.6 million in cash and had access to a $95 million committed debt facility with $50.4 million undrawn. During the half, we drew $29.5 million under our CBA facility to support fleet expansion while maintaining appropriate liquidity within the business. Capital commitments relating to PhotonAssay units on order were approximately $70 million, reflecting the strength of our contracted deployment pipeline and providing forward visibility on sustained strong revenue. Next slide, please. Subsequent to period end, we secured approved term sheet to refinance and expand facilities to a total committed level of $200 million, further enhancing funding capacity to support accelerated deployment. The proposed $200 million syndicated facility refinances our existing debt, expands growth capacity, improves pricing and extends tenor. With 43 units deployed and 72 contracted at period end, we now both have operational momentum and financial capability aligned. The key message from the financials this half is clear. The business model is scaling, operating leverage is evident, cash generation is improving and funding capacity is in place to support the next phase of Global growth. Back to you, thanks, Dirk.

Thank you, Brett. Next slide, please, operator. Our vision remains clear: to become the world's leading provider of innovative assay services and technologies. PhotonAssay is the foundation of that vision and the opportunity ahead remains substantial. Slide 17, please, operator. We're focused on converting gold mining projects across the globe, often working top-down from the biggest miners to create a halo effect to convert smaller miners and explorers. We closely partner with customers who have capacity for multiple deployments, whether they be labs or miners. We price competitively to enable rapid penetration, effectively offering a better product at an equivalent price. We operate a lease model that delivers high returns on capital and long-term annuity style revenue with upside potential linked to industry cycles. Beyond gold, we see additional opportunity across silver, copper and other elements. But even within gold, the conversion opportunity remains very significant. Our total addressable market comprises approximately 610 sites globally, and today, we operate in 29 active sites with 43 deployed PhotonAssay units, equating to around 5% of market share. Next slide, please, operator. Geographic expansion continues to be important. South America represents a meaningful portion of global gold production and our partnership with Bureau Veritas establishes a beachhead into that region. Our strategy is disciplined building regional hubs supported by major laboratory partners and developing direct relationships with miners in those regions. This ensures we maintain strong gross margins while expanding globally. Next slide, please, operator. While gold remains our core market, PhotonAssay already operates commercially across gold, silver and copper. We see increasing interest in broader applications, including base metals, rare earth and energy metals. These represent incremental opportunity layered on top of a very large gold market. Slide 21, please, operator. We reaffirm FY '26 guidance of revenue between $80 million and $90 million, EBITDA between $20 million and $27 million. Importantly, based on current trading conditions, both revenue and EBITDA are tracking toward the upper end of that range. The industry cycle remain supportive, utilization remains elevated, and AAC continues to perform strongly into the start of the second half. Next slide, please, operator. Summarizing the half where we delivered 49% revenue growth and 152% EBITDA growth with margin expanding to 33%. We now have 43 deployed units and 72 contracted units with deployments expected to accelerate through the remainder of the calendar year and beyond. Record sample volumes reflect both successful conversion and strong industry conditions. And importantly, we're now very well funded to execute the next phase of our global rollout. So stepping back, the story of the half is very clear. A strong industry cycle, coupled with ongoing conversion is delivering the revenue, AAC uplift and margin expansion, our model is designed to generate. Sales momentum is building. Deployments are expected to accelerate and we have funding capacity to scale. We're excited about the second half of FY '26. Thank you. And Brett, and I are happy to take your questions.

[Operator Instructions] The first question comes from the line of Branko Skocic with E&P.

Solid set of numbers for the half. So congratulations there. The first question just around that FY '26 guidance, something nice to see lifting towards the upper end of the range. But you are annualizing above the top end, particularly if I look at the EBITDA line. So I just wanted to understand why you haven't felt confident to raise this. You did call out some pretty encouraging trends even into January. So just trying to understand, I guess, the moving parts here, please.

Yes, absolutely. And thanks for the question, Branko. I mean, we intend to be conservative with guidance, but it's also important to point out that this was a 7.5% swing in AUD USD, and we do have a proportion of our income in USD that's affected by that. So we do want to see how the ForEx market settle over the coming months as well.

And then I just guess on that FX point maybe even happy to take this offline as well, but potential to get a rough EBITDA and impact sensitivity just to really understand how that's going to impact the bottom line? Because obviously, utilization trends continue to improve. And obviously, you get more units deployed as well in the second half. So trying to really understand how these offsets each other.

Yes. Look, fair point. And from our perspective, we are continuing to see the industry to be supportive of our volumes. Brett commented in his speech that we saw 950,000 samples going through in January, which continues to be a record. So we're not guiding to any reduction in sample volumes. It's really just making sure that we're providing accurate guidance, and that is towards the top end of that guidance range.

That makes sense. And final question from me. I guess a few of your peers have called out North America as a region having lagged in terms of exploration activity over the past 12 months. So just interested to see if you're observing any improvement there regarding customer activity, particularly in the last 6 months as well as exploration budgets over the next 12 months as well?

Yes, absolutely. And I think you can see from the chart that has the breakdown of where our revenues are coming from regionally. And you can see a pretty significant uptick there in Australia representing or demonstrating the really high utilization that we're seeing in Australia based on high exploration and sample volumes coming from the industry. We haven't seen as much of an uptick at the moment in those other regions. So there's definitely an opportunity there to see an uptick from where we are at the moment. I do think that the entire industry is moving and Australia has been probably a little bit faster than the others.

Next question comes from the line of Josh Kannourakis, Barrenjoey.

Apologies in advance if you have answered this, just jumping between a couple of calls this morning. Obviously, very strong contracting momentum in terms of both the first half but also the year-to-date. Can you give us a little bit more context on how you think the conversion of those maybe to deployments. And I guess if we sort of reflect the prior full year when you talked about the hoping to do at least similar in '26 as you did to '25. Does that still hold? Can you give us a little bit more context on those 2 factors, please?

Yes, absolutely. And I'll answer them in reverse order. So we would remain disappointed if we don't get the same number of units this year as we did last year. With respect to contracting momentum, I think that, that really builds both the rest of this financial year, but also going into subsequent years. You can see that we've got 4 units deployed, one deploying against 14 new contracts. And having disclosed what the bulk of those contracts are, you can see that they're all to Tier 1 counterparties. We're very happy with how that book is building out. We've got a high degree of confidence in those deployments, which is what's allowing us to say that we intend to accelerate deployments going forward.

Okay. That's great. And just in terms of some of the existing customers that have obviously been adopting it more broadly, what sort of activity are you seeing at some of the labs? Obviously, as they also see those increase in volumes and get closer to capacity. Are there further discussions for broader rollouts in particular regions of the world? And maybe you could not mention the lab names, but give us some context maybe by region where you're seeing the most potential activity or potential opportunity in terms of the contracting pipeline into the second half?

Yes, absolutely. And I think some of this is already public from labs, putting it on their LinkedIn and this type of thing. So we saw -- sorry, Kalgoorlie SGS coming out with a record month, a couple of months ago. We saw ALS come out -- sorry, Intertek coming out most recently hitting 50,000 in a single unit. What we're seeing is very high numbers coming through in Australia. In relation to that, you've seen in this period, the additional units going into WA would say, ALS and SGS as well. So we're certainly seeing that at this point. I think as we start to see volumes pick up in other parts of the world, we'll continue to see more units going into these hubs. Again, demonstrating that would be something like Thunder Bay in Canada, taking their second unit. So I think there's an opportunity here for more units going into hubs, but also our long-term focus of getting more units on to mine sites as well.

Okay. Great. And then just maybe 1 in terms of operating leverage. Obviously, we'll put the ForEx discussion aside for a moment. But maybe, Brett, just to talk through as we do step up over the next few years, what you guys need to you've now established that more direct sales force, like is there more to do there? Where are the sort of the incremental operating costs of the business going to be? And maybe just to give us a bit of a feel for how we should be thinking about the sort of cost base growth over this year and next year based on what you've planned out in your pipeline?

I don't think anything has changed in that messaging, Josh. I think that our position remains that it will be continue to be increasing incremental on those costs, and this half has been a demonstration of that. Obviously, as our business grows and we find different needs, sometimes there does need to be -- steps up. So one of those things that we're talking -- spoken to the market before about is our team that is obviously building that sales and marketing team out across the globe. That's something we've done over the past couple of years and doesn't need to be replicated as a big pickup. So we can't say that we're seeing anything in the horizon, but just working on that being incrementally improving, and part of that is also that we -- as we do those things in the future, obviously, the baseline is a bigger number now as well. So those have been lesser effect each time going forward. And obviously, our growth is about deploying our business across the globe and generating higher EBITDA margins.

I'll answer that very briefly. Just if you look at what we're doing with respect to deployments quite soon after announcing the BV unit going into South America, and we were able to announce the Newmont unit going into South America. We are actively looking at getting additional units into these regions. One of the pieces that's in this release is around the unit with ALS going to the Nordics. That's hot on the heels of what we've done with CRS as well, meaning that we can now amortize our costs over 2 units rather than 1 unit. And that's really about this hubbing strategy where more units near to each other allow us to lower our costs.

Next question comes from the line of Joseph House with Bell Potter Securities.

Congrats on a good set of results. Just keen to get your view on where PhotonAssay technology adoption is sitting in the adoption journey. Like it's good to see the 14 contracts signed financial year-to-date. Do you see that Newmont, MSA and the lease agreements as an accelerant to the PhotonAssay adoption since you achieved those milestones? Like how are the leads on new contracts tracking since like, say, 6 to 9 months ago, are you starting to see new prospective clients coming to the table and wanting to trial the technology?

Absolutely. And look, in these industry cycles, and this is the second 1 that we've been through we definitely get that further adoption. This time, we are backed by Newmont, by Barrick, by Goldfields, by Northern Star, and we're able to drive that halo effect. So I think what we see at the moment is kind of 2 things going on at the same time. Continued adoption by those global majors through our sales efforts and then also a buoyant industry that is driving further volume into hub labs. And now we're seeing the hub Labs moving as well. So for example, we've got ALS here with 6 contracts out of the 14. So we've got a very strong relationship and growing relationship with those labs at the same time as continuing to convert these big mining projects across the PhotonAssay and you really do get a halo effect when you've got a -- some of the biggest miners using the technology, it does simplify adoption for smaller explorers and miners.

Understood. And if you can provide this detail, I just can't get a sense of the utilization of the fleet kind of where it fits given the uptick in additional assay charges. It is comprising a larger proportion of revenue. Just wondering what sort of flex up in additional assay charges we could kind of get based on the headroom in utilization rates?

It's always a tricky one because when we talk about hub labs, we know that hub lab can quite easily get up and over nameplate capacity where as a miner, we're not necessarily expecting that capacity utilization to be quite elastic. I mean if you run the numbers from your side, you've got 43 units deployed nameplate capacity of 40,000 samples per month, and you've got us suggesting that we're on our way to 1 million samples per month. So that kind of gives you that utilization number. We also provide all of the pieces here around how many of our units are in mine sites compared to laboratories. So one could argue that the laboratory units would trend up toward capacity when the industry is running hot. Yes, we've kind of created a little breadcrumbs to run those numbers. I don't actually have come off the top of my head, I'm afraid.

Next question comes from the line of Lindsay Bettiol.

A couple of quick clarity clarifying questions. First one, just on the leases. It looks like you've signed, I think, 1 lease post AGM and then 6 year-to-date, like I don't know if you want to go into specific names, but could you just call out like the breadth of those 7 leases? Like has it been ALS, again, I could probably go back and back solve some of this, but like out of the 7 is ALS done 3 or 4 of those or like what's the breadth is like among the 7 you've done recently, please?

Yes, absolutely. So I think we've got, what, 4 ALS leases signed post period and there was a mine site post period as well. And then we've actually given you the individual breakdown of all of those lease agreements that we've signed.

Yes, cool. I can go back and look at that. That's helpful. And then maybe just -- I mean, you talked about accelerating deployments. You've talked about hopefully hitting the number of deployments last year. Like could you just give us an inventory update in terms of where like finished units are sitting, please?

I don't actually have the actual number that's sitting ready to be deployed, but it's still definitely between 5 and 10. And they're also sitting strategically around the globe as well. They're not actually all sitting in a warehouse in China. They're actually sitting in port in numerous occasions around what our deployment schedule looks like. So we're well positioned going forward for that.

Okay. So maybe just -- I'll just push you on that a little bit. Like piecing what you've said together, you're implying deploying something like 6 to 7 units, maybe in the remainder of this financial year. Like the 5 to 10 in inventory, would that show up your inventory? Or are they over and above the units that you will deploy this financial year?

So we're continuing to build units as well. And you can imagine that as we're seeing the sales pipeline expand or the contracted lease pipeline expand, we're always planning ahead on these deployments. So a unit build start to finish is in the order of 18 months. We're ordering those sort of final pieces of the unit between 9 and 12 months out. So we're constantly ordering ahead based on what we're seeing from the industry. So as we're seeing a pickup in lease agreements, well then we're forward planning our manufacturing so that we can deploy against those. So we will consume some of the inventory and then we will replace some of the inventory as well. Really, we're trying to have a steady state balance between manufacturing and deployment. One little bit further is we've guided previously that we've got a sort of manufacturing capacity at the moment in the order of 18, so that gives you that kind of level that we can quickly put our foot on the accelerator too and then obviously, we would be looking not to grow that inventory dramatically. I think I've said previously, it would be nice to have somewhere in the order of sort of 5 to 7 units in inventory, allowing us to move quickly, but we certainly don't want to be kind of 10 to 15.

Yes. Okay. Understood. That's helpful. And then just again on the cost base, it's been asked maybe a couple of times, but -- like 50% revenue growth and 20% growth of the cost base looks good. I think like it undersells the story a little bit. Like if I look at OpEx, say, half 2 '25 versus the first half, like your OpEx is actually flat you're growing like 20% half-on-half. So is there some seasonality in that? Or is the cost base genuinely being held flat over the past 6 months?

No. Look, I mean, cost base doesn't really have seasonality from that perspective. The revenue side does. And generally, the seasonality across the different regions cancel each other out somewhat. But certainly from a cost base, we don't really see a seasonality. Like if you consider the bulk of our costs really coming down to staffing around the world, there's little to no seasonality in that. And look, as we see the high margins come through and particularly when we're seeing margin come through that is the very high AAC margin. We make sure that we're very disciplined not to be building additional costs in at the same time.

That's helpful. No, it's just -- I mean cost being held kind of dead flat half-on-half is impressive against that backdrop? And then I've asked a lot of questions, but just final one on the debt piece. Obviously, it's upsized now to $200 million. Like are there any conditions in and around the debt that would stop you from drawing down the full $200 million today? Like is there any kind of equity requirement? Is there any kind of a unit number requirement? Or could you just take that money out?

There's a long-form documentation requirement before you draw down. So it couldn't be today, but it's certainly much more cash flow looking than previous facilities. So improving on the terms of our existing facilities. So yes, so we are in a good position. There's no restrictions on that. There will be, obviously, the standard form covenants as that comes out in the long form, but nothing that would stop us accessing that full $200 million as we grow.

[Operator Instructions] There are no further questions at this time. I'll now hand back to Mr. Treasure for closing remarks.

Thank you. Thank you and thank you, shareholders. We're pleased with the performance for the half and look forward to providing you with further updates as we progress FY '26.

Thank you. That does conclude our conference for today. Thank you for participating. You may now disconnect.