Compañía de Minas Buenaventura S.A.A. (BVN) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us at Buenaventura's Investor Day. It's a pleasure to welcome you to this important event where we will provide an in-depth discussion on Buenaventura's strategy, growth plans and our strong commitment to sustainable operations. Before we begin, let me remind you that today's remarks will include forward-looking statements based on management's current views and assumptions. While we believe these assumptions, expectations, and projections are reasonable in light of current available information, we caution you not to place undue reliance on these forward-looking statements. Today's agenda is designed to give you a comprehensive understanding of our key projects, strategic priorities, and financial objectives. You will hear directly from our executive team as they share updates on flagship projects, insights into our growth and value creation strategies, and an overview of the sustainability and community initiatives that underpin our long-term vision. Let me now hand over the presentation to Mr. Leandro Garcia, Buenaventura's CEO.

Thank you for coming today, and good morning to everyone. This is the cautionary statement. I would like to have a couple of minutes to read it. You have in the presentation also. This is our team. I will make the presentation, the first part, highlighting the main principles of our strategy for the following years. Alejandro Hermoza, our Sustainability Vice President, couldn't come with us, but I'm going to make his part. Juan Carlos Ortiz will explain the operations of all our mines; Juan Carlos Salazar, our exploration program and results; Renzo Macher, our projects; Aldo Massa, our business development and commercial part; and finally, Daniel Dominguez, our CFO, will explain our remarkable results obtained last year and what we expect for the following years. Our strategy is built on a foundation of operational excellence where we continuously optimize processes, improve efficiency, and reduce cost to ensure sustainable performance. This commitment to operational improvement drives our ability to generate strong and consistent cash flows, providing the financial flexibility necessary to fund growth initiatives and adapt to market dynamics. A key pillar of our strategy is extending the life of our mines, which not only enhances the longevity of our operations, but also maximizes the value extracted from our resources. By focusing on mine line expansion through exploration, we secure a more stable and predictable production profile over the long term. Equally important is the disciplined allocation of capital, ensuring that every investment aligns with our strategic priorities and delivers measurable returns. This involves a rigorous evaluation of projects. The consolidation of long-term production in metals such as gold, silver and copper as produced by Buenaventura requires a combination of strategic planning, significant investment and continuous improvement, to ensure sustainable and efficient output over the years. To achieve this, the company focuses on optimizing mining operations, improving extraction technologies, and managing resources. Additionally, our commitment extends to advancing our mines to higher levels of productivity, which will help to ensure predictability in our operations. A key element of this long-term strategy is our ongoing effort to reduce production costs. We are focused on positioning ourselves in the second cost quartile globally, which will allow us to enhance both our operational and financial strength. Achieving this cost efficiency will help us secure a robust and resilient business model, ensuring profitability even in fluctuating market conditions. In Buenaventura, sustainability is at the core of our mission and present in all our operations and projects. Our commitment to sustainable practices expands across the 8 operations we currently run located in the 8 key regions where we engage with local communities and local governments. Our mining units strategically situated between 3,500 and 4,800 meters above sea level are an essential part of the local economies. We understand the critical need for responsible resource management and have implemented systems to ensure that our environmental footprint remains minimal. Our 3 pillars in sustainability are people, environment, and social affairs. Our workforce is more than 12,000 workers. We recognize the importance of clean energy in driving sustainable growth with 63% of our energy sourced from renewable sources. We are reducing the carbon emissions associated with our operations. Furthermore, we are committed to building strong, enduring relationships with the more than 100 communities we are -- we work together with. One of our proudest achievements is the recycling of 85% of the water we use in our process in the underground mines, demonstrating our dedication to preserving local water resources for future generations. As you can see in this graph, we are proud that 67% of our workforce comes from the areas directly influenced by our operations, reinforcing our dedication to creating jobs and economic opportunities for the local population. We have reached recently in our last internal poll a 77% of the workforce satisfied with the work environment, a clear reflection of our efforts to create a positive and supportive work environment. Additionally, 50% of our workers are represented by -- sorry, are represented by 14 active unions, ensuring that their voices are heard and their rights are upheld. In terms of safety, we are committed to improving the operational ratios of our mining units by involving all personnel in raising awareness about the need to think of safety as part of our DNA. We spare no effort in ensuring that we have sufficient engineering controls in place to prevent any accidents while instilling in our team the importance of acting responsibly in every assigned task. By fostering a culture of safety and responsibility, we aim to achieve optimal operational performance while safeguarding the well-being of everyone involved. We maintain a policy of open communication with the communities where we operate, ensuring transparency and fostering trust. By actively engaging with local residents, we strengthen the local economy through the creation of jobs and the acquisition of services and products of the community-based companies. We are also committed to supporting the development of essential infrastructure in these areas, working hand in hand with local and regional governments to ensure that the communities have access to resources they need for growth. Additionally, we prioritize human development by supporting educational initiatives that empower local populations and help build a skilled workforce. This holistic approach not only drives our business forward, but also contributes to the long-term well-being and prosperity of the regions we are part of. The reduction in the level of conflict in our country can be attributed to the better management of the government in addressing potential issues before they escalate. Our ability as Buenaventura to foresee conflict risk and take proactive measures has been key to preventing conflicts from developing by anticipating tensions and respondingly swiftly, we have created a more stable environment, where potential sources of unrest are dealt in their early stages. This approach not only mitigates the risk of larger-scale conflicts, but also strengthens the social cohesion and resilience at the country as a whole. Lately, we have successfully obtained several key permits. The environmental and operational permit for Yumpag has enabled us to increase our silver production aligned with Buenaventura's historical production of silver. The environmental permit for San Gabriel allowed us to begin the construction of this project, which will be the cornerstone of Buenaventura future gold production. We are currently awaiting the environmental permit for Tantahuatay, which will permit the construction of the necessary leaching pad and help stabilize the mine's production until it's at the end of the life of mine. Finally, we are expecting the environmental permit for Brocal in the second quarter of 2025, which will allow the construction of the necessary components to sustain production at a rate of 6,000 tonnes of copper per year. Finally, as I mentioned before, we show in this slide some key measures of our environmental performance as the high ratio of recirculation of water, the use of renewable resources of energy in our operations, and consistent reduction of greenhouse gas emissions during the last 3 years. Now I call Juan Carlos to explain the operations.

Good morning, everyone. I would like now to share what is the strategy, what we're doing now from the operational point of view. And I'm working -- the team is working on these 2 pillars that early Leandro shared with us that are the operational excellence and extending the life of mine of our mines, particularly 4 of them that are the key pillar for our strategy in the coming years that are Uchucchacua+Yumpag, El Brocal, San Gabriel, Coimolache, and of course, Cerro Verde, where we hold almost 20% stake in the mine. Getting into more detail about this, how we're doing this. The first step, obviously, is to increase our reserve. There has been a hard work from the geology team as well from the engineering team to try to increase the reserve in all of our commodities. As you can see here, there is an increase of almost 22% in gold, 22% in copper, and 47% in our reserve in these 3 metals. And part of that has been due to exploration. That's the case of the silver in which Yumpag has shown an additional substantial increase in our nearby ore body that we will cover in a minute. It's increasing the size of the reserve that we hold in the order of 100 million ounces of silver only in Yumpag. In the case of gold and copper, the main increase has been driven by, of course, the exploration to replenish what we have mined in the current year, but at the same time, by the engineering on recovering the pillars that we have in the underground mine in Brocal that hold a high-grade copper and gold values and have been incorporated now a part of our reserve once we completed the engineering for the cemented backfill and recovery of the existing pillars underground. Then you have here the pricing scenario that we use for our long term is about $1,900 per ounce of gold, $24 per ounce of silver, and $8,800 per tonne of copper. Based on that, this is our production guidance for the coming years in the 3 main commodities that we hold, in copper, silver and gold. We will get in more detail in a minute. In copper, we will foresee a steady production in the order of 58,000 tonnes of high copper containing concentrates coming mainly from the El Brocal mine. In silver, it's a combination of several mines, but mainly coming from Uchucchacua and from Yumpag production. And in the case of gold, it's coming mainly from San Gabriel, the new operation that we are putting into production next year, and also for the existing production coming from the El Brocal mine. The focus of the first part of the presentation is to explain how we're going to get this production coming from silver, lead and zinc. The production in the short term is coming from Uchucchacua, that's the main one producing silver, lead and zinc. The slide that you see here is basically the special distribution of the robotics that we have all the blocks that we're going to mine in the underground mine of Uchucchacua. They are very spread all over. But the important key point here, the takeaway is that we have all the infrastructure already done. So there are blocks that are right next to our existing galleries on main shaft or ramps. So we will only need to go with development, infill drilling and mining in these blocks. The other point is that it's now basically a polymetallic mine. The transition of the 100% silver mine to polymetallic mine happens in the last 2 years when we complete exploration on the western part of the mine, this section here, where we proved right, all the ore bodies that we have known from the past, but now have access and we have all the metallurgical test to process them in our existing processing plant. And they are, as you can see here, close to our existing infrastructure, that's the 2 shafts that we have one side right next to the other. The combination of the 2 will give you this evolution on the operating cost of the underground mine. There is a ramp-up in parallel. We finished this year with 1,600 tonnes per day of production from the underground mine. Next year, 2025, we're going to reach around 2,000 tonnes per day. And as you can see, we will reach around 3,000 tonnes per day by 2027. So the combination of the 2 factors, the combination of having the formation of the ore bodies that we know, the concentration of the ore bodies and the mining in the next year, probably the evolution will be going into this direction. We will be concentrating the mine in the coming years next to the shaft. So we're going to be concentrating our operations in the next few years and obviously getting some cost reduction based on that. And of course, the increase of throughput help us to dilute our fixed cost in the operation. But also looking into the future of Uchucchacua mine, we have not only the existing mine that I mentioned before. We have also some good evidence of a scar deposit, a good section of ore bodies with good volume that Juan Carlos Salazar will cover in the geology presentation. So we have a good indication where the future of Uchucchacua mine might be. And we are, at the same time, developing all the engineering infrastructure to access ore body, like deepening 400 additional meters to the shaft and designing a new decline access to get easy and short-time access to the bottom of the mine. So we are doing the engineering. We will place the permits, and proof it -- or, complete exploration in order to have this as a next evolution for the long term of the Uchucchacua mine in order to build not only asset for the next 5 years, but also have an asset for more than 10 years. These 10 years in Uchucchacua will be also in combination with the other assets that we have. Yumpag mine is around 4 kilometers to the east of Uchucchacua. The Yumpag mine is a stand-alone operation that feeds all the mineral to the Uchucchacua processing plant. So they share the same processing plant. We work in batches. There is almost 20 days of Uchucchacua and 10 days of Yumpag on a single month. And as you can see here, we have the first ore body, that's Camilla, fully developed. We have access to all the ore body to all the section of the ore body. We are mining it in a sequence that allow us to make a ramp-up based on the mostly on the permits that we need to have in order to increase the production in this area. It's a very high-grade ore body. This year, 2024, probably we have with an average in the rate of $27 -- 27 ounces of silver per tonne. That's equivalent to $650 per tonne. That's the value of each single tonne of ore. And then you can see the cost that we have leave us a margin of almost $100 per each tonne that we mine in Yumpag. It's a very high-grade operation. Very concentrated. And based on that, we have the production that I showed early on the guidance for the next 3 years. Also, we are looking into the future of Yumpag. The additional reserve that we show in the first slide in which we jump with a substantial increase in silver reserve are coming from this area. This is Tomasa ore body. It's a big collection of veins and ore bodies altogether, almost 300 meters to the north of Camilla. So it's going to be mined with the same infrastructure with the same pumping system, ramp access, ventilation circuit, electrical circuit. So it's going to be a marginal cost to get there. We will be mining this area in 2020 -- late 2027, early 2028 when we have all the permits in place. But from now, we are doing all the infill drilling and developing all the ramps right next to it. So it will be ready for mining in 2028. Also, it's a very high-grade area in the area of 25, 28 ounces of silver per tonne. And it's going to be easily mining that you can see right next to the Camilla. So here also, we have a ramp-up, but also we have a cost reduction, a substantial cost reduction. Well, this is the first year in 2024, we start production in March this year. The production in 2025 is going to be the first 12 months continuous year production of Yumpag. And we will reduce cost, not only based on the increase in throughput, but also because in 2027, by the end of 2026, early 2027, we have the connection to the electrical national grid. So we will avoid using more diesel for power generation. And also in 2028, increasing throughput, substantial increase in throughput and the mining of Tomasa that is a bulk mining operation. This is kind of more of a selective mining, but Tomasa is going to be bulk mining. So the cost is going to come down to the around $140, $150 per tonne with an ore value with the price that we're using earlier of $650 per tonne. So it's going to be a substantial cash generator for the company with a life of mine right now of about 10 years. That was for silver. We have also some important evolution in gold. This is the San Gabriel outline. This is the project that is being built. Renzo Macher will cover the project development, the construction project, and we're going to get into more detail about the development of the underground mine. The underground mine in the left side of the slide, you can see in gray, all the areas that have already been opened, the tunnels. There are 2 ramps. And this is the development that we are going to make in the coming quarters. We have the contractor in place. We have our equipment. We have our crews of Buenaventura being trained in order to work in this new mining method. This is going to be an undercut-and-fill. So the experience that we are gaining in this new mining method is with the help of a consultant that we have retained his service from Nevada. He worked until next year for Nevada Gold Mines in that area. So he has a lot of experience with the undercut-and-fill mining method that we're going to use here. We are doing the training of our people right now in Tambomayo Mine. So we're training our people right now in one of our operations. And with that knowledge, we'll start -- starting digging tunnels into the ore body by the second quarter of next year. You can see also here in this part of the chart how going to be the development of the mine, the underground mine in the next 3 years, 2025 to 2027, in order to have a continuous operation in the order of 3,000 tonnes per day, or around 1 million tonnes of ore extracted and processed by year. The first level that we are going to start digging into San Gabriel in the second quarter is the one that you see there. The red line that you see development are the tunnel is running across the ore body. The gray ones are the backfill ones. When we drive the tunnel, we complete the mining of that section, and we backfill that with cemented backfill. And it's pretty much the same that Newmont and Barrick are doing here in Nevada. So it's the same mining method that we are using here. Because the quality of the ground is very poorm, so we need to do undercut-and-fill. We need to drive -- sorry, we need to drive -- the first tunnel that's going to be this one, it's going to be like a top layer, the top cut, what we call the top cut. And when we complete the top cuts and backfill with cemented backfill, we can go underneath and make some openings on a safe round, having a safe round. So the one that is more expensive is the first one, the top cut. And the one underneath is going to be more cheaper because we don't need to do so heavily roof support that we need to do in the first one. So the emphasis of the mining method here and the development that we are doing right now is to develop and get a hold of the first top cuts in the next year. When we complete the first cut, the under -- the one that are below are going to be easier to mine. So the training that we are doing, it's in Tambomayo Mine with the support of a team of people that have all the experience in Nevada, locally here in Nevada. In the case of Coimolache, Coimolache is an interesting asset because it's by the geological nature of this deposit, it has gold on top and it has some copper down below. The current operation that we have is on the upper part on the gold oxides, where we mine by open pit and we place the ore into the leaching pads in order to extract the gold. But at the same time, we're doing this structure, this mining method, this open-pit mining method, we're getting closer and closer to underneath copper deposit. That's the footprint that we have in here is the sulfide. So the sulfide deposit is down below. It's not like it's a 5 kilometer to the east or to the north, it's exactly down below. It's some 50 to 75 meters below the bottom of the open pit. So it's going to be very, very close to the surface, very, very close to the existing footprint that we are mining right now. But in the short term, we are mining the -- we have all the production. I will cover what areas are we going to develop in the coming years. The green area over here is one of the open pits that we're going to mine. This area over here is the pad. So we need to break the ore and place it in the pad. Since the third quarter next year, we will have all the permits in place in order to cover our life of mine for the gold phase. So the production in the next year, 2026, is going to be the same, breaking the ore in here and here and placing the ore in one open pad consolidated. We have fully permitted open pad with all the land required and all the access to it. So we don't need additional permits or additional purchases of land. 2027, the same, and 2028. So as I mentioned, all the mining will happen in this area and partly in this area, and we will be closer and closer to the copper sulfide project that we have done below. That's part of our long-term view. So we will complete the mining of the gold phase on the upper layer, and we will get a hold or access to the sulfides that are down below. It's an important deposit that Juan Carlos Salazar from the geology team will cover and also Renzo Macher from the engineering point of view to develop the pre-feasibility study starting right now. We have right now like 11 rigs drilling in this area to get a hold of the geological shape, getting into detail. It is a prerequisite for the pre-feasibility engineering. And from the copper purview, we have a production kind of steady production in the order of 55,000, 60,000 tonnes of copper containing to copper concentrate with a cash cost in the order of $5,800 per tonne. It's important to mention here that these cash costs include the cost of the -- or the penalties of the arsenic. It's a mine that is mining sulfides with high arsenic content. Pretty much the penalties of arsenic are in the order of $1,800 per tonne of copper. So it's $4,000 per cash cost and $1,800 per tonne of copper of arsenic penalty. So the part that we can optimize are actually $4,000 per tonne as an operating cost on the mine and the processing plant and our overheads on the mine. And how it looks like in the mine? You can see how is the evolution of the mine in the coming 3 years, in 2025, 2026 and 2027, you see different colors, what areas of the mine are going to be mined each year. The idea to show this is to get a grasp of that all the blocks that we are planning to mine in the next 3 years are within our existing footprint. They are right next to other blocks that we are mining. So we got a good assessment of the quality of the rock of the geometallurgy of each block and the access to put that into the processing plant. The other important thing in order to reduce our cost from an operational point of view is that by the end of 2025, early 2026, we will start doing the mining by ourselves. Right now, we have 100% of the underground mining by our contractor. In 2026, we'll start getting the full -- complete the transition. So we will redo all the mining in order to reduce our operating costs and put the contractor more focused on the long-term development, the exploration and development of the mine. Also, as I mentioned earlier in the presentation, the reason why we increased almost 300,000 tonnes of 5 metric tonnes of copper as a reserve between 2023 and 2024 because we complete the engineering of the phased backfill plant. So now we have geomechanical assessment and a technical assessment that we can recover most of the pillars that are underground. It's hard to see from the distance here, but most of the mining that happened in the past only removed or extracted around 50% of the ore body. The other 50% of the ore body remains underground as pillars and has not been filled. The quality of the ground is pretty good. It's open, it's void. So the idea is to put cemented backfill on both sides of the mining area in order to recover the pillars that are in between. So with this plant, cemented backfill plant, that will start construction in 2027, we can recover most of the pillars in the long term. And how the long term looks like in El Brocal, in the previous slide, we were looking kind of a zoom in this area. But the size of the deposit of El Brocal is pretty large. We have been mining this area for the last 15 years. To the north, we have the open pit that has been mining also for around 10 years. And we have all like a ring-shaped ore body all around. We have all the evidence by geophysics that we continue with the same mineralization that we have mined for the last 15 years on the ground. So we will start at the same time of doing the mining, doing the extension of the mine to the east and to the south in order to explore and access this area. The blue galleries that you see here are part of a long-term plan in order to get a hold of that. This section of the -- to the southern part of the mine is in the order of 3 kilometers, almost 2 miles, to develop -- to complete the expansion of the ore body to the south, and almost 1 mile to the east in order to get the hold to the next anomaly that we have in this area. So at the same time, we're doing this steady production in order of 58,000 tonnes of fine copper containing to concentrate per year. We are also investing right now in order to build the expansion of the life of mine. We believe that having 15 years is a good opportunity, not only to consolidate that production in the order of the 12,000 tonnes per day that we have right now, but also prove it right, there is some additional ore bodies in the southern and to the eastern part in order to reassess if that 12,000 tonnes per day is the right size for this -- or the right throughput for this asset or we can even explore further. The processing plant that we have right now is built and operated in the past when we operated open pit at around 18,000 tonnes per day. So we have the processing plant, we have the tailing dam, we have the power supply. We have now to make the assessment for the underground mine to catch up with the plant. So the future of Brocal probably will be in that regard, looking for new opportunities for doing further expansion in the underground mine and get all the facilities, all the existing facilities to work at 100% of the capacity. And this one, just to finish my presentation, is Cerro Verde. As you know, we have almost 20% stake in this mine. It's the largest copper concentrate complex worldwide with a throughput right now in the order of 450,000 tonnes per day. It's a very large operation. It's the largest copper producer in Peru and is the fourth largest copper producer globally. So it's a substantial asset for us and also an income for dividends on a yearly basis in the future. Just to wrap up what we cover in the slides, Uchucchacua and Yumpag, Uchucchacua with a 5 years life of mine right now, Yumpag with 10-year life of mine. So Uchucchacua, the effort that we're putting right now is to continue with exploration, preparing all the engineering, preparing all the permits in order to catch up with Yumpag that have 2 assets working together, feeding the same processing plant with a 10-year life of mine. San Gabriel, progressing as expected to our production this year. I covered the part of the underground mine, and Renzo will cover the construction part. Coimolache, next year, by the third quarter, we will resume operation for the gold oxide. And we will continue doing that up to 2028, 3 more years to go with the gold oxide phase. But at the same time, we will continue -- we will do in parallel the drilling and all the engineering for the pre-feasibility study of the copper sulfides that lie beneath the gold. In El Brocal, current production in the order of 12,000 tonnes per day. And we are working with the engineering and the exploration team in order to assess, is that the right size or we can push a little bit harder. The ideal is to get closer to 17,000 tonnes per day in order to catch up much with the current capacity of the existing processing plant at all the permit that we have. And of course, Cerro Verde, a cornerstone for Buenaventura in order of cash generation flow from this operation. Thank you.

Thank you, Juan Carlos. Buenaventura has a long and successful history of replacing reserves and discovering new resources in the mining district that we are being exploring. Our main objective in exploration is to extend the life of our mines and focus on high-value exploration assets. Buenaventura is actively in the most important precious metal and copper belts in Peru. In the north of Peru, La Zanja and Coimolache, original gold oxide mines are being transformed into important copper and gold projects. In Central Peru, important deposits of silver and base metal such as Uchucchacua, El Brocal, and now Yumpag. A little further south, we have the Trapiche project, located in one of the most important copper belts in Peru. And to the south, precious metal deposits such as San Gabriel and Orcopampa. On the right of the slide, we can see the evolution of our reserves and resources in the last 4 years. Gold remained stable at 4.7 million ounces. In silver, we have an increase in 12%, mainly due to the new resources in Yumpag. And finally, copper shows an increase of 5%, mainly due to the new resources from El Brocal. Now I will focus my discussion in our 2 flagship operations and 2 advanced exploration projects. The first one is Uchucchacua+Yumpag mine. At Uchucchacua, the objective of the exploration is to increase the life of the mine by more than 10 years. To do this, we are focusing on the polymetallic ore, which have a great potential to grow and is located close to existing infrastructure of the mine. In 2024, measured and indicated resources in the polymetallic ore increased 3.9% to 28.5 million ounces of silver equivalent. Most of these new resources are located in the Cachipampa target, which supports more than 90% of the mine production and still has the potential to grow at depth. Next to Cachipampa is the Luz Norte target, which is currently under resource delineation with positive results. Finally, we have Bonnie, a new skarn target. Preliminary drilling has identified at least 4 new ore bodies. This exploration is an early stage, but has the potential to increase resources significantly in the near future. Our best drill hole intercept in Bonnie -- sorry, is here, 25 meters with 3 ounces of silver, 5% lead, 5% zinc, and 0.3% copper. Yumpag is our new silver mine located 5 kilometers northeast of the Uchucchacua mine. In March of this year, we received the operational permit to begin production from Yumpag. In this first year, we plan to produce 8 million ounces of silver with an average grade of 27 ounces per tonne. This is a bonanza material. Measured and indicated resources in 2024 increased 34% to 92 million ounces of silver, while the grade increased 10% compared with the previous report. This increase was driven by a conversion of inferred resources into measured and indicated at the Tomasa and higher grades at the Camilla structure. Exploration drilling outside of the current resource model continues to deliver high grades. The last drilled hole in the Camilla structure intercepted 19.6 meters with 31 ounces of silver and 5.9 meters with 46 ounces of silver. As you can see, Yumpag starts with a mine life of more than 10 years and with great potential to continue growing its mineral resources. The second operation is El Brocal, which is an extensive hydrothermal system that extends for more than 8 kilometers within a north-south corridor. Measured and indicated resources in the underground mine increased by 43% to 1.3 million tonnes of contained copper. This increase is due to new addition and resource conversion and also the optimization of the recovery of remainder pillars, as Juan Carlos mentioned in his presentation. Our exploration in El Brocal are focused in 2 targets. The first one is in the Marcapunta volcanic center. As you can see, the copper resources are located in the upper half of the Marcapunta volcanic center in this sector. And the geophysical survey shows that the mineralization could continue in the lower half of the volcanic center. In order to explore this area, we are developing 2 exploration tunnels, which should be completed by the end of the next year. Preliminary drilling is showing the continuity of the copper mineralization for more than 300 meters on the eastern edge of the volcanic center with very encouraging results. The second target is related to the longitudinal fault, which is this one. This is an important structure that controls mineralization at El Brocal as well as in Cerro de Pasco, another important polymetallic ore deposit. The exploration tunnel should be completed by the second quarter of the next year in order to start drilling this target. As you can see, Brocal has a significant mineral endowment with exceptional exploration potential. The Zanja Sulfide is an advanced exploration project with copper and gold mineralization related to breccia pipes. This year, we completed 10,000 meters of infill drilling in 2 new breccias located in the southern part of the corridor. Mineralization in these 2 breccias start below the 3,000 meters elevation and has been recognized for more than 500 meters in vertically. Gold dominated in the upper part of the breccia with grades between 3 to 5 grams, while the copper increases at depth with grade around 1% and the potential remain open at depth. With this new result, the mineral resources increased 52% to 13.8 million tonnes with 2.2% copper equivalent. For next year, we plan to focus our exploration drilling in the northern zone, which is located here, which is an extensive area with multiple evidence of breccia with significant gold values. Finally, is the Coimolache sulfide project, which is a very large copper gold deposit sitting just below the current oxide open pit mine. This year, we completed the third infill drilling campaign, which includes 22,400 meters of drilling, focused on improving the certainty of the mineral resources. The results of this campaign have validated the geological model and the copper and gold grades are very similar of those of the previous resource. The new resource update is expected to be completed the second quarter of next year. And on this information, we will forward for the prefeasibility study of the sulfide projects. Now let me turn it over to Renzo Macher, who leads projects.

Thank you, and good morning to everyone. I'm going to be explaining the projects. And first, let's start with the pipeline. Since its beginning, Buenaventura has been developing its own deposits through exploration, mainly focusing on gold, silver and copper. As you can see, thanks to those efforts, we have been able to build this solid project -- pipeline of projects. Moreover, over the last 7 years, we have been developing this solid project delivery methodology to make sure that all these explorations turn into stable operations. And thanks to that, we're seeing the first results. This year, we -- earlier this year, we started the operation at Yumpag. Next year, we are going to be delivering San Gabriel towards the end of the year. And we can see here that Trapiche, which is our next copper project is going to be -- it's finishing its feasibility study. And finally, as Juan Carlos was saying, the Coimolache Sulfuros is the one starting its pre-feasibility studies. So let's get a little deeper into San Gabriel and Trapiche. San Gabriel, our main goal next year is to produce the first gold bars towards the end of the year. We are currently at 65% progress with a reduced risk profile. As we have seen, we have reached 80% of all the earth-moving activities, which means that we already find the bottom of all the foundation levels. So there's no more uncertainty in geotech. We have a solid community relationship program that with no stoppage or no major problems in the community over the last couple of years. Our strategy for non-stopping engineering and procurement is finally paying off as we have all the materials, all the equipment and all the contractors on place and not any contractors, top-notch contractors in Peru, like COSAPI and HV, who are going to be building the plant, who are currently building the plant. Our operational readiness efforts, we finished the planning, and we're currently, as Juan Carlos was saying, hiring the people, training the people to make sure that we have trained operators to start towards the middle of next year. And finally, our commissioning team, which was already hired, trained and are going to get into the field in the first quarter of next year. So this is the efforts we have been doing with this commissioning team. We call it commissioning readiness. And in order to make sure that we have a smooth startup and that we can reach stable operation, we need to secure 5 things. The first one is power. As you can see in the picture, there's the power line under construction. It's currently at 35% progress, and we plan to finish in June. We have a backup plan in case we have a problem there. We can start the commissioning process with the generators on site as well as with the substation that is currently under construction. And this is used for what we call commissioning 1, which is with power, no load. Then we will need water, which is for commissioning 2, when we add water and test all the equipment. And you can see the picture here with the water dam currently at 35% progress. And we think that towards September, we're going to be able to conclude this as we pass this rainy season. Our backup plan here is we have enough storage capacity for water. So commissioning is going to be covered. Once we finish commissioning 1 and 2, we're going to start putting some ore. So ore is the next resource that we need. We have already 90,000 tonnes of ore ready to process right at the side of the plant. So that's not going to be a problem. And we're going to use this ore for the C3 and C4 commissioning. C3, it's testing each equipment and C4 is testing the whole system. And finally, we need a waste deposit that we face it in 2 sections. The first one is already completed. The next one will be delivered on February. And finally, a tailings storage facility, which is currently at 45% progress, and we're aiming to finish that in April. So moving to the processing plant commissioning. As I was telling you, all the main contractors are already on site. And you can see there under each picture, there's the different contracts. There's only 2 contractors for all those 4 contracts. And following the logic of the previous slide, we're planning to have the crusher ready for C1 and C2 commissioning between February and March, grinding between May and June, the [ seal ] process and the [ gold room ] between April and May and finally, the filter between April and May as well. Once we finish all this, we're going to move to C3. We're going to put some ore into each one of these facilities. That will take place between July and August and finally run the system to stable operations in September. So moving to Trapiche, our goal here is to deliver a world-class bankable study, bankable feasibility study around 2026. And this is Trapiche, it's a copper mine. It's an open pit -- side-hill open pit copper mine with an SXEW plan to produce copper cathodes. Where are we? We have finished all the field works. As you can see in the picture, we have a metallurgical on-site pilot plant to test columns. This year, we finished loading the column with the next 100 columns to test variability. And we're going to start receiving the results towards the mid next year. And with that, we will complete our models and project the feasibility study towards 2026. Not only that, but we're also working on securing the lands and the permits for the project. So we have completed external access land right of path with the community. We have signed an agreement and we are working with them in constructing it. The power line lands, we are at 70% completion. There are 7 communities there. We have signed agreements with 4 of them. There's 3 more to go. So probably next year, we're going to be having this completed. And finally, the environmental permit, I think this is a great thing that happened this year. We were able to complete 2 public assemblies with the community. We already received the questions from the authority and we're in the process of resolving those questions. So summarizing, the project department is going to be supporting these 2 pillars, San Gabriel, First Gold bar by the end of next year. And finally, Trapiche with a world-class bankable study to feed this capital allocation committee. And with that, I'll leave you with Aldo Massa.

Good morning, everybody. I'm going to present business development and commercial. Buenaventura has successfully divested mining assets over the last 4 years that were not aligned with Buenaventura's growth strategy, such as the Mallay mines in October 2020 and sold assets to finance the capital required by Buenaventura to enhance and expand its core mining operation, which was the case of the sale of Buenaventura's 41% stake in Minera Yanacocha, the sale of Contacto that was our insurance company and the divestment of Chaupiloma, 1.8% NSR royalty. This demonstrates management team's commitment to regularly review our portfolio of projects and mining operation with a focus on maximizing shareholder value. We are currently implementing a strategic framework to maximize the value of these 3 mines, Orcopampa, Tambomayo and Julcani by fully unlocking their geological processing and operational potential. The framework is based on the evaluation of the following main pillars: first, geological potential; second, mineral processing; and third, mining operations. Once the analysis has been completed, we will define the asset management strategy for each operations to ensure we create the highest value for Buenaventura's shareholders, whether to maintain production, explore further sell or close the mines. In the left hand of the chart, we have our corporate guidelines. As you can see, Buenaventura is focused on achieving long-term annual production of 140,000 ounces of gold, 18 million ounces of silver and 130,000 tonnes of copper through our underground and open pit mining operations, positioned in the second quartile of the cash cost curve, the operation should have respective mine life of 5 years for underground and 10 years for open pits with a large minimum annual EBITDA of $100 million per year. As you may know, Buenaventura's growth strategy, which is part of our DNA is focused on the exploration and development of our mines as is the case of San Gabriel, Trapiche, Coimolache and La Zanja. We have been successful in organic growth with a focus on development of our own projects. However, we also recognize the value created through inorganic growth. Buenaventura has actively explored and drilled in Mexico and Chile in the past. And today, we continue to view M&A as an alternative to boost metal production and cash flow as well as to replace output and revenue from aging mines. Let me share some of our related criteria. The third one is advanced exploration projects where we see geological potential to expand mineral resources through JV partnerships. The second is both active and suspended mining operation and also potential acquisition for Buenaventura, and we will focus on projects with consolidated mineral properties. Which are the [indiscernible] regions we will focus on in the future? Of course, Peru, that is our home country and also Central and South America, which will enable us to diversify our portfolio and gold projects will ensure a balanced metal mix. As a closing statement for business development, as a conclusion in business, I would like to emphasize Buenaventura's ability to balance organic and inorganic growth strategy that will ensure our long-term business sustainability. The integration of assets, management, exploration expertise and disciplined M&A activity position Buenaventura to maintain product targets, manage cost effectively and maximize shareholder value. Now we will move into the commercial area. As everybody knows Buenaventura has a world-class diversified portfolio focused on metals with some strong fundamentals. The future for copper is very bullish. The demand for copper is expected to grow in the next years, driven by the energy transition and new products are not keeping up with the demand. The market is expected to go into a structural deficit by 2028 and 2029 and around 34% of our sales come from copper. This does not include our 20% stake in [ Cerro Verde ]. Gold prices reached an all-time high in November in an environmental of geopolitical instability due to international conflicts, although the upcoming U.S. administrator should strain the dollar, which will pressure gold prices. We believe that gold price should remain high as it now has a higher floor. Silver as a precious metal has been following gold's uptrend, but this is -- this industrial use and its importance for the energy transition has better fundamentals than gold for the future. Market, as you can see -- sorry, market, as you can see that this is for copper concentrate, zinc concentrate and lead concentrates are in the lower end and have even reached negative values, some of which for the first time ever. We have taken advantage of the -- sorry, we have taken advantage of these great spot terms for 2025 contracts, which we expect will enable us to generate additional $44.6 million in revenues compared to our 2024 contracts. And finally, we have accomplished our goal for this year and successfully signed a contract with Cerro Verde to start marketing at least a portion of our offtake. We will begin with a small portion of 40,000 to 50,000 tonnes per year, which will enable us to increase our portfolio of products and will help us better commercial terms overall. This will not affect Cerro Verde sales, profit or dividends in any way. Thank you.

Thank you, Aldo. Good morning to everybody. I will go through some financial messages for the company. Year 2024 was -- or represents a turning point for Buenaventura. In the following years, we expect to generate positive free cash flow from our operations, basically by focusing on our 4 flagships. These are Uchucchacua and Yumpag, El Brocal, San Gabriel and Coimolache. We have already secured full funding for San Gabriel project with the proceeds coming from the Chaupiloma Royalty sale, the dividends that we receive from Cerro Verde every year and the cash that we receive -- that regenerate from our operations. We want to focus our capital allocation in exploring and developing projects with high return for our shareholders. And of course, we will also pay dividends to our shareholders. And finally, we have managed to reduce our leverage ratio to below 1x net debt over EBITDA. Going through our financial estimates, year 2024 represented a very important or very significant growth in respect to the previous year, basically due to better production from Yumpag, silver production from Yumpag and of course, as Aldo mentioned, the better commercial terms at El Brocal. For the following years, we expect a stable production or stable revenue outcome of between $1.1 billion and $1.2 billion. But in year 2025, we will have a slight decrease. As Juan Carlos mentioned, we will reduce the production from Orcopampa and Tambomayo. In year '26 and '27 and going forward, we will replace the revenues from Orcopampa and Tambomayo with the production of San Gabriel. Our EBITDA followed the same path of our revenues. This year, we had a strong or significant growth compared to last year. Next year, we will have a slight decrease in the EBITDA. But in year '26 and going forward, we will be a company that generates around $400 million of EBITDA per year. Cost reduction is one of our priorities. We are working very hard in order to locate our costs in the second quartile of the curve. At El Brocal, we will stabilize the cost below $6,000 per tonne. Basically, as Juan Carlos mentioned, by increasing the throughput to [ 12,500 ] tonnes per day of throughput. At Uchucchacua, we will be producing at a cost of between $12 and $13 per ounce, basically by focusing on the grade -- the high grades of Yumpag. In San Gabriel, we are going to start production as a full year in 2026 and we are going to be producing at a cash cost of close to $1,300. However, there's an opportunity to reduce this cost close to $1,200 per ounce by increasing the plant capacity of San Gabriel. And in Coimolache, we are going to stabilize the cash cost in $1,000 per ounce when we resume the operations next year. Capital allocation. As I mentioned, we are going to focus on explorations and projects with high return. For this year and 2025, most of our CapEx was devoted to build the San Gabriel project, while maintaining the maintenance CapEx in the order of $90 million to $100 million. In the following years after 2026, we will not have big growth CapEx, and we will focus on the maintenance CapEx to increase the life of mine of our operations and to continue with the optimization at our operations that will permit us to reduce costs. In '26 and '27, maintenance CapEx should be in the order of $100 million to $120. Regarding our liability management, we -- as we announced in the past, our intentions are to refund our bond in the next year, basically in the first quarter of 2025. Depending on the appetite of the market, we could go -- we could increase the maturity of our bond to 7 years or 10 years. As all know, Fitch upgraded Buenaventura recently to BB stable, basically considering the following factors: a solid balance sheet, liquidity, the higher EBITDA margins that we are reporting every quarter and the financial discipline to decrease the leverage ratio below 1x. Our goal is to maintain this leverage ratio below 1.5x or 2x. Finally, going through our free cash flow expected for the following 3 years. As you can see, we are very conservative in prices, especially in copper, $8,800 per tonne. And with this level of prices, we are going to start the year -- next year with close to $400 million of cash. We will generate between $320 million and $350 million of EBITDA. We will pay $45 million from the -- of taxes from the asset sale. Our CapEx program is for next year around $390 million to $400 million. And we will -- we expect to receive $150 million of dividends from Cerro Verde. Here, I am being a little bit conservative. This year, we are going to receive $180 million of dividends. If the prices continue at this level, we should be receiving a little bit more than $150 million. So by the end of year 2025, our cash position should be in the order of $380 million. Year '26, with San Gabriel starting production, we should be generating an EBITDA of more than $350 million, $380 million. The CapEx should be reduced to $140 million or less because we will just focus on maintenance CapEx. We will pay dividends and we will receive dividends from Cerro Verde in the order of $150 million. By the end of year 2026, we should have a cash position in excess of $600 million. In year '27, our EBITDA should be closer to $400 million with CapEx as well, only devoted for maintenance CapEx. Financial expenses and dividends, $130 million. And again, $150 million coming from Cerro Verde. By the end of 2027, we should have a cash position of more than $850 million. As you can see, there's a path of growth and we are very optimistic that we will be generating cash in the following years. Now I turn back to Leandro.

Thank you, Daniel. Before we close the presentation, I would like to highlight these 5 strong ideas we have for our strategy of what we offer to you to our investors. We are committed to increase the operational efficiency, reducing costs, making -- embracing innovation and also involve our team in continuous improvement. We will continue our effort to reducing costs and making the company much more efficient. We are improving also our long-term visibility. We have been asked in the past why we cannot work with assets -- longer assets. And now we are working with geology and Juan Carlos Salazar and Juan Carlos Ortiz in increasing our life of mines of all our mines. And the effort, you can see this year what we are -- how we advance in that objectives. We are going to focus in our flagship mines, the 4 we have mentioned. We have compromised without efficient capital allocation to -- in order to reach the best decision-making and also the best value for our investors. If of course -- and of course, our prudent liability management that Daniel has explained to you. And as a result, we have received yesterday the new clarification from Fitch that help us for the long term that we are going to have with our bonus program that we are going to -- have to work in January. In summary, our focus, efficiency, visibility, flagship assets, disciplined and efficient capital allocation and prudent liability management is our focus in the long run. We foresee a better years coming, as Daniel explained. And I would like to thank you for continued support and we're ready for your questions. Thank you very much.

Thank you all for your attention throughout today's presentation. We hope it provided valuable insights into Buenaventura's strategy, projects and vision for the future. Now we would like to open the floor for questions. To ensure we address everyone's questions effectively. We will first take questions from those here in the room. Afterwards, we will move to the questions submitted via the live webcast. Let's begin with the questions from the floor.

Alex Hacking from Citi. Let me first ask on capital allocation, if that's okay. The balance sheet is now back in a very strong position. You're coming to the end of the CapEx cycle with San Gabriel. So how should investors think about the possibility of increased capital return going forward and how you're going to balance investing in growth and shareholder returns?

As Daniel explained, we have planned to reach the use -- the dividend policy we used to have, and we should begin -- yes, and after completing San Gabriel, we should have -- we should go back to our policy you used to have. I don't know if that's it.

Okay. And what -- sorry, what's going to be the target leverage ratio?

Alex as I mentioned -- thanks for your question. We are currently in 1x net debt over EBITDA. And our target is close to 1.5x for the following year, 2025 with an intense CapEx for San Gabriel and for the future, '26, '27, below 1x.

Okay. And would you consider a buyback program? Or it's just going to be dividends?

This is something that we need to discuss internally first. But as Leandro mentioned, our priority after completing San Gabriel CapEx will be to meet our dividend policy, which, by the way, is not less than 20% of the net income and plus the dividends -- the 20% of the dividends that we received from Cerro Verde.

Okay. And then just, I guess, one more question, if I might. Can you just remind me of the timing of the transition at Coimolache to the copper sulfides and when we should expect to get some kind of update on a potential project there?

Yes. We have the life of mine of Coimolache and production steam until 2028. During this time, we are working on the project. We are in the conceptual phase. And we expect to have all the things ready to begin construction after Trapiche is working on. We are not building 2 projects at the same time. So in order to be -- in order to have the enough capital and enough resources to invest, we decided many years ago to construct -- to build one project first at the one time. I don't know, Juan Carlos, if you want to add something?

Yes. The gold oxide phase will be completed by 2028. And probably by the same time, 2028, we will have completion of the feasibility study of copper sulfides.

Okay. So just to confirm then that there will be a period where Coimolache effectively ceases mining. Okay.

Yes. Very likely in this scenario, where we continue doing exploration and looking for some other opportunity that we have in the same footprint. So probably, yes, the current scenario is that one. Probably we're looking into a continuous operation, a smooth transition.

Carlos Ago with Morgan Stanley. So before I ask my question, just a confirmation on what Alex asked. The dividend then resumes in 2026 at the earliest after you complete the construction of San Gabriel next year.

Yes. For next year, we are planning to raise the amount we have been paying the last 3 years. And once we finish the construction of San Gabriel, we will go back to our dividend policy we used to have.

First question I have is, if you could remind us just what are the pending permits that you still have, just to make sure that we don't miss anything and the timing of when you expect them to get those?

In terms of Coimolache, we should expect in this quarter the construction permit of the leach pad. In the case of Trapiche, we should expect the environmental permit in 2025 in the second half. With that permit, we can begin the construction. And of course, sorry, and San Gabriel, we should have the construction permit, the operational permit in the -- at the second half in June or July, by the end of 2025.

Okay. All right. And final question, do you have any update on the tax dispute in the core system that you usually have with [indiscernible]?

No, no, no. We are -- it's moving forward, but very -- it takes a lot of time in our initial power to resolve our cases. There is no news to share.

Okay. It's Tanya Jakusconek from Scotiabank. I have several questions. So I just want to start with the capital allocation again, which you said will start in, I guess, Q4 next year when San Gabriel is up. Have you thought about maybe going to a more fixed dividend policy so that you would be attracting dividend funds rather than this floating 20%?

Well, we will see what -- first to go back to our dividend policies. We are not doing this with any -- to attract any funds, any different funds. We have to think emphatic that we have closed and we have changed the dividend we have paid to our investors. In the last 3 years, we have restricted dividend payments and we have to go back to our policy. That is our effort and our objective.

Okay. And then maybe just continuing on capital spend. Can you just remind us what it's going to cost you to do the Coimolache sulfides? And then also on Trapiche, is the capital still $1.5 billion, $1.6 billion?

Yes. In Coimolache, we have a very, very conceptual study. And the first number we have is $640 million of CapEx. That is the underground project. And Trapiche, it's between $1.2 billion and $1.5 billion.

And can you just remind me the production coming from Coimolache and Trapiche just per annum is 150 and the other 170.

Yes. Coimolache around 70,000 tonnes per year of fine copper. And Trapiche is the same, 70,000, 75,000 tonnes of copper or refined copper yearly.

Okay. And then just maybe how you're seeing the funding of this, especially the funding for Trapiche. Are you thinking maybe you would bring a partner in for that project?

Yes, Tanya. That's why the emphasis of -- Renzo when he explained Trapiche is a bankable project. It's a -- this is a big project for us, and we have been telling the market that in the right moment, we should look for a partnership to develop this project.

Okay. Just maybe on your M&A strategy, you mentioned that you're trying to find some assets, obviously, Peru, but in Central and South America and early stage and so forth. Can you maybe share with us where you would not go in Central and South America, first of all, so I can eliminate those countries? And then secondly, how early stage? Is it more exploration or are you looking for something that already has defined resources?

Yes, it's not -- it's only advanced stage exploration. And we were looking in South America in 3 countries, of course, Peru, then Guyana and also Argentina. There are 3 countries we are looking for some projects. We're in an early stage really. We just signed NDAs and the idea is to look for those projects and take a decision in the future if we're going ahead or not. The rationale behind the M&A is because if you see -- we feel very comfortable our production. We feel that we are hedged between the industrial metals and precious metals. And we foresee reduced production in the future, a reduced production of gold compared with the one that we will have on copper. So our effort is to look for any project in gold primarily.

Okay. And maybe just on your M&A strategy, would you think about potentially increasing your interest in Cerro Verde?

No, that -- I think this is not in our plans. We feel comfortable with our 20% -- 19-point-something.

Okay. And maybe just my last question, maybe on San Gabriel. Can we just have an idea of how the development and the decline is going? You have some tough ground conditions. So I'm interested in what your advance rate is and sort of your cost per development per meter.

Well, right now, we have 2 crews driving tunnels in San Gabriel underground. The average development is about 550 meters per month, the combined fleet running together. We will add an additional fleet in April next year. And then we will add the Buenaventura's fleet by July through October, more for production than mine development. Development will be ready. We are accessing ore right now. So as today, the idea is to have more extended footprint there once we have all the construction completed in order to place the ore in surface. So now we are focused on waste development. And in the second half of the next year, we will be more opening in the ore body itself. Sorry, it's about -- right now, it's around $5,000 per meter.

Yes. One more question for me. On the asset potential sales, any timing as to when we should receive updates? Or have you set the time internally to explore and analyze those potential divestments?

This is Juan Carlos. Right now, as we -- as I explained, we are reevaluating these 3 mines. The idea is to have a final conclusion maybe in 5 or 6 months. Probably in July, August, we will know what we're going to do with these 3 mines.

Cesar Perez-Novoa from BTG Pactual. Thank you for the presentation by the way. It was really detailed. If I may, I know that you showed forecast for 2028 that would be the profile that you're visiting today. But perhaps when we think about Buenaventura on a longer-term basis, you have projects like Trapiche, Coimolache. Would it be correct to assume that you are headed to become a 200,000 metric tonne producer? That would be fully -- at full production, of course. That will depend whether you include partners or not. And I was wondering if you could actually provide us a longer-term outlook when you think about gold, maybe the integration between Yumpag, Tomasa within the Uchucchacua district, what silver profile would you be able to attain with that?

In terms of silver, we will be situating between 15 million ounces to 18 million ounces. In terms of copper with Brocal, Trapiche and Coimolache, 200,000 tonnes of refined copper per year. And gold, depending on what Aldo bring to the table, 130,000, 150,000 ounces of gold.

Okay. That would be your long-term profile?

Long-term profile.

So let's now move to the questions submitted via the live webcast. The first question comes from Orlando Barriga of Credicorp. If I understand correctly, you will start buying copper concentrates from Cerro Verde so that you can mix it with El Brocal's copper concentrates to improve quality. Is that correct? If so, that implies you will get better TCs?

Thank you for the question. There's no way that we're going to mix copper concentrate from Cerro Verde with Brocal. As you know, Brocal has between 8% and 11% arsenic and the maximum range that we can enter into China is 0.5 -- if we have to blend that material, I think that we need more than double the production of Cerro Verde. The idea is to sell the concentrate that we bought from Cerro Verde directly. And you know that there is so much demand for clean material that with the material of Cerro Verde, we will get better terms for Brocal for many of our concentrates. I already put that improvement in the terms in the presentation. Part of this $44.6 million is because we are -- we will sell some of material of Cerro Verde.

The next question comes from Henrique Braga of Morgan Stanley. On M&A, can the company provide more details regarding those possibilities? Are you in advanced talks on that universe? Will the company deviate from gold, silver and copper, for example, lithium?

As I already explained, we are in an early stage, only just signed NDAs with some projects. And the idea is to stay in gold, silver and copper. As Leandro said, most probably we are going into gold more than silver and copper, not yet with lithium.

The next question comes from [indiscernible]. Will the target of 1x of leverage in the midterm be affected by Trapiche?

Well, as Aldo explained, Trapiche is in a very early stages. So we don't know yet how we are going to face that. We could eventually find -- look for a partner and will depend on that. However, we -- our goal is to maintain the leverage ratio below 2x.

At this time, there are no further questions. That concludes the Q&A session of today's event. I would like to turn it back over to Leandro Garcia for closing remarks.

Thank you for coming today and being with us and the possibility for us to share our strategy for the following years. Be sure that this team is making all the efforts to give you the return back and increase your -- our price -- our share price and increase our dividends. We are focusing on being very low-cost [ producer ] in order to maintain in the long term, Buenaventura as an excellent company to invest. Thank you very much.