Cora Gold Limited (CORA) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Good afternoon, and welcome to the Cora Gold Limited investor presentation. [Operator Instructions] Before we begin, I would like to submit the following poll. And I would now like to hand you over to CEO, Bert Monro. Good afternoon.

Brilliant. Thank you very much, and thank you, everyone, who's been able to join this morning. Looking forward to giving you an update on Cora's progress and obviously plans for the future as well. For those of you who don't know me or the story, I'm obviously the CEO of Cora. I've been running Cora for the last 6.5 years or so as Cora has obviously progressed from a sort of a pre-resource exploration company through maiden resource scoping studies, feasibility studies and obviously, where we stand today where we're progressing through sort of final permitting before we look to move into construction as soon as we can. So that's a brief bit about me. Obviously, I'm here to talk about Cora and predominantly our Sanankoro Gold project in Mali and Southern Mali today. I'll just get straight into it. Hopefully, everyone can see the slides. So just an overview, Cora Gold is an AIM-listed company. As I mentioned, our focus is the Sanankoro Gold project, which is a 1 million ounce plus project in Southern Mali. Additionally, we've got a really interesting looking exploration asset called Madina Foulbé in Eastern Senegal in the KKI, arguably the most prolific sort of gold exploration corridor in West Africa of late. So very much focused in Francophone West Africa. We've got a great team on the ground, which has been with us very, very little staff turnover through the years as we've developed up those projects and obviously progress forward. So I'm going to start obviously focus on Sanankoro and obviously, background on the project and then talk about obviously permitting as well and obviously, the next steps to take the project forward. Then I'll also touch obviously on Madina Foulbé and in Senegal and then a little bit on sort of the corporate side of things. And then obviously, there'll be Q&A at the end as well. So I'll just start with Sanankoro. So obviously, as I said, it's in Southern Mali, quite near the border with Guinea. It's about a 4-hour drive south of Bamako. For context, you're driving about 4 hours. So you're driving for most of the way on a tarmac road up until about 25, 30 kilometers short of the project, then you're on a dirt road. So logistically, it's in a good spot. [Audio Gap] Of the benefit of that is obviously, it's a free-digging material, which obviously has very high recoveries, obviously helps to keep your operating cost as low as possible because you don't need to drill and blast, you're in ore from surface. And then when you move into the processing of it as well, you don't need to go through multiple stages of crushing. It can go through, in our case, a scrubber and straight into through a mill for some of it and then straight to CIL. So we'll talk a little bit more about that later, but the project is really positive in that. When you look at those numbers, I mean, at a $3,500 gold price, so a decent chunk below where we are now, a 98% IRR, 0.7 years payback period is obviously fantastic. At the moment, we stand at a 10-year reserve life. Obviously looking to expand that in the later years. The production profile drops a little bit. And obviously, we're doing some drilling now, again, I'll touch on later, but obviously looking to expand the reserve life in the future. CapEx of $124 million. Again, we'll talk about the financing previously. We obviously signed up various financings this year, both equity financing, but also stream as well, which obviously fully funds the project. So for us, the project is in a great location in Southern Mali to operate from. The project itself is a really fantastic open pit oxide project with ore from surface, which is great, delivering very strong free cash flow, a quick payback period and a manageable CapEx, which we have fully funded through various financing arrangements we'll touch on a little bit more in the future. So straight into, obviously, the funding of it. As you saw on the last slide, it's got $124 million project CapEx to get it into positive cash flow. We're currently doing the FEED of the project, which is obviously your first phase before you move into construction, but the FEED forms part of your CapEx. So we're actually currently spending some of our equity, some of our cash on the FEED, which obviously forms part of the $124 million CapEx. Earlier this year, we brought in a new significant shareholder called Eagle Eye Asset Holdings, which actually put out an announcement this morning where they're just doing an internal restructuring and obviously, their shareholding will be moving to an A2MP, which is another group company. But effectively, we took some [indiscernible] Eagle Eye early this year, they became our largest shareholder, a significant shareholder at 29% as part of a nearly GBP 16 million fundraise, which was supported by other existing shareholders and other new shareholders as well. Then a month or so later, we signed $120 million binding stream agreement with Eagle Eye, which fully funded the project. Additionally and significantly, we have the right to replace -- we have the right to replace 50% of that stream with traditional senior debt as well. We're currently working through a debt process for that 50% replacement of the stream. That's going very positively, have lots of interest in looking to replace 50% of the stream with debt and really good to see that we've got a number of banks in the data room, and we're obviously working through that process. So hopefully, more to follow on that in the near future. But I think for investors or potential investors, I think, obviously, significant that we've got commitments for the money we need to build a project, which is obviously a great position to be in. In terms of the strategy and the time line, clearly, it's to develop Sanankoro as quickly as we can and deliver gold pour as soon as we can. That's been our focus. We've been working with SENET, which is South African engineering firm. They did both our feasibility study in 2022 and also the feasibility study we updated at the end of last year. As I said, SENET, is part of the DRA Group based out of Johannesburg. They've built a number of mines in West Africa and importantly, in Mali as well, and they've also been involved in other expansion projects in Mali. So SENET have got a great track record of delivering in Mali, and we've obviously worked with them for a long time now, which is great. In terms of what we're planning to build, it's a straightforward gravity CIL processing plant. This is the type of plant that have been built for a couple of decades now in West Africa. So we aren't bringing in any forms of new technology. We've got a straightforward metallurgy for our project as well. So we get very good recoveries into the mid-90%, which is obviously fantastic. The only difference probably from our plant from some other West African plants we're looking to take maximum advantage of this oxide ore and obviously have incorporated a scrubber circuit, which reduces the size of the ball mill you need, which obviously then reduces the power requirement you need to drive your ball mill. So looking over the sort of life of mine, our view is if you can reduce your life of mine power requirement, it should help maintain as low an OpEx as possible. I think particularly in a period that we're going through now with sort of uncertain times around diesel pricing. I think having both solar hybrid power and having a lower power plant obviously was a good transition we made between the 2 feasibility studies. But look, this is just taking through the time line, development time line. And obviously, 16 to 18 months before from when you commenced to getting into gold pour and really kicking off. So it's a relatively quick process, which is good. So where we're at now with the project. We obviously delivered an updated feasibility study at the end of last year. And I'm going to talk about permitting in a minute, which obviously comes into the time line. But obviously, the government opened up after a period of permit moratorium and opened up the permitting process again. We saw obviously operating miners transition on to the new mining code. Obviously, we've seen ourselves receive our first permit renewal, which is obviously the first phase of getting the mining permit. With that sort of confidence and with that progress happening in country, we've obviously committed to get with the FEED -- a number of benefits of doing that. Obviously, it should expedite our transition into production when we get a mining permit. Obviously, by getting the feed out of the way, we can hopefully transition as quickly as we can into full-scale construction rather than having a month -- 3- to 4-month period of sort of before we can sort of break ground. So by getting on with the FEED, it's obviously speeding up the process of our transition. It obviously locks in a lot of other elements of the project as well. So that's been good to get on with that and obviously been working on that with SENET. We've also been doing work around the TSF as well, not only from a FEED perspective, but also land compensation for -- there was a smallish farm on an aspect of the TSF. So we had to effectively acquire that land off the farmer and other technical work as well. We did a big improvement project on the existing exploration camp as well. So it's a much better shape now, which is great. So it's ready for the commencement of construction and exploration camp. There will be a purpose-built mine camp built as well. But certainly, in the first phase of construction, you'll be using -- the construction teams will be using the exploration camp. So that was upgraded to make sure it was fit for purpose, which was great. So the work over the last few months has gone really well. Team has done a really good job. And obviously, we're just working through the final phase of the FEED, obviously, as we stand right now. Diving into the CapEx on the project and obviously, the flow sheet. I think I've sort of touched on it briefly, but I appreciate on a presentation, it's always quite hard to see on your screen. But effectively, it's a traditional or conventional gravity CIL circuit, which we've obviously done a lot of work around to make sure it's as optimized for [indiscernible] what we need. So we've incorporated the benefit of a scrubber circuit. Effectively, what the scrubber does is it obviously reduces the amount of material that needs to go through our ball mill. And obviously, some of the material can go straight from the scrubber directly to your CIL. The impact that has is by having a smaller ball mill is you need less power. And obviously, the benefit of having less power is you don't need as many generators which burn through an awful lot of diesel. So I think that's obviously the massive win for our flow sheet. It didn't make really any change to the CapEx, to be honest. It wasn't a CapEx decision. It was really about maintaining it lower OpEx or as lower requirement to need a lot of diesel as possible. Obviously, on the left-hand side, there's just the breakdown of the CapEx. I don't necessarily jump into each line item. Obviously, as part of the FEED, we're obviously firming up those CapEx numbers. We're looking to obviously build out from there. So I mean, look, I think the numbers are all tied in. Obviously, we've done 2 feasibility studies now and working with existing engineering firms and obviously construction partners who have been building these projects in Mali and West Africa. So I'm happy with those numbers. So yes, just a bit around operating costs. I think I probably talked enough about the ball mill and the scrubbing circuit. I mean, obviously, another thing we've obviously brought into this project is a hybrid -- we are planning to bring in is obviously a hybrid power solution, obviously, incorporating solar as well as diesel gensets. On the current 10-year life of mine, obviously has the benefit of a significant reduction in diesel usage, as you can see there. Obviously, our anticipation is the mine life will get longer and longer. And obviously, that benefit will increase as I'm sure everyone is aware, the cost of solar panels has come down massively over the last 5, 10 years. I think, obviously, the cost of batteries and the integration of batteries is obviously still something which is being -- still has plenty of room for improvement. So as it stands, it will be solar predominantly in the day and then obviously using the diesel gensets overnight is effectively how it will operate. If you're looking at the production profile now, and I think obviously about to touch on it, but one of the reasons we're still drilling and every company needs to keep drilling is, frankly, every year of production, you've got a year less mine life. It goes without saying. But if you look at our production profile, towards the end of the mine life, you're processing low-grade tails and your production is really dropping off at the end. So for us, our belief is we'll be able to maintain your sort of average production levels in the first 4 years for a significantly longer period of time rather than seeing that dip off from year 7 like you can see in front of you now. It's a case of being underdrilled. I mean we've got about 7 kilometers of strike length in MRE in resources, but we've got probably 25 kilometers or more of mineralized strike length on our permit area. So not guaranteed to get the same ounces per kilometer we've currently already got. But what I'm saying is all of our deposits are currently open. We're drilling them at the moment. And our belief is we will continue to grow our resources. And obviously, we'll be looking to translate this into reserves as well in the future. So yes, obviously, we've got 1 million ounce of resources, but we've got about just over half of that has been converted into reserves. So we've got 530,000-ounce reserve at just over 1.1 grams a tonne with a sub 5:1 strip ratio. It's a really good starting point. It's a really good basis point for the project, obviously gives us that 10 years of reserve life. We've also done an exercise where we effectively pit-optimized inferred resources, which obviously need an indicated resource to be converted to a reserve. So we pit optimized inferred resources using the same mining parameters as our reserves. And it gave us on our existing 1 million ounce resource, another 170,000 ounces of sort of mineable ore, which I guess one would expect with further drilling would be converted into reserves. So our view is, we can see very clearly line of sight to expanding the 10-year reserve life. Notwithstanding, obviously, we're also doing drilling now to look to expand our existing MRE. So 530,000 ounces is a great start, gives us the basis point for a project with an unbelievably quick payback period and obviously significant free cash flow generation, but we certainly believe it will expand significantly in the future. Again, I touched on this already. You obviously got 1 million ounces at just over 1 gram a tonne of MRE. As you can see from the tables, the vast proportion of our resources are in oxide, obviously, with some additional ounces in transition and really nothing really in fresh. That doesn't mean there isn't fresh resources to be found in the future. Our average drill hole depth is probably only 120, 130 meters deep. We've done a couple of deeper holes into the fresh, and we've obviously got a couple more coming in this drill program we're looking to finish very soon this time around as well. So I'm sure in a decade's time or more, there will be the ability for a fresh rock mine to be opened up at Sanankoro. But I think our focus is on maximizing the oxide material. It's your lowest-hanging fruit. You can mine it and process it on a really good OpEx basis, maintaining a lower sustaining capital on the basis that it's easy free-digging material and can be processed in a relatively straightforward manner. So obviously, very robust starter resource, obviously, currently drilling, which we'll touch on some drill results, I think, on the next slide. But as a basis, a very strong position to be in at this stage. We're currently drilling -- at the moment, we're just coming to the end of a 12 plus thousand meter drill program. I think on the back of the success of some of the holes we've already released, we're looking to obviously maximize the meters we can get within the allocated budget we gave to the geo team for the program. So the program is going to be more than 12,000 meters, which is great. And obviously, the early results have been extremely positive. I think if I just jump straight, it was 89% complete this drilling at the end of September. We're obviously now in the middle of October, and we're very close to finishing all the drill holes. So that's good to see. Touching on some of the results we've released to date. I think what's important to say is these results are basically all outside of the MRE picture. So the purpose of this drilling because all of our deposits were open was to try and look to see if we can optimize those deposits by effectively drilling around the edges up and down strike and obviously underneath and try to make sure we maximize the existing deposit pit shells. So the first set of results we released was from Zone B had some absolutely phenomenal holes outside of the existing pit shell, 22 meters at 2.2, 34 meters at 6.7 and these are really, really good drill holes, like 50 meters at a gram a tonne. So those are some really nice holes to see coming out of Zone B initially. And then obviously, just this morning, we announced the results from Selin. We are just consistently very good in line with the MRE, which is what you want to see. I think Murray Paterson, our Chief Geo always says that the key to good mining operations is to have nice consistent ore bodies. And I think just seeing so many consistent holes, which reinforce the existing resource is obviously really good to see. Again, these holes are basically all outside of the existing MRE model. I think there's -- the other important or interesting thing to see is this Western zone, which you can see referenced there. I think there was effectively a bit of a blind -- it looks to be a bit of a blind mineralization in this new Western zone. The gold wasn't sort of cropping from surface, hence, it's been called a blind zone. But we put a few holes in there to test this Western zone, which could become either part of the Selin deposit, hopefully in the future, part of the future Selin MRE growth story, but effectively a new western zone to the main Selin deposit. That was nice to see coming out of those results as well. I mean exploration is obviously something which goes on through your life of mine. We've obviously got a strategy around it. As we say there, we firmly believe this will be a bigger than 2 million ounce deposit in time, hopefully significantly bigger. Drilling is expensive. And obviously, our focus is on building a mine and getting into positive cash flow. So the drilling we're doing is always on a sort of managed basis, and therefore, I don't want people to think the results mean that you've stopped the ability to grow further. Certainly, the drilling we've done now is -- we've been expanding and the results are looking good. And clearly, you've got to give your geologists a sort of a budget to work to. But when you're in production, obviously, hopefully those budgets can expand and you can really look to drill out a lot more and really maximize the size of the deposit potential. As I touched on, you've got 10 years of reserves already. So everything is incrementally positive. But look, there's a strategy. We built up a pipeline excitingly, we are drilling currently 3 of those sort of pipeline targets as part of this drill program. So we're drilling into 3 new areas, which have really not been explored before much apart from sort of surface exploration. So when we get the results back and get them out, if we can get some nice drill hits on one of those 3 target zones, that could be the starting of a new resource, a new deposit within easy trucking distance of our planned processing plants, that could be a really exciting addition to the story as opposed to just expanding existing known resources. The team is strong. The team has been together now for quite a few years. I think we brought on Lourens 3 years or so ago. He's got a really good West African construction experience. He's worked for a long time before joining us with both Resolute Mining and Perseus Mining, who have both got operations across Francophone West Africa. Sort of mid-tier companies. Murray has been with Cora for a long time now and Frikkie's been doing all the reserve work as well. So really pleased with the sort of the senior team, our country managers, Siaka Koumaré and our 2 senior geologists on the ground, Fomba and Traoré have been with us as well for -- since the inception of Cora. So really pleased to have had a really strong loyal team who have got lots of extensive track record of success. And also, we've managed to hire in and bring in sort of new talent, senior talent who have wanted to join the company and join the project and help us deliver it. Obviously, I mentioned before, SENET, obviously, we've been working with on the FEED and obviously delivered our feasibility study, have got a strong track record of delivering these projects in West Africa. I guess the big one, which I think probably a lot of people probably join to hear an update on I know there was a few early questions coming through as well in the sort of the Q&A around permitting. So what I'll do is probably do my best here to say everything I can about permitting. And I'll probably then won't be able to answer any more questions in the Q&A on permitting. So I'll try and tell you everything I can tell you now. And obviously, hopefully, that's -- everyone can understand that. Just to go through a little bit of background on the permitting. I think everyone knows there was a moratorium in Mali for 3 years, whilst the government put in place a new mining code, which I guess lines up the Mali mining code with some of the other countries or neighboring countries around West Africa. That process concluded and then the government's focus was probably -- was really around transitioning existing operating miners onto the new mining code for obvious reasons, obviously, with a higher royalty rate and other factors. So you can understand why they did that. Then obviously, now the focus is on companies with projects which are nearest to development, trying to get their projects permitted. The way the permitting system works in Mali is effectively you have an exploration permit, which lasts for 9 years. And within the 9 years, every 3 years, you have to do interim renewals. So due to the length of the moratorium, effectively every exploration permit in Mali needed to be renewed. So you have a situation where the entire country's exploration permits need to be renewed, which obviously creates a massive backlog the government needs to work through. That's obviously the same for us. Our Sanankoro Gold project is made up of 5 contiguous permits. You have the Sanankoro 2 permit, which has just been renewed in August and then neighboring that, and that has the vast majority of our resource on it probably has 98% of our resource on the Sanankoro 2 permit. Then we have a Kodiou permit to the north that has some of the Selin deposit dipping into it. Then you have a Bokoro 2 permit to the east -- that's significant for Cora because it is going to have some of the infrastructure for the mine, tailings, camp and other things, waste dumps. Then we've got Bokoro Est further to the east, and then you have Dako as well to the south. So we have these 5 contiguous permits. All of them needed renewals. We've got significantly the project with nearly all of our resources on it renewed at the end of August. For our process now, we need to have the Kodiou permit and the Bokoro 2 permit renewed. We're obviously working very closely with the government on a day-to-day basis to have that happen as quickly as possible. Then we have to go through a reshaping exercise where effectively you were allowed to have a 100 square kilometer mining permit area. Sanankoro 2 is an 84 square kilometer permit. So effectively, we're looking to take 16 kilometers -- square kilometers of ground from Bokoro 2 and from Kodiou and cut that into a new shaped permit, which is predominantly Sanankoro 2, but obviously parts of Bokoro 2 and Kodiou -- so you have 100 square kilometer area, which is then issued your mining permit. This is not an unusual process. It's fairly standard. Understandably, mines don't stay within permit boundaries. So you have to get things changed around. We didn't lose any ground. The ground which isn't falling within the 100 square kilometer mining permit will then remain as an exploration permit. So as a company, we're not losing ground. We just need to reshape the license. We've been working with the government, various ministerial departments as well as ministerial legal teams as well around the permitting process. So it's clear what we need to do and everyone understands the process. So -- we are working with the government as actively as we can do. Obviously, getting that Sanankoro 2 renewal done was obviously a great first step. And obviously, we're looking to push through the Bokoro 2 and the kodiou renewals as quickly as we can to allow the sort of the reshaping and the issue of the mining permit to happen as quickly as it can. I think as people will have seen and some people follow, obviously, these renewals are going through the Council of Ministers. That generally meets once a week. It doesn't meet necessarily every week. And I think what people have probably seen is -- the number of renewals have been increasing over the last month or so, which is really positive to see. I think you're seeing the backlog obviously reducing. You're seeing the government getting through more of the renewals and permitting. And obviously, you've seen a more steady state happening. So I think there has been lots of positive progress for us. There's also been lots of positive progress for the whole sector and for other exploration companies receiving their renewals, which is great, reducing the backlog. And I think we've seen a renewed focus from all parties to try and alleviate backlogs and to push things forward. I mean, for us, clearly, the economic benefits for the country, for the people of Mali for our project getting built is obviously very clear. It's going to create an awful lot of employment. It's going to obviously create -- generate a huge amount of revenue for the government. And obviously, there's no reason for it not to be getting pushed ahead quickly. So I think look, everyone is on the same page, and we're working with the government as close as we can to transition us into construction as quickly as we can. So moving away from Sanankoro. So Madina Foulbé is our exploration asset in Senegal. It sits actually right up to the border with Mali effectively. So it's in the far east of Senegal in what's known as the KKI, the Kenieba Inlier, arguably the most prolific bit of exploration ground in West Africa in terms of discoveries. It's got fantastic geology. It's near a number of very significant mines globally, frankly, which people probably have heard of, which hopefully you can see sort of raise on that map there. It's been -- like I touched on earlier, I mean, obviously, exploration and drilling is an expensive hobby to have, and you've always got to manage your budget. So we've done early-stage exploration, and we've done early-stage drilling on it. The results have always been very good, and there's huge potential for the permit area. But obviously, we've been managing the budget that we can deploy into it because ultimately, we want Cora to be building a mine and we want as much -- we need all of our money really to be put towards building that mine for Cora and delivering on that, and that's how we're going to maximize return for shareholders for you guys. So some really exciting early-stage work, but we've been really keeping our hand closely on the budgets there and not releasing huge amounts of money to develop and deliver the Madina Foulbé exploration program. So frustrating for our geologists, you can clearly see you've got a potential future resource there, you've had some good early exploration results. So yes, good location, good geology and one for the future, hopefully. Just touch on ESG as well. Obviously, a big part of the project and making sure that we've got our social license to operate. We carried out ESIA to international standards with the 2022 study and obviously, we were awarded our environmental permit on the project before the moratorium happened at the end of 2022. So that's obviously very positive all through the moratorium period. We maintain full sort of ESG teams on the ground and full coordination with local communities and have maintained our support, whether it's education, health care, alternative livelihood and other sort of more philanthropic type stuff as well. So those have always been an engagement which we've maintained and have never paused. And obviously, from an environmental perspective, obviously, the use of solar and trying to use hybrid power and other things is obviously right on our agenda. So yes, certainly, it's a really interesting part of the project is something which I find interesting. And yes, as a team, everyone is committed to making sure we're delivering on the ground and are being the best corporate citizen that we can be. Touched on most people here, so I probably won't go into any more detail on it. But obviously, it's there for everyone to see in terms of sort of core management team. Obviously, that will be looking to expand significantly with the permit and our transition into construction. I think this is really just pointing out really the value creation from the start of construction to sort of gold pour has obviously historically been very, very positive for junior operators transitioning into their first production. So yes, we're looking forward to getting that journey really kicking off once the permitting is completed. Look, I think we've got a good share register. Obviously, Eagle Eye joined earlier this year to join an existing register who have been extremely supportive over the last decade since we IPO-ed, which is we've never not had money. We've often done fundraisers at a premium, and we've always had the benefit of being able to operate, which has been fantastic for shareholder support during different periods for the business. So yes, pleased that we've been able to deliver the growth we have in terms of resources and studies and obviously pleased that we've had that shareholder support. So for everyone who's currently watching or listening who's a shareholder, thank you for your continued support. I appreciate things haven't happened as quickly as we wanted them to, but we are obviously every day looking to deliver as quickly as we can. I think I'll probably end it there and obviously move over to Q&A. I think I've probably gone on for 5 minutes on what I wanted. So I'll probably hand back briefly before we move into Q&A, if that's okay.

[Operator Instructions] And Bert, if I may now hand back to you to take us through the Q&A session, and I'll pick up from you at the end. Thank you.

Great. Sure. Thank you. It seems to be quite a few questions submitted, so I'll do my best to answer them. Obviously, some of them -- I'm obviously reading them sort of in live time. So apologies if I miss any. Obviously, if I do miss any, you want something answered, which I haven't covered or only partially covered by answering another similar overlapping question. Obviously, please feel free to e-mail the company, and we'll do our best to get back to you. So apologies in advance if I do miss anything. I'll just read out the question and do my best to answer it. So construction, question number one. If the mining permit were awarded during Q4 2026, how quickly could Cora place major equipment orders and begin full construction? I guess in brief, hopefully, very quickly. Certainly, that's our intention and why we've committed to doing the FEED. Clearly, from the award of a permit, it's not like you can start breaking ground the following day and then dig a pit in the ground. Clearly, you've got to award significant contracts. You've got to mobilize teams on the ground. You've obviously got to go through -- whilst we've got the funding commitment there, you still got to go through the process of obviously completing long-form documentation and drawing funds as well from the stream and/or the debt when we get there as well. So obviously, we hopefully we can get this permit done as quickly as we can in the time frame being proposed. But obviously, there isn't -- it isn't going to be the following day you're in full-scale construction. But I think the fact that we've committed to the FEED, and we're obviously completing the FEED this year. I think the fact that we've already lined up significant commitment to do the funding and obviously working with our largest shareholder who is delivering the stream to make sure we can. I think the whole -- everything we're doing this year is to make sure that we can as seamlessly and as quickly as possible transition from being a development company into a construction company once the permit is awarded. But hard to give an exact time line how long that transition will take. But obviously, our aim is to be as ready as we can. So I think that commitment by the Board to sign off on commencing the FEED is obviously the most significant. I mean if you look at our construction time line, around 18 months from commencement to first gold pour, the first 3 months to 4 months was the FEED process. So by taking the FEED process and getting that done before the permit was awarded, certainly, that's straight away taking time off your construction time line, which is obviously a positive. Question number two, resource expansion based on drilling completed so far, is management increasingly confident that the resource can expand materially beyond the 1 million ounces? And when is the MRE targeted -- when is the MRE update targeted? I think definitely, I think one of the things we tried to get across in the 2 drilling RNSs to date is that the vast proportion of these drill holes have been outside of the existing MRE. Obviously, I can't pre-guess what independent MRE consultant is going to deliver for an increased resource or not. But the reality is if you're hitting consistently good drill results outside of an existing MRE pit shell, one would hope or expect the MRE pit shell to expand to incorporate those resources, which would obviously or should then obviously lead to an increased resource. So I would say, in brief, we are extremely confident in that resource growing over time. And obviously, these results have been positive. And sorry, it's moving around quickly while I was reading it. I can't give an exact time on MRE update. Obviously, we're still waiting on drill results to come back. We're just finishing the drilling now. So I think we're, gosh, over 95% complete on the drilling. Obviously, then there's a lag, as you can all tell, on getting the assays back from the lab. And then obviously, once all the assays are back, it should be -- once you've got all the assays in, the actual update of the MRE should be relatively quick and straightforward. But obviously, there is a lag on getting the assays back from the lab, finishing drilling. But we are days, weeks away from finishing the actual overall drill program, and then you've got the lag on the assay results and then the MRE turnaround should be relatively quick after that. Another similar question, how many meters of the planned 12,000 meter plus program have been completed? How many assay results remain outstanding and when are the next results expected? Obviously, I can't tell you exactly when the next results are expected. Obviously, when you receive them, they're obviously material and obviously, you need to announce them as quickly as you can when you've got a sort of batch together, which sort of makes sense to RNS. So I imagine we will have another set of results relatively soon because of the nature of being drilling every day for months and obviously, results coming back fairly regularly. So I imagine there will be another set of results relatively soon. Now we started them coming. I think we always said it's going to be a 12,000-plus meter program, obviously, trying to work within a fixed budget. Hopefully, we're going to be nudging out a few more meters than 12,000 based on both good result -- good solid early results needing to sort of follow up on some of those holes, but also the fact that we've managed the budget pretty well, and we're pretty confident we can get a few extra meters over and above 12,000 meters done. So that will be hopefully positive to get a few more holes out of the system. Right. Third question or fourth question, I think. What kind of banks is Cora in talks with for the 50% stream replacement? Are these regional banks? And what kind of debt structure could Cora consider? Again, obviously, the nature of the discussions are sort of confidential at this stage. So tricky to say too much. But I think what we've said and what we sort of said today is that clearly replacing 50% of the stream with the sort of traditional debt sort of optimizes the structure. I think we benefited from having the fully funded nature of the stream, but also we will benefit from -- significantly from replacing 50% of it then with debt in terms of optimizing equity returns for investors. I think we are predominantly speaking to West African banks. They're showing the most appetite. And I think there's a good track record if you look at other financing of West Africans of listed miners of those banks -- of a number of West African banks being supportive of those financings. So yes, look, the process is positive and it's going well. And obviously, in time, hopefully, we'll be able to say a lot more about that. Then there's a final question, which is, again, talking a bit about the structure and the nature of the debt finance and sort of who we're talking to and what we're discussing. So due to the sort of slightly confidential nature, I can't say probably more than I've said. But yes, I'm happy to say and confirm that we are having -- we've got a number of banks which are interested and we're talking to about obviously the financing. So I'm very confident we'll be able to replace 50% of the stream with debt. And I think that will be optimizing the financing structure for us, UK investors as well. So I think that will be a good result for the company and for the development of the project. Now I think unless I've missed anything, are there any more questions to jump in here. I appreciate there might be some which I thought I've sort of tried to answer either I've already answered in the presentation when I went through the slides and/or open up a lot of questions, but I don't know if there's any more questions coming on.

I think that's all the questions for today. So thank you very much indeed for addressing all of them. Before I direct the investors to provide you with a feedback, which is particularly important to yourself and the company, could I please just ask you for a few closing comments?

Sure. I mean, firstly, thank you very much, everyone, for joining to hear the update today. Obviously, massive particular thanks to the Cora investors, shareholders who are currently watching today. Thank you again for your support in this business. Thank you for your patience in your investment. And every day, we're driving and pushing to push forward the permitting as fast as we can. Obviously, hopefully, concurrent with the permitting -- we've made a lot of progress this year on the ground, which has been really positive, and we are very much trying to set ourselves up to transition into execution as quickly as we can on the permitting lens. So yes, look, please thank you for the support, and we are continuing to sort of fight and drive as quickly as we can to move this project forward and to deliver for everyone. Thank you.

Fantastic. Thank you once again for updating investors today. Could I please ask investors not to close this session as you'll now be automatically redirected to provide your feedback, which help the company better understand your views and expectations. On behalf of the management team, we would like to thank you for attending today's presentation, and good afternoon.