Lynas Rare Earths Limited (LYC.AX) Q2 FY2026 Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Good day, and thank you for standing by. Welcome to Lynas Rare Earths Quarterly Results Briefing. [Operator Instructions] Please be advised that today's conference is being recorded. I would now like to hand the conference over to Lynas Rare Earths. Please go ahead.

Good morning, and welcome to the Lynas Rare Earths Investor Briefing for the December quarter of FY '26. Today's briefing will be presented by Amanda Lacaze, CEO and Managing Director. Joining Amanda on the call today are Gaudenz Sturzenegger, CFO; Pol Le Roux, COO; Daniel Havas, VP, Strategy and Investor Relations; and Chris Jenney, VP, Sales and Market Development. I'll now hand over to Amanda Lacaze. Please go ahead, Amanda.

Thanks, Jen. Good morning, everybody. Happy New Year, and welcome to what I plan to be our best ever year. As always, thank you to everyone for attending. As I think you all know, for me, there's not too many more of these briefing sessions. And so I am quite determined that they should all be very positive. Following the announcement on my plans to retire on the 30th of June this year, I have received an overwhelming number of complementary messages, sufficient to make me blush in some instances. And I would like to thank all of you who have sent me sort of positive feedback following last week's announcement for your very kind thoughts. However, as I've said to everybody, this company is not so key person-dependent that it should matter, and I'm delighted to see that, that has been the market sentiment. We've spent 12 years -- I've spent 12 years of my life working to build a strong and resilient business at Lynas. And I am delighted to be leaving the company in excellent shape with the completion of our Lynas 2025 capital program, a very strong balance sheet, a path forward outlined in our Towards 2030 strategy and a team that is really second to none, competent leadership, in fact competent people right through our organization. So I look forward to a great sort of 6 months leading into the retirement date. And I think, as I've said to some, I have suggested to my team that I would expect an excellent farewell tour. Today, in particular, I am delighted to be able to present really a very good quarterly result, despite our previously disclosed challenges at Kalgoorlie as a result of the power outages during November. So production of NdPr during this quarter, whilst it was less than the prior quarter, is as we expected and as we foreshadowed in our announcement in late November. Production of dysprosium and terbium is ahead of our plan for the quarter, but effectively, we used up oxalate, which had been produced during the prior quarter. So we sort of look at this and average it out over the 6 months, starts to give us a bit of an indication of where we will be able to continue to operate those circuits into the future. During the quarter, we undertook some really substantial maintenance on the kilns, including some 10-year maintenance on a couple of those kilns. They have restarted in very good order post that maintenance schedule in January. Of course, as you've seen from the report, which we've lodged this morning, the sales of NdPr have been -- sorry, just finishing up on the operations. As we'd indicated in late November, we had significant power outages in Kalgoorlie during November, which meant that we were unable to produce and get material to Kuantan to be processed in time during the quarter. We did have -- we have had much more active engagement with our supplier in this area and at least 2 issues that have been identified have been rectified. Having said that, we've had much more stable supply for a period of time. However, as recently as yesterday, we had 2 significant power outages. So we continue to assess new off-grid solutions. As flagged previously, diesel generation can give us reliable power, but we are very focused on continuing to reduce our environmental footprint. So it is not the most desirable path forward, but we are assessing what off-grid solutions may be available to us. Moving on to sales. Sales of NdPr were ahead of production of NdPr. And so you would have worked out that saw some drawdown of inventory, which we believe we will properly replace in due course. We have not sold all of our DyTb as we continue to use that material strategically. As we've indicated previously, it's in very high demand. The sales team continues to negotiate new contracts, which particularly looking to how can we acquire high-value NdPr agreements alongside sort of the DyTb, which is required by particularly magnet customers. Just a word on the costs because I saw one of the early analyses this morning, which notionally showed a significant increase in costs. Of course, some of that is related to the fact that the volume -- production volume was lower. And so therefore, things like fixed costs have been shared across a smaller volume. But I would just also caution everyone to recall that this is a cash report for the quarter. And so therefore, the cash costs and the actual production are typically about a month apart. And so I would suggest wait until we put out our half year to really get a very good fix on the achieved costs within our business. And as we look at the cash flow, I mean, of course, we're sitting on a very substantial and positive bank deposits. We are still washing out the final Mt Weld invoices, and we've got a few more to go through in this coming quarter as well. So I think everyone understands that the market settings remain positive and in fact, in some ways, have even become more positive during January. NdPr price continues to strengthen. And frankly, geopolitics continue to be our friend. Although we are yet to finalize various agreements with governments, the policies which have been particularly implemented by the U.S. government have already fostered more functional market dynamics. As I've said on many occasions, our objective is a proper functioning market where materials are valued appropriately, right? And what we've seen over the last sort of decade or more really is a situation where that is not the case and where market dynamics are dysfunctional rather than functional. So whilst we might look at various governments and the sorts of support that they might seek to be providing to industry, as we've said to the government, ultimately, our objective is that no government has to write a check because actually the market functions in a proper way. And we are seeing significant improvement in market function as a result of the various policies, which have already been implemented. Certainly, as we've seen the relaxation of some of the -- or the proper sort of implementation of some of the export controls from China, the demand inside China has increased. And as that has occurred, the price has also started to increase. And even during this month, some of the Chinese rare earth suppliers have signaled a price increase, which was published earlier in January. So bearing in mind that our objective remains to place all of our production outside China at sustainable price levels, that is no government checks ultimately involved; we see ourselves on course to do so and certainly welcome many of the policy initiatives and also the development of a number of options in outside China supply chains. So with that, just a reminder, a very good month in terms of, actually, production, notwithstanding the power outages, certainly in terms of the completion of our maintenance program and as I said, the start-up of it in -- the restart of our Lynas Malaysia facility in January and a particularly good quarter in terms of sales, and we're very focused on ensuring that we continue these positives in 2026. So with that, I'm happy to take any questions.

[Operator Instructions] First question comes from Rahul Anand from Morgan Stanley.

Look, my one question is around the price and the pricing mix, if you can help me a bit on that. So obviously, the [ REO ] realized price was significantly above our consensus forecast. It was a really good outcome. I guess there was a bit of benefit from a perspective of your points noted in the release, which were higher benchmarks, higher dysprosium, terbium and perhaps a bit more NdPr in the mix. Can you maybe highlight these points a bit more and maybe help us understand a bit more as to how we should be thinking about perhaps the sales mix on a going-forward basis and then also where we can expect better performance?

Okay, Rahul. Look, I think the first thing is that as a current producer at scale of separated NdPr and also DyTb, every -- and an established supplier, every movement in the current market index, which is Asian Metal, delivers benefit to us every day. And that is one of the things which really sort of sets us apart from many others, is that we start to bank that value from day 1. Having said that, our objective is to continue to add new contracts, which either give us a premium in some instances, which is referred to the current benchmark or indeed agreements which are sort of tied more closely to the sort of floor prices, which have been indicated by the agreement of the U.S. government, entered into with NdPr materials last year. So we're doing both of these things. And we do track. Don't ask, I'm not going to disclose, but we do track very closely what's the premium that we're achieving versus various benchmarks. But we think that the strengthening market and strengthening demand for NdPr are the things that ultimately drive improved financial performance.

Next, we have Neal Dingmann from William Blair.

Just quick question is really around the production mix. Specifically, you guys are doing a nice job of continuing to grow the mix. And my question is, what is sort of the longer-term target for dysprosium and terbium sales volumes as a percentage of total mix? This looks like that's growing. I'm just wondering kind of what is -- do you have sort of a target maybe for end of this year or maybe next year on that?

Neal, so we did put out some advice on our heavy rare earths investment as we grow out -- as we invest in further capacity expansion in Malaysia earlier -- not earlier this year, late last calendar year in any case. And so we do aim to increase the proportion of DyTb. But I think it is really important to note that it is always a relatively small volume. So a magnet maker typically is using about -- and Chris Jenney, correct me if I'm wrong, but about 30 tonnes of NdPr to 1 of DyTb. So what we aim to do is to really be able to utilize that DyTb so that magnet makers and magnet buyers can feel comfortable and confident to buy from non-China sources, whereas up until last year when we commenced the separation of DyTb, even if they purchased NdPr from, say, us, they still had to source their DyTb out of China. So it's less about the specific volume and more about the offer that we can make to our customers.

Next, we have Austin Yun from Macquarie.

Just a quick question on the production. Previously, you said the production rate was to the market conditions, and we can see that the market is quite supportive, driven by both fundamentals and the macro events. I'm just keen to understand, what's the -- in the near term, talking about next 6 months, what's the achievable production rate from your whole facility? Is that 10.5 the right number to think about the kind of a near-term cap? Any color would be appreciated.

Thank you, Austin, and thank you for asking yet again for guidance, which we -- certainly, what we have provided very clearly is the fact that we've made investment in our production facilities to be able to deliver 10,500 tonnes per annum of NdPr. The operations team continues to work on ramping up to that number, and our objective is to get there as soon as possible. Other than that, I'm not going to give you a date on which that will occur. Effectively, what it requires us to be able to do is to be able to produce sort of really quite reliably between 30 and 33 tonnes a day. And we are on track to be to do that. But until we have demonstrated our capability to produce at that 10,500 tonne run rate, we don't finally say, yes, Lynas 2025 is absolutely completed. But we are in good order to get to that sort of target.

Got it. Okay. Yes, I was truly just trying to understand if there's any the near-term hurdles of plant and maintenance that we need to be aware of.

Well, Austin, as always, I mean, external factors tend these days to trip us up a lot more than internal factors. So things like power at Kalgoorlie. If we cannot get Kalgoorlie producing reliably because we keep on having power outages, then that absolutely makes it difficult for us to achieve that sort of average daily run rate. So there are always external risks, and we seek to manage them absolutely as best we can. But we have a plan, we have a very clear target, and 10,500 tonnes is the objective.

We've got Paul Young from Goldman Sachs.

Amanda, back onto the -- on projects and just ramp up, I see Mt Weld is -- ramp-up is going really well. I think you said it's running at 70% of nameplate, which is a pretty quick commissioning and ramp-up, albeit it's pretty small project, but nonetheless complex than others. What is the plan to get to -- when you expect to get the full capacity there and to be able to test Kalgoorlie cracking and leaching to your point, if power supply is reliable, you can actually start really testing the kiln at full capacity? Or just with the market backdrop and everything else and the timing with the refinery expansion, do you expect to maybe stockpile concentrate? So just curious around when you can achieve nameplate and what the strategy is as far as really testing Kalgoorlie cracking and leaching?

Thanks, Paul. I don't think that it's proper to describe Mt Weld as a fairly small project. That is a very substantial project. And yes, we are very pleased to be running at 70%. And -- but I would note, and this is particularly recognizing sort of the efforts of our team, that start-ups are never completely trouble-free. And so even at Mt Weld, where we are very confident about our assets and really have a lot of experience, sort of making that shift from our -- from what was indeed a little plant to now a much larger, more complex plant, that using more different mineralogies; we certainly have -- certainly has presented the team with a number of challenges. If at present, up until we commissioned the new plant, we were actually producing, even from the old part, 2 grades of [ corn ], one which was slightly higher grade for Malaysia versus one in Kal. At present, that's not the case. We're basically producing all of the same grade. In terms of the Kal, if we said everything is perfect outside, we would actually say that the kiln and the cracking, the actual cracking and leaching process in Kalgoorlie has proven itself to be working as designed. And so therefore, we wouldn't see that there was any significant challenge to being able to ramp that up. The area where in terms of the ramp-up from commissioning that has presented us with the most challenges is the production of the next rare earth carbonate, which is a new -- which is actually a completely new circuit in our flow sheet. And so we -- over the last year, the team has made quite a lot of process improvements there to -- particularly to improve quality. Some of the early material that we were sending up to Lynas Malaysia was not on spec for a variety of different areas. And I think that we've now got ourselves to a position where we're pretty confident about most of the quality specs. But it actually has been the area that has challenged us the most other than our inability to be able to put together so long runs because we keep having these power outages. So we do need to be able to continue to ramp up Kal, and that remains at the heart of us getting to the 10,500 tonne run rate. Having said that, I can also tell you that the Lynas Malaysia facility and particularly cracking in Malaysia continues to improve, is significantly ahead of where we were performing even a year ago, certainly 2 years ago. And so therefore -- so really balancing the 2 facilities, we are confident that we continue on a good pathway towards reaching that 10,500 tonnes.

Next, we have Daniel Morgan from Barrenjoey.

Amanda, you said earlier in the call that you are yet to finalize agreements with various governments. It sounds like that's multiple governments. Can you just talk about what is the nature of what you're seeking? Is it offtake as you talk about with the Department of War? Is it price protection agreements? Or is it something else?

Thanks, Daniel. So I think everyone, even with a passing analysis of the rare earths market, will recognize that the feature which was far the most significant for the deal that the U.S. did with MP was the price protection agreement. And I think that we can see that a lot of other things, even though that deal did include capital injections, et cetera, that the private markets will sum up the equity for our functioning market where you can see that there is a business that can be a successful business. And that is -- has been the positive effect of those -- the positive effect of the price protection agreement. So we have encouraged privately and publicly sort of other markets as they're considering their policies. And if you think about the sort of notification, which has even come out of the Australian market; the Resources Minister, a couple of weeks ago, talking about the critical minerals, strategic reserves, was really talking about managing with floor and ceiling prices. I note that Scott Bessent spoke in Davos yesterday. He was talking about the conversations of the G7+ meetings and about putting in place a floor and ceiling prices to ensure that you've got a positive functioning market. In a couple of instances, it is also relevant. So say, for example, in the U.S., whilst there's significant investments being made in future capacity, there is a current requirement for product, particularly for some of their -- particularly for the defense industry, which is really the objective of a number of the Chinese policies, is to ensure that no Chinese product goes into defense applications. And so that's why in some instances, there is -- it's also relevant to be considering whether a physical stockpile is a benefit to the government. But essentially, it is the functioning of the price market for us. We don't need government to be buying our product, we need customers to be buying our product, and we need those customers to buy our product at prices that properly reflect the cost of doing business. And so really, that discussion around policy and policy execution is the most important discussions that we are having with government.

Next, we have in Chen Jiang from Bank of America.

We will miss you after this financial year for sure. One question from me is about your lost production. So I guess with your capacity 10,500 tonnes NdPr and cracking and leaching plant is running well from January at Malaysia and Kalgoorlie power situation kind of resolved or stabilized, I guess the production loss from December quarter can be recovered in third quarter and fourth quarter over the financial year. So I guess we shouldn't assume the production is lost but delayed into the rest of -- if I am understanding correct?

Yes, yes. I think we're pretty confident about -- always with the qualification that we are -- to get to 10,500 tonnes, we must have [ MRAC ] coming out of Kalgoorlie. If we have no power, then we can't have any [ MRAC ] coming out Kalgoorlie. That is absolutely our #1 constraint over time. But yes, it would be our expectation that we should be able to now continue with an orderly ramp-up towards the 10,500 tonnes.

Next, we have Reg Spencer from Canaccord.

Amanda, I'd just like to start by first saying congratulations on your tenure at Lynas and what yourself and the rest of the team has achieved over those years. It's been a long journey and at times, I think we all agree, hasn't been necessarily an easy ride. But congratulations and hopefully, you get to put the toes up at some point in the next few months. I should try to dive in a little bit earlier, but we're right at the back of the queue now. So my question I have because most of the other questions have been answered, relates to the magnet plans for JS Link and Noveon. And clearly the market is moving ahead in the West, it seems to be almost every second day a new magnet plant being announced somewhere. Have your plans and your conversations with both JS Link and Noveon moved ahead? And are we getting closer to a point where we might be able to get some detail around what those plans might actually look like on execution?

Thanks, Reg. Thank you for your very kind thoughts, comments. And yes, we'll make sure that we had time to actually celebrate the past 12 years in good order before I [ write ] off into the business. So yes, discussions with both JS Link and Noveon are progressing. And I might actually invite Chris Jenney, who lead our sales and market development area, to add comments on that.

Thanks, Amanda, and thanks, Reg, for the question. Yes, so the discussions continue with both JS Link and Noveon. And just looking at what is the best partnership model based on the current geopolitics, but also the current dynamics of the market, and I think what feeds into that is the increased appetite for OEMs to create the non-China supply chain. And so we're working with a number of maker -- metal maker partners, not just JS Link and Noveon, to make sure we can link those OEMs to them magnet makers and metal makers to basically supply [ our oxides ] into. So we will keep you updated as we progress. But it's interesting times. And yes, we'll update you as we can.

Chris, interesting indeed. Not a lot of metal makers out there, actually. And I see one just got bid for today. But look, I appreciate the questions. And thanks, Amanda.

Next, we have Scott Ryall from Rimor Equity Research.

You mentioned a couple of times the electricity situation in Kalgoorlie, and it is one of the hardest places, as I understand, to get bulk reliable electricity in Australia at the moment. So I guess my question is, what's in your control for actually solving the issue versus third-party control? And is it the government or is it your electricity supplier that you're most pressuring, I guess, at the moment? And over what time period do you think you'll be able to resolve this on the assumption that at least part of its third-party pressure that you have to apply? Is it something that you can solve over 12 months, 24 months? That's -- I'm just after a broad estimation there.

So we are definitely engaged, Scott, with both the government and with the supplier, the power supplier, given it's -- Western Power is government-owned enterprise. And then clearly that these two things go hand-in-hand. I think that you're right when you say Kalgoorlie is challenged, and we're certainly not the only industrial operator in Kalgoorlie that has suffered as a result of power outages. And I would also say that the state government absolutely recognizes that and has, I believe, a sort of specific project team to address how to improve this. However, from public commentary, they've talked about sort of that timeline being somewhere in the range of like 2029 to 2032. So this clearly doesn't align to our requirements. So our team has -- it continues to work on water alternate power solutions, which would be either completely off-grid or maybe a combination of grid and off-grid activities because we would want to be able to put a solution in place. We'll be aiming to do it within, I guess, the next 12 to 18 months as opposed to the next 2 to 3 years. A diesel generator, diesel power station can be put in place pretty quickly. And if we get to a position where that's the only way that we can assure power reliability, then we will do it. But we would rather look at a better medium-term solution than burning diesel. So we've decided not to proceed at this stage with a diesel power station, but that can change, and it can be implemented pretty quickly if it does change.

Next, we've got Regan Burrows from Bell Potter.

Amanda and team, congratulations on the quarter despite the disruptions there. A lot of the questions are sort of focused on Kalgoorlie and the ramp-up there. If I could just sort of summarize and make sure that we're understanding it correctly, excluding the power outages that we've seen at Kalgoorlie and once you get Mt Weld up to sort of 100% run rate, are there any bottlenecks within the entire business in reaching that 2,600 tonne per quarter rate? Or is it -- is there anything else that we're missing there?

Regan, there's always a bottleneck, right? In fact, it's a measure of progress of your operations that you find new bottlenecks because as you resolve one, then the bottleneck moves around and you find another one. So at this stage, we remain focused on ramping up Mt Weld. And as I said, even though we've had a very positive ramp-up to date there, notwithstanding that, barely 3 months into that ramp-up, and we are still identifying bottlenecks and issues to be resolved as part of a normal ramp-up. And in Kalgoorlie, likewise, as we continue to increase production, we will discover new areas that we need to improve. However, as I indicated earlier on the call, we have our sights set very firmly on the 10,500 tonnes. And the way that we get there will be by optimizing each of the production facilities, recognizing that yes, there will be various bottlenecks either internally or externally at each of those facilities. So yes, there will always be a bottleneck. If there's not, then we're not moving forward, actually.

Next, we have Dim Ariyasinghe from UBS.

Just a question on Japan. So earlier in the year, China imposed additional controls on the trade of rare earths into Japan. I figure the market is still trying to work its way through implications. But any -- can you give us any indication on how your Japanese partners feel? This is -- is there more upside potentially ahead for -- to that 7,200 tonne volume arrangement? Yes, anything -- yes, how's that...

Thank you, Dim. So yes, look, I think as we look at the actions that the Chinese have taken since April last year, they announced very substantive controls in April last year. And I think we all saw the outcome of the fact that they announced the new licensing framework before they implemented the systems to be able to manage that new licensing framework. Since then, notwithstanding various other announcements and commentary and we had sort of a further set of -- sort of comments from the Chinese in -- I think it was in October about further constraints; effectively, the things which have been implemented in China are really those April controls and a series of nonprice controls with respect to the export of knowledge and equipment. So when we say that it's not really clear what the further commentary earlier this month with respect to China and Japan really means, it's because it's not clear that there is more than what was already announced last April, which were significant controls on what term dual-use materials, which is essentially those using -- those with heavies. And so we have been very actively engaged with our Japanese partners for many years on ways that we can increase supply of heavies into the Japanese market. So we continue to be focused on that because it's that which really gives particularly magnet makers and non-Chinese customers the confidence to be able to go forward. So yes, we're not seeing anything over and above what had already previously be disclosed. But we are seeing now that the Chinese are getting their administrative systems in place. And some of the benefit to that is that exports have started to flow again, particularly of sort of magnets. But we've not seen a significant effect from the announcements earlier this month. Is that helpful, Dim? I have really -- yes. I don't think we can see anything more than that at this stage. And what we do see is that all of it, as I said in my opening remarks, geopolitics do remain our friend.

No, that's really helpful. Yes, and congratulations on an amazing career.

We have a follow-up question from Chen Jiang from Bank of America.

Just a comment in the release about the increasing share of rare sales at prices independent of the market index, I guess the most you are referring to the heavy rare earths dysprosium and terbium. But there are also, I guess, increasing NdPr pricing independent of China's benchmark. I'm just wondering if the increase in NdPr sales, independent of China's benchmark, is your new contract? So which means that is the contract sales outside of Japan or even in Japan, you can have prices independent of China NdPr.

Okay. So yes, yes, yes. But our objective is that it is not just on the heavies. Our objective is that by having the heavies, we are able to agree contracts with the target customers outside of China and Japan and that we are able to agree those at the sort of price levels, which have been signaled very strongly into the market as price levels, which are sustainable, both from a supplier and also a customer perspective. So yes, we are starting that process. Some of those contracts are relatively low volume at present expected to grow over time, but we are aiming to write contracts which are either independent of the Asian Metals index or utilize sort of the floors and ceilings that we see being signaled into the market elsewhere. Ultimately, heavies on their own don't significantly shift the dial for Lynas. I mean we need to understand that it is always -- that today, we are still very heavily dependent upon NdPr to drive value in our business. And so using all of our skills and portfolio capabilities to do that is our core objective.

It would be good to say your NdPr price can be gradually recovering from China, that would be good.

Well, that is certainly our objective. But it won't happen before I retire. That's right because I've already notified when I will retire. But certainly, it is our objective. And it is our objective to continue to grow the share of our business that is -- and it always has been. We're just slightly -- I think we are in a more favorable market situation, which is allowing us to execute on that objective rather more successfully.

We just have a follow-up question from Paul Young.

A quick question on the heavy rare earths circuit and the expansion. This is certainly not big picture, necessarily, I don't think material, but just to confirm on the timing of the expanded circuit and the first production of samarium, which I think you -- in your release is saying is Q4 2026. I think the prior guidance it was April 2026. I just want to confirm, are you referring to December quarter of '26, just a modest delay? And if so, is that because of -- I think you're calling out just procurement of...

No, no. It's Q4. It is Q4 this calendar year. It's no delay.

No delay. Okay. Thanks for confirming.

Thank you.

Okay. So maybe there's no further questions, no, I thought maybe not because I think many of you will be going to -- I think there's another briefing that starting at midday. So I want to give you enough time for a nature break ahead of that. Once again, thank you all for joining us today. We are pleased to have been able to deliver the results that we have delivered. And we are pleased to be looking into a market which is looking pretty positive in terms of its various settings, and look forward to seeing all of you in the next couple of months when we release our half-year results. So thank you all.

Thank you. This concludes today's conference call. Thank you for participating. You may now disconnect.