Nickel Asia Corporation (NIKL) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Hey. Good afternoon. Sorry, we started late. We're just facing some technical difficulties, but we should be starting in 30 seconds. Thanks. [Audio Gap] Good afternoon. All participants, thank you for dialing in. I'm sorry about that, we started a bit late. But welcome to Nickel Asia Corporation's Full Year 2024 Earnings Call, and thank you for joining us. I'm Andre Dy, Head of Investor Relations. I'd like to introduce to you the senior management that's available to speak to you during this call. First, we have our Group President and CEO, Mr. Dennis Zamora. And then we have our Chief Commercial Officer for Nickel Asia's Mining business, Mr. Koichi Ishihara. So may I inform attendees to put your microphone on mute during the presentation and only open your mic during the Q&A, which comes after the formal presentation. I'd like to inform everybody this video conference will be recorded and that this recording will end right before we enter the Q&A. After the formal presentation, we will move to the Q&A where you will have a chance to ask your questions, but we will first go through the questions that have been sent by investors beforehand. So we'll start now with the -- the first slide here is the direct shipping ore prices, which we export to Indonesia and China has seen a rebound in the second half of 2024 compared to the first half of 2024. And this was the main driver for NAC's performance for the year. So if you look at the top chart on the left column, the direct shipping ore prices for the second half were averaging at $31.36 per wet metric ton. So that's a 42% increase in the -- from the first half, which were -- ore prices were only at $22. So it's a big rebound in prices. And then in the middle chart on the left column, we -- it shows that the volumes have picked up as well in the second half. So seasonally, this is the case. It is when our mine sites in Surigao are open, so we're able to ship more. So the price increase is timely because it came at the time when most of the mine sites are open. So volumes increased by 28.4%. So that translates to direct shipping ore sales, an increase of 81% in the second half compared to the first half. So PHP 9.73 billion in direct ore sales were realized in the second half. Meanwhile, the second column shows that the limonite HPAL ore performance in terms of pricing, it declined by 7.7% due to weak nickel LME price. And then even the limonite HPAL volumes were also slightly -- were also lower by 12.2%. So the limonite sales were down to PHP 2 billion from PHP 2.44 billion on a half-on-half comparison. But overall, if you were to take everything, then the overall -- and the DSO exports revenue improvement was more than enough to offset or to positively impact revenues versus the limonite HPAL performance. So moving on to the yearly results. Please have a look at the bar chart on the top left portion of the slide. Revenues from the sale of the ore is the light green bar chart. This has decreased by 8.5% year-on-year to PHP 19.56 billion due to lower nickel ore prices year-on-year, which weighed down on the positive impact of higher shipments. So we were able to do 8% more exports this year. But this is still better than what we reported in the 9 months where the decline was more than double the 8.5% decline. So due to the improvement in ore prices and the ramp-up in the volumes for last year fourth quarter, we were able to trim the year-on-year decrease. And then the lower nickel DSO prices and lower nickel LME prices in the first half of 2024 are due to the oversupply of both nickel classes, driven by the ramp-up in production and consumption in Indonesia, even if there has been a fairly resilient and neutral demand support from China's stainless steel markets and China's battery materials requirement. In the second half, Indonesia had faced nickel ore shortage due to their challenging weather conditions and mining quota permit challenges, leading for them to purchase ore from the Philippines. So this has supported the direct shipping ore prices in the second half of 2024. So that explains why our second half was better than our first half last year. Then if you focus on the top middle bar chart with regards to EBITDA, our consolidated EBITDA totaled PHP 8.8 billion, down 19.3% year-on-year. On the rightmost bar chart, our attributable recurring net income or our core income is PHP 3.07 billion. So that's down 17% year-on-year due to 3 things. So net income is down -- recurring net income is down due to lower DSO prices in the first half of 2024 and lower limonite HPAL ore prices for the full year due to weaker nickel LME price. And then also the continuing losses recorded from the investment in the HPAL plants remain a drag. We reported a PHP 1.56 billion provisioning for EPI's geothermal investment in MGCP (sic) [ MGPC ], which was made back in 2017. So after that, the attributable net income is PHP 1.52 billion for the full year 2024. For the HPAL operations, we registered a loss of PHP 898 million due to lower nickel prices. This is slightly less than the PHP 1 billion losses recorded for the same period last year. Now, refer to the table below for the first 2 rows, these are related to our margins, EBITDA and net income margins. First row, EBITDA margins. Please see the second to the last column for -- or, I mean, the last column 2024, EBITDA margins are 39%. This is a 7 percentage points lower than the same comparable period last year. And then the second row, recurring net income margins have also declined to 22% from 24% last year. Again, the very low ore prices that we've seen in the first half of 2024 really weighed down on the margins of NAC. And because of the recovery in the second half, it somehow push on the EBITDA margins and net income margins to this level. Moving to the third row of the table, you will see nickel LME price per pound, which for the period is [ $7.66 ] compared to $9.49 for the same period last year. Then moving to the fourth and fifth row is the average price in dollar per wet metric ton for our direct shipping ore and our HPAL deliveries. For ore export for the full year, the average prices registered a value of $27.34 compared to last year's $30.59. For limo HPAL prices, this is a lower value also of $10.50 from last year's $14.66 per wet metric ton. Then moving to the sixth and seventh row is the nickel pay factor. For nickel pay factor related to ore exports, the nickel payability is higher year-on-year at 18.03% versus last year's 16.54% because despite a weak nickel LME price, the direct shipping nickel ore prices have seen a support. So this is supported by the nickel ore shortage driven by the bad weather in Indonesia and the mining quota permit challenges that we face there, which resulted in the Indonesia buyers needing to purchase nickel ore from the Philippines, and that helped support ore prices. However, for HPAL deliveries, we registered a decrease in nickel pay factor, and this decreased to 9.28% from last year's 9.73%. This slide, we declared dividends. So just to take you through this, we declared a combined 50% of previous year's recurring net income of dividends amounting to PHP 1.536 billion or PHP 0.11 per share. So the way we compute recurring net income, we add back the provisioning that we announced because of that MGCP (sic) [ MGPC ] investment. So the recurring net income attributable to NAC's equity holders is PHP 3.073 billion. The approved CapEx for this year is PHP 1.655 billion. So the prospective dividend amount would be PHP 1.418 billion. So for us, that is close to 50% of previous year's net income. So what we have declared and was approved by the Board is a regular dividend of 30% of previous year's recurring income, plus an additional 20% of previous year's recurring net income. So this will be for shareholders on record as of March 13, 2025. It will be paid out on March 26, 2025. So this is how we arrived with our computation for dividends. Okay. Moving on to the shipments and revenue by ore type. On the left bar chart, which refers to ore volume sold in millions of wet metric tons, we could see the orange bar representing limonite ore for the HPAL. This has decreased by 2% to 7.38 million tons from last year's 7.53 million tons. But it was greatly offset by the green column of direct shipping ore exports, which have increased by 8.1% to 9.64 million tons versus previous year's 8.92 million tons. So total nickel sales volume for the year has increased to 17 million tons or by 3.5% because of the direct shipping ore volume improvement. In the middle column charts are the changes in ore prices in dollar per wet metric ton. Again, for the orange bar, the HPAL prices have declined by 28% year-on-year to $10.50 and also for the direct shipping ore prices, there has also been a decline to $27.34 per wet metric ton from $30.59. The decline is 8.9% in ore export price. But as I mentioned earlier, we -- the big reason why direct shipping ore prices were low was because of the drag during the first half of 2024. But it was during the second half where the ore shortage developed and there was a sudden support in ore prices for the second half of the year. And then in the right bar chart, the revenue of NAC has declined to PHP 19.56 billion or an 8.5% year-on-year decline for the combined ore sales. But somehow, this has been cushioned by more shipments overall for the year and a recovery of direct shipping ore prices that we saw in the second half of the year. So for the revenue variance analysis table, the big positive variance is really from the increase in volume that our mine sites have generated coming from the Dinapigue mine site and Manicani. And then the big negative variance are really the soft nickel ore prices, which we saw in the first half of last year. And then other positive variances are the foreign exchange rate. We saw a 2.8% year-on-year improvement in our realized sales with an exchange rate of PHP 57.36 versus the previous year's PHP 55.78 to $1. Another positive variance for revenues is the incremental 72 megawatts from our Subic power plant JSI, which started operating in March. So we realized some revenues there. So that's a positive variance of PHP 461 million. And then another negative variance in revenues is the onetime excavation services for Coral Bay tailings facility, which had ended in December 2023. Moving on to cost and expenses. The positive variance for the cost and expenses are the decrease in excavation activity related to the tailings facility. Now the negative variance was brought about by more direct shipping ore production. So while this is a negative variance on the cost side, we have more than made up for it in the revenue side. And with ore prices picking up in the second half of 2024, this was beneficial to Nickel Asia. Okay. Moving on to our investment in the HPAL. We completed -- we're happy to announce that we completed the sale of our 15.625% equity stake in Coral Bay Nickel Corporation to SMM at the carrying value that was -- that's registered during the 9 months 2024. And then for the full year 2024, we trimmed our total losses in our equity investments by around 13% due to the divestment of NAC's share in CBNC. So if you look at full year 2024, the THPAL, THPAL's losses were at PHP 395 million. So this is larger than the previous year's PHP 215 million. But Coral Bay losses for 2024 have been reduced to PHP 503 million from previous year's PHP 822 million because of the divestment that we've made. So we no longer have to realize the losses in the fourth quarter. So, our move will strengthen our financial position to focus our resources on our core projects in upstream nickel mining, exploration and development of gold and copper and our solar project developments in the near pipeline. So the situation is the weaker year-on-year nickel and cobalt prices persist and continue to result in equity losses in our investments in the HPAL operations. Now moving on to JSI, which is our operating solar plant in Subic. The top left bar chart shows that the generation performance for the year has climbed to 224,179 megawatt hours. That's a 56% increase year-on-year compared to the same period last year due to our expansion of another 72 megawatts last 28th February. The top right bar chart is the EBITDA, which improved to PHP 939 million or an increase of 64% versus the same period last year. EBITDA margins remain healthy at 83%. And you can see our weighted average tariffs are at PHP 5.04. And this is because of the TSAs that we have secured, which has kept the weighted realized tariff higher. Now moving on to our new mines and our renewable energy pipeline. To start off for our new mines, if you look at the new mines, the updated large resources -- the updated resources are now at 241 million tons as of end of 2024, okay? So this substantially adds to the mine life of Nickel Asia, considering that we ship out anywhere between 16 million to 19 million wet metric tons. And these are just for the new mine sites, not counting the existing ones. These 3 mines, the target annual gross additional production to what we're doing today is 7.5 million wet metric tons at full ramp-up. Just to dimension where we are today in terms of these mines. For 2024, we could safely say that these 3 mines have contributed maybe close to 2 million or a little over 2 million tons, around 1/3 of its full potential, right? So if we're able to fully ramp up these mines, this will incrementally add to your annual tonnage. And what's important with these mines is also the nickel grade. If you carefully look at the saprolite resources or the ore that could be used for direct shipping, the nickel grades of Manicani and South Upper Guintalunan are between 1.5% to 1.64%. So this would substantially add to revenues. So just for perspective, most of our saprolite direct shipping ore are at around 1.4% on average. A 0.1% difference could add another 12% to 15% into the prices that -- the ore prices that we're realizing today. So not only can we add in production, but also the quality of the ore could fetch a higher price. So the new mines, if we ramp up and do it on time, this could contribute to our revenues moving forward. For solar assets for 2025, the total gross capacity to be added is 265 megawatts. The attributable to EPI is 217 megawatts. To dimension how soon this will happen, the COD for Subic Cawag will take place in the fourth quarter of 2025. And then for Leyte Phase 1 project, which is a joint venture with Shell, this will come online on third quarter of 2025. So for easy reference, just look at the total gross capacity and attributable capacity on the upper right hand of this slide. And then for 2026, to give you visibility of this, the total gross capacity to be added is 369 megawatts. What's attributable to EPI is another 221 megawatts. So this will be the Phase 2 of the Leyte project, which will -- which is -- which the construction is starting this first quarter. And then we will -- it will commence on the second quarter of next year. And then projects like Botolan, Nazareno, the construction of which will also take place over the next 2 quarters, and they will come online by next year as well. And then 2 new projects also, Libag Sur, 140 megawatts joint venture with Shell. So we are hoping to construct this later this year, COD end of 2026 to start of 2027. And then Botolan, it will be an expansion to the Zambales project, a small 14-megawatt expansion, again, also to start construction early next year and to come online immediately 6 months thereafter. So that's the visibility of our Emerging Power, Inc. and why the gross capacity of 400 megawatts can be achievable by this year and the gross capacity of up to 800 megawatts next year. We still have pipelines of 2027, but we will reveal as we get closer. So what we want to show you is projects that you can actually pencil down and put in your near-term forecast. But, of course, if you're going to look at the whole picture, we have pipelines of another 1.1 gigawatt that we can build out in order to reach close to 2 gigawatts by 2028. Remember, what we've guided before is our target is to reach 1 gigawatt by 2028. But we have actually more in the pipeline that we can develop. In fact, by 2026, by end 2026, we already have close -- we will already have 806 megawatts in gross capacity. And then some updates on the geothermal projects. For Biliran, our existing geothermal project, we are -- we will develop BGI and we're evaluating partners or investors to work with on this project. But meanwhile, for Mindoro, we have decided to write off investments from MGPC due to the project's viability after having studied or getting more data on this asset. So we will focus on developing Biliran. Okay. Moving on to regulatory updates. Senate Bill 2826, the third reading copy of which was published in the 4th of February. Just to tell you, for Nickel Asia, we've done a sensitivity on what impact it would have to our net income. Should the royalties be in place for the tiered royalty outside of mineral reservations and the windfall profit taxes, if it were applied to Nickel Asia's net recurring core income, then it would impact Nickel Asia by 3.6%. So it's not that substantial. But of course, the more -- the bigger news in the Senate Bill is actually the insertion of the proposed ore export ban, which is still in deliberation for both houses. Okay. Next is a disclosure that we've made this morning. So it's a project that we are looking to study. It's a nickel processing plant that we're studying together with DMCI Mining, who is our peer. So we will come together to explore the feasibility of developing and operating a nickel processing plant in the Philippines, right? So what we aim to achieve here is to process the low-grade nickel ore that is not viable for export. So that's a way to maximize our resources and to generate opportunities and boosting our local nickel industry. So over the next 3 years of this collaboration, what we aim to determine are the following: the technology to be adopted by this processing plant, a suitable site to host the plant and to secure the nickel ore reserves to supply the plant and to do this through our joint exploration, of course, subject to the approval of necessary permits to make it happen. Meanwhile, we are still in the process of determining the equity structure of the potential joint venture entity for this plant. So we have nothing yet to share about that. Now we move to Q&A. But before we open the floor, let me just answer some of the questions that were sent during the registration. So first question is, what is your outlook on nickel prices in the next 3 to 6 months and in 1 to 2 years? So in the near-term, the direct shipping ore prices are skewed to the upside because, again, there has been unpredictable weather conditions also in Indonesia, more rains. And again, the uncertainty of mining quota permits and some challenges there have led again to what we see as a tightness in ore supply up until today. So at least for the near-term, that's what we're seeing. Meanwhile, for the limonite HPAL ore prices, it will still be under pressure because of the low nickel LME prices due to a lack of HPAL capacity that has come to the market this year. For a longer 1- to 2-year view, we think both the direct shipping ore and the limonite HPAL ore prices may skew towards the upside given that we are nearing the bottom of low nickel LME prices because the incentivized cost for Class 1 nickel projects are almost at par with the payability. Therefore, an inflection point will come. In fact, you will start reading about a lot of Class 1 nickel projects being canceled because of where nickel LME is or being postponed, okay? And then while the demand -- on the demand side, it continues to steadily grow. And then for direct shipping ore, the uncertainties in the mining quota given by the Indonesian government and the unpredictability of weather combined with the large amounts needed by the Class 2 processing plants in Indonesia will support the direct shipping ore prices. So this is our view on nickel prices. Next question is, how are export prices trending so far if you compare it with 4Q of last year versus 3Q? To give you an exact answer, the third quarter of last year, nickel ore -- direct shipping ore prices for Nickel Asia was at $29.94. In the fourth quarter, it has risen to $36. So that's a 20% quarter-on-quarter improvement in price due to the tight ore supply. Third question, is there a difference between the nickel demand for China and Indonesia? Okay. The first answer here is for the limonite high-iron product, it is only China that would require this for their blast furnace smelters. But for the saprolite ore, the mid-grade saprolite ore, the demand is quite similar for both countries. And the pricing that is sold to China is similar to what the Indonesian buyers can pay for. There's a fourth question here regarding, is there a plan to sell the THPAL stake? We remain minority shareholders of THPAL. In fact, while we have sold the Coral Bay stake, I think for THPAL, our capacity here is 30,000 nickel ton per year. So the breakeven point for the THPAL is lower. Just to align with our view on where nickel LME is, right, and we think we're nearing the bottom. There will -- but there will come a time that nickel LME prices will recover to such that the THPAL will be able to operate more efficiently. Next question is, will renewable energy business need to raise equity and capital? Okay. So I talked to you, we've shown you our pipeline or the projects slated for 2025. The business has funded at the moment adequately for the pipeline being revealed in 2025 and partially for some of those in 2026. But for 2026, there will be new ones, and we are currently evaluating options to finance that portfolio moving forward. And then a question on dividend declaration. So we've already talked about the 50% of previous year's earnings that we declared. But what would be the dividends for this year? It's hard to say, but I think last year, if we think about our first half operations, we saw very depressed direct shipping ore prices, only $22. So if we are able to see some recovery in ore prices from that very low price this year, then that would actually free up a lot of operating cash this year. But we cannot -- it's hard to pin an amount and whether that certainty will happen. But at least what we could say is so far, ore prices are in the short-term trending towards the upside, but we need to see this development unfold in the second quarter, and we're monitoring it on a daily basis. And then next question is what is your stance or your view on Senator Escudero's proposed bill on banning the export of mineral ores?

Well, let me take that. First of all, the -- what's written is a 5-year -- is a proposal for a 5-year ban, but Senator Escudero himself has been saying that most likely, they will agree to a 10-year -- an extension to 10 years. The other news that we heard was that if in case the 10-year ban is passed, there will be other conditions, meaning it's not a hard and fast rule that the ban will take place in 10 years. There has to be other conditions that have to be met by the government. If not, then there will be an extension of the ban. The other possibility is that the House may not agree to the ban itself. So it may be removed during the bicameral conference. So my view is that even if it's passed, given what we've heard, it will not have a negative impact because, number one, it's 10 years; and number 2, other conditions have to be met that will be favorable to the downstream nickel sector.

Okay. And then next question, why did Nickel Asia venture into renewable energy?

Okay. Well, this was -- this happened a long time ago, more than a decade ago. And the -- there are 2 main reasons why we got into renewable energy. The first was our desire to have a business with more stable revenues and income because nickel and it's the case even today is quite a volatile commodity. So we wanted to diversify into a more stable business. The second is our belief that the -- even at the time that the Philippine energy story that clean energy and renewable energy will play a major role. Also given the volatility of other fuel sources, as we all know, a lot of our fuel source are important. So we knew that for the future stability and the lowering of electricity price in the Philippines that it would be essential for the government to have renewable energy as a major part of the energy mix in the Philippines.

Okay. And then for the last question, I think we already discussed this in our slides for EPI. So we will upload this presentation on our website so that you can go back and review the pipeline for 2025 for gross capacity and for 2026. Okay. And then we -- and then I'll just answer some more questions. This is from Regis Partners from Klyne. What is the reason for the divergence in the trajectory of direct shipping ore prices and prices of the HPAL limonite ore? So the big reason, again, for the support in our direct shipping ore prices is the shortage of the direct shipping ore needed to process for the Class 2 nickel processing smelters in Indonesia. And because it was for the weather -- the bad weather and also the challenging permits, and that is still persistent up until today. Meanwhile, if you look at the Class 1, there is an oversupply -- a slight oversupply for battery materials due to the sudden ramp-up and production of all these HPAL plants in Indonesia. So that's what's keeping nickel LME price more tempered. And then another question from Klyne is how much of your 2024 sales volume were from saprolite direct shipping exports and limonite direct shipping and limonite provided to HPAL? So that breakdown, Klyne, saprolite direct shipping ore is around 48% of our total volume. Limonite HPAL is around 43% of our volume. And then the limonite direct shipping ore, which is high-iron is around 9% of our total volume. Next question is, how have ore export prices trended so far for 2025? It remains quite similar to what we've seen in the fourth quarter of 2024. Then what is your CapEx guidance for 2025? So if you look at our dividend declaration slide, I've given you the figure of our approved CapEx for this year, that is PHP 1.6 billion for mining. And then can you please provide construction progress for each of your power expansion projects? In the EPI slides, there will be a row there that will talk about the specific construction status of those projects. But at least I can talk about the ones in 2025. Subic Cawag, it will open by December Christmas time. So we'd like to say that the construction there is about close to 50% done for Subic Cawag. Then for Leyte Phase 1, this is a bit closer to open sometime in July. So this is really around 80% done already in terms of construction. Okay. That's all the main questions I have. We can now open the floor for other questions from our audience, if any, or you can type your question in the chat box.

We have one from [ Fernandez Michael Isaac ]. Is the intention to have all future renewable energy projects developed under the JV with Shell?

Thanks for your question. So in our pipeline, we do have a substantial pipeline with Shell, but there will also be projects that we have vetted with Shell first. But due to some preference, they would opt not to pursue. But for EPI on a stand-alone basis, we could continue to pursue these projects. So it will always be first with Shell, but it doesn't -- but if the joint venture will not push through [Technical Difficulty], EPI will always have a choice to do it on its own.

Next question from [ Ralph Fausto ]. Will the growth in ore production moving forward come exclusively from the new mines or is there still potential to expand production at existing mine sites?

Thanks, Ralph. I think the existing mine sites, they're already operating at the full potential that they could. In fact, one of the mines, Hinatuan, HMC Tagana-an will be approaching mine life. Last year of operations, we're projecting for it to contribute one more year next year. Then thereafter, by 2027, these 3 mines should play a key part in offsetting the absence in the volume of that mine. So that mine would generate around 1.3 million tons to 1.5 million tons. So easily, any of these 3 mines will be able to fill the void of Hinatuan. So the growth -- to answer your question, the growth will come from the new mines.

Next question from Ralph. Could you provide some context on why NAC is assessing the feasibility of a new nickel processing plant after divesting its stake in Coral Bay? Additionally, are there specific differences in the dynamics of THPAL that make you inclined to retain your stake in it?

Well, yes, let me take that. We mentioned in the disclosure that if we today, the factors are not all there to have a feasible nickel processing plant. So first of all, LME price has to go up. And then we also need resource that is big enough. We estimate at least maybe 200 million wet metric tons to be able to support a scale -- a minimum -- a plant of a minimum scale. And then we also mentioned in our disclosure that other aspects have to fall into place, including clear and stable government policy and other factors. So this is in preparation for the future and with a view towards more or less 2030, where we think that the supply and demand for nickel will be in balance and hence, will probably lead to an increase in the LME nickel price at that point in time. More questions.

Yes, we still have 5 minutes in this call. So...

Well, Klyne just reached.

Klyne, yes, please. Klyne, you may ask your question.

Just on the power unit, I just want to get a sense of how much you're -- I guess, you're planning, you're going to spend this year and maybe next year for all your power projects, even maybe you can provide a figure before financing, just so we have an idea of, I guess, the CapEx that you need to spend for all of these projects?

Right. Klyne, the cost to construct has gone down substantially also since we started this business. In fact, what we're -- I guess on the per megawatt, rather than giving you the exact figures of the CapEx that we are setting aside for this on a per megawatt basis, I guess, also considering for civil works, so civil works, panels, inverters and all that, what we're seeing right now is a figure of around [ $550,000 to $600,000, $650,000 ] per megawatt. And that cost -- and it was skewed to the upside if the transmission lines and the terrain would be more challenging. But otherwise, for anything that's flat and anything that's not too far, the best case would be around [ $500,000 ] per megawatt. So you could kind of extrapolate that to our pipeline, and that would be the figure required to finance the projects.

Is that only for the solar assets, I'm assuming...

Yes. Only the solar asset.

Sorry, I missed a large portion of your presentation earlier. Can I just clarify if you're only doing solar projects at the moment or are there other technologies that you're...

Majority -- yes, the big focus is really on solar. So it's really building up to 800 megawatts of gross capacity up to year-end next year and then going up to the 2 gig -- to the almost 2 gigawatts that we're targeting by 2028. So that's pretty much solar. Now for the geothermal client, there's not going to be a big investment yet in Biliran. We're still evaluating our options. Although compared to Mindoro, where the studies really show that we cannot push through with it for Biliran, and we're at a stage where we're evaluating how we can scale this up more before making the investment. We have around 3 minutes. We can take in 1 or 2 more questions if there is any.

[ The Amos ].

Yes. So I just have 2 questions. So the first one, is it possible to give a breakdown of the customers by country for your saprolite ore, like how much to Indonesia to China, et cetera? And then for my second question, do you have updates on the Marian copper gold project? Like do you already have possibly a target year, start date of operations in mind? Yes, that's it.

Okay, Amos to answer your first question, what we sell to Indonesia today, so I mentioned that saprolite exports are around 48% of our volumes. So half of the saprolite exports have been sold to Indonesia last year. So that would be around 48%, so 24%. Approximately 24% -- 23% to 24% of the total volume sold to Indonesia. Then second question for the Marian project of CExCI, Cordillera Exploration, we are now doing drilling, continue to do drilling on the sites. We cannot give a year yet, Amos, where -- on where it's feasible. But from what we've mentioned before, it will be a couple more years. I think earliest would be you will see 3 years. In 3 years' time, we will be happy to report more developments with this project.

We have a question from [ Fernandez Isaac ]. What is Shell's role in the JV? Will they play a purely financial role or will they take on other roles like O&M, EPC et cetera?

Okay. The value of Shell in EPI is as an offtaker. So it derisks the project from having to -- for your power supply agreements. So not only financially, so they have a financial benefit to it, but reducing the offtake risk is a big part of the partnership with Shell. So for example, the project that is coming online in San Isidro, we already have power supply agreements in place for the later project in Visayas at rates that will be able to pay off the returns that our joint venture would desire. So I think that's how you should look at it. If there are no other questions, please send -- or if you have any questions later on, please send an e-mail to me or the Investor Relations team, and we'll be happy to answer. Then for this presentation, it will be uploaded after this earnings call. So please go to the website and download it. And yes, thank you for attending our earnings call and hope to see you in the next one. Goodbye.