Stanmore Resources Limited ($SMR)

Thank you for standing by, and welcome to the Stanmore Resources Limited March 2026 Quarterly Activities Report Investor Briefing. [Operator Instructions]. I would now like to hand the conference over to Mr. Marcelo Matos, Chief Executive Officer and Executive Director. Please go ahead.

Good morning, everyone. Thank you for joining [ Shane and I ] for our first quarterly activities report for 2026. It has certainly been a dynamic beginning to the year with industry-wide weather disruptions and more recently, a heightened macro environment with the ongoing conflict in the Middle East. Despite these challenges, I'm pleased to say that our operations have once again delivered a solid quarter. Saleable production concluded at 3.2 million tons, driven by a strong recovery late in the quarter. Metallurgical coal prices improved during the quarter, supported by the combined effect of the widespread supply disruptions and firming demand from India. However, these gains were partially tapered later in the quarter as market participants entered a wait-and-see mode and amid the unfolding energy situation. Nonetheless, met coal prices remain materially stronger than this time last year, and we remain confident in the strength of our asset base and balance sheet position with more than USD 400 million in liquidity at the end of the quarter. Getting into the detail, we'll start with a brief summary of our safety and operational performance. The serious accidents frequency rate increased to 0.5 with one serious accident recorded during the quarter. This incident, which was a hand-related injury, was thankfully very limited in its potential severity. The employee is recovering well and is expected to be back to normal duties imminently. Nonetheless, we remain focused on understanding the leading indicators for this type of accidents and continue to refine our processes and controls accordingly. Overall, I remain very proud of our consistent safety performance, which continues to remain below the industry average for open cuts. Operations delivered a very strong March to recover volumes following the disruptions from ex-tropical cyclone Koji in mid-January. This weather system brought significant rainfall over a short period with close to 160 meals recorded in a single day at Moranbah more than what has historically been recorded for the whole month of January. Our assets were relatively well prepared with healthy inventories and learnings implemented from the extended wet season of early 2025, which provided a meaningful buffer against the early quarter disruption. ROM coal concluded at 4 million tons, of which 1.8 million tons was mined in March alone, with South Walker Creek contributing an all-time monthly record of 1.1 million tons. This gives us confidence heading into the remainder of the year at South Walker Creek with the strong initial results reflecting a positive start to the new mining services contract for truck and excavator operations and the benefits of low strip ratio mining in the MRA2C area. With [indiscernible] ROM coal volumes normalized from the prior quarter, which was in accordance with our plan, given that there was almost 1 million tons of inventories available to commence the year. The drawdown of these inventories maintained consistent wash plant feed, supporting saleable production of 1.2 million tons, largely in line with the prior year. This trend was similar at Isaac Plains Complex, where ROM volumes reduced by almost half, following an acceleration of volumes into a heavily back-ended 2025. Isaac recovered much better from the wet weather compared to last year, and we are pleased to see volumes tracking in line with the run rate of saleable production guidance this year -- this early in the year. The Isaac Downs Extension project also remains on track with the submission of the EIS anticipated in the June quarter following the completion of all the baseline studies and groundwater modeling. Touching briefly now on the market. Overall, there has been a welcomed improvement compared to this time last year. Prices for premium hard coking coal increased to about USD 250 per ton early in the quarter, primarily due to the supply concerns from impacts of ex-tropical cyclone Koji. We have seen some moderation in demand since then as customers adopt a more cautious approach to restocking post the weather impacts and ongoing geopolitical uncertainty and energy market volatility. Nonetheless, coal prices have generally remained anchored around the USD 230 per ton mark since the quarter end. There are some positive signs around steel activity and blast furnace utilization in China, along with strong economic data coming out of India. Furthermore, recent news suggest that Mongolian trucking volumes into China may also be challenged by the elevated fuel costs. In terms of our sales, you may have noticed that the realization of the average sales price compared to the average of the headline PLV index was lower in this quarter. This was largely due to a higher proportion of thermal coal sales in the March quarter, which is simply a function of the ebbs and flows of the mine plan, which we expect to normalize over time. Against this backdrop, I'll now hand over to Shane to take you through the balance sheet and the updated full year guidance.

Thanks, Marcelo. Starting with a quick update on the balance sheet. Stanmore concluded the quarter with a consolidated cash balance of USD 166 million. With a term loan balance of $245 million and undrawn revolving capacity of $270 million, this translates to net debt of $79 million and total liquidity of USD 436 million at quarter end. This represents a strong and flexible balance sheet position from which to navigate current market volatility. Importantly, strong underlying cash flow generation during the quarter limited the increase in net debt to $46 million despite the USD 80 million dividend paid in March and $12 million in capital expenditure during the quarter. Moving on to guidance. We have reaffirmed both saleable production and capital expenditure guidance, reflecting the strong operational recovery late in the quarter and confidence in the delivery of the full year plan. We have, however, lifted the guidance range for free onboard cash costs by approximately USD 5 to USD 6 per tonne, reflecting updated macroeconomic assumptions for both diesel pricing and foreign exchange rates. The situation in the Middle East remains very dynamic, contributing to increased volatility in global energy markets, particularly in the Asia Pacific, where there is greater reliance on Gulf crude oil supply. With diesel comprising around 7% to 8% of our original FOB cash costs for guidance, the recent volatility warrants updating our assumptions for the remainder of the calendar year. Our Singapore gas oil or SGO assumption has increased from USD 80 per barrel to USD 120 per barrel. This is based on recent average SGO futures pricing for the remainder of the year, noting the curve remains in backwardation and the revised guidance for FOB cash costs factors in higher stripping activities and lower sales in the first half. This results in an approximate USD 4 per tonne increase in full year FOB cash costs with the balance of the movement driven by updated foreign exchange rate assumptions. The higher unit costs are more weighted towards the first half with lower costs expected in H2. Importantly, these changes reflect updated external assumptions only, while underlying operational performance of the business remains strong. [ Absent ] these macroeconomic assumption changes, our FOB cash cost guidance would have remained unchanged. In terms of fuel supply, we have contractual coverage for our full year requirements with our long-term supplier with delivery visibility currently confirmed through to the end of June and rolling updates thereafter. We continue to work closely with our fuel supplier, and our level of assurance has improved as supply chains adjust to alternative sources of crude. Overall, the business remains operationally strong with a cost -- with a disciplined cost base and a robust balance sheet, positioning us well to deliver on full year guidance. That concludes the prepared remarks for today's call. I'll now hand over to the moderator so we can take your questions.

[Operator Instructions] Your first question comes from Glyn Lawcock with Barrenjoey.

Just wanted to drill down a little bit into your comments around the weighting of production. And obviously, you need to do a little bit more stripping in the June quarter to catch up for the inventory rundown from March. Should we expect a similar sort of split to what we saw in 2025 then? Is that how we should think about the year?

Glyn, probably not as steep as 2025. If you look at production itself, it's actually looking like just slightly higher in the second half. But obviously, we have the timing effect to translate that into sales, right? So look at sales, probably a bit more, but I don't think it's going to be as steep as in '25.

Okay. So I think last year was like 46%, 54% on the production front. So maybe 48%-52%, something more like that, not as steep. And sales, obviously, a little bit more -- that's a bit more of a skew in first half to second half.

Yes. I mean, I'm just doing the percentage here just to talk to your indication. Sales is looking like 47% in the first half and production just slightly above that. Production, 49% in the first half. So production is looking just slightly higher on the second half based on the latest forecast.

And then just a clarification question just on what Shane was saying around the sensitivity to fuel. So you've assumed that the $120 a barrel SGO assumption holds all the way through the year. But obviously, if the conflict ends and the backwardation that we can see comes through, you'd expect to recover some of that $4 a tonne cost impost. Is that the right interpretation?

No, no. I think do you want [indiscernible] Shane to that?

Yes. No, Glyn. So we're actually following the curve with our assumptions. So it averages out at $120 over the remainder of the year, but it is higher in our assumptions in the first quarter and then it comes down over the second and third and fourth quarters as the curve does as well. So we've kind of picked up the curve as our base level assumption for this updated guidance.

Which is averaging 120 [indiscernible]. So first quarter, no impact to fuel, right, first quarter of the calendar year. Second quarter, based on our current assumptions is going to be the highest impact because it's more affected by the very short-term profile of the forward curve with a better variation then in Q3 and Q4, averaging then at $120. That's the current assumption.

Yes. And you'll see that as we report our half year results, our cost guidance is set for the full year, but it will obviously be a little bit more first half, second half weighted on costs following that curve as well a little bit.

Yes. So if you then -- just -- so I'm clear, sorry, it looks like every $10 a barrel is roughly $1 a ton -- where is the SGO assumption today then if $120 is the average over the forward curve? I'm just trying to make sure I understand what -- if this conflict unfortunately drags on, SGO stays where it currently is, what's the risk? And I know there's very little you can do about just making sure I understand what we could be faced with if this drags on.

Yes. So the general sensitivity I'd be looking at is around USD 0.70 to USD 0.80 per tonne for every $10 per barrel in SGO movement, if you want to apply that as a sensitivity. The curve, the SGO input curve that we used for this guidance was getting up close to the sort of $190 per barrel at the beginning in sort of April, May and then dropping away to closer to the 115, 110 at the end of the year. Now that changes every day, right? I think it's actually come off a bit since then in terms of the spot price.

Come off it's [ $170 ] today. The curve we are using we're close even to $200 in April, May, Glyn. So it's a bit lower. I mean this thing is very volatile now, right? So -- but yes, I think we've picked a certain position when we locked this guidance in the latest forecast. But as Shane said, I think for every...

Every $10 a barrel, it's around USD 0.70 per ton.

Of cost, yes.

We also have started implementing some fuel hedges in the second half as well to lock in, and this was done a little while ago before the curve has moved dramatically, and that's factored into our cost guidance as well.

I appreciate it's a moving piece, but trying to provide as much clarity is very useful.

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

So thank you all for your questions and for joining today's call. As always, I'd like to thank our employees, our contractors for their hard work in rising up to the challenges, both from a safety and diligently -- both safely and diligently during the quarter. We look forward to continuing to engage with our shareholders when we update you on our second quarter progress in July. Thanks, and have a good day, everyone.

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