Yancoal Australia Ltd ($YAL)

Good day, and thank you for standing by. Welcome to Yancoal First Quarter Production Report Conference Call and Webcast. [Operator Instructions] Please be advised that today's call is being recorded. I would now like to hand the call over to Mr. Brendan Fitzpatrick, Head of Investor Relations. Thank you, Brendan. Please go ahead.

Thank you, Desmond, and thank you to everyone on the call for joining this briefing on Yancoal's first quarterly production report for 2026. We have several members of Yancoal's executive leadership team to recap the quarter and participate in the question-and-answer session. The commentary provided today is based on the quarterly production report published on the Australian Securities Exchange and the Stock Exchange of Hong Kong announcement platforms on the 20th of April. There is no presentation pack for this call. The Yancoal website holds past presentations for any participants who require additional information on the company. I'll hand over to our Chief Executive Officer, Sharif Burra, to provide the first quarter highlights.

Thank you, Brendan. I also welcome everyone joining us on today's conference call. We would have spoken to some of you just a few days ago after announcing the Kestrel Coal Mine acquisition. The acquisition price for Kestrel is USD 1.85 billion plus a potential contingent cash consideration. Adding a long-life asset that produces hard coking coal at strong margins is a compelling step forward for Yancoal. We're working with the vendors to reach completion in late Q3 of 2026. As important as the acquisition will be, we're maintaining our focus on the existing portfolio, which underpins our financial performance and our capacity to pursue growth. In this context, let's now turn to the first quarter performance. Collectively, our operations are running to plan so far this year. When setting our 2026 guidance, we indicated the first quarter would have comparatively lower production with output increasing over the remaining quarters. This profile is similar to our 2025 production profile. ROM coal volume was 1% lower than the first quarter last year and saleable coal was 5% lower. After the first 3 months, we're in a comparable position to last year. If we can exceed last year's 12 months performance, it would be another record year for Yancoal. Understandably, we've received a number of queries about diesel supply and implications for costs. We can confirm we secured diesel supply until around the end of May and are working closely with our main suppliers. Beyond this horizon, continuity of diesel supply depends on events in the global market. As a prudent measure, we have established contingency plans should continuity of supply become less certain. Given the outlook for diesel prices, we now anticipate cash operating costs for the year could be close to the upper end of our $90 to $98 per tonne guidance range. Uncertainty in global oil and diesel markets will require ongoing assessment of our cost profile. The positive aspect of the global energy market disruption is the potential for higher realized coal prices. The international coal price indices we sell against increased 5% to 14% during the quarter despite some buyers in the thermal market running down winter stockpiles. Due to our contract structures, the benefit of rising prices will start carrying through to our realized prices from the second quarter onwards. I'll now hand over to other members of the executive team to share further details from the first quarter, starting with David Bennett, our Executive General Manager of Operations.

Thank you, Sharif. Our positive trend for total recordable injury frequency rate continued. It reduced to 5.77 at the end of March. Although our rate is below the industry weighted average of 9.6, we remain committed and focused to further improving our safety performance. During the quarter, we produced 15 million tonnes of ROM coal, 1% less than the first quarter last year. From our ROM coal, we produced 11.9 million tonnes of saleable coal, 5% less than the first quarter last year. Sharif mentioned diesel supply. Yancoal's operations and procurement teams have been working closely with our diesel suppliers regarding continuity of delivery. Currently, operations are running normally, and we expect this to remain the case until at least the end of May. Longer term, there is some uncertainty as supply will ultimately be influenced by the availability of crude oil in the global market as well as the regional refining and shipping activity. Should diesel supply become less certain in the future, various adaptions to our open cut mine plans are possible. These adaptions include reducing lower priority fleets, slowing overburdened removal activity whilst delivering ROM coal and maximizing use of our electric rope shovels and draglines instead of diesel-powered hydraulic excavators. As our underground mines are less diesel intensive, revisions of those mine plans should be minimal. Looking at the operational performance in the first quarter, the Queensland mines, Yarrabee and Middlemount were impacted by extropical Cyclone Koji early in the quarter, but subsequently recovered the lost production. By contrast, New South Wales mines had minimal weather-related disruptions during the quarter. To facilitate production throughout the remainder of the year, we have prioritized overburden removal at most open cut mines, and this should ensure we meet our forecast production. However, as Sharif mentioned, the outlook for our cash operating costs has changed since we provided the guidance in February. In 2025, diesel comprised approximately AUD 7 a tonne of direct mining costs. This figure was consistent within our 2026 budget. However, as diesel pricing increases have started to have an effect, we now suggest cash operating costs for 2026 could push towards the top end of the range. I'll now hand over to Mark Salem, our Executive General Manager of Marketing and Logistics, to provide commentary on the coal markets.

Thank you, David. Our attributable sales were 8.2 million tonnes, a decrease from the prior quarter that reflected lower sales production and the timing of shipments relative to the reporting period. During the quarter, the API5 index averaged USD 81 per tonne, up 5% from the prior quarter, and the GC Newcastle Index averaged USD 120 per tonne, up 12%. In the met coal market, the Platts Low Vol PCI index averaged USD 161 per tonne, up 14%, and the Platts Semi-Soft index averaged USD 146 per tonne up, 14% as well. These increases are yet to flow through to our realized prices. After converting to Australian dollars, our first quarter average realized prices were similar to the prior quarter at AUD 134 per tonne for thermal coal and AUD 213 per tonne for metallurgical coal. Our overall average realized prices for the first quarter was AUD 146 per tonne compared to AUD 148 per tonne in the prior quarter. The year started with conditions in international coal markets gradually improving before global energy markets were disrupted due to the Middle East conflict throughout March. There was immediate increase in speculative coal trading activity, direct impacts on the physical coal markets have been slow to emerge. The general expectation across energy market participants is that reduced Middle-Eastern liquefied natural gas LNG supply prompts gas-to-coal switching for power generation. This thesis is supported by indications that Japan, South Korea and Taiwan will lift restrictions on coal-fired power generation to improve power generation stability. However, higher levels of post-winter coal stockpiles in these countries have mitigated underlying demand as many end users take a wait and see stance. Across the seaborne thermal coal market, there was a moderate decrease in supply during the first quarter compared to the same period last year. Supply from Australia was the same due to limited weather disruptions and minimal shipping queues. Indonesian exports were 5% lower due to uncertainty about export policy implementation and were also constrained by the expiry of temporary quota allowances. So far this year, there has been a mixed demand activity in seaborne thermal coal market. The 2 largest importers, China and India have reduced imports due to elevated stockpiles and domestic production. Reductions were 5% and 12%, respectively. Elsewhere, demand increased 3% in Japan, where coal is a balancing fuel source for power generation and the removal of restrictions on low-efficiency coal-fired power plants are planning to conserve LNG. Also, South Korea demand increased 25% as cost optimization in power sector favored coal-fired power stations. Looking at the metallurgical coal markets, they were broadly balanced through the quarter. One positive factor to note was an apparent shift in conditions to cost-based pricing rather than demand-driven pricing. This shift suggests supply has rebalanced to the point where the marginal cost of supply is setting spot prices. If that is the case, higher costs associated with diesel prices might be passed on to metallurgical coal customers. I will now hand over to Kevin Su, our Chief Financial Officer, to address the financial position.

Thank you, Mark. For the past several quarters, we have talked about our strong financial position. The cash balance and access to debt allow us to continue Yancoal growth story with the cash flow acquisition. We ended the quarter with over $2 billion in the bank. As Mark mentioned, sales were lower this quarter due to factors such as the timing of the shipments, but the differential between production and sales always evens out over time. The cash flow will be caught up in the subsequent periods. In the cash flow announcement, we said between [ USD 650 million and USD 850 million ] of the upfront payment will be funded with cash. The final amount will be influenced by cash accumulation between now and completion late in the third quarter. [ Kevin ] explained how we are projecting higher operating costs than we were when we set our guidance, but Mark also alluded to the higher realized prices we are likely achieve in the near term. We will determine the optimal cash amount as the completion date approaches. One of the factors in the determination will be the outlook for the shareholders' distribution in the future periods. Speaking of distributions, just last week, we paid [ $0.12 ] per share fully franked final dividend for 2025. This took [ $161 ] million from our cash position. I'll now hand back to Brendan to coordinate the Q&A session.

Thanks, Kevin, Mark, David and Sharif for highlighting the drivers of our first quarter performance. We will now move on to the question-and-answer session, starting with questions from the phone, then moving on to questions submitted via the webcast. Desmond, could you please initiate the process for questions via the phone?

[Operator Instructions] There are currently no questions on the phone. Please continue.

Thanks, Desmond. I'll come back to you shortly to check against the phone. In the meantime, let's take a look at the webcast questions coming through. Unsurprisingly, diesel is one of the topics at the top of the list. We did provide some comments through the earlier part of the webcast. But if we could look at some of the questions and address them once more, could we provide an update on the diesel shortage situation in Australia, whether we see any easing of the conditions and if coal production has been impacted as a result of diesel supply. I'll take that to mean both at a company level, but also at an industry-wide level, Sharif, could you provide an initial comment?

Yes. Thanks, Brendan. At the moment, we have stability and security of supply at the very least until the end of May. We are working very closely with our suppliers. And whilst at this point in time, there is uncertainty, we are preparing the operations in the event we do get some constrained supply for our operations. We haven't adjusted our production guidance or target for 2026 at this point with the exception of the cost increases that we expect to start to see flowing through with the higher diesel price. We do have operational flexibility, and it's not an apples-for-apples across all the operations. Our underground mines use comparatively very low volumes of diesel, and we would anticipate to be materially less impacted than perhaps some of the open cut mines, albeit some of our open cut mines, we do have a higher proportion of electric powered equipment, draglines and road shovels, et cetera, that we will optimize. So at this point in time, we are looking at some options across particularly the larger open cut mines if the constrained supply does eventuate. But a direct supply constraint won't necessarily materialize as a direct impact on ROM production. And as you will note, we are prioritizing overburden removal in the front half of the year to allow us to free up the coal and production for the second half as well. So I might leave it there, Brendan.

Thanks, Sharif. It's a good and expansive answer. It covers a lot of the topics coming through -- sorry, a lot of the questions coming through on the topic of diesel. There is a question there that asks us to think ahead. And if the disruptions supply from the conflict in the Middle East was to last 50 or even 90 days, do we have a sense for what the potential diesel shortage might look like. And again, I'll ask that question both at a company level, but then more collectively at an industry level.

Yes. Thanks, Brendan. I wouldn't anticipate that diesel would be turned off completely for 50 or 90 days or likely is a reduction in supply. Now that gives us the opportunity to optimize the diesel usage within our minds to optimize our portfolio in terms of output. And I would anticipate the industry would do this. This broadly would impact all mining operations throughout Australia and at different levels, given the makeup of the diesel usage for each of those operations and sites. At Yancoal, we understand this very well. We understand where we would prioritize our diesel usage to optimize our returns. But I don't, at this point in time, envisage a scenario where diesel is totally turned off.

Let's stay on that topic of diesel. With regards to our diesel supplies and having secured supplies until late May, are we able to provide any commentary about the nature of the longer-term contracts we have with refiners and suppliers or whether we have inventories on site or outside the mine site that we can draw upon?

Yes. I won't go into the detailed contractual detail of our suppliers. We are -- our sites are under supply obligations. Our sites have been maintained at the requisite supply levels on site. We do carry those stocks on site, but we do rely on our suppliers to maintain those supply levels on site. I might leave it there.

Okay. Perhaps just to clarify on that -- in the context of supplies to our mines, do we see any differentiation between Yancoal and the supplies of diesel it receives relative to other industry participants in the domestic coal producing sector?

I think materially, Yancoal is under long-term supply contracts. I would anticipate many of our peers to be of a similar nature, given that we are less exposed to the spot market for diesel, where some others may not be, but we're focused on Yancoal supply and security of supply.

Let's move off the topic of diesel for a moment and on to the coal markets. There's a question seeking clarification on how much thermal coal is sold at spot prices versus fixed-term contracts and how much of the increase in recent coal prices Yancoal has captured or will capture in its contract structures. Mark, could I turn to you for a comment on the contract structures and the price activity and what we're realizing now and going forward?

Yes. Thanks, Brendan. Happy to answer that question. Look, I suppose in line with the market shifts, we're seeing a lot more buying on index-based pricing. And even if it's a term contract, it can still be associated with an index-linked formula. So the old traditional fixed term contracts at a fixed price or at a negotiated price per quarter is changing to more of an index-linked price based on a period of time typically prior to shipment. If it's a term contract where we have multiple shipments, those shipments are typically priced ahead of the delivery period. So we have a known position still based on an index. And most of our business is contracted in that manner these days. And this is why we always talk about this lagged impact on index pricing to realize pricing aspect. Does that cover the question?

I think that's sufficient. Desmond, I'll turn it back to you. We'll check if there's any questions coming through on the phone line, please.

[Operator Instructions] There are currently no questions on the phone. Please continue.

Okay. Back to the webcast questions, sticking with the topic of energy markets. The question coming through is, are we surprised by the relatively muted response from coal prices given the disruption to the global LNG market? And is it related to shoulder season demand weakness and running down of inventories. Mark, could I turn to you once again, please?

Sure. I suppose -- thanks, Brendan. In terms of being surprised, I think the answer is no. We realized that prior to March, most of our buyers had very high stocks. and we're well covered coming into this energy crisis caused by the Middle East conflict. As a result -- in addition to that, I should say, we're also going into the shoulder season, which the question also highlighted. So we weren't surprised that we've seen a dramatic increase in the paper prices to go up, but we've also seen a dramatic fall since the Strait has reopened. So we're assessing that. We're continually assessing. We are coming into the summer season. We hope that we'll see some more buying coming through.

Thanks, Mark. Let's move on to some questions in the financials. There's -- one of our participants has identified the relatively flat cash balance from end of December through to the end of March and seeking clarity on whether it is due to inventory build and normal seasonality, testing whether there's cost or CapEx components in the first quarter that were relevant to this outcome and any other factors that might be relevant to the circumstance. Kevin, could we turn to you, please?

Sure. Thanks, Brendan. I think that's the right observation. The lower cash balance largely driven by lower shipment, which reflected by a higher inventory [ base ]. From a CapEx perspective, everything is pretty consistent with what we have been planning. Are there are some other potential reasons contributing to the lower cash balance such as some tax payment for timing difference. But at end of the day, is largely driven by the shipment, as I just mentioned.

And Kevin, as you indicated in the comments earlier, the shipments balance out over time. So the difference between production and sales in any one period will normalize over time.

Yes, that's right. Yes.

Thanks, Kevin. On the topics of the financial setting, the question looking back to the acquisition of Kestrel, which we announced last week. And the question asking what is the outlook for dividends and dividend capacity going forward. Kevin, please?

Yes. I think -- thanks, Brendan. I think that's quite a simple feedback to the investors. It's not in our company's intention to change our dividend policy. We will still pay dividend as what we've been planning as 50% free cash flow and 50% NPAT, whichever is higher at the general guidance.

Thanks, Kevin.

Brendan, the other comment I'd make is the acquisition is expected to be immediately earnings per share and free cash flow accretive.

That's good observation. Thank you, Sharif. Just about through the end of the webcast questions. If anyone on the webcast has a question, please take the opportunity to type and submit as soon as you can. Desmond, I'll come back to you for a final check for questions on the phone.

[Operator Instructions] There are no questions from the line. Please continue.

Okay. I see one final question on the webcast. It's returning to the topic of diesel. And then the second question has come through, I'll get to both of these. First one on the topic of diesel. With the diesel supply that we've been talking about, is there any capacity for Yancoal to consider alternative power, structures, renewable energies and the likes. Sharif given the nature of our operations, do we have any flexibility to adjust our diesel consumption and usage?

I think this comes back to what David had mentioned previously, where we do have electrified equipment. So the underground operations, they're already electrified. We rely on electricity in the open cut mines, some of the mines have the electric shovels and the draglines and we would obviously see no impact on those that don't consume diesel. With regards to the heavy mobile as moving equipment, trucks and the like the transition to renewable energy on those is something at the moment that whilst the industry and we are certainly looking at is not readily available for deployment. So that would be something that couldn't be readily deployed immediately, i.e., battery electric truck technology, et cetera. That's still a little way down the track.

Now, we do have a few more questions coming through. Again, on the topic of diesel, can we comment on the influence on the potential for higher diesel prices to influence and affect our cash operating costs?

Yes. I think what we would say is what we've said here is our forecast cash operating cost of $90 to $98 per tonne our guidance provided at the start of the year. Our initial forecast suggests that the higher prices could push 2026 cost towards the top end of that range.

Okay. And speaking of costs, there's a question coming through asking what realized price Yancoal would need to achieve to be cash breakeven for 2026. There are several components to this. I appreciate the cash operating costs, which we've guided to and then the subsequent elements, CapEx and the like. It's not typically something we've been specific on. But Kevin, is there some commentary we could provide that would provide context for this question?

I think, Brendan, you made a very good summary already. It's a good indication from the guidance, we can look at operating cash cost. But at the same time, there's a big component need to be balanced, which is the CapEx. And I put these 2 together, largely going to decide what would be the cash breakeven. Yes, but at least not something we just openly disclose to the market.

Given currently, there's no debt, so there's no financing costs. We would make our tax payments typically on a monthly basis of pay-as-you-go. There'll be those components and the corporate overheads. So it would be dependent on all those elements being aggregated to reach an estimate for the breakeven price. There's a couple of questions on the acquisition. And Kevin, we momentarily -- a moment ago, we talked about the payout ratio and the dividend structure that the company has in place. If the acquisition does not affect the dividends, does that mean the payout ratio remains above or around 50%?

Thanks Brendan. Our general guidance is about 50% of free cash and/or 50% NPAT, whichever is higher. In the case, the free cash flow is better than NPAT, which has happened in the past few years, you will notice the payout ratio could be above 50%, and we are not changing our plan.

Okay. Kevin, I'll stay with you. One of the questions coming through is regarding the cost of debt we're using to fund the acquisition. Is there anything we can say on the cost of debt that we have on that facility that we plan to put in place?

Thanks, Brendan. I would love to share the cost but unfortunately, we are bound by the confidentiality agreement with the financiers. So we are not able to disclose precisely how much funding costs we are paying and will be paying. However, we just want to assure our investors, Yancoal is very proud about our funding history. We always have a very competitive facility with us. And then in the future, when we disclose our annual results, we normally disclose the average earning cost in our financial results. So that's a good place for any interested investors to have a look.

Thanks, Kevin. We've had several questions on these availability and production impacts at the operational level. But a different topic coming through now is the comment on shipping freight, fuel costs, what that could potentially mean for our customers and the delivery of seaborne coal to the international marketplace. Mark, do you have any thoughts you could provide on this topic?

Sure. Yes. Thanks, Brendan. Look, we have seen charter party rates appreciate in terms of reports due to the cost of fuel and bunkering. In the height of the crisis, we also saw some countries restrict bunkering and we saw a lot of vessel diversions from normal bunkering ports to other ports bunkering which ended up delaying some spending. But more recently, we've basically seen a return to normal bunkering and very minimal impact on the business. Vessels are reviving at their scheduled time of arrival, and we're not seeing any delays in natural physical arrivals.

Okay. So at this point in time, there's no suggestion that we could be looking at circumstances similar to 2022 with supply constraints, albeit at that point in time was largely weather related. But in terms of current market conditions and supply constraints that we might potentially encounter in the international trade?

Yes. No, the supply is still quite strong from a coal supply point of view. The LNG supply comes from a variety of different markets. And we haven't seen a very strong switch of the coal to -- from LNG to coal. And in terms of coal usage, we haven't seen that jump as expected due to the energy crisis.

But is it potentially still yet to play out in its entirety, given the time lag between supply and delivery in oil and gas markets and then the carryover to coal markets and then the regional impacts around the world?

Yes, we could still see that throughout the -- especially towards the end of Q2 coming into the summer burn period when demand picks up, we could see some impact from the crisis -- lagged impact from the crisis.

Thanks, Mark. Just one question has come back through again. It was on the topic of renewable energy and asking whether Yancoal considers renewable energy. I asked it previously in the context of operational supply, but is there a broader thought we need to contemplate in terms of general power usage and renewable energy consumption and energy mix across the company?

Look, I think -- Mark Jacobs here. We have looked at renewable energy opportunities in the past, and we considered solar in the past. The problem that we have is that all of our operations are 24-hour operations. And so we're still reliant on the grid. We are, however, very close to getting state government approval for our Stratford Pump hydro projects which will provide long duration storage of renewable energy into the grid. So that is one opportunity that we're continuing to investigate.

Thank you, Mark, and thanks to everyone on the call. I've addressed all the questions coming through on the webcast. Sharif, could I please hand across to you to provide the closing remarks.

Thanks, Brendan. This is the fourth time we've engaged with the market since the start of 2026. In January, following the fourth quarter report, we highlighted the production records delivered in 2025, thanks to our world-class assets run by some of the most capable people in the industry. With all that is happening in global energy markets and our acquisition of Kestrel, it's important to remember our large-scale, low-cost thermal coal mines are the foundation of our business. We delivered a great production performance last year and hope to improve upon it this year. In February, following the 2025 results, we talked about continuing to reward our shareholders with fully franked dividends. We also highlighted the strong net cash position and continued access to debt markets that provided considerable financial flexibility. Then just last week, we were in a position to tell you how we'd utilize that financial flexibility by acquiring Kestrel Coal Mine. We strongly believe Kestrel is a high quality and attractive acquisition that will deliver on Yancoal's value-adding growth aspirations and positions the business to deliver strong performance and shareholder returns in the future. We see this acquisition as another great step forward for the business. Through all these discussions, I see a common theme, we deliver on what we say we will do. This starts with operating our mines safely and efficiently to deliver great operational performances. We reward our shareholders with dividends while being disciplined with our capital management allocations. Then when the right opportunity was available, we acted decisively to continue growing the business with a great asset that will enhance our portfolio. Thank you once again for joining us. I hope you have a great day.

Thank you, Sharif. Desmond, could you please conclude the call.

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