Franco-Nevada Corp (FNV) 2024 Q2 法說會逐字稿

Good morning, and welcome to Franco-Nevada Corporation's second-quarter 2024 results conference call and webcast.

This call is being recorded on August 14, 2024.

(Operator Instructions) I would now like to turn the conference over to your host, Candida Hayden, Senior Analyst Investor Relations.

Please go ahead.

Thank you, Laura.

Good morning, everyone.

Thank you for joining us today to discuss Franco-Nevada's second-quarter 2024 results.

Accompanying this call is a presentation, which is available on our website at franco-nevada.com. Where you will also find our full financial results.

The presentation is also available to view on the webcast.

During our call this morning, Paul Brink, President and CEO of Franco-Nevada, will provide introductory remarks, followed by Sandip Rana, Chief Financial Officer, who will provide a brief overview of our results and Eaun Gray, Senior Vice President Business Development, who will discuss our recent transaction.

This will be followed by a Q&A period.

Our full executive team is available to answer any questions.

Participants may submit questions by telephone or via the webcast.

We would like to remind participants that some of today's commentary may contain forward-looking information, and we refer you to our detailed cautionary note on slide 2 of this presentation.

I will now turn the call over to Paul Brink, President and CEO of Franco-Nevada.

Thanks Candida and good morning.

Our Q2 results benefit -- benefited from record gold prices.

Revenues and cash flow from operations were up compared with Q1.

Results were lower compared to Q2 last year without contribution from Cobre Panama and due to lower production at Candelaria and Antapaccay.

Lower quarterly production of the two operating assets, a short term bump.

And we expect to return to normal operations at both for the balance of the year.

Is at two of our best performing assets over the long term, we look forward to the potential underground expansion at Candelaria and in the future development of the [car quaker] project at Antapaccay.

Business development team have had great success in recent months, and we're very pleased to have added two long-life assets to the portfolio.

The gold stream on San Gold's Cascabel, copper gold development project in Ecuador, a royalty on [NeuMoDx, Yanacocha] operations in Peru, Euan I'll give more detail on the acquisitions later in the call.

Initial contributions from Yanacocha and the growing contribution from the (inaudible) Greenstone and talk to senior gold mines that all started production in recent months will boost our results in the second half of the year.

With that, I'll hand it over to Sandip.

Thanks, Paul.

Good morning, everyone.

I'll turn to slide 4 to give an overview of the financial results for the quarter.

Overall GEOs sold were 110,264 for second-quarter 2024.

This compares to [168,515] for the prior year quarter and 131,865 at the prior year quarter with Cobre Panama GEOs are excluded.

As you are aware, Cobre Panama continues to be on preservation, safe management.

In terms of operating assets and GEOs delivered and sold for the quarter, we did receive less ounces from Candelaria and Antapaccay compared to prior year.

Yields delivered were both less than ours -- from both for less than our expectations.

At Candelaria, GEO delivered and sold in Q2 2024, were lower than those sold in Q2 2023, as mining rates were impacted by the interface of the open pit and historic underground mining stopes.

This required more stockpile ore to be processed with reduced grades and recoveries.

With access to higher-grade ore anticipated in the second half of 2024, Lundin Mining anticipates stronger production, I've maintained that production guidance for Candelaria.

At Antapaccay, GEOs delivered and sold were also lower in second quarter compared to prior year.

Mine scheduling was adjusted in part due to attack -- geotechnical event, which temporarily limited pit access, resulting in a lower production.

Franco anticipate stronger production in the second half of 2024 and Franco-Nevada expected stream deliveries for the full year to be within our initial expectations of 50,000 to 60,000 GEOs.

[Hemlo] NPI was also weaker than expected in the second quarter of 2024.

There was less mining on royalty lands along with higher costs which resulted in a lower NPI paid to Franco, continues to be difficult to estimate what the Hemlo NPI will be going forward.

For the quarter, precious metal GEOs were 82,350.

This compares to 95,383 in prior year when Cobre Panama GEOs are excluded.

Precious metal GEO represented approximately 75% of total GEOs for the quarter.

For diversified deals, total GEOs sold were 27,914 compared to just over 36,000 in Q2 2023. [Buying] or GEOs sold were relatively flat year over year, while energy GEOs were lower at 22,100 for Q2 compared to 28,063 a year ago.

Decrease in GEOs is a combination of lower revenue due to weaker natural gas prices as well as the impact of converting energy revenue to GEOs by higher gold prices.

Also in Q2 2023, revenue included a catch-up royalty payment related to new wells in the Permian Basin, which was not present in Q2 (technical difficulty)

As we look at total revenue was $260.1 million for the quarter compared to $329.9 million a year ago.

When you exclude Cobre Panama from prior year revenue, revenue was actually still up from $258.2 million.

Q2 2024 saw continued volatility in average commodity prices.

As you see on slide 5, gold and silver average prices were significantly higher for the quarter when compared to prior year.

However, platinum and in particular, palladium average prices were lower year over year, which did negatively impact conversion of PGM revenues to GEOs.

Oil prices were higher as well, while natural gas average prices were essentially flat.

Slide 6 highlights the financial results for the quarter and year to date 2024.

As mentioned, GEOs sold and revenue were lower year over year.

Adjusted EBITDA was $221.9 million, while adjusted net income was $144.9 million.

On a per share basis, adjusted net income was $0.75 for the quarter.

On the cost side, we did have a decrease in cost of sales compared to prior year, as we did not incur in the ongoing fixed cost per ounces delivered for Cobre Panama and had lower GEOs delivered and sold from Antapaccay and Candelaria.

With respect to the arbitration costs for Cobre Panama, the company incurred costs of $800,000 in Q2 2024 and have incurred $2.3 million year to date, we expect approximately $3 million to be incurred for the rest of the year.

Commissions decreased to $52.9 million versus $75.1 million a year ago.

Again, the decrease was due to no depletion recorded for Cobre Panama as well as lower depletion recorded for Antapaccay because of the lower deliveries in the quarter.

One additional item to note in Q2 2024 is the tax adjustment recorded in May 2024, the government of Barbados enacted legislation to implement tax measures also in response to the OECD's Pillar two global minimum tax initiative measures include an increase of the Barbados corporate tax rate to 9% and the introduction of a qualified domestic minimum top-up tax, which together aim to ensure that the Barbados effective tax rate payable subject to Pillar two, is at least 50% going forward.

What's important to note is that of the $122.8 million total tax expense recorded for the six months ended June 30, 2024, [$49.1 million] relates to an adjustment for prior years.

And the actual incremental tax expense related to 2024 is about $21 million because it's changes.

Going forward, we estimate that our effective tax rate will be about 19% to 20%, depending upon where taxable income is generated.

Slide 7 highlights the continued diversification of the portfolio from the charts you can see that 75% of our second-quarter 2024 revenue was generated by precious metals with revenue being sourced 82% from the Americas.

Slide 8 illustrates the strength of our business model to generate high margins.

For Q2 2024, the cash cost per GEO, which is essentially cost of sales divided by gold equivalent ounces sold, was $264 per GEO.

This compares to $280 per GEO in Q2 2023.

This amount will fluctuate depending upon the mix of royalty versus stream GEOs, including mining and energy.

But as you can see, at current average gold prices, the company generates significant margins -- margin of approximately $2,100 per ounce in Q2 (technical difficulty) Rising commodity price environment, we expect to benefit fully as the cost per GEOs sold should not increase (technical difficulty) As we turn to available capital, the company has $2.4 billion as at June 30, 2024, as highlighted on slide 9, please note that subsequent to June 30, 2024, the company has funded a number of transaction, the acquisition of a royalty on Nuevaunion Yanacocha property for $210 million, which Eaun will speak to shortly, $23.3 million advance to SolGold’s as part of the $525 million stream commitment agreed to in July.

Purchase of shares in G mining ventures as part of the Reunion Gold business combination for $25 million and the funding of a five year $35 million to EMX royalty.

Even after funding of the above the company still has a strong balance sheet to complete additional transaction.

Also during the quarter, the company amended its $1 billion unsecured revolving term credit facility to extend its term to June 3, 2029.

Finally, with respect to the GEOs SolGold guidance for 2024, [480,000] to 540,000 total GEOs sold and 360,000 to 400,000 precious metal GEOs sold.

We reiterate those guidance ranges, which we expect, but expect to be at the lower end of both ranges.

You anticipate stronger deliveries from Candelaria in the second half of the year and continued contributions from (inaudible) , Greenstone and Solaris Norte.

And with that, I will now pass it over to Eaun, who will speak to the recent business development transactions completed.

Thank you, Sandip.

And good morning.

As Paul mentioned, we were happy to announce gold stream financing on SolGold’s on (inaudible) project in July.

We view this as a world-class copper-gold porphyry.

Stream is tailored to solve those needs, allowing from derisking with initial preconstruction tranches and funding construction once key stage gates are met and funding is secured.

Transaction was syndicated 70/30 with a Cisco Gold Royalties and we believe represents a prudent capital allocation and risk-adjusted return.

The Apollo stands out amongst copper gold's projects globally based on its size and grade summarize the recent pre-feasibility study, which demonstrates a robust project and look forward to management steps to advance and derisk the project.

Our team sees great upside Apollo and on the broader cast of our concession, which the stream covers.

Projects like (inaudible) increase the value of the stream in our view.

Our experience is that these types of deposits also tend to cluster, and we see great potential in the drillbit over time on the property.

The transaction includes a number of risk mitigants to determine when funding takes place and various protections for streamers, should there be delays or rescoping of the project.

An acquirer would benefit also from the ability to reduce the stream, but to do so would have to provide for payment to both Franco-Nevada and Cisco.

We, along with the Cisco look forward to the steps management is taking to advance project completed Cascabel will be a meaningful contributor to Franco-Nevada for years to come.

I'd also point investors to SolGold's recent update release this morning providing information on their steps to add value to the project.

Moving to the Yanacocha royalty acquisition from Buenaventura, which was announced yesterday.

We're happy to add this asset to the portfolio.

Royalty will contribute immediately given significant oxide production, and we expect would step up significantly for the sulfides project.

We are very positive on the sulfides and see great potential from the existing footprint to extend the life for many years beyond what is currently envisaged.

The royalty also covers the Conga and Gilles projects, providing excellent upside.

We're able to visit the site as part of our review and have good institutional knowledge of the asset dating back to Newmont and maintain an excellent relationship with Buenaventura, providing comfort in the long-term potential.

We view this as another world-class geological setting, as evidenced by past production and extensive resource.

We see great potential to contribute significant production for decades to come that further potential and the (inaudible) that we maintain on the additional royalties.

With that, I'll hand it back to the operator and Candida for any questions.

(Operator Instructions) Josh Wolfson, RBC Capital Markets.

Yeah, thanks very much.

First question on the Yanacocha transaction.

The returns that we calculate would be comparable to some of the, I guess, mega type of returns we saw maybe 2015, 2016, which I would note ultimately worked out fairly well for the company.

If we're looking at these deals today like Yanacocha and maybe others that could be on the horizon.

What's the sort of appeal here?

And I would note from our perspective like the main bulk of the economics are not really happy.

The project hasn't really been developed versus some of the historical low return deals, we're large producing known assets just a bit more insight on what the company sees versus what we know in the market today?

Thanks, Josh.

Eaun speaking, we see great potential in the asset.

It's been a huge producer over the years brownfield site with a very large resource and (inaudible) We do get the benefit of existing oxide production and expect the short term rule should be a decision on the sulfides, we were able to do an on-site diligence as part of the transaction, which provided additional comfort, especially in the sulfides.

We see that as a great project that Newmont, which we expect will advance.

I think they've put off that decision until 2025.

But then on top of that, you have fantastic projects on the site, which really incentivized maintaining production in our view, you have the Conga project, which not that long ago was advancing in the fullness of time.

There is potential there and the Quilish projects both very, very large.

And so you have the benefit both of immediate cash flow and fantastic optionality longer term.

So that is why we find it attractive.

And it's a great partner at Newmont's, as I'm sure, has a great track record of both advancing projects and operating successfully.

So we're happy to be involved there.

Great.

And then just in terms of the opportunity for maybe more of this style transaction that skews towards the optionality’s, are these the type opportunities you're seeing out there or there's been a focus, at least from commentary from other companies about project financing type of deals.

We see both in short, I think there is certainly opportunity for a project financing type transactions operating assets.

There's a pretty rich deal environment at the moment.

So, we'll continue to advance all fronts.

Thank you.

And one last question, just on one of the deals that was done early this year on the energy side of things for Haynesville.

I'm not sure if this is an anomaly for the quarter, but your Haynesville production or revenues hasn't really improved that much and there was a large investment made in the first quarter.

When should we start to see the increased royalty revenues from this asset?

Hi, Josh.

This is Jason speaking.

You're right, we did add incrementally to install at the end of last year and despite that revenues were sort of flat.

A lot of that is timing and commodity price.

So gas prices, which you probably know, have fallen off fairly dramatically in the period we're speaking about that impacts the royalty, both in terms of straight royalty economics that also impacts the way the operators are managing their production.

So low gas prices in the Haynesville have resulted in softer drilling rates and at times operators dialing back their production levels to trying to rebalance the market.

So there's a bit of a -- there's a large commodity price, I guess, impact there in two ways.

We're also onboarding, right, continuing to onboard the assets that we acquired at the end of last year.

That takes some time for all of the ownership interest to transfer over.

So I think as you see commodity prices rebound here in the coming quarters.

I think you'll see volumes and revenues normalize a bit.

Those are my questions.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Lawson Winder, Bank of America.

Yeah.

Thanks, operator, and good morning, Franco team.

Thanks for taking the question here.

I wanted to ask first of all about the (inaudible) Yanacocha, congratulations on getting another big deal done.

What was the assumption in terms of the startup of the sulfides when you got to an IRR that you are comfortable is for this?

Thanks Lawson.

Eaun again here.

In terms of the sulfides, I think, what Newmont has said is 2025 that's possible that Bill will adjust it's worth noting that the oxides are currently in production.

And I think that our due diligence would indicate there's potential there to continue to do leaching, there is delay, but I think we are expecting something around the 2029 time line production.

Okay, great.

Very helpful.

And then, just thinking about the deal pipeline and the relative middle mix I mean, that's improved population (inaudible) used the word improve, but that's swung back in the favor of gold and silver in the precious metals quite significantly in Q2 versus Q1, where it dipped to quite a low level as you're now back to 70% of revenue from gold and silver.

In that context, how do you think about adding new streams in terms of metal mix is gold and silver still a continued priority here or does the rebound in gold and silver prices and the move to the metal mix as a result, perhaps shift your focus now going forward, more to non-precious deals?

Lawson, it's Paul.

Thanks for question.

Focus, as always is precious metals and it stops as always, with asset quality.

Anytime we're looking at stuff it's what are the great assets that is the biggest driver and what generates the best returns over time, then we get onto commodity mix.

But so first is do we like the asset?

And second, can we get it done within the guidelines of what we do with the commodity mix?

So as always, gold and precious metal is number one on the list in terms of what we'd like to do, but always open-minded.

If they're great assets in other commodities, we think we'll get long-term returns happy to add those two.

Okay.

That's great context.

Thanks very much, Paul.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Tanya Jakusconek, Scotiabank.

Hi, good morning.

Thank you so much for taking my questions.

I'm just going to start off on just some of the guidance, and Thanks, Sandip, is that Hemlo is always difficult to forecast but just as we look at the second half of the year and we do have, the Candelaria, I think was one that you had mentioned and (inaudible) Salares Norte, those ones ramping up Amicas.

Thanks.

Like it's a second is second-half weighted, but is it more weighted to Q4 or is it more of an even distribution plus I have the valet top-up in Q3.

I'm just trying to understand Q3 versus Q4?

Sure as of right now, sort of the visibility that we have I would say it's probably going to be pretty even between the two may be in Q4, it might get a little bit higher, as you know, Greenstone and Solaris, no changes at ramp up, but I don't expect too much of a difference.

Obviously, part of it is all dependent on commodity prices with respect to the MPI's, but for simplicity, I would say that they should be pretty close.

Okay.

That's helpful.

Thank you for that.

And then if I can move on to just some the transactions and just the environment itself and Eaun for you, thank you for your forecast of 2029 for the start-up of the sulfides.

We modeled it into the next decade ourselves, but when you look at the internal rate of return and again, making that decision, whatever gold price you want to use for both of your transactions that you recently did what are you getting?

Are you getting the middle single digit internal rate of return?

Just a benchmark for us to see on that the same with cap about like when did you figure start-up on that asset as well?

Thank you for the question because there's a lot there to unpack.

I would say first of all, it's a risk-adjusted returns when we think about optionality.

It is important that in the investments we want to see that there's a lot there that can go right now over time and we can earn an outsized return, even if it does take time, it might not show up in an IRR, but certainly enhances the profile of the company brining gold for years to come.

So with Yanacocha, yes, I would say an it's a pretty reasonable return we see with the oxides and sulfides.

And beyond that, you have fantastic projects which stands providing many multiples on your investments as those move forward now.

Conga, Gilles could take a lot of time, I think if they get developed, but certainly that skew towards outsized cash flows from the investment was attractive to us.

So maybe that provides a bit of context now

--

On a reasonable for you, single mid-single digit, middle single digit, like 5%.

I don't know what reasonable is for you?

Yeah, for an asset that has a great degree of optionality for that would be at least it will return again, all just all things equal it's risk-adjusted economically.

And in other cases like SolGold, the return was meaningfully higher.

And it just represents again, I mentioned our risk-adjusted rate of return.

Okay.

And then for SolGold, when did you assume start-up of that one?

And when you say significantly higher, are you implying double digit?

Yeah, in terms of I don't want to get too much into deal specifics.

I don't think it's appropriate.

But roughly, we look at scenarios for startup there in the early 2030s and rate of return certainly above the mid-single digits.

But beyond that, I don't I don't think it's appropriate to comment.

Okay.

No, thank you for that color.

And maybe just turning to the M&A environment. just I wanted to know on the last conference call we talked about is saying bigger size deal plus $500 million.

I guess the Capital One was over $500 million.

What sort of opportunity size are we still looking at now?

Is it still over that $500 million?

Are we back to that $100 million to $300 million on the gold side?

That's my first question on the transaction side.

Thank you for the question.

Good question.

I would say to expect more of the same in terms of what you've seen recently for deal size and $100 million to $300 million is a pretty good kind of average size within the pipeline.

The overall comments, I think, is that it remains extremely busy.

So there's lots to look at, which is great and plenty on the precious metal side.

So the team remains very focused.

Thank you.

Okay, thanks.

And then in terms of royalties, main (inaudible) had been talking about this selling of this royalty on Yanacocha's since last year.

So congrats on finally getting this done.

Are you seeing other opportunities on the royalty side and in the environment separate from stream?

Certainly, we like royalties or the breadth of the portfolio

(inaudible)

Okay.

And then maybe just for Paul.

I think the last conference call we talked about transaction and nonmedical space, and we expect business specifically and talked about lithium in the $50 million to $400 million range and, just looking at opportunities in the part of the market where commodities are not as strong as we see in the gold market.

So I'm just wondering what your thoughts have they change, though of the opportunities for lithium still there?

And is that something you still want to pursue?

We're still busy on that front.

As Eaun mentioned, for most of our asset on the precious metal side, but we are looking at some diversified.

Some of that is lithium some in other commodities.

So I think there's still good potential to get some deals done in those areas.

And that $50 million to $400 million range or so the range that would fit into?

Yes, that's a good range.

Okay.

Looks like you're very busy.

Congratulations on both of those deals.

Thank you, Tanya.

Thank you.

Martin Pradier, Veritas Investment Research.

Thank you.

It looks like you need the sulfide project to go ahead to make your money back in Yanacocha.

Is that a correct assumption?

That is correct in speaking here.

Okay.

And did I hear that there was a $49 million that adjustment from previous year.

Is that correct?

Or is just previous quarter?

Yes.

So because Barbados increased its tax rate for the 9% corporate tax rate.

Our deferred tax liability on our balance sheet was set up at the old rate.

So we had to adjust that and that was $49.1 million one-time adjustment.

Okay, perfect.

Thank you.

That's all.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

There are no further questions on the phone line.

I will now turn the Q&A session over to Candida Hayden who will take questions from the webcast.

Thank you Laura.

Our first question comes from Bernie Fiji from Palisade Capital.

Given the recent social and political turmoil in Ecuador.

I'm a bit surprised by your commitment to the capital project, especially after kind of my experience, what extent have you balanced your attention to the project geology versus your view of the political environment there?

Thanks for the question. (inaudible) transaction was very carefully structured to take advantage of the geology, but also mitigate the risks.

First point in terms of the funding structure, it's broken down in tranches based on stage gates.

And this allows certain items to be dealt with before additional capital is funded.

And then when it comes to the final construction funding that is contingent on the rest of the funding being secured and a robust investment agreement being signed with government of Ecuador with criteria included has conditioned funding as we take a lot of comfort from that.

But I would probably say bigger picture, Ecuador, if that's a very fair split of physical flows versus other countries.

So we draw comfort from that as well.

Our minds like for still more to the government drives 50% and the economic benefit of the projects.

So that provides what I believe is a good backdrop towards stability going forward, social acceptability of mining projects.

The government is also quite supportive of the project, which gave us a lot of comfort as part of our diligence, we met with number of government officials (inaudible) and so on from partners, Cisco and also out of Canadian and US Embassy staff.

Next question is also from Bernie Fiji from Palisade Capital, an update on Panama, especially given the new government?

So Bernie, it's Paul.

The since the Millennia Molino administration has come in, I think early indications have been positive, they've indicated a willingness to look at a reopening of mine enter into negotiations.

That is with some conditions, I'd say most positive steps.

The taking of the first item is that they want to do a comprehensive environmental review.

And so they're putting together a panel of experts so they can do that.

I'm very hopeful that will help demonstrate that the company that the asset has been very well operated and that some of the misgivings that had been promoted in the population that there was environmental damage will be dispelled.

So I think taking very positive steps to set the table, so that they can one have a discussion with the company and two position this project better with Republic in Panama.

The last question comes from [Bjorn with Lander] Current cash portfolio is USD1.4 billion.

Is there deals out there such as royalty or stream that are coming that can match this cap -- cash position?

Or are there other opportunities that this cash position can be used for?

And if so, what could that be?

Thanks for the questions.

Eaun speaking.

As I mentioned, we see a very robust pipeline at the moment is good potential to deploy that capital, what we have in the pipeline going forward.

I think you will see us continue to transact on a number of opportunities.

So I don't see it as a surprise.

It's quite beneficial for us in terms of bidding competitively.

Thank you, Eaun.

There are no further questions from the webcast.

This concludes our second quarter results conference call and webcast.

We expect to release our third-quarter 2024 results after market close on November 8 with the conference call held the following morning.

Thank you for your interest in Franco-Nevada.

Good bye.

Ladies and gentlemen, this concludes your conference call for today.

We thank you for participating.

And ask could you please disconnect your line.