Caledonia Mining Corporation Plc (CMCL) Q1 2026 Earnings Call

Investor webinar replay

Replay transcript excerpt

Welcome to the Caledonia Mining Q1 2026 results presentation. I would like to now hand over to Mark Learmonth, who is the CEO, to begin the results presentation. Mark, over to you. Thank you and welcome to this results presentation for the first quarter of 2026. Can we just move through to the presenting team? I actually can't see the slides there. Yeah, just move through to the presenting team. So, as you heard, I'm Mark Learmonth, Caledonia's CEO. I'm joined by Ross Gerrard, the CFO, Victor Capari, Executive Director. We're not altogether certain if Craig Harvey will be able to join us. We're having some connectivity issues to Johannesburg, which is where he is. So, Craig may or may not join us. And then there's Maurice Mason, Vice President... corporate development and investor relations. So if that's the team, shall we move on? Okay, just by summary, as we've previously announced, gold production in the first quarter was somewhat challenged. It was about 14,700 ounces of production from blanket mine. And that was entirely due to, as you'll see in a moment, the lower grades lying during the quarter. Notwithstanding the lower production, financial performance was still robust, supported by the higher gold price environment. So revenue was up 18% to just over 66 million. Profit was also higher. Profit after tax was up nearly 70% to nearly 19 million. And also very strong cash generation, in particular free cash flow, more or less tripled from 4 million dollars to $12 billion in the quarter. As you might expect, with lower ounces produced, and particularly the effect of the lower grade, that affected the cost per ounce. So cost per ounce, the all-necessary cost increased to $2,700. Having said that, it's worth noting that our cost per tonne was very much in line with...