Agnico Eagle Mines Limited (NYSE:AEM) Q3 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

Jamie Porter: Yeah, Josh, it’s Jamie here. So it’s about $23 an ounce that we’ve benefited from in terms of, what we what we guided to at a CAD130, relative to what we’ve realized closer to 135. But even, without that benefit, we’re still within our guidance range. So as the strong operating performance in terms of costs.

Ammar Al-Joundi : And that’s Josh, it’s a bit of a complicated question, because, we labor clearly Canadian dollars, it’s a direct relationship. But if you’re looking at things like spare parts, even if you pay for the caterpillar transmission in Canadian dollars, it’s really priced in U.S. dollars. And it’s sort of like cars. So it is something that team has done a great job with, it is something that is a good and positive tailwind, and we’ll take any tailwind we can. But as we’ve said, on all the calls, and I’ll say it again, on this call, the team has really done a good job controlling costs to some of the proactive work they’ve done, but also, through delivering good operating results. It’s the operating results always set your costs.

Josh Wolfson: And sorry, just to clarify that. That $23 per and that was on the FX side, it sounded like was there any additional factor on the diesel price?

Jamie Porter: Yeah, I don’t have the dollar per ounce in terms of diesel. But much lesser benefit. I think it’s closer to about $3 an ounce.

Josh Wolfson: And then one sort of final quick one on the Kittila permit. I think unless the Finnish people like to work weekends, you know, there’s three days left here in October. Any sort of commentary on what the status is? Or what whether there’s any remaining uncertainties for this outstanding permit? Thanks.

Ammar Al-Joundi : Yeah, we’re in constant contact. And our understanding is they will have a decision imminently. So we are, continue to be cautiously optimistic. But we obviously will respect whatever decision the court makes. But we expect that Josh, to be very soon.

Josh Wolfson: Thank you very much.

Operator: Your next question comes from the line of John Tumazos from John Tumazos Very Independent Research. Please go ahead.

John Tumazos : Thank you very much. When the geologists turn the keys over to the engineers to restart production. Roughly how many years and how many dollars would it take to resume the mine at the expanded target level? Once again, I’m assuming the geologists have already found all the gold a little bit optimistically.

Dominique Girard : Thank you, John, Dominique speaking. Look, when we use the start the project, we’re looking to have a kind of a 10 years of operations into our enterprise resource reserve to do that. This is what we’re looking for. What we have let’s say right now, but this continuing finding more that we need to extend that.

Ammar Al-Joundi : But I think John, you are asking how long it would take for us to start producing?

John Tumazos : Yes, sir.

Ammar Al-Joundi : Yeah, it, it will be. I don’t want to give a time. But it would be a lot faster than most because, we have a camp, we have power generation, we have the port facilities, we have water treatment. The real emphasis will be on the mill. And the mill building is there. And we’ve done the analysis on that. So we basically have to empty out what’s in the mill and basically go inside that. That’s always an advantage that’s particularly advantage up in a place like Nunavut, where until you basically have a closed in building, you can’t work in the winter. And so we have that. So, I don’t know exactly the time it’s a good question, but it would be materially less time than if you were starting from scratch.

John Tumazos : So if I had it in my model for the second half of 2030, there’s a chance you could do a little better.

Ammar Al-Joundi : Yeah, I think so.

Operator: Thank you. Your next question comes from the line of Jackie Przybylowski from BMO Capital Markets. Please go ahead.

Jackie Przybylowski: Thanks very much. Maybe I could start with some with a follow up to John’s question on Hope Bay. If you continue to have exploration success around Madrid. Is there any thoughts to recentering the operation around that? Or I guess Ammar, you kind of alluded to this with the values of mill building, you’ll continue to hold or to the existing location. Can you talk about how to think about like the layout and the overall scope of Hope Bay?

Ammar Al-Joundi : Yeah, it’s a good question, Jackie. So, everybody knows, or a lot of people know their stories. There’s Madrid, and then there’s Boston. And I think a lot of people know that, the total distance. But the truth is, it’s a pretty quick drive from Doris to Madrid. I can’t remember exactly, but it’s a few kilometers. It’s I think, 8 kilometers. So I think it’s almost certain Well, it is certain that we would be focused at the existing facilities and leverage off of that.

Jackie Przybylowski: Got it. Thank you. And to follow up maybe on Josh’s question about its Kittila. Can you talk like, when you when is — let’s assume that the Supreme Court of Finland provides a positive decision on this. Are we going to have a press release saying that the case and would you be revising guidance at all for 2023? Or would this just be sort of like at the upper end of existing guidance, like you’ve already mentioned?

Ammar Al-Joundi : Yeah. So one, we will issue a press release either way. To be sure, you know, the impact in ’24 is about, it’s about 30,000 ounces. And it is, and as you all know, we’ve already provided guidance, assuming we don’t get that. So I think — I mean, we’ve already said, we’re going to be above the midpoint, and we’ll be closer to the upper end of our guidance, Jackie, if we get that. So I don’t know that we need to send out new guidance. But we will say what I’ve said, which is, if it’s positive, that we got it that we expect an additional roughly 30,000 ounces. And that we will — we are now expecting to be towards the upper end of our guidance. If we don’t get it, we’ll mention that. And we’ll mention that we still expect to be above the midpoint of our guidance. So we’re in good shape either way.