Earnings Call Transcript - SGML Q1 2025

Operator, Operator

Good morning ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to Sigma Lithium’s 2025 first quarter earnings conference call. We would like to inform you that this event is being recorded and all participants will be in listen-only mode during the conference presentation. There will be a replay for this call on the company’s website. After the prepared remarks, there will be a Q&A session for participants. At that time, further instructions will be provided. I would now like to turn the conference over to Irina Axenova, Vice President of Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Irina Axenova, Vice President of Investor Relations

Good morning. Thank you all for joining us for Sigma Lithium’s first quarter 2025 earnings conference call. Speaking on today’s call will be Ana Cabral, our co-Chairperson and Chief Executive Officer. I will also be stepping in for Rogério to cover the financial highlights for the quarter. Before we begin, I’d like to remind everyone that this call is being recorded and webcast live. Today’s presentation includes forward-looking statements and non-GAAP financial measures. These statements reflect our current expectations but involve risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially. For further information, please refer to the cautionary statements in our presentation and our public filings with Canadian and U.S. regulators. All of these materials are available on our website. With that, I will now turn the call over to our Chief Executive Officer, Ana Cabral. Ana, please go ahead.

Ana Cabral, Co-Chairperson and CEO

Good morning. I’m very pleased to present you with our first quarter 2025 results. Over the last two years, we have transformed Sigma from an emerging producer to a leading global lithium company. Our core strategic advantage is our resilience to lithium price cycles. Our competitive advantage is a direct result of operational efficiency that drives the way we run our business because we focus on the elements that we can control, mainly continuously lowering our production costs. We would like to outline our competitive advantages to start this presentation. First, we’re strategically well positioned. We industrialize lithium oxide concentrate, which has higher margins than refining. Our plant and our mine are located in Brazil in an established industrial and mining jurisdiction with strong rule of law. Second, we are resilient to lithium market price cycles. We are a low-cost producer on an all-in sustaining cost basis. Third, we achieved operational efficiency at scale on all fronts. We have perfected our knowledge into an unprecedented 70% recovery levels at a plant that mimics flotation. We have also achieved over 700 days with zero accidents with lost time. Fourth, we have been rewarded with US $100 million in heavily subsidized government debt from our development bank, with a term of 16 years at a 2.5% fixed cost in U.S. dollars, because we deliver shared prosperity to one of the poorest regions in the country. As a result, we also earned our social license, which ensures we receive environmental permits repeatedly achieved on schedule. I want to highlight that 100% of our production is uncommitted, which brings the potential to receive prepayments from signing offtake agreements with clients. This is a very standard financing practice in the mining industry and is an untapped funding source that is readily available to us from clients seeking resilient suppliers. In this quarter, we want to highlight that we increased the overall resilience of our business. Our key accomplishments were: first, we delivered production volumes on target at 68,300 tons, demonstrating the operational efficiency of the Greentech industrial plant. Secondly, we delivered all-in sustaining costs, outperforming our targets by 6%. We are now at $622 a ton; this is the quantification of our resilience, and these costs are among the lowest in the industry. They’re lower than African spodumene operations, either ethically produced, like us, or not, so we beat the competition. Thirdly, we generated positive cash flow from operations, which translates into this operational resilience because we make money per ton of lithium concentrate produced, therefore we can easily repay some of the more expensive, shorter ton duration trade financing debt. We outperformed 2025 targets across the board. When we compare our results versus a year ago, the numbers showcase how Sigma progressed exponentially. Our EBITDA in the first quarter this year increased 3.5 times from last year, up 223%. Our sales were up just 17%, so the magnitude of the EBITDA increase versus sales highlights our cost efficiency. Comparing results on a quarter-over-quarter basis, we demonstrate this continuous positive trajectory of our profitability. Our EBITDA has increased 3% while our sales decreased, which quantifies our resilience. Our operational performance slightly beat the quarterly production guidance for 2025, demonstrating that after structural upgrades, our Greentech plant achieved continuous cadence at an increased level of performance. This page also highlights a crucial point I made earlier. It quantifies indirectly the amount of prepayment Sigma can receive from clients by signing offtake agreements to supply lithium. This is an untapped funding source, readily available in the current market environment due to robust lithium demand, so we have clients seeking to secure certainty of supply. Our production is 100% uncommitted, so we can comfortably sign up to three offtake agreements at current market prices and still have 30,000 tons of production remaining to validate the market pricing of these offtakes, which is a sound financing strategy. Here, we demonstrate our low costs at plant gate, at CIF, and our all-in sustaining costs. This culminates with a 20% annual decrease in our all-in sustaining costs compared to last year. These low costs underscore the resilience of our business. A year ago, we were already among the lowest cost producers globally of lithium oxide concentrate, and over the last year, we continued to improve and further lower our costs and reach this 20% decrease. We demonstrate our leading position in the global lithium industry. Sigma delivered what we call the holy trinity of lithium production: large scale, low costs, traceable and ethically produced lithium materials. We deliver at large scale, low costs, and ethically sourced materials, underscoring our cost efficiency because we are lower than the African miners shown in pink just to our right. The only company with lower costs than Sigma is Greenbushes Talison, which has five times our scale. This is achievable. Here is a breakdown of our all-in sustaining costs, which this quarter reached $622 per ton. It shows how we outperformed the 2025 target by 6%. Our operational efficiency this quarter enabled us to lower maintenance CAPEX of our plant, and our SG&A will reach target regardless of our increased production volumes. We have also been actively decreasing financial expenses by using part of our cash generation to repay expensive short-term financing debt, as discussed earlier. We’re very proud of achieving over 700 consecutive days without accidents with lost time. This is significant because we’re sending our employees safely back home to their families every day. Our team is proud of this because it demonstrates how we rose to the challenge of the battery materials industry by delivering a low-cost product without compromising health and safety. We have one of the best safety records among all ICMM companies in the global metals and mining industry. We achieved this level of safety excellence due to robust processes and a culture of ownership among our team, who continually think about protecting themselves and their colleagues. Here, we talk about our Greentech production plant. We’ve mastered the dense media technology for producing lithium oxide. We have been consistently achieving unprecedented recovery levels for this technology - above 70% at the plant level, while global recoveries have been consistently well into the 60%. This achievement is a result of constant innovation and improvements, culminating with us implementing, in the fourth quarter, the recycling circuit for the lithium tailings, where we reprocess the lithium oxide in the tailings and convert it into high-grade product. This increases our product mass, thereby enhancing our production volumes through recycling the dry stack tailings. Now I’m going to hand it over to my colleague and partner, Irina Axenova, who will go through our financial performance this quarter in detail.

Irina Axenova, Vice President of Investor Relations

Thank you, Ana. Let’s now take a look at our financial performance for the first quarter of 2025. We reported $48 million in revenue, representing a 28% increase year-over-year, driven by higher sales volumes and disciplined execution across operations. Cost of sales came in at $34 million, reflecting a 19% increase year-over-year due to higher production volumes, partially offset by lower operating costs. As a result, we delivered a solid cash gross margin of 35%, highlighting the continued efficiency of our operations and our strong low-cost position. EBITDA for the quarter was $10 million, and when adjusted for non-cash stock-based compensation, adjusted EBITDA reached $11 million, a substantial increase compared to the same period last year. This translated into strong EBITDA and adjusted EBITDA margins of 21% and 24% respectively, underscoring our scalable and profitable business model. We ended the quarter with a cash position of $31 million, which I will cover in more detail shortly. Finally, we reported our first net income of nearly $5 million or $0.04 per share. These results reflect our ongoing progress in increasing production, maintaining cost discipline, and achieving strong financial performance. The next slide shows how strong execution translated into solid margins this quarter. With $48 million in net revenue and cost of sales of $34 million, Sigma generated $17 million in cash gross profit, resulting in a cash gross margin of 35%. Reported EBITDA for the first quarter was $10 million, and when adjusted for non-cash stock-based compensation, adjusted EBITDA surpassed $11 million, reflecting a robust adjusted EBITDA margin of 24%. During the quarter, we continued our work on reducing short-term debt by decreasing our trade finance balance by 15% from $60 million to just over $50 million while our interest per ton reduced further to $17. Looking ahead, we expect further reduction in interest costs per ton as we ramp up production. The total financial cost for the first quarter was $75 per ton, and we anticipate this will decrease to around $70 per ton for the full year. This reflects our ongoing efforts to replace short-term trade finance facilities with subsidized BNDES financing and to leverage other liability management tools available to us, as Ana mentioned earlier. One key advantage is the flexibility provided by our uncommitted production volumes. We haven’t signed any offtake agreements to date, so 100% of our annual production, or 270,000 tons, is fully available. This gives us the ability to sign offtake agreements with prepayment structures if and when it makes strategic sense. That level of flexibility provides a powerful financing tool, allowing us to extend our debt maturity profile by deciding how much of our production to allocate to these agreements. Finally, we put together this slide to highlight our strong cash flow performance during the quarter and our disciplined, transparent approach to operational cash generation. We started the quarter with $46 million in cash on hand, and during the quarter we received over $32 million in cash payments from customers, with an increase in trade receivables of $15 million related to sales made before the quarter end but settled after the accounting cut-off. Total cash outflows for the period were $30 million, including $23 million in operational costs, excluding SG&A and royalties. Summarizing performance on a pro forma basis, including an increase in trade receivables, operational cash flow reached $24 million. After accounting for SG&A and other expenses, pro forma cash from operations was $17 million. Financial expenses amounted to $12 million, which includes the $10 million of repaid debt. All in all, this highlights our strong ability to generate steady operational cash flow while staying disciplined in how we manage and allocate capital. With that, I’ll hand it over to Ana to provide operational updates.

Ana Cabral, Co-Chairperson and CEO

On this section, I’m going to give you an update on our expansion plans. We continue to make progress in our construction work for our second industrial processing plant. We have completed approximately 32% of the construction as of this first quarter. This chart illustrates the pace of our progress: earthworks completed, water drainage pipelines completed. This infrastructure enables our closed water circuit, which allows Sigma to fully reuse the water we pipe from the Jequitinhonha River, which is sewage grade. This closed water circuit is crucial. We have been thoroughly managing the pace of our construction to preserve cash flow, therefore we have not yet submitted the orders for the long lead items of the plant, but we will. This construction is fully funded by a signed subsidized loan agreement with BNDES, the Brazilian Development Bank. As I mentioned earlier, it has a very benign 16-year duration and a low fixed interest rate of approximately 2.5% a year. We have already submitted our first reimbursement package to BNDES, which includes over 500 invoices, and the receipt of our first disbursement tranche is still pending. This will drive the timing for placing the orders for the equipment I mentioned. This construction makes sense to double our production capacity at a cost of just US $100 million. The devaluation of the Brazilian real works to our favor because over 80% of our equipment is sourced locally, making the second production plant very cost-effective. It is one of the lowest in the industry at just $400 per incremental ton of lithium oxide. Given our all-in sustaining cost, the payback period on the plant is very short even at current lithium prices. More importantly, when we double our production capacity, we become even more resilient to lithium price cycles because we can lower our all-in sustaining costs by 20% from $660, which is our target guidance, down to $530, which is our target guidance for 2026. An American author called Jim Collins, whose strategic thesis we greatly admire, advocates for building a company to last. Our strategic direction towards increasing our resilience demonstrates this - Sigma’s leading competitive position will continue to strengthen as we expand. We are building this company to last, to withstand lithium cycles well into the future. Finally, I want to thank all of our shareholders for their trust in me to lead Sigma in building it to last.

Operator, Operator

Thank you. The floor is now open for questions.

Rock Hoffman, Analyst

Hi, this is Rock Hoffman from Bank of America. My first question is, was there a conscious decision to produce 5.0% spodumene concentrate this quarter? Is there less desire in the market right now for even 5.2%? What’s a good assumption going forward?

Ana Cabral, Co-Chairperson and CEO

Yes, it was a conscious decision. We have very high grades, and as we put the reprocessing circuit into full capacity, we have the luxury to adjust down our grades. The current pricing formula for lithium concentrate decreases the base price linearly; however, by adding the reprocessed material through recycling, we gain mass exponentially, which significantly lowers our costs by processing our existing tailings. The market unfortunately doesn’t reward higher grade material properly with the appropriate premium, as it does in other established industries such as iron ore or copper. So, yes, this was a deliberate decision, and we will continue to do it.

Rock Hoffman, Analyst

Understood, thank you. Just as a follow-up, I understand that much of the cost optimization that can still be achieved is largely in industrial operations. Can you describe that a bit more, as well as on the sizing and timing for how low these costs can feasibly go?

Ana Cabral, Co-Chairperson and CEO

Not really. We prefer not to discuss the gains from scaling down our operating costs, whether from our mines or plants, since we are already among the lowest in the industry. In the guidance we provided at year-end from the previous quarter, we indicated that increasing our scale would help us achieve economies of scale, reducing our SG&A costs by half because running a double plant doesn’t require the same resources. We would also cut our interest expenses by half since we included a pro forma number covering the financing to establish the second plant. We expect our total sustaining costs for two plants to be $530, compared to the anticipated year-end target of $660. This reduction is purely a result of scaling down interest and SG&A costs. We consider this an obvious advantage of achieving scale.

Rock Hoffman, Analyst

Thank you.

Operator, Operator

Our next question comes from Shannon Gill from Cormark Securities. Please, Ms. Gill, your microphone is open.

Shannon Gill, Analyst

Hi there Ana. Sorry if this is a repeat, as I had to miss the beginning of the call, but when are you planning to do your first draw on your BNDES loan? If it’s delayed, is there some sort of plan to secure offtake or refinance some of that short-term debt? Can you let us know what your financial plan is going forward?

Ana Cabral, Co-Chairperson and CEO

Absolutely. Let me unpack your question. First, I’ll go backward. The reimbursements have been submitted, so the ball is in their court. The amount isn’t high given that, if you look at our capex deployed on building this portion of plant two, we did the cheapest part of construction, which is earthworks and civils. Equipment hasn’t been ordered yet. Regarding the short-term debt, repayment makes sense with cash generation, and the decision is made quarterly depending on how much extra cash we have and how lithium market prices behave. We manage our financing short-term liquidity based on our cash availability. Regarding prepayments, we still have a significant source of untapped financing; we’ve reached this point without committing a single ton of lithium. Therefore, all of our available production is uncommitted, giving us the flexibility to commit these units in offtake agreements. This is a solid question because I want to clarify for everyone here that these agreements do not mean fixed prices or hedging current low prices into long-term futures. It means delivering secured tonnage to clients who are concerned with the ethical sourcing of lithium materials. Clients globally are very focused on sourcing, and that’s how we achieved this trinity. They look for potential offtake recipients as companies with the ability to supply low-cost materials. Therefore, it is a great environment to negotiate and sign offtakes because we are low-cost producers who deliver ethically sourced materials. This makes us eligible to receive prepayments, which are typically signed at market prices, sometimes with a floor, sometimes at a high cap. These structures do not detract from value; it is a win-win. Sometimes there are no such conditions - sometimes it’s at market prices. What clients want is to secure the volumes into the future because everyone acknowledges that in 2026, 2027, 2028, and beyond, demands will outstrip supply.

Shannon Gill, Analyst

Okay, thanks, Ana.

Ana Cabral, Co-Chairperson and CEO

Thank you.

Operator, Operator

Our next question comes from Katie Lachapelle from Canaccord Genuity. Ms. Lachapelle, your microphone is open.

Katie Lachapelle, Analyst

Hi Ana. I just wanted to build on Shannon Gill’s question with respect to the potential prepayment of offtake. Is there a certain percentage of your production for either phase one or phase two that you’re targeting to cover with offtakes or prepayments? Is there a particular duration as well?

Ana Cabral, Co-Chairperson and CEO

Yes, there is flexibility. I was given flexibility by the Board to sign the offtakes we highlighted earlier. The decision will be made based on conditions. If we’re offered good conditions, we’re going for it. These offtakes mean we get prepayment not for all future sales amounts but for a certain percentage, with a grace period to repay calculated like a fixed mortgage. Clients often prefer a minimal duration of three years, which reflects their concern over getting secured lithium volumes in the future. We are in a very fortunate position - it's 2025, demand is strong, and we are low-cost, resilient producers. This moment is advantageous, indicating a convergence of factors beneficial to us.

Katie Lachapelle, Analyst

Thank you, Ana, very clear.

Operator, Operator

Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, since there are no further questions, I’m returning the floor to Ms. Ana Cabral for her final remarks. Ms. Ana, you may proceed.

Ana Cabral, Co-Chairperson and CEO

Thank you everyone for joining us on this call, and once again we want to highlight that we’re building Sigma to last. We take our strategic steps very carefully, managing our cash with discipline. We are focused on cost cutting. I want to leave you with a thought - cost cutting is like clipping your nails; it’s a culture of efficiency we have implemented. More than 50% of the equity of the company is held by our employees, so we care about returns. Again, having this job in a low point in the price cycle is an honor to lead such a committed team. Thank you for entrusting me with the responsibility to lead Sigma.

Operator, Operator

This will conclude the first quarter of 2025 conference call of Sigma Lithium. For further information and details of the company, please visit the company’s website. You can disconnect at this time. Thank you once again and have a wonderful day.