ELVR January 27, 2026

Elevra Lithium December 2025 Earnings Call - Record revenue and operating cash flow at NAL, but FY26 production guidance trimmed due to lower head grades and high iron

Summary

Elevra delivered a paradoxical quarter. North American Lithium posted record quarterly revenue of $66 million, a $12 million operating profit and $13 million operating cash flow, driven by disciplined sales timing and a 27% rise in realized prices. Yet production hiccups at NAL forced a conservative reset to FY26 guidance after lower feed grades and elevated iron in mined zones hit recoveries and spodumene output.
Management says the problem is localized, transitional, and fixable with more drilling, tighter grade control, and smarter stockpile blending. The market will want proof, not promises. Cash sits at $81.3 million post-merger, capex guidance unchanged at $26 million, and an accelerated, staged expansion plan for NAL is being scoped ahead of detailed engineering.

Key Takeaways

  • Record quarter revenue of $66 million at NAL, driven by a 27% increase in average realized FOB price to $998 per ton.
  • NAL generated $12 million operating profit and $13 million operating cash flow for the December quarter, demonstrating leverage to higher spodumene prices.
  • Spodumene concentrate production fell 15% quarter on quarter to 44,154 dry metric tons, driven by lower feed grade and elevated iron content affecting recoveries.
  • Average mill feed grade fell to 0.98% in the quarter from 1.14% in the September quarter, a material drop that reduced recoveries.
  • Higher iron in the mined material increased use of WHIMS, reducing lithium recovery, and contributed to the production shortfall.
  • Sales volumes rose to 66,016 dry metric tons for the quarter versus 25,975 in the prior quarter, reflecting a deliberate strategy to time sales into stronger prices; finished product inventory was ~30,000 tons.
  • Fiscal 2026 guidance was trimmed: spodumene concentrate production now 180,000 to 190,000 tons, sales 170,000 to 190,000 tons, down from prior 195,000 to 210,000 range.
  • Second half FY26 concentrate grade guidance lowered to about 5%, with management warning recoveries will be below prior 69% to 73% range in the short term.
  • Unit operating cost guidance was raised to $860 to $880 per dry metric ton sold for H2 FY26, up from $765 to $830, reflecting extra spending on drilling, blending, and stockpile management; last quarter's FOB unit cost was $812 per ton sold.
  • Management calls the head grade and iron issues transitional and localized to areas adjacent to historical underground stopes in phase three, estimating the tougher patch will take a few quarters to work through.
  • Action plan: increase grade control drilling, alter stockpiling and feed blending, and optimize mill feed to restore recoveries; management expects recovery and grades to normalize into FY27, targeting circa 5.2% concentrate grade.
  • NAL expansion will shift to a staged approach to bring incremental capacity online faster; a revised scoping study will be released early next quarter ahead of detailed engineering.
  • Moblan baseline environmental studies advanced, Ewoyaa mining lease submitted for ratification with variable royalties tied to spodumene pricing, and Carolina Lithium progressed with stormwater permits and US government engagement.
  • Balance sheet: cash of $81.3 million at quarter end, down from $97.9 million due to $14 million of non-recurring merger costs and $7 million of planned capex and operating outflows; no secured debt reported.
  • Management will disclose merger cost synergies in the half-year interim results in February; near-term profitability at group level is plausible at current prices after accounting for corporate costs of roughly $7 million per quarter.

Full Transcript

Conference Operator: I would now like to hand the conference over to Mr. Lucas Dow, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer. Please go ahead.

: Thank you.

Lucas Dow, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, Elevra Lithium: Welcome, everyone, and thank you for joining us for Elevra Lithium’s December 2025 Quarterly Update. I’m joined today by Sylvain Collard, Chief Operating Officer and President of Canada, Christian Cortes, Chief Financial Officer, and Andrew Barber, Chief Development and Investor Relations Officer. Unless otherwise stated, all references to dollar amounts today are in US dollars. This reflects a leveraged change in reporting currency from Australian dollars to US dollars. All historical figures have also been converted to US dollars. The December 2025 quarter marked the first full quarter following completion of the Sayona-Piedmont merger and was a quarter where we delivered record revenue and positive operating cash flow at North American Lithium, while also identifying and addressing operational challenges that have informed an updated outlook for the remainder of financial year 2026. Moving now to operations at our NAL operation.

Starting with safety, NAL delivered its second-best quarterly safety performance since restarting operations in 2023. While we recorded two lost time injuries during the quarter, this followed six consecutive months with no lost time injuries, and we also achieved two separate stretches of more than 40 days without a recordable injury. Operationally, mining activity was contained to phase three, and all mined increased 15% quarter-over-quarter to nearly 390,000 wet metric tons. Mill utilization improved to 89%, and mill throughput reached record levels despite a planned shutdown for a rod mill reline. However, these positives were offset by lower processing recoveries, which resulted in reduced concentrate production compared to previous quarters. During the quarter, mining progressed into areas adjacent to historical underground workings within phase three, which reduced in-pit ore availability.

In addition, the areas that were mined during the quarter contained a lower lithium grade and also had higher iron content. It is important to note that the higher iron content experienced in this quarter is well above the life-of-mine average and not representative of NAL’s life-of-mine ore body. Mill feed was supplemented with lower grade ore, which had been stockpiled on site, and the average feed grade to the mill was 0.98%, which was materially lower than the 1.14% feed grade in the September quarter. The reduction in feed grade, combined with increased iron content, negatively impacted lithium recovery and ultimately spodumene concentrate production. Specifically, the higher iron required increased use and intensity within the wet high-intensity magnetic separators, or WHIMS, which in turn saw reduced lithium recovery.

The impact of the reduced recovery resulted in 44,154 dry metric tons being produced, a 15% quarter-on-quarter decline in spodumene concentrate production. Looking forward, additional drilling to increase grade control and altering our stockpiling and feed blending strategies are definitive actions to reduce the impact of higher iron on recoveries as we work through distinct areas in phase three over the next several quarters. Importantly, this quarter is not representative of NIL’s life-of-mine ore grades, iron content, and ultimately lithium recovery and spodumene concentrate production. I’ll detail how this impacts our outlook for the second half of fiscal year 2026 in a moment, but first I’d like to discuss our sales and cost performance for the quarter. NIL made two shipments and sold 66,016 dry metric tons for the quarter compared to 25,975 tons in September quarter.

The quarterly increase in tons sold was aligned with our strategy of waiting sales through the December quarter to capture improved pricing. We finished the quarter with 30,000 tons of finished product in inventory. On pricing, our average realized price increased by 27% to $998 per ton on an FOB basis, which generated a quarterly record revenue of $66 million. The increase in realized pricing came amidst a significant rise in spodumene concentrate pricing. Pricing increased throughout the quarter, driven by tightening supply and continued demand growth from electric vehicles and stationary storage applications. Our strategy through the cycle has been to remain disciplined and keep NAL operating through the pricing trough, and we remain positioned to capitalize on a leveraged leverage to lithium prices. Unit operating costs decreased 1% quarter-over-quarter to $812 per ton sold.

Stronger realized pricing combined with stable unit operating costs translated into a $12 million operating profit from operations at NAL for the December quarter. Now moving to our growth projects. While optimizing production at NAL remains our priority, we also continued to advance our growth portfolio during the quarter. Following the NAL expansion scoping study released in mid-September 2025, we continued to advance permitting, environmental, and technical work during the quarter. We were pleased to announce an accelerated path to increasing annual concentrate production a few weeks ago under a revised approach which contemplates a staged approach to the expansion, allowing incremental production to come online more quickly through staged investments rather than a whole-of-project expansion. We plan to provide an updated scoping study in the coming months prior to moving directly to detailed engineering. With market conditions improving, we believe this offers an attractive near-term growth opportunity.

At Moblan, baseline environmental fieldwork progressed with additional environmental studies nearing completion. At Ewoyaa, the mining lease was submitted for review and ratification by the Ghanaian government following consultation and amendments to fiscal terms, including variable royalties linked to spodumene pricing. Advancement of the project remains subject to ratification, market conditions, and financing. At Carolina Lithium, we secured general stormwater permits for both the mine and conversion plant and continued engagement with regulators and community stakeholders. From a financial perspective, Elevra finished December with a cash balance of $81.3 million, down from $97.9 million in September. Importantly, NAL generated $12 million of operating profit and $13 million in operating cash flow. This was driven by higher sales volumes, stronger pricing, and stable unit costs. This reinforces NAL’s leverage to higher lithium pricing and its ability to generate cash in an improving price environment.

The declining cash was attributable to $14 million of non-recurring merger transaction costs and $7 million in planned capital expenditures and corporate operating and working capital outflows. We will provide information on cost synergies generated through the Sayona-Piedmont merger with the half-year interim results in February. With $81 million in cash and no secured debt obligations, Elevra remains well-capitalized and retains the financial flexibility to continue investing in our operations and advance near-term high-growth project growth objectives in a disciplined manner. I’d like to end my remarks by providing our updated FY26 guidance. Following a review of first-half performance and current mining conditions, we have revised short-term FY26 guidance to provide a more conservative outlook as we work to recognize the benefits of increased grade drilling, grade control drilling, stockpile blending, and feed optimization.

We would like to reiterate that the operational headwinds we have seen in relation to lower head grades and higher iron content are not representative of the NAL life-of-mine ore body and are more reflective of a point in time rather than a longer-term trend. We have reduced our spodumene concentrate production guidance so that it is now in the range of 180,000-190,000 tons. Our spodumene concentrate sales guidance now sits within the range of 170,000-190,000 tons. These two updated ranges compare to a previous range of 195,000-210,000 dry metric tons for both production and sales. This updated guidance reflects that we now expect production and sales volumes to be comparable to the levels achieved in the first half of FY26. Spodumene concentrate is expected to be reduced at a grade of 5% in the second half of FY26.

Based on mining conditions, we expect lower feed grade and higher iron content to reduce recoveries as compared to previous performance levels of 69%-73% in terms of recovery. Therefore, production volumes will be impacted over the short term. Importantly, these conditions are not considered representative of the broader ore body. On unit operating costs on a ton sold basis, we’ve increased the range to sit between $860-$880 per dry metric ton and increased from a range of $765-$830 per dry metric ton. The increased unit operating cost outlook is a result of the additional short-term expenditure associated with ore mining, ore blending, stockpile management, and grade control initiatives. Our outlook for capital expenditure remains unchanged at $26 million. At this time, we’re happy to take questions and provide answers.

Conference Operator: Thank you. If you wish to ask a question, please press star one on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. If you wish to cancel your request, please press star two. And if you’re on a speakerphone, please pick up the handset to ask your question. Your first question comes from Austin Yun from Macquarie. Please go ahead.

Austin Yun, Analyst, Macquarie: Good morning, Lucas and Tim. Two questions from me, please. The first one is on the recent operational performance. I understand you’ve revised the guidance. I’m just trying to understand, given currently you’re mining through this historical underground area, so being impacted by that, how long would that last? Would that finish by this financial year, or would that bleed into the future financial years? And also on the guidance, what’s the key assumption for your production and sales volumes? So I’ll go back with the second one. Thank you.

Lucas Dow, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, Elevra Lithium: Thanks, Austin. Yeah, so I think I’ll take your first question initially, Austin. So I think a couple of key things to note. We have been mining through these historical underground stopes previously. What we found and encountered during this quarter is that the impact and influence of the underground stopes in terms of the geological model on thin veined and some of the narrower pegmatites. In short, if we had our time again, we would have increased the drilling density to be able to improve the confidence in that area. So the geological model had served us very well in those areas adjacent to underground workings previously. What we’ve seen with these narrower veins that are adjacent to the underground workings is that we need to increase the amount of drilling.

We’re also in an area that is significantly higher in terms of iron content as compared to the life-of-mine average of the ore body. So in some ways, we’ve had a convergence of a couple of factors, but we’re confident with the increased drilling that’ll help improve the grade control in close proximity to those underground workings and return us to that sort of level of predictability we’ve seen before. The strategies that Sylvain’s implementing in terms of ore blending, the ore stockpiling, and how we feed that then into the mill are also areas that we’ve already implemented. And so we expect that we’ll have to chew through this area of the mine over the next couple of quarters, but it’s certainly not indicative of the longer term. And we’ve taken pains to make sure that people are aware of that.

We’re probably in one of the more challenging areas of the mine right now, and we’ll move through it. So it’s not explicitly the underground stopes. It’s the combination of the underground stopes with the geological modeling, but the increased definition drilling will certainly help us improve the geological model’s accuracy in that space and also the resilience of our planning. In terms of head grade for the ensuing quarter, we expect to be around sort of 1.03%. So that’ll be an increase, and we expect iron to also reduce, Austin, as we move forward. So probably the most challenging quarter behind us, but still some work that we’re going to really have our shoulder to the grindstone on for the next couple of quarters as we just chew through this area. As I said, that is atypical of the life-of-mine ore body of NAL.

Austin Yun, Analyst, Macquarie: Thank you, Lucas. Just for the second part of the question, for the new guidance, the spodumene sales, what’s the grade assumption? Is that still around 5.5%, or should we actually be lowering to just sub 5% given this higher iron content in the near term? Thank you for that.

Lucas Dow, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, Elevra Lithium: Yeah, Austin, yeah, thank you. As per my comments, the second half will be at 5%. It’s certainly clear if we get an opportunity to produce above that, but as you’ll be aware, it’s a trade-off between recovery and concentrate grade. So it is certainly an area that we’re actively managing, but at this stage, the guidance contemplates that we’re producing a concentrate of 5% for the balance of FY26.

Austin Yun, Analyst, Macquarie: Thank you. Just the second question is on the NAL expansion. Great to see that you are accelerating that process with the deep automating steps and with multiple work streams planned out already. Just wondering if you could provide any color on the capital cost to deep automating those steps.

Lucas Dow, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, Elevra Lithium: Yeah, Austin, we’ll be out with a revised scoping study first part of next quarter. So I think we’re just sort of hold fast. We’re working through that at the moment and effectively just getting what the capital ask looks like through those steps, but we’re still confident of the expense in totality being what it is, but it’s really a question of how we phase it and how we bring that online as quickly as possible.

Austin Yun, Analyst, Macquarie: Perfect. Thank you, Lucas. I’ll pass it on.

Lucas Dow, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, Elevra Lithium: Thanks, Austin.

Conference Operator: Thank you. Your next question comes from William Jones from Canaccord Genuity. Please go ahead.

William Jones/Reg Spencer, Analyst, Canaccord Genuity: Good morning, Lucas. And I guess well done on getting through what appears to be a reasonably difficult quarter. I think you’ve mostly answered my questions around understanding the impacts, but I guess I just wanted to get a sense for how your block model is reconciling in both grade and iron and whether you can give me some feel for tonnage or maybe better timing when you’ll be, I guess, through this and moving into areas more in line with the LOM.

Lucas Dow, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, Elevra Lithium: Yeah. So I think really the next sort of probably 2.5 quarters are sort of harder going in terms of the higher iron content and grade being a little lower than the life-of-mine average. I think encouragingly, Sylvain and the team have been able to increase mill throughput, which has obviously compensated for that to a large extent. So the next couple of quarters are going to be a grind for us, but we’ve put in this additional drilling and so forth, which will improve the predictability and also the blending and stockpiling strategies will see us provide increased plan resilience. In terms of reconciliation, look, it’s probably early days with the expanded model. Obviously, we’ve been tracking since the recommencement and performance of the geological model had been pretty tight.

We’ve just seen a couple of aberrations in that close proximity to the underground working and particularly the thinner seam vein. So it’s probably a little early, but suffice to say we’ve moved proactively once we sort of saw that there was a little bit of deviation and we want to get that additional definition drilling in. And I think probably 6 months on from now we’ll have a better and more informed view of that, but I think right now we’ve seen that the geological model’s been faithful outside of those areas directly adjacent to the underground stope. So we’re still very confident of the life-of-mine performance of the model.

William Jones/Reg Spencer, Analyst, Canaccord Genuity: Thanks. That makes perfect sense. Just to confirm, so will be Grade Control drilling be primarily targeted near those prior workings, or will it be more broad spread across the broad area? Okay, gotcha. And then just.

Lucas Dow, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, Elevra Lithium: Yeah. Sorry. Well, it’s a combination of both. So we will increase the drilling density for the grade control, but the primary focus is around the proximity of those thinner veined pegmatites that are in closer proximity to the underground workings.

William Jones/Reg Spencer, Analyst, Canaccord Genuity: And just last one from me. Subject to, obviously, there’s some work to be done, but when do you think we could expect concentrate grades to return back to that sort of 5.2%?

Lucas Dow, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, Elevra Lithium: Yeah. Well, certainly, the expectation would be during the course of FY27, if not earlier. We’ve taken a conservative approach with the balance of FY26, but we sort of want to be up around that 5.2, 5.25. I think, I mean, last quarter, I think we shifted what, Christian, around.

Christian Cortes, Chief Financial Officer, Elevra Lithium: 5.2.

Lucas Dow, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, Elevra Lithium: Yeah. So we’ve been there or thereabouts. So yeah, it’s certainly not something we’re giving up on. And where Silver Ains can flex the recovery and be able to maximize grade, we’ll do it.

William Jones/Reg Spencer, Analyst, Canaccord Genuity: Thanks, Lucas. Thanks, Silver Ains. I’ll pass it on.

Lucas Dow, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, Elevra Lithium: Thanks, Will.

Conference Operator: Thank you. Once again, if you wish to ask a question, please press star one. Your next question comes from Reg Spencer from Canaccord Genuity. Please go ahead.

William Jones/Reg Spencer, Analyst, Canaccord Genuity: Thanks. Morning, Lucas. Morning, Christian. Just wanted to follow up on some of Austin’s and, I guess, Will’s questions before. Maybe asking it a different way. Apologies if we’re laboring on this. We’re just trying to get a feel for what the likely longer-term impacts might be, acknowledging that you’ve got some more work to do and need to do a little bit more grade control drilling. How much into the current phase three are we? Because from memory, phase three did bring in more of that big—I forget what it’s called—marvelous dike.

Lucas Dow, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, Elevra Lithium: Marvellous dyke.

William Jones/Reg Spencer, Analyst, Canaccord Genuity: Yeah, which was the big thicker main pegmatite there. Then maybe another way of asking this question is how much of the life-of-mine inventory is likely to be impacted by areas like this if you wanted to take a more conservative standpoint and say, "Okay, well, 15% of the overall inventory might be impacted by this," and then we could adjust our future forecasts accordingly. Able to help me out on that front?

Lucas Dow, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, Elevra Lithium: Yeah. So look, I think a couple of things, Reg. It’s certainly not impacting our modeling of the marvelous dyke. That’s well delineated. It’s a nice big thick dyke. The impact that we’ve seen has been more localized on these thinner veins and just in the close proximity of the underground stopes. And just as you’d imagine for the geologists, yeah, how they interpolate or extrapolate between those thinner dykes is an area that will improve as we give them increased drilling density. And clearly, if we knew now what we—if we knew then what we know now, we would have increased that drilling density earlier, but the model had been performing quite well around these underground stopes. So it’s probably just thrown up a little bit.

I mean, I think to give you a sense, the underground stopes in terms of the remaining volume or the volume that was extracted represents less than 2% of the overall life-of-mine. So the influence we expect to be pretty minimal, and it’s much more indicative of a point in time rather than a longer-term trend because as we chew through those underground stopes over the next couple of years, they’ll disappear entirely. And as a consequence of that, and not to bore you with too much detail, but when those underground stopes aren’t there, it means that there’s ore in place in that marvelous dike, which will reduce our strip ratio and also improve recovery. So it’s just a case of having to chew through these over the next couple of quarters.

And then I think with the increased drilling density and the Grade Control that will afford the geos, they’ll have a lot more precision as it relates to those areas immediately surrounding the underground workings.

William Jones/Reg Spencer, Analyst, Canaccord Genuity: Understood. Thanks, Lucas. Last question from me. So you mentioned earlier that FY27, you might expect concentrate grades to get back to that 5.2%-5.25% level, which would imply either maintaining that increased throughput and/or an increase in grades. So do we take that as that this will only impact, say, the next 6-9 months, and then FY27 should be back to what we saw through most of CY25?

Lucas Dow, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, Elevra Lithium: Yeah. I think that’s a reasonable description, Reg. I mean, we obviously want to get that drilling data, and we’ll need to update the model once we’ve got that in and those sort of things. But as we look at what we’ve got going forward, we expect to sort of return to those levels of production.

William Jones/Reg Spencer, Analyst, Canaccord Genuity: Great. Great. I was going to ask about the scoping study on the accelerated expansion, but it sounds like I might just wait for that because, yeah, it’d be great to get an idea of what the CapEx profile might look like and what the cost profile might look like. But yeah, it sounds like you’re not quite there yet, so we’ll hold tight on that front. Thanks. Thanks, guys. I’ll pass it on.

Lucas Dow, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, Elevra Lithium: Thanks, Reg. Yeah, we just want to make sure we get that right. So we’re beavering away on that at the moment. So we expect early in the next quarter, we’ll certainly be able to update the market.

William Jones/Reg Spencer, Analyst, Canaccord Genuity: Great. Thank you. Thanks, guys.

Conference Operator: Thank you. There are no further phone questions at this time, and I’ll hand back to your speakers to address your webcast questions.

Austin Yun, Analyst, Macquarie: Thanks, Tommy. We did have a couple of questions. So Lucas, one of the questions is regarding the use of mobile crushers last year and that we had record spodumene production while those were in use. And the question is, is it safe to assume that running the primary crusher and the mobile crushers simultaneously would allow us to increase production?

Lucas Dow, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, Elevra Lithium: Yeah. I think probably a couple of things to unpack. Probably the most instructive metric we could point people towards is the fact that last quarter, so the December quarter, we saw a record throughput through the mill, which is really a direct reflection on crushing performance. So the work that Sylvain and the team did, particularly around putting in mitigating actions to be able to manage weather fluctuations and so forth, have paid dividends. So still a bit more fine-tuning, but it’s certainly illustrative that we can continue to be able to provide the crushed material. As it stands, the bottleneck for NAL continues to reside in the milling capacity, and that’s the primary focus for us as we think about being able to expand production at NAL.

Austin Yun, Analyst, Macquarie: Great. Thank you. The next question is, at what point do you expect to completely finish operating within the underground stope areas?

Lucas Dow, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, Elevra Lithium: Yeah. Well, as I said, the challenge has not necessarily been the mining through the underground stopes. Sylvain and the team have put in place excellent safety protocols, and we’ve, if you like, sort of mastered that. The issue has become more so around the geological modeling in very close proximity to those underground stopes, and that’s the work that we’ll be doing with the additional drilling. So it’s not a case that we’re trying to race through the underground stopes or that we’re prioritizing the elimination of them. It’s really more a case of being able to give the geologists through increased grade control drilling a greater level of information to be able to help them feed that into the model and then obviously allow us to be able to schedule and plan and put in mitigating actions as and when required.

Depending on which phases we’re moving through, it’ll occur over the coming months, but the bulk of it will be through within the next couple of years.

Austin Yun, Analyst, Macquarie: Great. Thank you. With regards to Moblan, where we have Investissement Québec called IQ as a joint venture partner, is IQ favorable to a transaction where that would result in Elevra owning more of that asset? And if so, would Elevra pursue that?

Lucas Dow, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, Elevra Lithium: Yeah. I think the short answer is we’d love to have a greater level of ownership in Moblan. It’s a fantastic deposit, but obviously, it’s a question of price. The reality is we’ve been focused around NAL and sort of moving that along and continuing to move the studies along. We’ve not opened up any conversations with Investissement Québec. And really, I think at this point, Investissement Québec are just working through as they bring on their facility, their lithium hydroxide facility at Bécancour. They’re really thinking about how they’re going to be able to feed that operation moving forward and so on. So I think probably a little premature. We’d like to be able to do a bit more work on it. Investissement Québec, they’re a great partner. We certainly appreciate having them there. Would we love a bigger piece of Moblan? Yes, but not at any cost.

I think probably remains to be seen in terms of Investissement Québec’s longer-term strategy where they want to hold these assets or divest them.

Austin Yun, Analyst, Macquarie: Thank you. At the last quarter, you provided some update on conversations with the U.S. government. Is there a further update on that that you can elaborate on?

Lucas Dow, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, Elevra Lithium: Yeah. So spent some time in Washington in the lead-up to Christmas, met with Department of Energy, Department of War, and also National Security Council representatives. Clearly, there’s an appetite to be able to develop lithium production in the U.S. Our Carolina project is a unique project. It’s really one of only two hard rock spodumene deposits in the U.S. And the fact that we are quite close to being fully permitted makes that project look quite attractive. We’re continuing to engage with the government in conjunction with moving NAL and Moblan and the rest of the portfolio along. So those conversations are alive, but there’s obviously quite a bit of work to move through those things. But we’re certainly engaging with the government as it relates to Carolina.

Austin Yun, Analyst, Macquarie: Thank you. The next question is, when can we expect updated definitive feasibility studies for Moblan and NAL?

Lucas Dow, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, Elevra Lithium: Yeah. In terms of NAL, just given the nature of the project, and we’d probably describe it much more as a brownfield, big bottlenecking project, we’ll likely move direct into detailed engineering rather than producing a conventional sort of DFS. That’s simply because I think the relative risks of the project and so forth are much better known, so we’ll move there. In terms of Moblan, we’ve been progressing the permitting, particularly around the environmental studies and so forth. We do have plans to update that DFS. Obviously, we’ve been mindful about what our cash burn looks like and so forth. That is an area that we are currently revising, and it’s something that we’ll look to pick up in the first half of—sorry, in this half of calendar year.

In terms of what that looks like, we’d probably tend to think it’d be towards the back end of calendar year 2026, probably early calendar year 2027. But I think it’s important to note that DFS currently doesn’t represent the critical part. It’s very much about permitting. So getting the environmental work moving has really been the key priority for us there.

Austin Yun, Analyst, Macquarie: Question specifically on lithium recoveries, which have dropped from 69%-62% with a higher iron content of PIP sequencing. Can you quantify how much of that recovery loss is structural versus purely transitional, and when recoveries will normalize back to historical levels?

Lucas Dow, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, Elevra Lithium: Yeah. Look, we’d certainly describe it as transitional and not structural. The reality is that if we look at the previous quarters in terms of iron content and lithium grades, in short, if we see those sort of grades in line with the ore body average for both lithium and also for iron content, we’ve been regularly performing at 69%, and there’s no reason that we won’t be back at those levels.

Austin Yun, Analyst, Macquarie: Great. Thank you. With spodumene prices now materially higher than last quarter, can you outline what operating margins look like at NAL at current pricing and where you see sustainable margins throughout the cycle?

Lucas Dow, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, Elevra Lithium: Yeah. I think the simplest thing I’d point to is if you look at our FOB unit costs, we’re at $812 for the last quarter. Quarter before was $818, so pretty stable around there. I think folks can then take what current spot prices are, and it’s pretty clear in terms of what those margins look like. But Christian Cortes, anything else you wanted to add on that?

Lucas Dow, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, Elevra Lithium: Well, as we look forward, we’ve obviously provided guidance for that cost to come up a little bit higher in the second half. Now, prices have obviously been a lot stronger over the past month, and into the end of January, they continue to hold. So if you factor that in, yes, there will be an uplift in profit as we look into the existing quarter, the quarter ending in March. And from there on, ultimately, if you take that guidance cost, you overlay the corporate costs, which come to around $7 million per quarter, that will allow you to understand that at current pricing, we’ll be profitable at group level, not only at NAL. And that will also allow us to allocate capital for sustaining purposes as well as continuing on with some of the growth projects that we have in the portfolio.

Austin Yun, Analyst, Macquarie: Thank you. That’s all of the questions for now.

Lucas Dow, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, Elevra Lithium: Thank you. That’s why I say thanks to everyone for dialing in, also for the questions. We look forward to being able to continue to drive NAL forward and deliver. Thank you.

Conference Operator: Thank you. That does conclude our conference for today. Thank you for participating. You may now disconnect.

William Jones/Reg Spencer, Analyst, Canaccord Genuity: Your participation in the conference has been terminated by the host.