Copper Mountain Mining Corporation (CPPMF) Q3 2022 Results Conference Call November 9, 2022 10:30 AM ET

Company Participants

Gilmour Clausen - President and Chief Executive Officer

Donald Strickland - Chief Operating Officer

Letitia Wong - Chief Financial Officer

Conference Call Participants

Orest Wowkodaw - Scotia Capital

Craig Hutchison - TD Securities

CJ Baldoni - Principal Global Investors

Operator

Good morning. My name is Annas, and I will be your conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to the Copper Mountain Mining Corporation Third Quarter 2022 Earnings Conference Call. All lines have been placed on mute to avoid any background noise. After the speakers remarks there will be a question-and-answer session. [Operator Instructions]

Please note that comments made today that are not of historical fact or nature may contain forward-looking statements. This information, by its nature, is subject to risks and uncertainties that may cause the stated outcome to differ materially from actual outcomes. Please refer to slide two of today's presentation and Copper Mountain's Third Quarter 2022 Management's Discussion and Analysis for more information.

I will now turn over the call to Gil Clausen, President and CEO of Copper Mountain.

Gilmour Clausen

Good morning, everyone, and thanks for joining us. Starting on slide three. Presenting with me today are Don Strickland, our Chief Operating Officer; and Letitia Wong, our Chief Financial Officer. We also have Brad Bolger, our Senior Vice President of Finance, joining us today.

I'll speak briefly on our third quarter results, our 65,000 tonne per day expansion plan and our capital projects. Don will present our operating results and Letitia will conclude with a summary of the sales agreement for the Eva copper project plus our expectations for the rest of the year.

Turning to slide four. Before getting into results for the quarter, I want to make a few comments. Our third quarter clearly did not meet our expectations, lower grade and lower mill throughput impacted our copper output. We experienced a grade reduction as most of the ore processed in the third quarter came from the lower grade north pit as opposed to the planned Phase 4 of the main pit. Our high-grade main pit Phase 4 ore release lagged due to some spotty or continuity in the upper benches of that pushback. But in the second half of September we advanced mining into largely continuous zones of higher-grade copper ore in Phase 4, and we're clearly into the meat of the ore zones in that pushback now. We expect that result to continue through the fourth quarter and solidify into that higher grade ore production through 2023.