Operator
Finally, I would like to advise all participants that this call is being recorded. Thank you.
I'd now like to welcome Justin Werner, Managing Director, Nickel Industries. Over to you.
Justin Werner
Thank you, and thank you everyone for joining our December 2025 quarterly results call. If I could ask the moderator to please go to slide two.
Pleasingly, safety for 17.7 million man-hours worked without a lost-time injury, a tremendous achievement. The company was awarded the Excellence in Sustainability Leadership Award at CNBC Indonesia, highlighting our leadership in ESG implementation and our contributions to the development of sustainable nickel.
We also, our solar off-taker, it achieved financial close, and it's the largest solar project in Indonesia, 262-megawatt peak with 80-megawatt battery energy storage, and it will allow ENC to reduce its carbon footprint. The power off-take agreement is at a 25-year fixed rate with no inflation escalation, we're able to lock in a big part of our power costs at attractive rates.
If we could just move to slide three. Despite frustration during the quarter of meeting our million wet metric tonnes, which did mean that most of our mining was, or majority of positives during the quarter, which includes record EBITDA margins from 12 for ENC and the approval of which will support our current application of moving from 9 million to 10.5 million.
Adjusted EBITDA from operations was $53 million, and RKEF nickel metal production was slightly up from well. EBITDA was down, driven mostly by higher coal, being unable to supply the RKEFs for a majority of the quarter.
That resulted in the third-party ore, so that did slightly push our costs up. HNC continues to operate well above nameplate, delivered $17.2 million US in EBITDA, which was a 32% increase on the September quarter.
Mining was able to restart our operations on the 12th of December with an increase to 10.5 million tonnes. In the last 19 days, we were tonnes, I think what's pleasing there is the operations, despite being out for almost 2.5 months, were very quickly able to ramp back up.
Currently tracking very well in January, looking at delivering. The standby costs and the mining, unfortunately, did deliver a $9 million US EBITDA loss for the quarter.
As I said, things are trending very strongly so far for January and this quarter. If we could just go to the and then the slide after that on RKEF operations.
Tons increased 1%, as I mentioned, cash for nickel ore costs. However, that was offset by lower.
The NPI contract pricing, broadly, of $11,100 broadly in line with the previous quarter. Spot NPI price is around US$13,200, at the moment, the December quarter average.
We've had a very strong start to the year nickel pricing, and so that does bode well for this quarter and for the remainder of the year. If we could just go to the next slide, please.
I mentioned record EBITDA at HNC. You can see they increased from $6,029 a ton in Q3 to over $8,800 for the December quarter.
MHP contract to $17,110 a ton. Spot is over $18,000 a ton, and obviously, the average LME price for the whole of 2025, which was $15,000, significant increase in the nickel price, as well as cobalt.
Current cobalt spot prices are over per ton. The average for 2025 was around $39,967.
Codes extremely well for the imminent ENC. The next slide, please.
Pleased to give an update on the ENC project. We're starting some wet commissioning in anticipation of final commissioning this quarter.
The installation of crystallizers has been completed and has been integrated with the rest of the circuit. The refinery, sulfate refineries will look to ramp up production once the HPAL smelter.
In terms of the, we've begun purchasing sulfur, and testing has commenced on the first. Mechanical tests have commenced on the counter-current decantation circuit, thickeners, reagent storage tanks, we've started all the mechanical tests.
Then there's been allocation of just to ensure that we can complete the slurry pipeline, which will to ENC and also return the tailings to a dry. I would encourage people, if you haven't already seen it, there is a link to a video in the presentation so that you can see the size and the scale of ENC, and it is at the moment.
If we could just go to the next slide, please. As I mentioned, unfortunately, impacted by RKAB delays, so as a result, we moved from a $32.8 million in the third quarter to a $4.9 million US, but as I said, we January is looking very good.
Approval of the AMDAL was a significant milestone, very confident of achieving a 19 million for this year. I think that was is sort of well supported by able to go from 9 million to 10.5 million.
I think that bodes well for an increase this year. If we could just go to the next slide, please.
The pilot project continues to track. The ETL feasibility study has been, we're hopeful of receiving approval for at the end of 2026.
That the initial target from ETL will be somewhere around [unclear] per annum. At the ANN IUP, the feasibility study, that feasibility study will actually incorporate a slurry plant, the same that we have at Hengjaya mine for any future potential limonite ore.
In terms of the haul roads between ETL and ANN, and during the quarter, we drilled about 18,000 meters of exploration and infill drilling to support detailed mine planning. If we could just go to the next slide, please.
We were very pleased to announce the acquisition by Tricor of 10% of the ENC project at US$2.4 billion, at a premium to the US$2.3 billion invested. Sprec is a South Korean KOSDAQ-listed premium alloy and precision manufacturer for the global aerospace industry.
They're one of only five global key vendors to SpaceX, a 10-year supply contract. This is to support SpaceX's rocket program.
That transaction is expected to complete Q1 2026. We see this as a, it represents our entry into and particularly the aerospace and aeronautical sectors, which demand the highest product quality and have the strictest qualification.
We think this is a strong endorsement of the quality. Not only that, it does access to supply to additional North American aerospace end users.
We're very pleased with the transaction. If we could just go, that finishes the quarterly results presentation.
As I said, despite the frustrating quarter, a number of positives, including a very strong cobalt price and NPI price at the moment, which bodes well for a strong quarter, back up to where they were. We remain confident of an increased RKAB and $8,000 a ton for the commissioning of ENC at the end of this quarter.
With that, hand over to questions.
Operator
If you wish to ask a question, please press star followed by one to be announced. That is star one if you wish to ask a question.
Peter William from Arkkan, the line is open.
Chun Wai Mui
Yes. Hi, thank you.
Wanted to get a little bit more clarification on the RKAB I guess for this year, for 2026. It hasn't been announced, right?
I think in the previous presentations, you've expecting 19, this is kind of 10.5 that you have currently. We've seen headlines in industry news that the RKAB aggregate fully I think down one-third year-over-year.
I guess, I'm just trying to figure out what's you guys not getting to the 19 million ton that you guys are expecting, that's number one. Then number two, and I think gets you guys 100% self-sufficient including ENC, what is the actual number to get you guys 100% self-sufficient?
Justin Werner
Yeah. Look, the first question, did the government reduce the RKAB quota from last year?
They've those that have integrated operations. Of course, we have RKEF lines, we have ENC as well.
We were able to go at the end of last year from 9 to 10.5 million. It supports the fact that the government is supportive of increasing our RKAB.
Look, there's always, environmental study that's been approved for the 19 million tonnes. We still remain confident, where the RKAB cuts come from.
I think what we are seeing is that it will come from a lot of the smaller producers of RKEF or HPAL operations, of which there is many, don't have the best, and I think this is just a way of ensuring that those who are operating properly shouldn't there shouldn't be too much risk on the RKAB. Then your second question
Chun Wai Mui
was— The cut-off level for us achieving self-sufficiency across our operations.
Justin Werner
All right. That the 19 million will get us to 100% for ENC, and it will get us 100% self-sufficiency at our RKEF operations, which is eight lines within the IMIP.
Chun Wai Mui
Okay. Maybe dig a little bit deeper.
You guys are operating at overall 25% to 30%. When the government kind of takes into account of kind of your integrated kind of midstream capacity, are they looking at nameplate or the rate that you guys are producing at?
Because, plus 30%, right? Sure.
I think is 19 100% on the nameplate, or is that 100% self-sufficient on nameplate plus 30%, is kind of my question.
Justin Werner
It's 100% self-sufficiency on nameplate, which is about 11. Obviously, with 19, there's a significant buffer there for operating significantly above nameplate capacity.
Chun Wai Mui
Thanks. As a reminder,
Operator
please press star followed by one on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. Once again, that is star one if you wish to ask a question.
There are no further questions at this time, I'd like to hand back to management for closing comments. Thank you.
No,
Justin Werner
look, thank you everyone again. As I said, we look forward to hopefully next quarter with an update on our RKAB as we continue to work closely with the government to secure it.
Operator
That does conclude our conference for today. Thank you for participating.
You may now all disconnect.
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