Thank you, operator, and welcome, everyone, to our conference call this morning. Joining us on the call are Renaud Adams, President and Chief Executive Officer; Maarten Theunissen, Chief Financial Officer; Bruno Lemelin, Chief Operating Officer; Ankit Shah, Chief Strategy Officer; and Annie Torkia Lagacé, Chief Legal Officer.

We are calling today from IAMGOLD's Toronto office, which is located on Treaty 13 territory, on the traditional lands of many nations including the Mississaugas of the Credit, the Anishinaabeg, the Chippewa, the Haudenosaunee, and the Wendat peoples. At IAMGOLD, we believe respecting and upholding Indigenous rights is founded upon relationships that foster trust, transparency, and mutual respect.

Please note that our remarks on today's call will include forward-looking statements and refer to non-IFRS measures. We encourage you to refer to the cautionary statements and disclosures on non-IFRS measures included in the presentation and the reconciliations of these measures in our most recent MD&A, each under the heading Non-GAAP Financial Measures.

With respect to the technical information to be discussed, please refer to the information in the presentation under the heading Qualified Person and Technical Information. The slides referenced on this call can be viewed on our website.

I'll now turn the call over to our President and CEO, Renaud Adams.

Thank you, Graeme, and good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us today. Before I start, I'd like to welcome Ankit Shah, who joined IAMGOLD on Monday as our Chief Strategy Officer.

Ankit, who many of you on the call are familiar with, brings to our team nearly 20 years of strategy, corporate development, and capital markets experience at a very exciting time for this company. Welcome, Ankit.

IAMGOLD is off to a strong start to 2026. In the first quarter, we produced 183,600 attributable ounces of gold, positioning us well to achieve our full-year guidance of 720 to 820,000 ounces.

The quarter was marked by robust financial results with revenue exceeding $1 billion and mine-site free cash flow of $525 million. The cash flow we are generating is allowing us to execute on all fronts, as in the first quarter alone, we returned $260 million to shareholders through our share buyback program and repaid $100 million of debt on our credit facility while increasing our cash position.

These results reflect the significant leverage of our business has to the current gold price environment and, more importantly, the quality of the assets we have built and the teams that operate them. What excites me most is where IAMGOLD is heading.

I believe we are entering one of the most catalyst-rich periods of company's history. Over the next 12 to 18 months, we expect to deliver updated technical reports across each of our assets: Côté Gold, Westwood, Essakane, and the Nelligan Mining Complex.

These studies are expected to outline a larger, longer-life production profile that we believe will redefine how the market views IAMGOLD. At Côté, the year-end technical report is expected to contemplate a significantly larger scales operations, incorporating both the Côté and Gosselin, supported by an updated mineral resource estimate coming this quarter.

At Nelligan, we are advancing one of the largest pre-production gold camps in Canada towards a preliminary economic assessment next year. At Westwood and Essakane, we see meaningful potential of mine life extension and production growth.

We will get into the details on each of these through the presentation today. When I look at IAMGOLD today, with $2 billion of EBITDA generated over the last 12 months, a strengthened balance sheet, an increasing production profile, catalysts ahead at every asset, and meaningful capital being returned to shareholders, I see a company that is delivering on its promises and building something very exceptional.

We are well-positioned to create significant value in 2026 and beyond, and I look forward to walking you through the details. With that, let's get into the quarter.

Starting with health and safety, in the quarter, our total recordable injury rate was 0.44, a measurable improvement from the prior-year period. I would like to highlight two big achievements in the quarter, as the Essakane mine achieved a milestone of triple zero in the first quarter, and Westwood achieved its first full quarter at a zero TRIFR, a goal every mine site strives to reach.

I want to thank our teams across our operation and in the field for their continued commitment to safe and responsible mining, as safety is where it starts for us. Looking at operation, and as I noted, IAMGOLD produced 183,600 ounces to our account in the first quarter.

At Côté, attributable production of 52,300 ounces was impacted by reduced throughput due to unplanned downtime associated with wear and tear on a conveyor belt as crushed ore volume significantly increased following the commissioning of the second cone crusher. This belt will be replaced in May, after which we expect to operate at full capacity with an improving cost profile through the year as the debottlenecking of the secondary crusher allows us to phase out the aggregate crusher.

Meanwhile, Essakane and Westwood both had very strong start to the year, demonstrating the value of having a diversified portfolio of producing assets. Cash costs including royalties were $1,301 per ounce in the quarter, tracking well within our full-year guidance range.

Including royalties, cash costs were $1,608 per ounce, and all-in sustaining costs were $2,124 an ounce. It is worth highlighting that both Côté and Essakane carry significant royalty structure, which are directly linked to the gold price.

In a quarter where the gold price realized was nearly $4,900 an ounce, the royalty component is naturally higher than what our guidance assumed at $4,000. As a reference, this worked out to around $115 per ounce increase in cash costs for a $1,000 per ounce increase in the gold price from royalty alone.

Meanwhile, on the input costs, the ongoing conflicts in the Middle East has introduced additional volatility to energy market, and we did see oil prices move higher towards the end of the quarter. Essakane in particular has meaningful exposure, given its reliance on diesel and heavy fuel oil to power both the processing and the mining fleet.

On a consolidated basis, a $10 per barrel increase translates to approximately $12 per ounce increase in cash costs. We are actively monitoring energy price movement and potential supply chains impact across all of our operations.

With that, I will pass the call over to our CFO to walk us through our financials. Maarten?

Thank you, Renaud, and good morning, everyone. The current gold market and our operating results have resulted in good financial results and considerable free cash flow being generated, which allows us to continue to execute on our capital allocation strategy to maximize value.

We produced $524.6 million of mine-site free cash flow, that is operating cash flows minus capital expenditure from each operation. $228.4 million of the funds was used to strengthen our balance sheet by repaying $100 million of the credit facility, and we also increased cash by $128.3 million.

For the shareholder return component, we purchased $260 million or 12.9 million of IAMGOLD shares as part of the share buyback program. Subsequent to quarter end, we purchased an additional 2.1 million shares for $40 million, which brings the total shares repurchased by IAMGOLD since it started the program last December to $350 million or 18 million shares.

In addition, we completed the debt repayment component of our plan and paid down the remaining $100 million balance of the credit facility, making the full facility available. The company intends to continue to use cash flow from Essakane to fund its share buyback program at approximately the same rate that cash is generated and repatriated from Essakane over the course of 2026.

Naturally, the actual number of common shares that may be purchased, if any, and the timing of such purchases will be determined by the company based on a number of factors, including the gold price, the company's financial performance, the availability of cash flows, consideration of uses of cash, and our strategic allocation. In terms of the financial position, at the end of the quarter, IAMGOLD had $550.2 million in cash and cash equivalents with $100 million drawn on the credit facility, resulting in liquidity at the end of March of approximately $1.1 billion.

With the $400 million term loan repaid at the end of last year and the repayment of our credit facility, IAMGOLD today is in a net cash position, a significant milestone for a company that a year ago was carrying over $800 million in net debt. Within cash and cash equivalents, we note that $281.9 million was held by Essakane at the end of the quarter.

The cash balance at Essakane increased during the quarter and will be used to fund tax payments in April and the Government of Burkina Faso's portion of the 2026 dividend payable in June. The company uses dividends and shareholder account structure to repatriate funds in excess of working capital requirements from Essakane.

Getting to our financial results, revenues from operations totaled $1 billion from sales of 211,500 ounces on 100% basis at an average realized price of $485 [realized price: $4,850?] per ounce.

The record gold price and operating results resulted in adjusted EBITDA of $666 million in the first quarter of the year, which brings the trailing 12-month EBITDA to a total of approximately $2 billion. At the bottom line, adjusted earnings per share for the quarter was 67 cents.

Looking at the cash flow reconciliation for the quarter, it offers a good visualization of the major drivers in the quarter. We see good conversion of EBITDA into operating cash flow, with $629.5 million of operating cash flow before working capital changes.

As stated earlier, the significant operating cash flow allowed for the funding of our capital expenditure of $101.6 million, $260 million under the share buyback program, repaid $100 million of the credit facility, whilst still resulting in an increase in cash of $128.3 million. As we look ahead, with our debt repayment goal achieved, we will continue to share the share buyback program using cash flow from Essakane and the remaining cash going to our balance sheet to further strengthen it as we evaluate the best use of the funds to increase value of the business.

We are evaluating an appropriate time to introduce a dividend that would likely be at the end of the year or early next year. It is worth reinforcing on how we think about our capital allocation framework today.

The Canadian platform, consisting of Côté Gold and Westwood, is generating sufficient cash flow to fund the company's Canadian operations and corporate activities, as well as our internal growth plans over the next three years. This is important because it means that the cash flow from Essakane can be directed to fund our capital return to shareholders that currently consists of the share buyback program, and we believe there is compelling logic to that.

The market has historically applied a discount to cash flows generating Burkina Faso. By repatriating those funds to Canada and using it to repurchase our shares at current market value, we are effectively converting cash that the market discounts into full-value equity for our shareholders.

We continue to evaluate the program and believe that this is currently the most prudent use of capital. With that, I will pass the call to Bruno Lemelin, our Chief Operating Officer, to discuss our operating results and outlook.

Bruno?

Thank you, Maarten. Starting with Côté Gold, looking at the quarter, Côté produced 74,700 ounces on a 100% basis.

Mining activities total 9.3 million tonnes of material mined with 3.6 million tonnes of ore, representing a strip ratio of 1.6:1. Total tonnes mined were lower in January and February.

The operation completed overburden removal activities required to open up the pit while managing seasonal winter conditions. Mining activity increased in March as drilling and blasting commenced in the pushback area.

Grade mined in the quarter was 0.99 grams per tonne, in line with the mine plan. Mill throughput in the quarter was 2.3 million tonnes.

As we noted in our results, throughput was limited due to downtime on the CV10 conveyor, which feeds material from the primary and secondary crushers to the screening building. This downtime was primarily due to the increased load on the conveyor following the installation of the secondary crusher, putting additional stress on areas of the conveyor belt that had prior wear and splices.

We were able to finalize repairs in early April. We then saw improved performance of the belt when the belt plant averaged 32,000 tonnes per day over the month.

Later this month, we are installing a new, heavier-gauge belt, which will allow for the circuit to resume full operations above nameplate. In summary, the CV10 belt situation is not structural in nature, but an isolated, non-recurring early life item.

We are seeing fewer of these as the operation stabilizes, marking an important step forward versus the past 12 to 24 months. Côté is transitioning into a phase focused on operating discipline and consistent execution.

Head grade for the first quarter was 1.07 grams per tonne, in line with the guidance for the year of 1 to 1.1 grams per tonne with recoveries of 93%. We continue to be very pleased with the reconciliation between reserve model to grade model to mill feed and production.

Production is expected to increase quarter-over-quarter as throughput increases in Q2 and on higher grade in the second half of the year. We remain on track with Côté's production guidance of 390 to 430,000 ounces for the year.

Looking at cost, Côté reported first-quarter cash costs excluding royalties of $1,369 per ounce and all-in sustaining costs of $2,109 per ounce. We have been clear with our plan to lower our cost this year, and that plan is still in place.

Our goal is to exit the year at sub-$4 a tonne mining cost and processing cost in the mid-15s. The primary drivers to lower cost this year are fourfold.

First is to increase tonnes through the mill and higher production. Second is to significantly reduce and remove the reliance on the contracted aggregate crusher.

Third is with improved maintenance cycles and iterative performance improvement, and fourth is to realize the operational efficiencies as the pit is opened up. The second cone crusher is operating well, which has removed the bottleneck on this area of the secondary crushing circuit.

Later this quarter, the increased capacity will allow us to phase out the usage of the aggregate crusher, which we contracted last year to allow the plant to hit its 2025 goals. We have already realized benefits beyond the additional volume capacity, with the HPGR seeing immediate reduction on wear of its rollers, which will translate to less roller replacement over the course of a year.

As Renaud pointed out, costs at Côté Gold are impacted by higher gold prices. In the first quarter, royalties accounted for $335 per ounce, or 20% of cash costs.

Further, and this is something that we've been asked about frequently of late, is the impact of rising oil prices. A benefit at Côté is that the plant and our shovels are connected to the low-cost Hydro grid, effectively, only our mining fleet is directly impacted by fuel prices.

Based on our estimates, this translates to about $7 per ounce increase in cost per $10 increase in the price of oil. With the path forward this year to our higher production and lower costs, all eyes turn to what is next for Côté or Côté.

The first step is the upcoming updated mineral resources estimate, which will combine both the Côté and Gosselin zone into a single block model. The goal is to see additional upgrading of ounces into measured and indicated.

The resource base will form the foundation of the Côté-Gosselin expansion mine plan, which is still on track to be announced in the fourth quarter of this year. The report will envision a near-term expansion of the Côté plant to 50 to 55,000 tonnes per day, targeting a significantly larger reserve base from the updated resource estimate.

We expect the expansion to be highly accretive on a NAV basis, as the near-term capital required for the plant expansion is relatively modest. The permitting and larger capital requirement for additional tailings management and opening of Gosselin will likely be spaced out many years in the mine plan.

Turning to Westwood, the mine continued its strong production, producing 36,300 ounces in the quarter, as underground activities performed very well with excellent mucking and hoisting performance. Underground mining totaled 106,000 tonnes in the quarter, with an average head grade from underground of 9.85 grams per tonne.

The Grand Duc open pit saw lower ore tonnes mined of 60,000 tonnes. Operations prioritized waste stripping to open up access to additional ore with opportunities for further extension, future extension.

Mill throughput in the first quarter was online at 303,000 tonnes at a blended average grade of 4.04 grams per tonne and recoveries of 92%. Together, Westwood produced $110 million of mine-site free cash flow in the first quarter, bringing the last 12 months of cash flow generation to $242 million.

Westwood demonstrates what disciplined execution and incremental optimization can deliver: safe operation, stable production, expanding optionality, and strong free cash flow without step-change capital. As a result of this strong quarter, cash costs average $1,217 per ounce and all-in sustaining costs averaging $1,733 per ounce, well below the guidance ranges for the year.

We have seen modest mining cost increases on the per-unit basis associated with increased drilling activities and higher explosive costs. Looking ahead, our teams are quite excited for the future of Westwood.

This year, we are spending about $30 million on expansion capital that is being used to explore and test the eastern extension of the mine, which you can see circled here on slide 13. We are seeing a thickening of mineralization in this area.

Our project teams are currently drifting into this area to conduct bulk testing. The company plans to publish an updated technical report for Westwood in the second half of 2027, which is expected to extend the life of mine and highlight the potential for bulk mining in this eastern zone.

This approach could potentially support higher overall underground throughput, and this conceptually would allow for increased gold production at improved mining costs, allowing the mill to be filled with higher-margin material. Turning to Essakane, the mine reported record production of 111,900 ounces on a 100% basis.

Past grade continued to benefit from the positive reconciliation as mining progresses deeper into Phase 7. As a result of this strong performance, mine-site free cash flow from Essakane was $302.7 million in the quarter, bringing the total cash generated by Essakane over the last 12 months to $803.6 million.

On operation, mining totaled 11.9 million tonnes versus ore tonnes of 2.2 million tonnes, translating to a strip ratio of 4.4:1. The higher proportion of waste was a result of the initial pushback of the deep extension in the Lauw pit.

The mill reported inline throughput of 3.1 million tonnes, which was a good achievement as the plant completed its annual shutdown. Head grade average 1.24 grams per tonne, coming off the record grade last quarter.

Despite the positive reconciliation impact in Phase 7, we are maintaining our guidance for the year of 1.1 grams per tonne as additional ore from Lauw is brought into the mine plan. Essakane costs came within guidance ranges with cash costs excluding royalties of $1,083 per ounce and all-in sustaining costs of $2,145 per ounce.

Mining costs benefited in the quarter due to free digging of the initial saprolite benches of the Lauw pit, resulting in reduced explosives consumption, while on the project basis, these savings were offset by higher energy and consumable costs and the replacement of the liners. Essakane costs also have exposure to the gold price.

In the first quarter, the strong gold price translated to royalties accounting for $597 per ounce, or 35% of cash costs. Further, Essakane is heavily reliant on oil and diesel.

Based on the usage between milling and mining, it is estimated that a $10 increase in the price of oil per barrel would equate to about $20 per ounce increase in cash costs and in all-in sustaining costs, respectively. At this time, our fuel supply has not been impacted by the conflict in the Middle East, though risk to price and supply have increased.

The company actively is monitoring the situation and implementing measures that are within its control. Essakane continues to be a highly cash-generative asset, delivering strong free cash flow while offering optionality to an updated mine plan targeting a potential five-year extension of its current life of mine.

In the first half of 2027, IAMGOLD expects to release this updated plan, which would extend Essakane's life to 2033. This work will also support discussions with the Government of Burkina Faso ahead of license renewal in 2028.

Today, Essakane hosts 4.4 million ounces of measured and indicated resources with further upside supported by ongoing drilling. With that, I will pass it back to Renaud.

Renaud?

Thank you, Bruno. This bring us to the Nelligan Mining Complex.

The first quarter was the first full quarter that we controlled the consolidated district, and our exploration teams have been drilling to expand mineralization at Philibert, Nelligan, and Monster Lake while prioritizing targets for further discovery. This year, we will be drilling over 60,000 meters to advance the project so we can release our initial PEA study to the market in the first half of next year.

The Nelligan Mining Complex already has a significant minerals inventory of over 4.3 million ounces of measured and indicated and 7.5 million ounces of inferred resources, and we believe there is meaningful upsides to those numbers. Many of these deposits and targets have not had a sustained or well-funded exploration program behind them.

That is changing now, and we expect the mineral inventory to continue to grow as we put capital to work across the district. We expect the study to outline a project with a central processing facility being fed from multiple ore sources within the 17-kilometer radius.

Considering the minerals wealth and potential for growth and the fact that IAMGOLD owns 100%, the Nelligan Mining Complex has the potential to be among IAMGOLD's largest mines. The Nelligan Mining Complex is already positioned as one of the largest pre-production gold projects in Canada.

What makes compelling is the combination of district scale, consolidation across multiple million-ounces deposit, the ease of access, the combine of underground and open pit mining, and the fact that is located in Quebec, one of the premier mining top premier mining jurisdictions in the world. Taken together, we believe these attributes positions Nelligan as a premium asset in our portfolio and one where we expect to unlock significant value as we advance the project through the study process.

With that, I want to thank our shareholders for your support. We truly believe it will be an exciting years for IAMGOLD with significant value growth opportunities ahead, including the upcoming resource update at Côté, the Côté expansion study later this year, followed by next year where we outline a mine life extension at Essakane in the first half of the year, an initial study wrapping economics around Nelligan Mining Complex also in the first half of next year, and a mine life extension expansion underground at Westwood in the second half next year.

Altogether, we have significant value accretion catalysts ahead, and with that, I would like to pass the call back to the operator for the Q&A portion of the call. Operator?

Hi. Good morning.

Thanks for taking my questions. My first question is on Essakane.

Are you seeing any risks in terms of potential supply disruptions for diesel or fuel oil over there? How much inventory do you currently have on site?

You also talked about the direct cost impact from higher oil prices, but how should we think about the indirect inflationary pressures?

Maybe Maarten, you take that one, please.

Morning, Sathish. We are de-risking the fuel supply at Essakane.

We have supply at site that's 5 to 6 weeks, and we try to maintain that at a maximum capacity. Then what we've also done is we continue to secure additional fuel up the supply chain.

We have secured that fuel. For the next 2 to 3 months, Essakane has already secured sufficient fuel.

The impact, as we stated, for the direct impact on the actual cost per fuel that is linked to the market price is about $20 per ounce for every $10 per barrel. There is other costs at Essakane as well, there's taxes on fuel, and those impacts.

We have not seen other inflationary pressures at Essakane or the other mines at this point, and it's hard to estimate those. If you look at our energy cost as a company, it's about 20% of our operating costs, and our consumables is about 15 to 16%.

That's kind of the level of our cost structure that could be impacted by inflationary pressures. It's hard to I think for anyone to predict at this point what exactly that would look like.

Thanks for the color. My second question is on Côté.

How should we look at the quarterly cadence of production and costs, especially for the second quarter with the reduced operating capacity and the scheduled maintenance shutdown in May? Should we expect the average milling rates and costs to improve versus the first quarter, or is it more a second-half story?

Bruno, you want to help answer that?

Good morning. We expect that once we have completed the shutdown in middle of May, like it's meant to be on the May 20th, we're going to be replacing the conveyor belt, and we're going to be replacing also the HPGR tires that were supposed to be changed earlier in the year.

We are going to make some adjustment in certain areas. After that, we're going to resume to full operation and even going beyond the nameplate capacity.

What it is what entails is after that, the expectation is both on the mining side and milling side, the unit costs are expected to decrease and to have a sharp improvement in terms of gold production quarter-over-quarter.

This is Graeme, and you'll note in our news release that we refined our throughput guidance for Côté to 12 to 13 million tonnes per for the year.

Okay. Thank you for the additional color, and congrats on the strong year-to-date buybacks.

Thank you.

Hi, good morning, guys. Thanks for taking my question.

I just wanted to ask a little bit about Westwood. This quarter a little bit lower production from the Grand Duc deposit or from the open pit, I'm not sure if it's still Grand Duc, but how long does that how long do you expect to have that ore?

I think it said into Q into 2027, but I was just trying to figure out, when it ends and sort of the ramp-up in 2026 in terms of the tonnage over the course of the year.

Good morning, Anita. This is Bruno.

Good question. We are seeing material from Grand Duc to be extended even beyond 2027.

We have also options, Phase 5, that could go even beyond to till 2029. That's what we're doing right now.

We are currently evaluating those options. Grand Duc has been a great support for Westwood, and the moment that it will be fading off, it could be also a great moment for the eastern zone that I'm referring to, the thicker part of the underground so that at Westwood to replace that material.

If I may add, Anita, what I really like about the work that's been done and the drilling that took place in the last two years, our effort has always been to protect the production profile on an off-site basis. The potential Phase 5 of the Grand Duc, should we be able to maintain this up to 2029-30, followed after that, by an increase of the underground in the eastern.

This is the focus right now, you don't see any gap, and if anything, a continued increase profile. It's a bit of about the same thinking, and I appreciate Burkina Faso is a different situation, we monitor and so forth, but the best, of course, would be to completely offset the gap and fit Nelligan camp, also being capable to maintain the production profile.

That's really the focus at this stage, understanding that we would be continue to monitor the situation in West Africa.

I guess what I was driving at with on the Westwood was, this quarter you had very good cost and very, a lot of mining from the underground, and with the Grand Duc ramping up, I'm just curious to see how the theoretically the overall mining cost per tonne should actually drive down more with more underground, more of the open pit ore coming in. I'm just trying to get a handle on you've had a significant cost beat in the first quarter at Westwood relative to your guidance, I'm just trying to figure out how I should be thinking about costs for the rest of the year.

Good morning, Anita. It's Maarten.

I agree we had a great quarter if you look at the dollar per tonne for the underground mine. We do expect that to maybe increase just above the $300 level again for the rest of the year, that it may not be sustained at that level, closer to that $325 for the full year again as we saw in the past.

We don't expect Q1 to be the norm for the rest of the year.

We wish so, but we do understand that there are some zones, some areas in the mine that requires maybe more support and so forth. You cannot really just It really depends where the guys would be where the team would be mining.

Our focus is to remain at the lower cost, but what I appreciate that we've been mining other sectors as well at higher cost.

Okay. My other question on Côté on throughput was answered in one of the other questions going above nameplate.

I'll leave it there and get back in the queue if I have any follow-up. Thank you.

Thank you so much.

Oh, great. Good morning, everybody.

Thank you for taking my questions. Maybe I'll do the financial one first.

Maarten, over to you to maybe talk about this $400 million dividend after tax that you're getting in Q2 from Essakane. Should I be thinking that all of that now could be going to share buybacks in Q2 or Q3?

How should I be thinking the payment of this $400 million over for the share buyback or from a quarterly perspective?

Good morning, Tanya. We had about $200 million left on the shareholder account for last year's dividend.

We expect that cash to be repatriated by June or July of this year. Then the reason why there's a bit of a slow down is because of the tax payments we have to make in Q2, as well as the government is getting the $100 million portion of the dividend.

The cash that we bring in, we expect for the remainder of this quarter to spend $40 to $50 million a month. We already did $40 million in April, getting to that $400 million for the year likely on the share buyback.

We will continue to evaluate, but that $400 million that we then declare in June is then a new shareholder account of $400 million. Then as we then repatriate cash from Essakane, we would then continue to use that to potentially fund share buybacks for the second half of the year into next year.

Gold price dependent is the exact sequence of that, but we have good vision on the next quarter starting soon in the middle of the year.

Great. That's very helpful.

Then my other financial question is just on the taxes. Were quite low in Q1.

When I look at your guidance and what you paid, significantly lower. Maybe just a little bit about what's happening there and how you see the rest of the year coming out in terms of taxes.

From a cash tax perspective, we paid about 14% if you take our guidance, cash taxes. We still think our cash tax guidance is in tact, and maybe if you look at it for how it's spread over the course of the year, 14 to 15% in Q1 and Q4, and then the remainder is spread over Q2 and Q3, and that's again driven by Essakane cash tax payment in Q2 and the withholding tax payment on the dividend that's normally either end of Q2 or beginning of Q3.

Okay. Should see that Q2 Q3

So 70% is in Q2, Q3, yeah.

Yeah. Okay.

Perfect. Thank you for that clarification.

Then just moving to some of the technical questions, maybe Renaud, over to you to, as I think about this updated resource that is coming out on Côté-Gosselin at the end of I think it's this quarter, end of Q2, or in Q2, should I be thinking, and I think I heard that we're upgrading the measured and indicated category, should I be thinking that that 20 million ounces that you have outlined, should I be thinking that 2 million of inferred gets moved into measured and indicated and there being no increase to the reserves of that you reported of 7 million ounces, or should I also be thinking that that 20 million overall should get bigger? Just trying to understand what to expect.

No, thanks for the thanks for the questions, and we've we've been we've been socializing this quite a bit. If you look at our year-end mineral resource, we were sitting below the 19 million and the 18.5-plus million of measured and indicated.

There was still some holes to be integrated in the database, with them some work on the saddle as well. In short, our confidence remain as you say that there would be additional conversion to to M&I to objective of 20 million ounces of measured and indicated, and and as you drill as you continue to improve your inferred as well.

We would all clarify this, but the most important thing is objective remains 20 million of measured and indicated, and that's will form the the basis for the the the reserves. We will not disclose the reserves obviously because will triggers the need for the report right away.

We're going to clarify in Q2 our resource, and the reserve then will be a a measure of a factor of conversion of the 20 million. Obviously, we're expecting a significant increase in reserve out of the 20 out of the 20 million, but that will be clarified in the study as it come out at the end of the year.

Okay. No, thank you for that.

That's what I thought was going to happen, but I just wanted to make sure. Then just maybe on, I know we talked a little bit about these costs coming down at Côté on the both the mining and the processing.

As we think about this new study that's coming out in Q4 for this complex, should I be thinking that you, the new study should have, costs of under $4 a tonne for mining and processing and that $12 to $14 a tonne as a combined entity? they were quite high this quarter as we know for various reasons, but I'm trying to understand if I am going to be benchmarking on that, under $4 a tonne and 12 to 14 on the processing.

You're absolutely right. Appreciate that in the short term, our costs have been higher, and as we highlighted in Q2 last year, the use of aggregate plan is a big portion of it.

Not having the capacity in the dry and short, all this have been tested. We've been using as well some external review to revalidate all this.

We're talking about feasibility, level type of study. We remain extremely confident.

We understand and appreciate our costs are higher, but I think we have good visibility about what has to be done. This is the focus as we park the aggregate and focus on reducing.

It's not going to be all in one year. It's going to be spread over a couple of years, two, three years, how well are highlighted heading to the expansion.

Maybe, Bruno, just quickly what you see as a main focus in the second half the year in term of cost reductions. Tanya.

For the mining costs, you will see those mining costs to decrease in the second and for the rest of the year, means you first of all, it was a volume related thing for Q1, and as we expect the volume to increase, our unit costs are going to go down. Second is we have also made a great improvement in drill and blast, increasing our performance by 65% of late.

We're also going to receive four additional 793 trucks increasing haulage. We're getting putting everything in place to be successful, to be at below the $4 a tonne before the end of the year.

Same thing happen at for the mining costs the moment that you take out, remove the aggregate crusher, the contractors, and demobilization of other contractors, you'll see also a sharp reduction in cost. We are also making improvement here and there as it should.

It's part of the optimization phase, and as Renaud pointed out, that optimization phase is going to take a good three years to make sure that we keep putting a downward pressure for the cost. We're quite confident that the 43-101 is going to be well-supported by assumptions that are realistic.

Okay. Understood.

A basis to go forward on that. Maybe just my final question, as I thought about the rest of the year, and I know in the previous in February, the guidance had been that Essakane production would be relatively stable through the year, as was Westwood, and then Côté would see quarter-on-quarter improvement.

We saw a stronger second half. How are we looking at the overall company for production profile for first half, second half?

Go ahead, Bruno.

Yes. It's going to be much stronger, as we mentioned, for Côté.

The grades are going to be hovering between 1 and 1.2, we we have to expect a stronger H2. For Essakane, it's going to be quite stable.

We need to we and we mentioned that we're going to remain within guidance as we start implementing the Lauw ore into the mine plan. Westwood Westwood is is just like The only thing that we need for Westwood is just being a stable operation, stable and safe operation.

1,000 1,000 ounces a month in average, and so far more within the 56. Overall, you will see a much stronger H2 as opposed to H1, and I think this is what we also disclosed last quarter, that H1 would be the softer to take into account winter conditions and some changes for the HPGR changes, like in conveyor.

I I think right now everything falls into into plan.

Yeah. No, that's what you had last.

I just wanted to make sure. Thank you.

Thank you.

Hi, Renaud and team, and thanks for taking my question and congrats on a good quarter. Maybe at Westwood if I could maybe ask a question on the underground.

We've now seen two quarters of mining rates above about 1.1 thousand tonnes per day and grades over that 9.8 grams per tonne mined. Could you maybe help me understand how to think about the next few quarters in terms of mining productivity and the grade over the coming quarters?

Thank you.

Bruno?

Yes. The hoisting, the mucking is going very well.

Our targets are close to 1,000 tonne per day, and in fact, we are exceeding those metrics every day now. It's done through optimization and better engineering, better preparation.

Hoisting, we have 4,000-tonne per day capacity at Westwood, we have plenty of capacity at the hoist, it's not constrained. Therefore, that's why it gives us great hope that whatever improvement that will be done at Westwood will become immediate catalyst into the gold production of the mine.

Overall, what we plan is we do what we plan what we do, and we do what we plan, trying to make sure that we have stabilized the operation, and we improve in an increment manner the Westwood operation. On all metrics: meter per meter of advance per day, meter per men shift.

The drilling is going very well also, and we have a new Simba drills coming in. The drilling performance is also improving very well.

The ability of our group mining crews to layout new zones are improving also with the algorithm that we have developed over time. Overall, it's going well.

I appreciate that you've seen quite a significant increase. It's again, it's a little bit as the questions on the cost side, depends a bit where you mine as well.

What we want is reliable and safe operation. Are we going to see a continued increase?

The focus is really to deliver sustainable and safe operation. We're very comfortable, really like the last quarter, but I think being in the zone of the 1,000 to the 1,200 is a good zone, and we're going to always prioritize the safe operations, Mohamed, but appreciate your question.

Thanks a lot. That's very helpful.

Maybe if I can ask a second question on at Côté Gold on the improvement on the process cost. If I missed this, but is the improvement of the maintenance timeline for the HPGR already reflected in that expected cost improvement you have for the end of the year, or is that a positive surprise following the installation of the cone crusher?

Thank you.

No, I wouldn't call a positive surprise. I would say a validations of what has been our belief since the start.

Again, with the short of capacity in the dry, we knew we were feeding the HPGR slightly outside of its design criteria with a coarser ore, which was accelerating the wear on the machine. Since we've commissioned the second cone and we've been in capacity to return to the design criteria, we've seen an automatic and overnight change, and we expect the change of the tire now to get back to the lifespan that we're expecting.

Yes, we're not expecting another change of tire this year, and therefore it is built in the reductions of cost post change.

Great. Thanks for taking my questions.

Thank you.

Thank you very much. I apologize, I just wanted to clarify a couple things.

I'm having trouble hearing some of the data points. Just going back to some of the details on Côté, this comment about the plant operating above nameplate in the second half of the year and some of the tonnage numbers that was provided, the numbers look to imply about maybe 10 to 15% above nameplate in the second half.

I just wanted to clarify, does that sound correct, and then is it reasonable to assume that those throughput levels can be sustained beyond 2026 even before the expansion takes hold?

Yeah. When we say they we can produce above nameplate is we had more than many days above 36,000 tonnes per day, even hitting 42,000 tonnes per day many times.

With the addition of the second cone crushers and also allowing the getting the unity of the ore, protecting now the HPGR which is going to be running very efficiently, we expect to remain into that zone between the 36 and 42 in average. That's very promising for us.

We With the shutdowns that we have in August and other shutdown that we have in certain areas, we are still evaluating and planning an overall average throughput of 36. Overall, when you have a very well run rate, it goes well beyond the 36.

What we've experienced, Josh, with the second cone is, we're for only a few weeks, unfortunately, before we started to have the issues on the conveyor. The objective has always been to stabilize at the 36.

What we've seen is effectively, of course, if you want to average 36, when you operate, you need to be above. You also heard Bruno earlier talking about slightly better grade as well.

It's not just a matter of throughput, it's a matter that we should access as well better grade in the second half. The priority at this stage is to demonstrate that minimum 36 average, all time, in the dry, in the wet.

As you crush finer, you will unlock more potential in the wet as well. For the first stage first is as soon as we change the tire, we change the belt, we park the aggregate plant, the focus in June is to demonstrate that we actually could operate at the nameplate.

Then will come the optimizations on the step-by-step basis. Far, good for what we've seen with the crusher.

Got it. Then your comment about the better grade, the number was mentioned on the call.

Again, I apologize for not being able to hear. It was said it was 1.1 to 1.2 in the second half.

Is that correct?

Between 1 and 1.2.

Yeah. We did 1.07 the first quarter, and we're you should see a quarter above the 1.07, we say 1 to 1.2, and hopefully, we'll see quarters above the 1.1.

Okay. Then last question, I know it's sort of been mentioned by some of the other participants just on mining costs for Côté.

I wouldn't necessarily extrapolate the current quarter, and obviously there's a lot of volatility on the energy side of things, but what is a reasonable sort of mining cost for us to assume in the second half of the year when you factor in maybe I'm not sure what sort of energy price views, I'll let you guys figure that out, but maybe just at these higher throughput levels, what would be the target steady state? Thank you.

Maarten, you can get some details, but I can say that at this stage, the focus is absolutely to bring those mining costs below the $4 as we exit the year. Maarten?

Josh, one thing we didn't mention earlier was that we've actually put in some price protection for oil at Côté. For June, as well as for all of Q3, 90% of Côté's oil is hedged at a price of about $80 per barrel.

If the price goes above $80 per barrel, it doesn't impact our cost further during that period, and we still participate if the price goes below that. That will help offset some of that cost as well to keep get us close to that $4.

As we exit the year, as we achieve our objective to drop our mining below the $4 and get the milling more towards the 15s as we exit, that is the main focus at this stage, knowing that there would be some more optimizations to continue to take place. So.

Great. Thank you very much.

Thank you, Josh.

Thank you very much, operator, and thanks to everyone for joining us this morning. As always, should you have any additional questions, please reach out to Renaud or myself.

Thank you all. Be safe and have a great day.