Operator
Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to Orbit Garant Drilling's Fiscal 2026 First Quarter Results Conference Call and Webcast. At this time, all lines are in listen-only mode.
Following management's remarks, we will conduct a question-and-answer session. Please be aware that certain information discussed today may be forward-looking in nature.
Such forward-looking information reflects the company's current views with respect to future events. Any such information is subject to risks, uncertainties, and assumptions that could cause actual results to differ materially from those projected in the forward-looking information.
For more information on the risks, uncertainties, and assumptions relating to forward-looking information, please refer to the company's latest MD&A and Annual Information Form, which are available on SEDAR+. Management may also refer to certain non-IFRS financial measures.
Although Orbit Garant believes these measures provide useful supplemental information about financial performance, they are not recognized measures and do not have standardized meanings under IFRS. Please refer to the company's latest MD&A for additional information regarding non-IFRS financial measures.
This call is being recorded on Thursday, November 13th, 2025. I would now like to turn the conference over to Mr.
Daniel Melançon, President, CEO and of Orbit Garant Drilling. Please go ahead, sir.
Daniel Maheu
Thank you, [Jolianne?] , and good morning, ladies and gentlemen.
With me on the call is Pier-Luc Laplante, Chief Financial Officer. Following my opening remarks, Pier-Luc will review our financial results in greater detail, and I will conclude with comments on our outlook.
We will then welcome questions. Our financial results for the fiscal first quarter reflect the impact of a few short-term issues.
In Canada, we complete drilling activities on certain project earlier in the quarter, and we gradually ramp up activity on new project, which typically yields lower gross margin at this early stage of operation. In addition, customer temporarily delay certain drilling project in Canada and South America during the quarter.
These were company-specific decision that had nothing to do with our performance. For instance, one of our project in Chile was delayed due to an earthquake in the area.
Fortunately, no personnel of Orbit Garant was injured, and this project resume after a couple of weeks. Revenue for our first quarter declined by 3.7% compared to Q1 last year, reflecting these short-term impact.
Adjusted gross margin was 17% compared to 20.2% in Q1 last year. We expect to benefits from the resumption of delays project in Canada and South America and the continue advancement of our ramp-up activities on newer project in Canada in our fiscal second and third quarter.
Demand for drilling services in both Canada and South America is increasing, supported by near-record gold prices and elevated copper prices. Our bidding activities on new projects has increased significantly in the recent weeks.
In addition, many current customer are informed us that they intend to increase drilling activities over the next 12 months. We have the operational capacity to accommodate this higher customer demand with minimal CapEx.
Accordingly, we have an opportunity to expand profitability as demand picks up, despite a highly competitive environment. I will now turn the call over Pier-Luc to review our financial results for the first quarter in greater detail.
Pier-Luc?
Pier-Luc Laplante
Thank you, Daniel, and good morning, everyone. Revenue for the quarter totaled $46.7 million compared to $48.4 million in Q1 last year.
Canada revenue was $33.7 million in the quarter compared to $35.4 million last year, reflecting lower drilling activity due to drilling project completions, client-initiated project delays, and the gradual ramp-up of new projects. International revenue totaled $13.0 million, similar to Q1 a year ago, as higher revenue in Chile was offset by lower revenue in Guyana.
Growth in South America was constrained by client decisions to temporarily delay certain projects, as Daniel noted. Gross profit was $5.7 million or 12.1% of revenue compared to $7.6 million or 15.8% of revenue in Q1 2025.
Adjusted gross margin, excluding depreciation expenses, was 17.0% in the quarter compared to 20.2% in Q1 last year. The decreases in gross profit and adjusted gross margin were primarily attributable to drilling project completions and the gradual ramp-up of new projects in Canada, and client-initiated project delays in both Canada and South America.
Adjusted EBITDA totaled $3.7 million, down from $6.2 million in Q1 last year. The decrease was primarily attributable to lower operating earnings in our Canada and international segments for the reasons I just noted.
Net earnings for the quarter were $0.3 million or 1 cent per share diluted compared to $2.9 million or 8 cents per share undiluted in Q1 last year. The reduction was due to lower operating earnings in both segments, as discussed.
Turning to our balance sheet. We withdrew a net amount of $5.3 million on our credit facility in the quarter compared to a net repayment of $0.5 million in Q1 a year ago.
Our long-term debt under the credit facility, including an undrawn $5.0 million US dollar revolving credit facility and the current portion, was $19.3 million as at September 30, 2025 compared to $14.0 million as at June 30, 2025, our fiscal 2025 year-end. Our increased debt was primarily the result of our yearly shipments of equipment and inventory for our operations in Nunavut and Nunavik.
We expect to be active in paying down debt on a net basis throughout the remainder of the year. On October 28th, we announced that the Toronto Stock Exchange approved our renewed normal course issuer bid, which allows us to repurchase up to 500,000 shares over a 12-month period that began on October 31, 2025.
Under our previous NCIB, which expired on October 30th of this year, we repurchased and cancelled 68,916 of our common shares at a weighted average price of 82 cents per share. We continue to view the NCIB as a useful tool to enhance shareholder value when the underlying value of Orbit Garant is not reflected in our share price.
Our working capital was $55.1 million as at September 30, 2025 compared to $50.4 million at the end of fiscal 2025. I'll now turn the call back to Daniel for closing comments.
Daniel?
Daniel Maheu
Thank you, Pierre-Luc. We are confident in our business outlook for the remainder of fiscal 2026.
The temporary issue that impact our fiscal first quarter result are rapidly being resolved. As delay projects resume and newer project continue to ramp up, we are getting back on track, and we are well-positioned to accommodate increasing customer demand.
The current metal price environment provides strong support for the demand. Gold prices reached all-time highs last month above $4,300 US dollar an ounce.
The gold mining industry is generating very attractive margin at current prices, which remain above $4,000. Miners have a strong motivation to spend more on exploration and development to expand their reserve, as much of their low-grade material has now become profitable to extract.
Copper prices also hit record level earlier this year and are currently above $5 US per pound. The supply-demand outlook for copper is favorable and support elevated prices going forward, which is positive for our Chilean operations.
Demand for both senior and intermediate mining customers is increasing, as we are encouraged by the recent increase in financing activities in the junior mining sector. While is has not immediately result in higher demand for our drilling services, we are optimistic that juniors will eventually deploy more capital on exploration.
We plan to selectively pursue more businesses with juniors as demand rise. Our priority going forward remain the same: first, a strategic focus on senior and well-financed intermediate customer in Canada and South America; second, our disciplined business strategy; and finally, our continuous operational improvement program.
By focusing on these three priority, we intend to capitalize on opportunities in this period of elevated customer demand to deliver enhance profitability on a sustainable basis and stronger returns for our shareholders. That conclude our formal remarks this morning.
We will now welcome any question. [Jolianne?]
, please begin the question period.
Operator
Thank you. As a reminder, to ask a question, please press star followed by the number one on your telephone keypad.
To withdraw any questions, press star one again. We'll pause for just a moment to compile the Q&A roster.
Once again, to ask a question, please press star followed by the number one on your telephone keypad. Our first question comes from Kerem Aksoy from Glacier Pass.
Please go ahead, your line is open.
Kerem Aksoy
Hi, thanks for hosting the call today and for all the commentary. I was wondering if you just follow up a little bit on some of the prepared remarks you had in terms of the overall market outlook.
You talked about bidding activity increasing and your clients looking to increase their activity. Maybe I'd just be interested versus the first half of the year, how many tender opportunities are you seeing now?
Then it'd also be great to get some color on what your existing customers are saying. In the beginning of the year, there were estimates that exploration budgets could be increased by up to 20% year-over-year.
That obviously kind of has not come to fruition, but do you think we might see that with a delay? I'd appreciate any thoughts.
I had two other questions afterwards as well.
Daniel Maheu
Thank you for the question. Actually, what we saw, our customer are in processing of doing their exploration budget for calendar 2026.
There are requests directly for increasing on some contract that we have with major and intermediate customer here in Canada to increase by one, two drill in 2026 calendar. Is that possible for us?
For sure, we have a great opportunity because we have a rate of activity of roughly 56% of our drill. For sure, it's easy for us to increase our activity with these actual customer.
For your second question, yes, we saw, let's say in the last six, eight weeks, more requests for bid from major customer in Chile, in Canada, and also intermediate customer. Recently, in the last few weeks, smaller junior request for bids.
That's something positive for us.
Kerem Aksoy
Okay. Thank you for that.
I appreciate that. Then maybe just two more technical questions.
During the quarter, you talked about the negative change in working capital from moving equipment. Just for the full year, I was curious, do you expect that working capital will be a source or a use of cash?
Pier-Luc Laplante
For the year, yes, we think that for us, one of the main cause that we have about that is in summer, we have to send equipment to our northern projects, equipment and inventory. That's because the barges have to leave and come back before the ice forms.
We have to send most of the equipment needs for the next year and most of the inventory needs for this fiscal year, fiscal year 2026.
Kerem Aksoy
I appreciate the
Pier-Luc Laplante
It should stabilize in the next coming months and the rest of the quarters, yes.
Kerem Aksoy
Gotcha. For full year, working capital will be kind of flat.
Pier-Luc Laplante
Yes.
Kerem Aksoy
That's helpful. Then just kind of the last question, just looking at Q2, you mentioned that you were seeing a benefit of a ramp-up from new activity.
I was just wondering, do you think the issues of Q1, have they fully played out, or do you think they might leak into Q2 as well? Or should Q2 be more of a normalized quarter?
Pier-Luc Laplante
We expect some of them to remain in Q2, and we anticipate that some of them will have resolved. We think that some of the client delays, most of them have resolved right now, but some of them will resume in January of 2026.
Kerem Aksoy
Okay. Thank you for that color.
I appreciate it. That was it.
Daniel Maheu
Thank you for your question.
Operator
We have no further questions. I would like to turn the call back over to Daniel Melançon for any closing remarks.
Daniel Maheu
Thank you to everyone for participating today. We look forward to speaking with you again soon.
Operator
This concludes today's conference call. You may now disconnect.
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