Agnico Eagle Mines Limited

Agnico Eagle Mines Limited

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Q1 FY2026 · Earnings Call TranscriptMay 1, 2026

Operator

Good morning. My name is Vincent, and I'll be your conference operator today.

At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to the Agnico Eagle Mines Limited Q1 2026 conference call. All lines have been placed on mute to prevent any background noise.

After the speakers' remarks, there will be question-and-answer session. If you would like to ask a question during this time, simply press *, then the number 1 on your telephone keypad.

If you would like to withdraw your question, please press the number 2. Thank you.

Mr. Ammar Al-Joundi, you may begin your conference.

Ammar Al-Joundi

Thank you, Vincent. Good morning, and thank you for joining our Agnico Eagle first quarter 2026 conference call.

I'd like to remind everyone that we'll be making a number of forward-looking statements, please keep that in mind and refer to the disclaimers at the beginning of this presentation. Next slide, please.

We're pleased to announce a solid start to the year, with production slightly above budget and with costs in line with our guidance. This solid operating performance, coupled with exceptional gold prices, has allowed Agnico Eagle to announce yet another quarter of record net income driven by record operating margins.

We are reiterating 2026 production guidance, with production expected to be weighted approximately 48%, 52% between the first and second halves of the year. We're also pleased to reiterate our cost guidance for 2026.

This is no small task, given the uncertainties and pressures in the market over the past several weeks. As you'll hear on this call, this has been a strong quarter across all of our businesses: solid operations, strong progress on moving our growth pipeline forward, continued exceptional exploration results, and, as mentioned, another quarter of record financial results.

My team will go through all of this in more detail in a moment, but let me outline and summarize what I believe are the three key messages that are important to take away from this call. 1: As mentioned, we're off to a good start to the year, with solid operating performance delivering record operational and financial results: record mill throughput at Macassa, record development rates at Meliadine, record pit tonnage at Detour.

We're delivering these solid operating results while doing an excellent job controlling costs, leveraging off our relentless focus on cost control while benefiting from certain structural cost advantages that derive from our business model, including, for example, in both Ontario and Quebec, where we produce the majority of our gold, all of our electricity is either hydro or nuclear and really not exposed to changes in fuel and diesel prices. With regards to Nunavut, where we do generate our own power through diesel, we've got a lot of that diesel hedged, both by necessity, because we have to bring the diesel up in advance through a short barge season and we have it stored up there, but also by some very smart and proactive hedging by our treasury department with regards to diesel exposure.

We've also got the benefit of lower employee turnover and the reliable supply chain that comes from being the best customer for decades in the safe regions in which we operate. 2: We continue to strengthen our financial position and to increase returns to shareholders.

This quarter, we paid a $1.3 billion 2025 tax catch-up, we distributed $375 million to shareholders, we invested almost $400 million into our high-quality growth projects, all while increasing our cash position by almost $250 million. At these gold prices, we will increase our share repurchases and we are increasing our normal course issuer bid to $2 billion.

And 3, and perhaps the most important takeaway, we continue to aggressively reinvest in our business: into the best pipeline in the industry, into projects that deliver exceptional returns at relatively lower risk, and we are making steady progress in many cases ahead of schedule. Dom and Natasha will spend some time talking about the projects they're moving forward to increase production at Agnico Eagle by up to 20% to 30% over the next decade, including Detour to 1 million oz, Malartic to 1 million oz, Hope Bay, Upper Beaver, and San Nicolas.

In addition, with the expected consolidation of our Finnish platform, we now see a path to further growth that comes from building a 500,000 oz a year, multi-decade platform in what we believe to be the most prospective land package in Northern Europe. Guy will spend some time going over some of the continued great exploration results he and his team have generated, focusing on Detour and Malartic, but he'll also spend a bit more time talking about this Finnish land consolidation and what he and his team see as a long-term potential well beyond the Ikkari project.

Our strategy remains focused: focused on safe, responsible mining; focused on operational excellence, delivering reliable, low-cost production. We have the best land packages in the most prospective and safest gold jurisdictions in the world.

We have a path to industry-leading production growth over the next decade. Our execution of delivering this growth remains on track, and at these gold prices, we think we can deliver this growth and reduce share count at the same time.

Now, before I turn the call over to Jamie, I need to spend a moment on safety. Tragically, we've had two fatalities over the past five months.

This is not acceptable. I recognize and I accept that the responsibility for the safety of our people rests ultimately with myself and with my team.

We've mobilized our teams to reinforce across our company and at all levels and to all employees our commitment to not only deliver on our guidance, but to do so safely and responsibly. There is nothing more important than the safety of our people and our communities, and we commit to do better.

With that, I'll turn the call over to our CFO, Jamie Porter, to review our first quarter operating and financial results.

Jamie Porter

Thank you, Ammar. As highlighted earlier, we delivered another strong financial quarter driven by solid operational performance and continued leverage to higher gold prices.

We had several record financial results during the quarter, including adjusted net income of approximately $1.7 billion, or $3.41 per share, and adjusted EBITDA of just over $3 billion. We generated about $730 million of free cash flow in the first quarter.

This is particularly impressive given that we paid roughly 50% of our expected 2026 cash taxes, totaling $1.8 billion in the quarter, of which $1.3 billion had been previously disclosed as related to our 2025 tax liability. First quarter gold production of approximately 825,000 oz was actually slightly better than planned, with the lower production year-over-year reflecting mine sequencing at LaRonde, Macassa, and Fosterville.

With the first quarter representing about 24% of the midpoint of our annual guidance in production weighted to the second half of the year, we're well positioned to meet our full-year production targets. Total cash costs were $1,093 per ounce and all-in sustaining costs were $1,483 per ounce, reflecting higher royalty costs associated with a significantly higher realized gold price, lower production volumes as expected, and a stronger Canadian dollar compared to the first quarter of 2025.

Importantly, costs continue to trend within our full-year guidance ranges of $1,020 to $1,120 per ounce for total cash costs and $1,400 to $1,550 per ounce for all-in sustaining costs. While we continue to monitor cost volatility, including diesel prices and foreign exchange movements, we believe our regional operating model, local procurement strategies, and disciplined hedging program provide meaningful mitigation against potential cost pressures.

With respect to diesel prices, our 2026 cost guidance assumes an average diesel price of 78 cents per liter. Direct diesel consumption covering mobile equipment and on-site power generation in Nunavut is estimated at approximately 108 liters per ounce of gold produced, representing roughly 7% of our total operating cost base.

We believe that our exposure to diesel price volatility is below industry average, reflecting the fact that the majority of our gold production comes from underground mines, which are generally less diesel-intensive than open-pit mines. Further, the majority of our gold production is from mines located in Ontario and Quebec, which benefit from access to non-oil-based grid power.

Overall, our sensitivity to diesel prices is estimated such that a 10% change in diesel prices results in roughly a $6 per ounce impact on annual total cash costs after taking into account our hedge position. We do not currently anticipate any disruption to our procurement strategy for fuel or other key consumables, and we remain comfortable with our full-year cost guidance.

If we turn to slide 5, we are in the strongest financial position in the company's history. We continue to deliver meaningful returns to our shareholders alongside further balance sheet strengthening and disciplined reinvestment in the business.

During the quarter, we returned approximately $375 million to shareholders through dividends and share repurchases, representing roughly half of free cash flow. As previously announced, we intend to renew the normal course issuer bid in May on substantially the same terms, with an increased limit of up to $2 billion.

At current gold prices, we are still targeting returning approximately 40% of annual free cash flow through dividends and buybacks. We will also look for opportunities to offset dilution from the proposed Rupert Resources acquisition, including potentially returning proceeds from portfolio investment sales through additional share repurchases.

In parallel, the balance sheet keeps getting stronger. At the end of the first quarter, our net cash position increased to approximately $2.9 billion, giving us one of the strongest balance sheets in the sector.

This strength was recognized recently by Fitch, which upgraded Agnico Eagle's long-term issuer rating to A- with a stable outlook. At the same time, we continue to reinvest in the business, advancing our five key pipeline projects that are expected to underpin long-term production growth of 20% to 30% over the next decade.

We are exceptionally well positioned in the current gold price environment, with a continued focus on disciplined capital allocation and long-term shareholder value creation. With that, I'll turn the call over to Dom.

Dominique Girard

Thank you, Jamie. Good morning, everyone.

In my section, I'm going to talk the update on operation and project for Quebec, Nunavut, and Finland. For the first quarter, a good start led by Malartic and Meadowbank on the production, and we are in good position for the full-year cost and production.

An important milestone in the first quarter at Malartic, where we took the first stope at East Gouldie via the ramp, approximately 1 km underground. Why it's important: based on the 2023 study, we're going to mine there up to 2042, but based on what we know now, we're going to be mining there up to 2060, most probably.

Most probably, I will not be the COO at that time, but we have good bench that's going to take it from there. It's very positive.

On the shaft sinking, I'm going to talk a bit about that next slide, shaft sinking and also production hoists, it's also going well. The plan is to bring that ore to the surfaces via the shaft mid-2027.

Everything is aligned. On the continuous improvement, an important milestone achieved at LaRonde.

They were working on that since a couple of years to do autonomous hauling. It's a good example of leveraging the synergy into the region using the LZ5 expertise.

What is that autonomous hauling? We are taking the ore from the 3.2 km underground up to 2.9 km without drivers.

This is a real example of a positive impact using technology. Instead of operating, let's say, using four trucks and eight operators, four day shift, four night shift, those guys in the current situation, they are able to operate effectively 10 to 12 hours per shift just by the time to go underground.

Using the technology, we're able to use two trucks operating by one person, one night shift, one day shift, total of two, and we're able to operate on a 20-hour basis. It's a clear example of using technology to improve productivity, and very good job done at LaRonde on that.

Also, in Finland, what we did, we took three or three and four people, key people from each site, from mainly Canadian operations, the GMs, the key guys in the continuous improvement, the VP. We bring them to Finland to see what they did there.

It was the first time for most of the people not just to see the reindeers, but also the Finland site. It was about how they did it in Finland: the mindset on continuous improvement, their leadership, and the tools they were using.

It was also a very good opportunity to build relationship and sharing best practices through our key people into the company. Guy is going to talk about that, but very happy also about the Ikkari, what's going on is very positive for the Finland team.

Next slide. On the growth project at Malartic, the ramp and shaft, as mentioned, going well.

The pilot hole for the first for the second shaft is done down to 1.8 km underground. No issue related to that.

The study continue on the shaft 2 and Marban in the Wasamac study. It's progressing well, and we're looking to give you an update in September later this year.

At Hope Bay, look to the picture. We are in good position.

That was our goal. We're in good position to potentially announce the construction in May with the board.

The camp is ready. The fab shops are ready to welcome the construction team.

The mill is empty, ready to go. We are in good position for the engineering.

That was one an important goal, we're going to be over 50%. That guarantee and give us confidence into the cost, into the schedule.

We're going to give you more detail at the visit at site for the lucky one that are coming, because we're going to have a muskox on barbecue, charcoal barbecue. The team is working on that.

That's going to be a good thing. Before giving the mic to Natasha, the visit at Hope Bay, you're going to see the picture of the first 10 years, but we're going to most probably be there for many 10 years.

That's what Guy is going to show you into the core shack, what is our vision onto the region. Also the last two year, we focused on infilling the patch, the new deposit, and to be ready for that study, but Guy is also gearing up to restart treasure hunting into the Hope Bay site eventually more next year and the years after.

On that, I would pass the mic to my great colleague Natasha.

Natasha Vaz

Thanks, Dom, and good morning, everyone. I'll cover the operational highlights for Ontario, Australia, and Mexico.

The regions delivered good performance to start the year. At Detour, they hit a quarterly record in tons mined, but they also had a record mill throughput for a first quarter, with the lowest quarterly turnover that we have seen since the mine began open-pit operations.

Over at Macassa, the mill here also delivered record quarterly throughput as a result of the ongoing optimization initiatives as we ramp up that mill towards over 2,000 tons per day by the end of the year. Now, despite this progress, total milled tonnage was below plan this quarter, and this was mainly a function of challenges we faced with our old paste plant while commissioning the new one, which we expect to be fully operational in Q2.

At Fosterville, they also performed very well this quarter. There was a significant step change in productivity, and that's really due to ongoing mine optimization efforts.

Improvements this quarter were seen in both development and stope cycling. It was the same with Pinos Altos.

The team there continues to work very hard on initiatives to safely extract the most value from their assets. Now, in terms of initiatives this past quarter, Dom spoke about a knowledge-sharing trip to Finland to help other sites understand their continuous improvement journey and really inspire them to do the same.

Of course, it was really great to network, to gain alignment, to collaborate with other sites. Another good example of collaboration between sites and really maximizing the value of our assets and of our infrastructure was between Macassa and LaRonde.

I just want to take a quick second to recognize both teams here. They worked very closely together over the last few months, and with a coordinated effort, they were successful in receiving the approval to allow ore from the AK deposit to be transported and processed at the LZ5 facility.

At Macassa, we also successfully completed the installation of the LTE network underground. The connectivity is expected to support a range of optimization initiatives, including the implementation of a dispatch system and enabling the site to obtain short interval control.

This can enable us to make decisions quicker, to become more agile, to become more productive, and as a result, further optimize our costs. These are just a few examples of our ongoing productivity focus and our operational improvement initiatives.

Moving to the next slide, I'll give you an update on the projects in Ontario and Mexico. The Detour underground project, that plays a very big role in the plan for the complex to be a 1 million oz producer annually.

We're still in the early days of this project, but we're making very good progress and we're advancing on schedule. We continue to advance the exploration ramp and have achieved just over 820 m of development, reaching a depth of about 147 m.

We also began excavating the overburden for the conveyor portal, which is near the mill, and progressed work on the camp extension. To complement the planned bulk sample, we initiated a high-intensity drill program in an area being considered for mining as early as 2028, and Guy will speak to this program shortly.

Over at Upper Beaver, there have been a lot of progress made this quarter, with both the ramp and the shaft advancing ahead of schedule. The ramp has advanced over 500 m in the quarter and has reached a depth of 108 m.

The shaft sinking, which commenced in the fourth quarter of last year, has already reached a depth of 382 m. Similar to Detour, to complement the planned bulk sample at 760 level, the high-intensity drill program continued during the quarter.

Now, with respect to San Nicolas, we're waiting on the regulatory decision for key permits, but in the meantime, we're continuing to advance the engineering of the critical infrastructures, which will help further de-risk and build confidence in our execution strategy. We're also continuing with the drilling activities focused in on condemnation drilling and geological evaluation near the planned mined area.

Finally, I'd like to close by just recognizing the teams at our operations and our projects for their very disciplined execution in the first quarter and for the continued focus on advancing our optimization initiatives and our key projects as we move through the year. With that, I'll turn the call over to my friend Guy.

Guy Gosselin

Thank you, Natasha, and good morning, everyone. Pleasure again to be able to report on progress we're making in exploration.

As obviously it is one of the key component to be able to deliver that 20% to 30% growth that we are promoting. We had an excellent quarter in terms of diamond drilling, completing 25% or nearly 360 km of drilling of our overall budget of 1.4 million m for the year, having 127 rigs in operation on mine site and key value driver project.

We continue to advance in our journey in exploration to make drilling safer and more productive while maintaining a unit cost in the same order than the last couple of year, aiming to offset inflation with gain in productivity. Going to specific project on slide 10, in Malartic, 35 drill rigs are in operation, completing 75,000 m in Q1: 16 underground, 13 on surface in proximity to East Odyssey infrastructure, and six other regional targets, including Marban deposits across the street.

At Odyssey, as mentioned by Dominique, the shaft and the ramp development are progressing ahead of schedule, and the first stope is currently being mined at East Gouldie, which is quite exciting considering the discovery hole in East Gouldie was made just a couple of years ago in 2018 and that we are already there with the ramp and the shaft because of the great collaboration between the various teams to turn it from a discovery into a mine in such a short period of time. This is impressive.

We continue to get strong exploration results at East Gouldie with 6.7 g over 36 m on level 105 in the center of the ore body, and also in the internal zone between Odyssey North and Odyssey South with a new structure that returned 9 g over 53 m core length. Although we do not have a full understanding yet of the true thickness of that structure, it continues to show the additional upside we see both in the internal zone at Odyssey North and South and in East Gouldie that keeps growing laterally.

On the adjacent Marban project, lateral exploration drilling continue to the west and to the north of the proposed open pit, while we are at the same time advancing with the condemnation drilling program to confirm the potential location of surface infrastructure. Now on slide 11, at Detour Lake, nine rigs completed close to 40,000 m of drilling in the first quarter, in line with our budget.

Drilling was continued to focus on the western extension of the ore body to the west of the open pit, where we are contemplating to initiate mining underground early on utilizing the exploration ramp. Some strong results such as 8.9 g over 14 m at 190 m depth and 10.7 g over 10 m at 500 m depth shows a strong potential for high-grade underground mineralization over a large area that extend over more than a kilometer now adjacent into the west of the open pit, where the exploration ramp is currently being developed.

Briefly, at Hope Bay, as mentioned by Dominique, we've had a great quarter in terms of drilling on ice thanks to the team, great winter drilling program. We started early.

We've completed north of 33,000 m of drilling as of the end of March, and a full update will be provided on the May 19 press release along with the project announcement we've been talking. Finally, on slide 13, in Finland, I would like to provide some color on the recent announcement we made with an offer to acquire all of the outstanding share of Rupert and Aurion Resources along with the 70% interest of B2Gold in the Finntrail JV.

It was a great job by our corporate development team and legal team. With these three combined transaction adding to our current landholding, we will be consolidating close to 2,500 sq km, consistent with our corporate strategy of focusing on regional hub, leveraging our 20 years of experience in exploration, permitting, mine construction, and operation with a strong social license to operate in the most fertile greenstone belt in Europe.

By combining the Finnish workforce of Agnico along with the workforce of Rupert and Aurion and removing property boundaries, we will aggressively explore in the near term the immediate lateral and vertical extension of the Ikkari deposit, as well as the multiple occurrences that were identified on the Finntrail JV and the large land position owned by Rupert and Aurion. Personally, it reminds me a lot about Kittila mine acquisition in 2005.

At the time of the acquisition, there was approximately 2 million oz down to less than a kilometer, and 20 years later at Kittila, it grows down to and still open at depth below 2 km, with a global endowment of 10 million oz considering past production, reserves, and resources known so far. I see a similar potential on the structure that holds the Ikkari deposit, and as these mineral system are similar to our Canadian greenstone belt that have demonstrated extended vertical geological fertility.

By this transaction, we are aiming to deliver in Finland a platform for multiple mines over multiple decades, similar to the three region in Canada that are Quebec, Ontario, and Nunavut, where we will be leveraging our regional expertise. On that, I will return the microphone to Ammar for some closing remarks.

Ammar Al-Joundi

Thank you, Guy, and thank you, Jamie and Dominique and Natasha and everyone else on our team. Really exceptional work, really tremendous results.

Done. As you can see, we continue to work hard for all of our stakeholders and we'll continue to build off the same foundational pillars that have defined our strategy and that have served us very well over the past almost 70 years.

We will focus on the best mining jurisdictions based on geologic potential and political stability. We'll be disciplined with our owners' money, making investment decisions based on technical and regional knowledge, creating value through the drill bit and through smart acquisitions where and when it makes sense.

We are uniquely well positioned with a quality project pipeline leveraging existing assets in the best regions in the world where we believe we have a competitive advantage. We will continue to be focused on creating value on a per-share basis and on being leaders in our industry in returning capital to shareholders, as evidenced by over 43 years of consecutive dividend payments and increased share buybacks.

We have a clear and executable strategy to create tremendous additional value per share for our owners well into the foreseeable future, with manageable risk, leveraging off existing infrastructure and regional competitive advantages. We have the assets, we have the projects, we have the resources, and we have the people.

We are making it happen right now. We will stay focused, and we will not be distracted.

Thank you again for joining us on this call, and for many of you, thank you for decades of trust and support. We will always work hard to maintain that trust, and we will never take it for granted.

Operator, may I ask that we now open up the call for questions.

Operator

Ladies and gentlemen, we will now begin the Q&A session. Again, if you'd like to ask a question, just press *1 on your telephone keypad.

First question comes from the line of Lawson Winder from Bank of America Securities. Please go ahead.

Lawson Winder

Thank you very much, operator. Good morning, Ammar and team.

Great to hear from you all, and thank you for the update. I would like to start off with the Finnish acquisition.

We haven't had a chance to ask you guys about this in this type of forum since the announcement. Guy, thank you very much for the picture you've painted and for the color on getting to 500,000 oz.

Can you help us understand what are the sort of value creation steps over the next 12 to 40 12 to 24 months to get to a better understanding of what that ultimately looks like? Resource update, study, when do you expect permitting to start, and just any other considerations along that sort of timeline thinking?

Appreciate it.

Ammar Al-Joundi

I can start, but maybe Dom and Guy can jump in on more details. The first thing, Lawson by the way, nice to hear your voice—really was to consolidate all of this property.

There's a lot of potential. They're good properties, but they were individually constrained.

That's why it was very important for us, and as mentioned, our entire team, but in particular the corporate development team and the legal team, did a really good job in allowing us to consolidate all of this at the same time. It's really, first and foremost, and then I'll pass it over to my colleagues, about consolidating what we think is the best land position in Europe.

Dominique Girard

Thanks, Ammar. Lawson, Dominique speaking.

Maybe I think what on my side I need to do is to freeze the scope of that one. Let's say without the boundaries, where we should put the mill, the tailing, and revamp the schedule, the study based on the new acquisition.

The exploration guys are all excited to add, but we're going to need to kind of try to kick that project for a first start but also to get some flexibility, maybe for example at the mill, to make sure it's always a challenge to get enough detail into the studies to push that into the permitting. That's what we're going to focus by staffing the study team and eventually the construction team.

Guy Gosselin

Maybe in complement, Lawson, Guy speaking now. As we discussed in the press release, our plan, by removing the property boundaries, to have sort of an updated view with the current information by the end of 2027, where we're going to have sort of a better picture of what the optionality that removing the property boundary offer on both the optimum pit design and location of infrastructure.

While we're going to right away, as a matter of fact, start drilling once the acquisition is completed because we know as well that property boundary was also constraining the drilling close to the property boundary. That's our intent.

By the end of 2027, we should have an idea of the kind of a revised concept based on the current information, while we're going to continue to drill and maybe look at other iterations. You can refer to what we did in Malartic.

We're going to be providing most likely a first version of what it could be, and then keep drilling and adjust based on what we're going to discover.

Lawson Winder

Thank you. That's helpful.

Then just a follow-up from me with respect to the Detour Lake underground drill results. There were some really, really substantial intercepts, of course.

With the drilling you've done to date, has your understanding of what the Detour Lake underground can be, has it evolved and changed in any way in the past let's say 12 months? Is it starting to look like it could be a much bigger system?

Are you possibly reconsidering what the ultimate development plan might look like for Detour underground?

Guy Gosselin

To me, the area west of the pit is very similar to what was historically mined underground at Detour that we are now mining with the pit closer to surface. Obviously, we are showcasing a couple of great results.

On average, we think that that area will be anywhere between maybe 2.5 and 3.5 g, something like that. Obviously, when you put some spectacular results along with some other that are in the 2, 3 g over 20, 30 m.

It's in line with our expectation, but we're actually just firming up the model of that zone. As we are mindful of the history at Detour.

In order to selectively mine the high-grade core, you need a ton of drilling, you need the right drill spacing. When we are getting there with the ramp, we're going to be soon being able to drill it more aggressively from underground as well from the exploration ramp.

It is shaping up as we thought. It's always an area that I personally like a lot west of the pit.

Natasha Vaz

Hi, Lawson. Just to add to that, it's Natasha, by the way.

We do have a study team looking at this and looking at different iterations as we proceed with the exploration program. With the combination of the exploration success and the high gold price environment, there is definitely optionality here at Detour.

It's really fairly early stages, I would say. The team is looking at different trade-offs for potentially a higher milling capacity, a larger underground, potentially another pushback at the pit.

Again, very early days.

Lawson Winder

Yep, fantastic. Thank you all very much.

Operator

Your next question comes from the line of Fahad Tariq from Jefferies. Please go ahead.

Fahad Tariq

Hi, thanks for taking my question. In the quarter, there was an announcement about a Nunavut collaboration agreement with B2Gold.

Can you maybe just talk about the thinking behind that and what you hope to learn from their operations at Goose? Thanks.

Ammar Al-Joundi

It's Ammar here. I'll start, and then maybe Dominique or Jean can comment.

In general, we always like to try to work with our colleagues and our peers. We have a lot of experience in the areas we operate.

We think we have some competitive advantages, but we're not so naive to think that we know everything. Anytime we get an opportunity to work with our peers to see what they're doing, we take advantage of that.

I think our owners would want us to do that. Also, from B2's perspective, they're good people.

We know them well, and they think that we do a good job where we operate, and they want to see if they can learn a little from our operations as well. It's just the kind of stuff that we want to do in the industry.

I think that's probably enough on that.

Fahad Tariq

Okay. Then maybe just one for Jamie.

I noticed the buyback pace slowed down quarter-over-quarter in the first quarter. Is that just a function of the pretty significant cash tax payment?

Can you just remind us of the minimum cash you'd like to keep on the balance sheet going forward? Thanks.

No,

Jamie Porter

that's exactly right. We said we put out our guidance in February that we'd be targeting returning about 40% of our free cash flow through a combination of the dividend and share buybacks.

Our free cash flow was lower in Q1 as a result of the cash tax payments. I think the percentage worked out to closer to 50% of the $150 million of shares repurchased in the quarter, which was half of what we did in Q4.

That will ramp up certainly in Q2 and through the rest of the year as our free cash flow is expected to be higher. In terms of minimum cash balance, I think we're comfortable where we're at now with $3.1 billion of cash, $2.9 billion of net cash.

Between $3 [billion?] and $5 billion, I think that's a good position to be in in terms of just giving us financial flexibility to be able to execute on our strategy.

Definitely higher share buyback activity expected through the remainder of the year.

Fahad Tariq

Great. Thank you very much.

Operator

Your next question comes from the line of Josh Wolfson from RBC Capital Markets. Please go ahead.

Josh Wolfson

Thank you very much. Appreciate the additional disclosure on the energy sensitivity side of things.

I had a question in terms of the Hope Bay project update later this month. When looking at the current market for prices, there's obviously been a high degree of inflation.

How are you thinking about incorporating some of those input prices for that project update and thinking about maybe the near-term impact versus what otherwise would a long-term, much more reasonable price be? Thank you.

Ammar Al-Joundi

Hi, Josh, it's Ammar here. I'll start, and then Dom will jump in.

In my experience, the most important thing in building projects is to get the engineering done and to have the execution plan well laid out. We have seen some inflationary pressure, but actually it hasn't been that bad.

The team, as Dom said, you looked at the picture. The camp is going to be there, the backup power is there, half the mill building is there, water treatment is there.

We're coming to this with an advantage of infrastructure in place, which allows us to execute. It's all about execution, but also exceedingly important is the amount of engineering the team has done, which allows them to get a much better control overall on execution and therefore on cost.

Dom?

Dominique Girard

Josh, in May, we're going to give more detail on the economics. That's going to be obviously a positive economics.

Our assumption are all based on the long-term view. We're going to give you some sensitivity to understand how that could impact, and we don't know the future.

As Ammar mentioned, I'm very comfortable where we are right now. We've been mining in Nunavut over 17 years, and we've built already three projects with Meliadine, Meadowbank, and Amaruq.

It's a good time for Nunavut. It's going to be over 400,000 oz per year, and that's going to bring us to potentially 1 million oz per year into the Nunavut platform.

Josh Wolfson

Great, thank you. Then another I guess two-part question for Malartic.

First question there is what drove the grade improvements this quarter, and I guess we saw something similar last year. Should we expect to see it going forward?

Then second part is just on this September update that you referenced, given that we had expected I guess the shaft project completion not really until year-end, and then a larger update the second half of next year, how should we be thinking about what information is disclosed ahead of that completion in September? Thank you.

Dominique Girard

Just for the grade, it's a question of sequencing mainly into the Barnat pit. That's the only thing that changed that.

I will let Jean-Marie answer on the second part.

Jean-Marie Clouet

Hi, Josh. Yes, in September, the plan would be to provide an update.

The last update we did for Canadian Malartic was in June 2023. What we want to reflect in September is the update in the reserves, resources that we've seen over the last few years, and also start giving a better idea in terms of how the second shaft, Marban, and Wasamac start to fit together, start giving ranges around what we think it will cost and operating.

You're right, the studies will be later in the year, but we should be able to provide a very good picture of what Canadian Malartic will look like to get to the 1 million oz per year.

Josh Wolfson

Great, thank you. I look forward to that update.

Operator

Your next question comes from the line of Daniel Major from UBS. Please go ahead.

Daniel Major

Hi, Ammar and team, and thanks for questions. First question on the Finland acquisition and then around the kind of balance sheet and capital returns.

First question is, was there a reason for using Agnico shares rather than cash specifically? Then I guess the second part, you alluded to exceeding the 40% cash flow payout potentially in order to reduce the share count following the acquisition.

Can you give us a sense of kind of quantum? You could be at $3 [billion?]

to $5 billion of net cash quite quickly through the year. Should we expect that as a limit to the cash balance you'd want to hold, and how that would flow through to the buyback?

Ammar Al-Joundi

Thank you for the question. Ammar here.

I'll answer the first one, and maybe, Jamie, you can answer the second question. It's a very good question on why we used shares instead of cash.

The answer is we wanted to use cash and they wanted 100% shares. I think their view, and rightfully so, is Agnico shares are good shares to have and they wanted 100% shares.

We used full cash on the other deals, and I think, Jamie, as part of his answer to the second, can also incorporate how we hope to offset a little bit of the share issuance through the rest of the year.

Jamie Porter

Absolutely. I think in our disclosure, Daniel, we refer to potentially increasing repurchase activity based on the sale of some of our portfolio investments.

If there's opportunities for us to do a little bit more based on our views on valuation, we will do so. With respect to kind of minimum cash balance, where we are now, I'd say is we're very comfortable.

As the cash balance increases, we'll look at even more activity under the share buyback. I'd say the minimum target's 40%.

We may be able to exceed that based on either our free cash flow performance or the proceeds of the sale of some of our investments.

Daniel Major

Thanks. Then my next question on San Nicolas.

I saw Teck and Anglo American yesterday and discussed the project a little bit. It feels like it's somewhat subscale at 50% for either yourselves or the other partner.

Have you had any discussions around, yeah, the ownership of the project? Would you be, yeah, keen to consolidate if the opportunity arose?

Ammar Al-Joundi

I think we would look at it. We still think it's a good project.

I don't want to forecast what our colleagues and our partners are thinking, but obviously if they said, "Hey, would you want to look at it?" we'd look at it.

Daniel Major

Great. Then just one quick one if I could on Finland.

I noticed that Boliden deferred a pushback at Kevitsa because of the change in the taxation for the mining sector in Finland. Can you just give us any color about how you're seeing that landscape with respect to Kittila and the new acquisitions?

Jean-Marie Clouet

Yes, there's tax change in Finland, and this is included into our evaluations as well as our life of mine at Kittila.

Jamie Porter

Yeah. I was just going to add, the industry is lobbying the government to look at potentially changing the structure of those taxes to make certain additional things deductible to offset the impact.

All that was factored into our modeling.

Daniel Major

Great. Thanks a lot.

Operator

Your next question comes from the line of Bennett Moore from JPMorgan. Please go ahead.

Bennett Moore

Good morning, Ammar and team. Congrats on the record quarter, and thank you for taking my questions.

I guess following the land consolidation in Finland and as you continue to think about the company's next leg of growth beyond the early 2030s, where does Australia fit into this picture? Do you see similar opportunities around Fosterville?

Ammar Al-Joundi

Thank you for the question. Actually, I was just out in Fosterville about a month ago, and it's such fantastic people, but we spent a lot of time on some recent I would say very good exploration results in and around Fosterville.

I think as some of we've consolidated some land. That part of Australia was the original gold rush, and nobody's really focused on it for decades.

It's still very early, but I was quite pleasantly surprised with some of the results they were getting and the enthusiasm they had. Now, we get questions all the time about the rest of Australia.

We think Australia is a great place to mine, not just for gold. Us, we are very careful about what we do.

We're very disciplined, and right now we continue to be focused in Australia at Fosterville and the team we have there and the opportunities around that.

Bennett Moore

Thanks for that. Then I think it's been about six months since you launched the Avenir business, just wondering how this is progressing, what sort of new opportunities the team may be evaluating, and then maybe if you could also comment on what sort of critical mineral opportunities they may be around the Lapland greenstone belt as well.

Ammar Al-Joundi

I'll ask Guy to talk about sort of base metal and critical metals in the Lapland belt, because there are some. Just with regards to Avenir, it's a really enthusiastic team.

They are looking at a lot of things. What I would say is that they are naturally narrowing down what they're looking at and becoming more focused.

It's an exciting business to be in. It is a separate entity.

We are supportive of it, and just to repeat, we're not obliged to do anything, but it does give us an opportunity to see things that are well considered. Maybe, Guy, you can talk about non-precious opportunities in Finland.

Yeah.

Guy Gosselin

In addition, obviously, of what triggers our primary interest, which is the structure around the Sirkka Line and the main break, we also know that it's the same to the north of that, that's the same rock package that holds basically the Kevitsa and the Sakatti deposit that are nearby, that are nickel, copper, PGE. Even at the old Pahtavaara mine, it was sort of evidences of massive sulfide that are potentially kind of a sign.

We have all of the ingredients, but for us, we see that potentially an add-on, and our primary focus remains to fully explore for gold. If there's something else, because there's the fertility of the rock is there, we'll see.

Bennett Moore

Great. Thank you, and best of luck.

Guy Gosselin

Thank you.

Operator

Your next question comes from the line of Anita Soni from CIBC World Markets. Go ahead.

Anita Soni

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

I just wanted to ask a little bit about the cadence of the production ramp over the course of the year. I think you said that in Q2 it'll be similar to Q1 production.

In Q1, there were I guess a couple of challenges with Kittila coming off of the shutdown, and then the weather just impacting the restart there. What are the things that are kind of offsetting in Q2 if Kittila's going to ramp back up?

I would assume it's the caribou migration that I should be modeling. Then going into the back half of the year, what are the things that are ramping up?

It's the AK project, right, in at Macassa?

Ammar Al-Joundi

Hi, Anita, it's Ammar here. Honestly, it's more just mine sequencing and where we are on the plan.

You've got a good point on specific items that were in the first quarter. There are always, and we try to spread it out through the year, when we have maintenance, when we have shutdowns.

We try to, as you mentioned, exactly right, there's always the uncertainty of the caribou season. I think our team is really quite exceptionally good at taking all of that into account and projecting through the year.

We don't typically give 48%, 52%. We decided we wanted to do it because we just wanted people to know that actually everything's going quite well.

As mentioned, the first quarter was actually a little bit above budget. There's nothing in particular.

It's mostly just mine sequencing and various other elements that come into it. Okay.

Then

Anita Soni

just from a longer-term capital allocation question, a lot of those questions have been asked and answered, but I just wanted to get an idea of, as you think about the cash balance increasing, just rank them again in terms of capital return to shareholders, and the balance sheet's pretty strong at this point and you're accumulating a lot of cash, has it moved up in term over the capital return to shareholders?

Jamie Porter

Thanks, Anita. I'd say, reinvestment in the business is always a very high priority, right?

The five key value driver projects that we're advancing are 30% to 60% IRR projects in the current gold price environment. We want to invest as much as quickly as we can in those.

We're doing that. Our capital spending has increased from $2.3 billion last year to probably $3 billion this year all in.

We'll look to continue to find opportunities to accelerate that to bring that production forward. Beyond that, I'd say right now in this gold price environment, we're fortunate in that we can do it all.

We can afford to reinvest aggressively in the business. We can afford to deliver very strong returns to shareholders.

40% is kind of the floor for this year of our free cash flow being returned, I think is quite attractive. We can continue to strengthen the balance sheet.

Having that $3 [billion?] to $5 billion net cash position just gives us, again, the financial strength and flexibility to be able to execute on our business strategy even in a much lower gold price environment.

I don't think our priorities have really changed. We'll continue to look for opportunities to accelerate reinvestment in the business while strengthening our financial position and delivering strong returns to shareholders.

Ammar Al-Joundi

We understand the questions. The exact position of cash on the balance sheet is as much an art as it is a science.

It's $100 billion company, whether it's $3 billion or $4 billion or $2 billion, really that's up to the discretion primarily of the CFO and treasury. I just want to make the point, having been a CFO myself, it's not like there is an exact perfect number.

What you want to do is look at all the circumstances at the time, make sure you have the most important thing a CFO has on his table is liquidity for the company. I think Jamie and the team are doing a great job balancing everything.

Anita Soni

Agreed. Thanks for answering the question.

Operator

Next question comes from the line of John Tumazos from John Tumazos Very Independent Research. Please go ahead.

John Tumazos

Thank you very much for your service to the company. I'm trying to make a back-of-the-envelope concept of the Ikkari mine or Central Lapland new mine coming in 2034.

Is a fair guess 15,000 tons a day times 2.25 g times 95% recovery to get to the 500,000 oz, and that might cost $1.2 billion when we get to 2034, all those years out?

Ammar Al-Joundi

John, first of all, I'd like to thank you for your service to the industry. That was a very nice introduction.

We're still early in looking at that. Maybe we can go through some of the details offline.

I don't know, John, we got to be careful because these are very, very early and we're working on it, but go ahead, John.

Guy Gosselin

I can step in. John, I'm very surprised with your question because I was expecting that you were asking how were able to put all of this together at once.

A bit disappointed with the question. On this, listen, 10,000, 15,000, we will have to define it, and function of the throughput, we will arrive with the minimum of, let's say, 200,000-plus.

We'll be careful before we'll provide any number, but I'm more focused on looking what it will be one day. As Guy described, it's a high potential, and I think this is where I would like that we bring most of the attention, what it can be eventually.

We are excited with the consolidation, and stay tuned, because I think moving forward toward the end of 2027, we'll have more to say. Guy?

John, what we are referring to in our press release is a platform of 500,000 oz when combining Kittila and Ikkari together. That's currently, and we still need to work if we can make it bigger than that.

Just to make it clear, the 500,000 is not solely for Ikkari. It's our vision of the platform for the time being.

John Tumazos

Let me ask another one if I may, and thank you for the clarification. I was assuming we were only talking about the new property.

I was guessing the CapEx and then the consideration for the three purchases, and on the 4.22 million oz of current resources, slightly larger than the 3.5 million oz of reserves, at a $1.2 billion development capital, it works out to $1,268 an ounce acquisition and CapEx to develop. Should we be assuming that the resources are going to double or triple and that that's not the new normal for how much we're going to pay for developing mines?

Ammar Al-Joundi

John, it's Ammar here. I think this is probably the way that we look at it.

The acquisition cost worked out by our internal assessment—and remember, we know this project quite well. We've been there for 6-plus years looking at it.

We acquired it effectively by our own internal models at quite a good discount to NAV just based on what we felt on our own, what we thought were fairly conservative. We've acquired an asset in a region we know well that we have been looking at for 6-plus years at a considerable discount to NAV, and we got the rest of the land package for free.

We're excited about it. We think it makes a lot of sense.

I can't get into all of the numbers, except to say, in our usual fashion, we did an awful lot of homework before we decided to proceed.

Operator

Thank you. Your next question comes from the line of Tanya Jakusconek from Scotiabank.

Please go ahead. Oh,

Tanya Jakusconek

good day. Thank you very much for taking my questions.

My first question is for Dominique. Dominique, I hope that snow will be gone from Hope Bay when we're up there.

That picture showed quite a lot of snow for our barbecue. I just wanted to ask because we've seen capital increases lately at some of the projects out there, should we still be thinking that $2 billion for Hope Bay would be a reasonable capital and your mine plan that you've been talking about?

Dominique Girard

Hi, Tanya. We see a bit of inflation, but it's going to be below a $2.5 [billion?]

for sure. The thing we need to finalize, we have a very good now let's say level of engineering, but there's decisions that we're taking, for example, to fast-track Patch 7 and to do more ounces earlier, for example to start the mill right up at 6,000 ton per day.

It's going to be a ramp-up, but the mill's going to be designed right up front at 6,000 ton per day, compare what we did with Meliadine. Also, for example, we're looking to add one more wing to keep the drilling ongoing and to let Guy doing treasure hunting onto the property.

There's decisions that we're taking internally that at the end of the day affecting the initial CapEx, but it won't be a big surprise. It's going to be slightly over $2 billion.

Ammar Al-Joundi

The changes are not so much inflation, they're more, instead of ramping up the mill in two stages, just because of the economics, you just do it all at once. As Guy said, do you invest in some peripheral infrastructures so that we can continue to accelerate exploration?

Tanya Jakusconek

That's helpful. If over $2 billion slightly because of planned changes rather than inflation.

Ammar Al-Joundi

Yeah.

Dominique Girard

For sure.

Tanya Jakusconek

Okay. Now that I have you, Ammar, I have just two quick questions for you.

You mentioned the strategy in Australia, which was to focus around Fosterville and drilling that platform to see what you have there. In Mexico, besides San Nicolas, do you have anything else that you're looking at to expand that platform?

Ammar Al-Joundi

At San Nicolas?

Tanya Jakusconek

In Mexico itself, besides San Nicolas.

Ammar Al-Joundi

We are looking at opportunities to expand San Nicolas. Beyond that, Tanya, there's really nothing substantial that we're seeing as an opportunity in Mexico.

Tanya Jakusconek

Thank you for that. Then my final question, Ammar, for you, it's always tragic to hear about fatalities for everybody in the mining industry.

My question to you is from your tragic incidents that you've had at your mine sites, what have you learned and what changes to procedures and processes have you put in place from these learnings?

Ammar Al-Joundi

Thank you for asking, because it is very important, Tanya. I think that we've learned what we already know, which is never, ever slow down in emphasizing the importance of safety.

Sometimes it's really disappointing. It's the routine things, the things that people do every day that they get too comfortable with.

That's human nature, and it is our job to really just push it. We mandated a stand-down where we took every employee in at all of our sites, every single one, and re-emphasized it.

We have a very sophisticated and comprehensive safety program like most of our peers. Frankly, it's really devastating to have had those fatalities.

Tanya Jakusconek

Okay. It seems that it was just routine things, nothing that you would have changed, I guess is what you're saying, from procedures and processes?

Ammar Al-Joundi

I think that I don't want to get into detail. There's a lot of work still ongoing.

Oh, actually, Carol, why don't you jump in? Sorry.

Carol Plummer

Hi, Tanya. As you can understand, any loss of life is a tragic loss of life.

In both of these instances, the in-depth investigations are still ongoing. The regulatory authorities and so on are involved in these investigations as well.

We can't share the results of these investigations yet, but certainly there are learnings around this. We're sharing to the degree possible not just internally, but to industry peers where there has been something that we can start sharing immediately to make sure that these types of accidents couldn't happen elsewhere.

Really for us, we're really, as Ammar said, re-emphasizing just the importance of safe production and making sure that we're following our procedures, and always looking for the risks in the workplace and how we can mitigate those risks. To that end, we've been looking at major hazards, which are the hazards of things that could actually be a life-changing accident, and putting in place critical controls.

We're continuing down that road, and I think that's a really important step for us as we continue on that journey towards zero accidents.

Tanya Jakusconek

Thank you, Carol, for sure. All sharing to the mining industry are all beneficial.

Thank you.

Operator

There are no further questions. I'll turn the call back over to Ammar.

Ammar Al-Joundi

Thank you, everyone, for joining us, and everyone have a nice weekend. Thank you.

Operator

Ladies and gentlemen, this concludes today's conference call. Thank you for participating.

You may now disconnect.