Member Info for Mike1959

Freedom, I remember we have discussed this before and capitalising the deferred stripping is an internationally recognised accountancy standard. I remember the number is in there.The stripping ratio in H1 was 12 3 but I expect the number for the full year to the end of September to fall to just 10.3 which would be the lowest number since 2019 and a massive reduction in waste stripping thanks to the previous work done in the last 12 months or so including contracted in temporary stripping teams. I hope this will boost the mining and processing and so overall production and sales in H2, possibly to record levels for the second half of the year.

Likewise under IAS 23, mining companies cancapitalise borrowing costs if those costs are directly attributable to the acquisition or production of a qualifying asset.

Patryk, at a average gold price of $3600 with the production and AISC as before I guesstimate the 2026 Profit After Tax as $370 million. As Bustard pints out I am assuming to hedges, no big one off acquisition gains and most of all that the gold price does not fall. That should be enough for the share price to reach 120p+ in 6 to 12 months. Unfortunately I fear the suggested AISC will increas due to a weaker USD and pressure to maintain or increace volumes at this elevated tin price. I make it we are the 5th biggest gold/ silver miner by market cap registered fully or partly in London and we have by far the lowest forward PE. I think you have to trawl down to SRB to find a lower forward PE.

GLA for the numbers tomorrow!

For those interested in further news on our Australian operations it is worth checking out the 2 presentations dated 4th Sept on the Emmerson Resources (ER) website (JV and exploration partner for TCMG). They have found further gold mineralisation to the west of the White Devil Project which will be included in a new Mineral Reserve Estimate in October.

Their recent fast tracked scoping study suggests White Devil will be a 650,000 tonne/year operation for 7 years (we are eventually going to need more processing capacity than the current 840,000 Nobles Nob C/L plant if we want to process this and all the other projects at the same time) producing 64,000 oz/yr gold (450,300 oz in total, 75% open pit, balance underground) with a current AISC of AuD 2050 or USD 1350/tonne.. They are fast tracking the current Prefeasibility Study and subject to regulatory requirements targeting production to start FY2027.

Under their working arrangement, ER will take a 40% share in White Devil but only a royalty and agreed payments in the other, smaller projects. During 2026 ER expects to receive at least AuD 18 m or around USD 11.8 million from TCMG so we need to allow for this in our expected 2026 numbers but at the current gold price it is a relatively small price to pay to increase exploration and production.

....yep, the LBMA pm gold price on Friday was $3594.55 while September Comex gold GCU25 closed a few hours later at $3600.80.

Bustard, assuming an average gold price of USD 3500/oz, production at the bottom end of the range 275,000 oz and AISC at the top end of the range USD1525/oz, I calculate the 2026 Profit After Tax as USD 351 million, that is an EPS of 17.4 c which is 143% up on the expected 2025 number next week and represents a 2026 PE of just 5.3 at the current share price. Even if the share price increases to say PE of 8, that is 103p/share. As we have said, lots of ifs and buts and a long way to go but if the gold price remains where it is or actually increases then we are printing money. Likewise I expect an interim dividend in 2026 with these numbers.

Yes the share price is down today but so are other gold miners and we have only lost the increase we put on yesterday. As others have commented below, nothing has changed and the future is rosey. I still think we need to see the interim numbers in Feb before we see £1, but who knows?

Although we roughly know the EPS and profit to be announced on 10th September it would be a fantastic sign if the net debt is now below USD 150 mIllion, the sooner it is paid off , the higher the 2026 dividend will be.

Moving to the main market would marginally help but we are doing very well without it and I want management time to focus on meeting the 2026 targets rather than leaving AIM

By my calculations the TCMG project payback will have been reached before the end of this month, just 5 months after starting production!

The SENS this morning is suggesting an EPS of 7.16 against my expectation of 7.3 to 7.4 so slightly lower than expected. That should still give a profit after tax of USD 141 million and attributable to shareholders of USD 142 million. Still an EPS increase of about 73 % on last year.

Looking forward to th

Charles/Bustard, good to have your opinion but in my humble opinion I still think you are over concentrating on the buybacks, the $11.1 million (around £8.2m) buyback represents only 0.7% of the total shares in issue, even if all of that $11.1m had been used to buy shares at 49p rather than the current ask price of 63.5p the total saving would be around £2.4 million, which is definitely worth having, but in context this only represents an extra 0.1p on the share price or an equally tiny incremental increase to the dividend, and don't forget we are now in the 2025-2026 financial year so you would not get that tiny incremental increase in dividend until the second half of 2026.

Yes, that buy back could be considerably higher but don't forget net debt to the year ending June 2025 is still expected to be $155 million after massive investment last year to increase production( I hope a little bit less) but a dividend of 1.3 to 1.4 cents will cost $26-28 million plus the buy-back $11.1 million. Better some financial prudence now, let us pay off that debt ASAP, we are probably paying around 10% interest. We should be totally debt free within 6-9 months which will naturally rerate the share price and then we can bang on the door for bigger buy-backs and a x3 or x4 or X5 increase in the dividend.

Actually at the current share price I think PAF is relatively well rated compared to to the other mid-tier gold producers at the moment but our potential growth in the next 12-24 months is considerably better. We just need to see the expected numbers on 10th September and confirmation of that future production growth (and a high gold price) for this to gradually rerate. I too believe that PAF is printing money but Mr Market just needs some incremental hard evidence along the way. I believe we will get the SENS announcement next Thursday 4th September that the basic EPS is expected to be around 7.3 to 7.4 c and the HEPS 6.1 to 6.2 which would represent a profit after tax of $145 million and attributable to shareholders. Below those numbers could see the share price take a hit but better numbers should see the chare price increase even before the audited accounts on 10th September.

Patience.

Guys, interesting chat today. With the share price, before today, up 38.22% over 3 months or 12.2% over one month I would not describe this as hiccups, more ups than hics! And over the last month again I would not describe this as wild swings. Again I can understand the frustration that Peel Hunt has not done more but they have already bought back around 8% of the agreed value at an average price of 47.82p which is 23% discount to the current sell price and are seemingly looking at the bigger picture. So on balance I agree with Jammin999, but we all have our own view Also the total buy back represents a relatively 0.7% of the total shares so do not let it detract from the fundamentals which we all agree are stunning.

Admittedly the share price has been sideways over the last week and psychologically we are all waiting eagerly for the big news on 10th September, we just need to remain patient . I hope the 919,950 uncrossed net purchase at the end of today will see the share price recover tomorrow. I see that Mr T ,in trying to fire the Fed governor is just weakening the USD and spooking most investors which continues to feed the gold price.

Sotolo, the chrome price that matters the most is the South African Cr2O3 concentrate 40 to 42% delivered CIF Chinese port currently at USD 271/ tonne which accounts for most of our chrome sales.Foundry and specialist chrome will trade at a slight premium say an extra USD 50/ tonne but account for only around 10% of sales. More recently we have started producing a few alloys but the volumes are probably relatively small.

The South African high carbon ferro chrome 50 % and Turkish Cr2O3 lumpy 40 to 42% are just there for comparison.

Viable, thanks for the info. I see that DRD has a trailing PE of about 13.5 and is expecting to increase production by about 29% in 2026 (155,000 oz to about 200,000 oz) in contrast PAF are expected to increase 2026 production by about 40% to 275,000 oz and so has a much better projected forward PE. DRD has mineral reserves of 5.5 million ozs so PAF is also much better on this metric.

Although the PAF 2025 full year accounts are out on 10th September it is worth pointing out that under JSE regulations a company has to issue a SENS trading statement a few days before if there is a reasonable certainty that EPS or HEPS will differ by at least 20% from the previous financial year. So as the 2025 EPS is expected to be up about 52% on 2024 I think we will see that SENS and the same statement in London by 5th September.

Hi Charles, the last share buy-back was on 9th July and reported on 10th July. PAF has handed full control for the buy-backs (with a few pre-agreed open rules) over to Peel Hunt which can then act independently including closed periods such as now when we are 22 days away from the interim accounts. As you suggest on one hand I am surprised that PH has not done any buy-backs for over a month but I suppose the share price has predominantly gone up during that period and they are keeping their options open if/when they see a relatively large dip , say down 5% in one day or say 3 or more days down in a row and then they can act to support the share price. . Also I expect they will stretch the buy-backs over 6 or more months so they do not want to do too much too early. I agree with Bustard that if they buy sooner rather than later then they would probably average a lower overall price but I suspect this is not the main motive for the buy-back.

On the uncrossed trades that you mention (reported as UT at 4.35 pm), when the LSE stops the usual trading at 4.30 pm each day there is a 5 minute auction trading session where buy and sell requests are matched to a single price determined by the sell and buy demand. This 5 minute auction is not an option for most PI's such as us as you need to feed in your instructions through a broker so this is largely used by big financial institutions who want to do a late trade and think the uncrossed final price will give them a slightly better spread price which is important when they are dealing with big numbers of shares. The UT price and aggregate number of shares and whether it is a buy or sell gives another slight angle on the psyche of the big institutions and particularly if there is a big buyer or seller.

I totally agree with your view and am also looking forward to 10th September and hopefully good news with no shocks.

Bustard , I agree with your comments, we need some luck with the gold price but the gods (so far) seem to be on our side (but we need to be aware that one day this will definitely change- hopefully we are over 12 months away from this).

I just want us PI's to be realistic with the share price over the next 6 months. Even a possible share price of say 70 to 75p in December is higher than the 61.7p today. As the warning goes, prices can go down as well as up. Better than over expectation now and then extreme anger and distress in 6 -12 months, as you elequently suggested earlier it is easy to get carried away (note to self to read more Greek mythology!).

Viable, the illegals at Baberton have been a massive ongoing issue for over 18 months and PAF have advised they are onto it, no doubt encouraged by the higher gold price. I would very much hope they have the problem solved and the reality is priced into the expected 2025/26 expected numbers. Contrast with our current migrant boat numbers!!!

Hendrix Pretorius has been representing PAF in Australia ever since the full TCMG takeover in

November 2024.

On the clowns we agree.

I hope there is enough PI and fund buying support to absorb any big sells , plus Peel Hunt have not done any share buy backs for over a month and could step in any time if the share price drops for 2 or more days in a row.

Guys, I agree with the bulk of the comments today but we still have to be realistic in our aspirations for the share price. Today is only the second fall so far this month and the gold price is holding up well but I assume the large volumes of sells today is down to jitters in anticipation of the Trump- Putin meeting on Friday, personally I do not think it will change anything in the medium term but if magically there was an agreed ceasefire or solution I still think there are enough geopolitical end economic problems in the world to keep gold at current levels, if not higher , for the foreseeable future (a possible US interest rate cut in September would be bullish for gold).

After a fantastic run this year , the current share price is actually above some "expert" forward 12 month predictions. Over the last 4 years the forward PAF PE has averaged only about 7. We will get the 2025 result on 10th September, but the current share price of 61.7p represents a PE of about 11.7 based on my guestimated 2025 Profit After Tax of $145 million. Most pundits are still behind the curve and are still grossly underestimated the potential 2026 result but based on slightly conservative numbers of say gold $3000/oz, production 270,000 (which is 5,000 oz below the minimum guidance of 275,000)and AISC of $1550/oz (the last PAF guidance was $1475 to 1525) my estimated PAT is $250 million , a forward PE of 6.8 based on the current share price.

Between now and the full year results on 10th September, I expect the share price to be between 60 to 70p. Assuming the 2025 numbers have no bad surprises I see the share price still rising but at a much smaller pace , perhaps still under 80p at the end of this year. A PE of 10 on my 2026 numbers above would be around 91p and I see that as the ceiling until the H1/2026 numbers are out in Feb 2026, if those numbers are good then the share price could then increase further. Based on an average 2026 gold price of $3300/oz , production say 275,000 oz and AISC say $1525 the 2026 PAT could hit $315 million which with a PE of 10 would be around 114p. To just maintain that we would then need the expected 2027 numbers to be better than 2026!

So, a lot of its and buts, particularly the gold price . Always happy to discuss and listen to other views. GLA

I understand what you say about Cobus not being finish yet in Oz but I would like to get the current mining areas up and running first before we try to run before we walk. Besides the 840,000 tonnes year processing plant at Noble will probably be fully utilised for the next 7 years or so and buying a similar new one would probably cost $50 million + and then you have to fill it and hopefully good prices continue for the next decade. But you might be right.

What trading insight have you spotted? Recently to me the sells have slightly outnumbered the buys and then right at the end of the day a big buy goes through so that the buys are greater than the sells.

....for me SVML might be worth a flutter but MTL sounds like a long waiting game and with the ongoing M23 militia I would not trust anything in DRC sounds like PAF's interst in Sudan) which makes S Africa look like Switzerland.

Viable, I remember that this was happening about 6 months ago at Sheba and thought it had largely stopped but possibly not. Just hope there is no loss of life or material effect on current Sheba production.

Regarding the shorts , Arrowstreet Capital will inevitably have lost money in theory by selling borrowed shares months ago at a lower share price compared to if they closed out and sold those share today at the current higher share price. But this will not be a one legged transaction or a simple bet against PAF, if it had been they would have closed out a long time ago. Rather this will be a judged hedge of gold against say silver/PGM's/a weaker USD , for example if they believe the gold price ratio to silver price will reduce they could be a seller of gold shares and a buyer of silver shares, so overall if the silver price increases faster in percentage terms than gold their silver gain would be greater than their gold loss. That is Arrowstreet's business, doing lots of sophisticated hedges to make money. Following the big share price drop at GGP last week, Arrowstreet cut their short position from 0.53% to 0.50%. The way I look at it is that they are currently shorting 0.90% of PAF's shares so that is over 18 million shares that they will eventually have to buy and return back to the big institutional investor that they borrowed from in the first place.

Another big 437,455 shares uncrossed trade announced at the end of trading today!

Viable ,yes production of 84,705 oz in H1 and about 112,ooo oz in H2 so about 197,000 oz in total.

Even with my $17.8 m adjustments to H2 revenue i still expect PBT for the full year of $197 m and PAT of $143 m. As always it would be good to hear other opinions.

After a big negative vibe to the hedge adjustment in H 1 I think we should all be adults with the expected number in H2.

As said earlier the 2026 numbers will be AMAZING!

Pleasure.

Yes, in H1 production was 84,705oz while sales were only 79,926 oz. For H2 I have assumed that sales will be 3,000 oz above production.

The gain on the acquisition of TCMG was $25.2 million in H1 but I am assuming it is a one off..

Totally agree that the 2026 numbers will be game changing while the current strength is showing the faith and trust in those forward numbers.

Bustard, I remember we discussed the hedge on 25th Feb and agreed it was a philosophical opportunity cost that reduced the revenue in H1/2025 by $17.1 million which caught alot of people by surprise. To finance MTR ,with a locked in advance loan , for March 2023 to February 2025 we had forward sold/hedged 4,846 ozs /month of gold at $1723/oz (looks low by todays market but this was over 2 years ago).

To understand these opportunity costs that will reduce H2/2025 revenue I think it is work breaking it down into 3 parts:

1. This MTR hedge finished at the end of February but for January and February combined I calculate will reduce H2 revenue by $10.5 mililion compared to if the hedge was not in place and gld was generally sold as produced.

2. Then there were zero-cost collars in place for 1991/ozs month in Jan and Feb at a maximum capped price of $2797/oz and then March to June for 12,577 oz/month at a maximum capped price of $3093/oz. I calculate these will reduce H2 revenue by $7.3 million compared to had they not been done.

3. PAF had approval to hedge about 75% of the estimated 50,000 oz/year production at TCMG for the first 2 years to lock in the return on the initial investment. We do not yet know if this hedge was ever done and if so, when and at what price plus the production before the end of June was minimal, so for these reasons let us forget this for the time being (but it could become a factor next year).

So based on 1. and 2 I calculate the hedge/zero-cost cap opportunity cost for H2 is about $17.8 million reducing the turnover from say $356 million to around $338 million ( or around $528 million for the full year). Happy to discuss further if anyone is interested.

Not sure about any operational update this week but it is worth checking out the Emmerson Resources website (ASX:ERM) for their announcement on 31st July of their own own Quarterly Activities Report for the period ending 30th June 2025. Their numbers on their exploration and development work at the currently 100% owned TCMG White Devil gold deposit are most impressive which their MD describes as having " the highest grade undeveloped open-pit development of substantial scale (+350,000 oz) in Australia". As a result under the JV agreement with TCMG they will almost certainly opt to retain a 40% interest in the project and TCMG reduced to 60%. Probably starting 2027 they suggest the initial mine life of 7 years and that 600,000 to 650,000 tonnes/year will be mined and processed through the Nobles 840,000 tonnes/year carbon/ leach plant producing about 65,300 oz/year, 60% for TCMG and 40% for Emmerson Resources.