Earnings call transcript: SSR Mining Q2 2025 shows stable performance

SSR Mining (SSRM) reported its financial results for the second quarter of 2025, highlighting a significant improvement in production and robust cash flow, despite challenges in cost management and operational disruptions. With a market capitalization of $2.63 billion, the company’s stock has demonstrated remarkable strength, posting an 86.64% year-to-date return. According to InvestingPro analysis, SSRM appears undervalued at current levels, suggesting potential upside opportunity for investors.

Key Takeaways

• Production increased by 15% from Q1 2025, reaching 120,000 gold equivalent ounces.
• Operating cash flow was strong at $158 million.
• The Cripple Creek & Victor mine contributed nearly $85 million in free cash flow in just four months.
• High all-in sustaining costs at Seabee due to forest fires.
• Continued efforts to restart the Copler mine in Turkey.

Company Performance

SSR Mining demonstrated solid operational performance in Q2 2025, with a notable 15% increase in production compared to the previous quarter. The company continues to strengthen its position in the Americas, driven by the successful integration of the Cripple Creek & Victor mine. However, the company faces challenges in managing costs, particularly at the Seabee mine, where external factors have driven up expenses.

Financial Highlights

• Revenue: Not specified in the provided data.
• Earnings per share: $0.42 per diluted share attributable net income; $0.51 adjusted net income per diluted share.
• Operating cash flow: $158 million.
• Free cash flow: $98 million.
• Total liquidity: Over $900 million.

Outlook & Guidance

SSR Mining remains optimistic about meeting its full-year production targets, with expectations for a strong Q4 performance at the Marigold mine. The company is actively working to extend the life of the Puna mine and advance projects like Hot Madden and Buffalo Valley. The restart of the Copler mine in Turkey remains a priority, with ongoing efforts to address permitting challenges. Analyst targets range from $10.75 to $16.50, with EPS forecasts for FY2025 at $1.83 per share. For detailed analysis and comprehensive valuation metrics, access SSRM’s full Pro Research Report, available exclusively on InvestingPro.

Executive Commentary

Rod Antal, Executive Chairman, emphasized the company’s constructive engagement with Turkish authorities to advance the Copler mine restart. CFO Michael Sparks highlighted SSR Mining’s strong financial position, stating, "We remain in a very strong position financially and are well positioned to manage all capital requirements."

Risks and Challenges

• High all-in sustaining costs, particularly at Seabee, could pressure margins.
• Uncertainty surrounding the restart of the Copler mine in Turkey.
• Potential impact of fluctuating gold prices on royalty expenses.
• Operational disruptions from external factors, such as forest fires.

Q&A

During the earnings call, analysts raised questions about the potential for the Cripple Creek & Victor mine to exceed guidance and sought clarity on the timeline for restarting the Copler mine. The management reiterated their commitment to addressing these operational challenges and emphasized ongoing strategic initiatives.

Full transcript - Silver Standard Resources BATS (SSRM) Q2 2025:

Conference Call Operator: Hello, everyone, and welcome to SSR Mining’s Second Quarter twenty twenty five Conference Call. This call is being recorded. At this time, for opening remarks and introductions, I would like to turn the call over to Alex Hunchek from SSR Mining. Please go ahead.

Alex Hunchek, Investor Relations, SSR Mining: Thank you, operator, and hello, everyone. Thank you for joining today’s conference call to discuss SSR Mining’s second quarter financial results. Our consolidated financial statements have been presented in accordance with U. S. GAAP.

These financial statements have been filed on EDGAR and SEDAR, and they are also available on our website. There is an online webcast accompanying this call, and you will find the information to access the webcast in this afternoon’s news release and on our corporate website. Please note that all figures discussed during the call are in U. S. Dollars unless otherwise indicated.

Today’s discussion will include forward looking statements, so please read the disclosures in the relevant documents. Additionally, we will refer to non GAAP financial measures during our discussion and in the accompanying slides. Please see our press release for information about the comparable GAAP measures. Rod Antal, Executive Chairman, will be joined by Michael Sparks, Chief Financial Officer and Bill McKnevin, EVP, Operations and Sustainability on today’s call. I will now turn the line over to Rod.

Rod Antal, Executive Chairman, SSR Mining: Great. Thank you, Alex, and good afternoon to you all. It is pleasing to report a really good quarter that progressed largely to plan. Despite the temporary suspension at CB due to the forest fire, we had a very strong quarter that generated both good operating results and significant free cash flow. We continue to work constructively with the relevant authorities in Turkey to advance the restart of the Copler mine, including progressing the various engineering plans and design documents.

This includes the closure plans for the heap leach pad and the issued preconstruction documents for the East Storage facility. While this is another step forward, we cannot yet provide a definitive timeline for a restart. Another key milestone was achieved at Puna in the quarter. We have developed a plan that will extend the mine life at Chinchillas by an initial three year period through to 2028. Further, we will continue to evaluate other opportunities, including advancing the studies at Corte Deres.

Other notable highlights in quarter two include, we had consolidated free cash flow generation of nearly 100,000,000 reiterating the strength of our Americas platform. We had a strong first full quarter from Cripple Creek and Victor, which itself generated excellent free cash flow, delivering on one of the main strategic rationales of the acquisition. And lastly, we continue to advance the Hot Madden project towards a construction decision, including $29,000,000 in capital expenditure year to date. As we move into the second half of the year, we have a number of meaningful catalysts remaining on the horizon. These include the release of a technical report and life of mine plans for Cripple Creek and Victor, initially based on existing mineral reserves.

And of course, the advancement of the Hot Madden project towards a construction decision. Across portfolio, we’ll continue to evaluate further organic growth initiatives at Buffalo Valley and New Millennium at Marigold, the Porkish target at Seabee and the Cortaderas target at Puna. Of course, the top priority is continuing to advance Copler to a restart. As you can see, we’ve already delivered on a number of our key priorities and demonstrated strong operating performance in the first half. This is particularly pleasing when you overlay the heavy lift of resources required for the very successful integration of Cripple Creek and Victor.

And now I’m going to turn the call over to Michael to take you through the quarter two financials starting on Slide number four.

Michael Sparks, Chief Financial Officer, SSR Mining: Thank you, Rod, and good afternoon, everyone. As noted, the 2025 was another strong operational period. Production in the quarter was 120,000 gold equivalent ounces, a better than 15% improvement over Q1 as we benefited from the full first quarter of production from CC and V. All in sustaining costs in the second quarter were $2,068 per ounce or $18.58 dollars per ounce excluding care and maintenance costs incurred at Copler. These results drove operating cash flow of $158,000,000 and free cash flow of $98,000,000 during the quarter.

We spent approximately $16,000,000 advancing Hod Maden in the second quarter as we progress engineering and initial site development activities. This brings year to date spend at the project to $29,000,000 as we advance towards a construction decision for what remains one of the most attractive underdeveloped copper gold projects in the sector. We also announced an initial extension to the Puna mine life, which Bill will speak to later in the call. Moving on to our financial results on Slide five. We recorded attributable net income of $0.42 per diluted share in the second quarter and adjusted net income of $0.51 per diluted share.

Both figures include approximately $37,000,000 in care and maintenance costs at Copler during the quarter as these costs are not adjusted for under SEC rules. Adjusted net income removed the impact of the additional reclamation and remediation costs at Copler, which I will speak to shortly, as well as the $44,000,000 in insurance proceeds received during the quarter. As previously noted, second quarter free cash flow of $98,000,000 was an excellent result. This strong free cash flow generation maintains our total liquidity position of over $900,000,000 We remain in a very strong position financially and are well positioned to manage all capital requirements across the business going forward, including the remaining remediation and reclamation costs at Copler. Let’s now turn to page six for an update on these efforts.

Following the Copler incident, the company estimated future reclamation and remediation costs of $250,000,000 to $300,000,000 related to the Copler incident. In Q1 twenty twenty four, the company accrued the low end of this estimated cost range recording $250,000,000 in reclamation and remediation costs in addition to the $22,500,000 that had already been incurred during the 2024. In the 2025, we recorded a $62,900,000 revision to the initial reclamation and remediation costs, resulting in a $12,900,000 increase to the initial estimate. The revision and estimate reflects the company’s advancement of the engineering and construction design of the e storage facility as well as the advancement of the studies for the permanent closure of the Heap Leach pad. This approximately 4% increase in reclamation and remediation costs reflects the improved fidelity in our engineering and construction designs and is not unlike the refinement in capital costs we are used to seeing as project advanced from PEA level scoping studies towards executable project plans.

As I mentioned previously, the engineering plans and related studies for the permanent closure of the Heap Leach pad continue to advance. As part of the Heap Leach Pad closure planning, the company will conduct further field investigations and will use the findings to refine and update the closure plan for the heap leach pad. Now over to Bill for an update on the operations starting on Slide eight.

Bill McKnevin, EVP, Operations and Sustainability, SSR Mining: Thanks, Michael. It was another solid quarter for our operations, starting with Marigold. Marigold produced 36,000 ounces in the second quarter at an AISC of 19.77 per ounce, as costs trended higher over the first quarter as expected. For the full year, we continue to expect a second half weighted production profile with Q4 planned to represent the strongest quarter of production for the year. We continue to be impacted by higher royalty costs at Marigold, given the strength of the gold price through 2025, but overall remain on track for our full year targets.

With respect to exploration and growth, we are continuing to advance engineering and study work at Buffalo Valley and New Millennium, two key avenues for future mineral reserve conversion and mine life extension. Feasibility study level work has commenced at Buffalo Valley, including infill drilling and initial engineering. We look forward to providing further updates on these initiatives as they progress. Now on to CC and V on Slide 9. CC and V delivered an excellent Q2 with production and costs benefiting from better than expected solution grades coming off the pad.

Second quarter production was 44,000 ounces of gold at an AISC of $13.39 dollars per ounce. These strong results helped drive significant free cash flow in the quarter. Since acquisition at the February, CCMV has now generated nearly $85,000,000 in free cash flow, effectively paying back our initial upfront purchase in just four months. While we expect production and costs to normalize over the remainder of the year, CCMV is off to an excellent start, establishing itself as a core piece of our Americas platform going forward. We are continuing to advance an initial technical report for CCMV.

We expect this document will represent a first step in our longer term plans to delineate meaningful growth and upside to the asset in the future. Now on to Seabee. Seabee’s quarter was heavily impacted by the power interruption caused by forest fires in Saskatchewan. Firstly, I want to take a brief moment to acknowledge the impact these fires had on our staff and their communities across Northern Saskatchewan and Manitoba. This was a particularly damaging fire season across the region.

And while the impact to our operations was thankfully limited to power interruptions, our thoughts with all those whose livelihoods were impacted. Owing to the downtime and subsequent ramp up back to operations, Seabee produced 11,000 ounces of gold at an AISC of 2,708 per ounce. Costs were particularly high in the quarter as we kept our full complement staff on-site to be ready for the restart of operations as soon as was practical. For the remainder of the year, grades will remain at or near reserve grade and production is expected to trend towards the lower end of full year guidance. With respect to growth and exploration, we are continuing to advance drilling campaigns at both Santoy and the Porky targets as we evaluate potential opportunities to extend the mine life at Seabee.

This work has continued delivering promising results and we look forward to providing further updates with our year end reserves and resources. On to Puna on Slide 11. Puna produced 2,800,000 ounces of silver in the second quarter at an AISC of $12.57 per ounce, another excellent result. While Puna has had an exceptional year so far, it’s worth noting that the year to date gold to silver ratio has been higher than our forecast, unfortunately diminishing some of the positive impacts from Puna’s strong first half on gold equivalent ounces. Positively, our continued efforts on exploration and development at Puna have provided an initial three year extension of operations at Chinchillas.

We’re continuing to advance opportunities to build on this progress and are also continuing work to evaluate the opportunity at Corte Deres as a pathway for longer term growth. Puna remains an exceptional contributor to our portfolio and we are keen to see its continued production and growth for many years to come. On to Slide 12. At Hod Martin, we spent approximately $16,000,000 on the initial site assessment efforts and technical report in the quarter, while infill drilling also continues at site with the aim of derisking the early years of the mine. Year to date spend at the project is now 29,000,000 and we continue to advance towards a full investment decision.

Overall, it was a solid quarter across the business and we’re looking forward to continuing to deliver in the second

Rod Antal, Executive Chairman, SSR Mining: half. Now I’ll turn back to Rod for closing remarks. Great. Thanks, Michael, and thank you, Bill. With the first half now behind us, we remain in a good position to meet our full year targets and are poised to continue to generate free cash flow through the second half.

We still have a number of meaningful catalysts over the remainder of the year across the portfolio that should lead to value delivery for our shareholders. This obviously includes Turkey Air, where we remain firmly committed to advancing to a restart at Copler. With a strong balance sheet underpinning the portfolio and solid operating performance over the year to date, we are in excellent shape as a business and it is our priority to continue to build on this strength over the remainder of the year. So with that, I’m going to turn the call over to the operator for any questions you may have.

Conference Call Operator: First question comes from Oraf Habib with Scotiabank. Please go ahead.

Ovais Habib, Analyst, Scotiabank: Thanks, operator. Hi, Rod and SAAR team. Congrats on the Q2 beat and really great to see the successful transit integration taking place at CC and V. Rod, just a couple of questions from me. Starting off with CC and V.

Based on what CC and V has already produced so far and the outperformance we saw in Q2, I mean, is there a chance for CC and B to beat guidance? I mean, any thoughts and color you can provide on how you see the second half?

Rod Antal, Executive Chairman, SSR Mining: Yes. I appreciate the congratulations, Ovais. It is pleasing on that the guys have done a terrific job across the business already this year. But look on specifically on your question, things have gone really well down there. The plan that we put together for the year is as expected with the higher production in the second quarter that the first full quarter that we’ve owned it.

And it really is just as a result of the high grade that was stacked on the heap leach during the last part of last year, in the early part of this year and those residual grades being produced. So at this stage, Ove is it’s tracking to plan. And as we look forward to the second half with stacking plans and all going up on the pad, we’re still comfortable with the guidance as it states.

Ovais Habib, Analyst, Scotiabank: Thanks, Rohit for that. And then just maybe a little bit more color on this technical review that you guys are going to be coming out with on CC and B. Obviously, is going to be based on the updated reserves that Newmont had published before the closing of the transaction. I mean, is there a possibility over here to significantly improve the mine life? Do you think you can pull forward some of that production?

Any thoughts, color on that Rod that would be appreciated as well.

Rod Antal, Executive Chairman, SSR Mining: Yes. Look, I think, I suppose the purpose of the update really was just to ensure that the most recent information for Cripple Creek and Victor was actually in the public domain. As you know, Newmont hadn’t published a tech report on it for many, many, many years. So we’ve basically just picked up what we know using all the information available to us based on the current reserve base. And that’s the starting point for the and the purpose actually of the tech report itself.

So we’ll conclude all of that work and publish it. Your question around future growth and future growth opportunities, clearly we see that. We saw that through the due diligence and now having ownership for the best part of four months, we continue to evaluate it. But it’s still pretty early of us for us to get our arms around it. We’ve got other priorities right now around getting Amendment 14 approved, which is important to underpin the reserves.

As I was stated by Newmont, that’s really clearly our first objective. And then as we look further afield and into the future, many of the opportunities will take some time to study properly and then obviously bring that to market once our understanding is more mature. So really just it’s really just a placeholder at the moment to get the information out there. So we’re all working off the same information. So you can see production profile importantly and the cost profile importantly and then we’ll go from there in the future.

But look, it’s off to a really good start for sure. Couldn’t be more pleased or more impressed with the team down there.

Ovais Habib, Analyst, Scotiabank: Excellent. Thanks for that Rod. And just quickly moving on to Chopler. I just wanted to see where things are at in terms of kind of discussions with the regulators. I’m just trying to figure out if the regulators have just given you a task list or agenda and any sort of permit to restart only comes once those tasks are completed?

Or is there any sort of fast tracking that could happen as well on the restart?

Rod Antal, Executive Chairman, SSR Mining: Yes. Look, I think we’ve sort of made most of the disclosure within the quarter. But I would say that the last quarter in particular, quarter two was very good in terms of the progress that we did make. A number of the open items we had been working on with the various stakeholders around the plans for the construction of the storage facility, which will hold some of the heap leach material, the remnant heap leach material, as well as the closure planning for the actual heap leach really made a lot of progress all the way through to us as we mentioned on the call being able to issue the construction, the storage facility. So that was a significant positive outcome for the work over the last quarter.

And as you can imagine, Avaes, as we’ve talked about early on, the work in this is important to work with the various government officials, stakeholders, professors from various universities to ensure we get it right in accordance with the Turkish law, but also a number of the interested parties. So that’s all that’s been a good quarter for us actually in a lot of ways to get a lot of the open issues resolved. So that’s favorable. And then as we look forward, there isn’t a sort of set of things that we have to do per se, Ovais, you must do this before you do that. Clearly, we want to make sure that everything’s in place before we seek approval for a restart, but we’re not quite there in a few regards, but we’re obviously plugging along and making good progress.

So I was really pleased with the quarter actually.

Ovais Habib, Analyst, Scotiabank: That’s perfect. Thanks Rod for that color there as well. That’s it for me in terms of my questions. So thanks for taking my questions and again congrats on a great quarter.

Rod Antal, Executive Chairman, SSR Mining: Right. Thanks. Appreciate it.

Conference Call Operator: The next question comes from Don DeMarco with National Bank Financial. Please go ahead.

Don DeMarco, Analyst, National Bank Financial: Thank you, operator and good afternoon Rod and team. Rod, certainly investors are interested in the Turfler restart and your disclosure covers a lot. In the disclosure, you mentioned that you’re not sure what the timeframe is that a restart might occur. But do you know what the timeframe may not be? In other words, do you know for certain that it won’t be, say, one month or three months, but it would be longer than that?

Rod Antal, Executive Chairman, SSR Mining: Yes. If you’re trying to trick me in a different way, a negative way to answer a question, Don, I appreciate it. But look, think what we’ve said publicly is what we’re going to say publicly. There isn’t a definitive timeline as sort of I was just explaining to Herve. I think the important thing for us is to continue to make progress and we are, which is important and continue to evolve it into a point where we’ll be seeking the approval for a restart.

So, I’m not going to put out their timetables in this regard to put unnecessary pressure on anyone. It’s not the valid point here. I think we’re like we’ve said, we’re committed to Turkey. We see tremendous value for the country in both the Copler asset and also in the Hot Madam project. And I think our commitment around Hot Madam and the progress that we’re making there leading up to the sort of for investment decision with our Board at the right time really does, I think support our commitment to country.

So and obviously, our progress in terms of getting a restart. So I think we’re in good shape as we move forward. But look, I’m not going to put out there a timetable at this stage.

Don DeMarco, Analyst, National Bank Financial: Okay. Thank you. We’ll keep looking for updates on that. Could you remind me what the permitting status is at Copler? What level of throughput, for example, is currently permitted?

And upon a restart in the event that it occurs, what is the process to update the permitting?

Rod Antal, Executive Chairman, SSR Mining: Yes. So if you remember, we disclosed probably, I don’t know, it feels like a long time ago, probably twelve months ago that we would have to revert to the twenty fourteen EIA, which is around 6,000 tons per day sorry, thousand tons per day on a throughput rate. And that’ll be our starting point once we get a restart. And then we’ll then be seeking a refresh to the EIA to account for everything we have to account for in terms of the site to be looking at improving that throughput rate in the future. But that won’t come immediately.

It will be a process. But first things first, just let’s just get things started. So we revert to 6,000 tons per day.

Don DeMarco, Analyst, National Bank Financial: Okay, Rod. Thank you. Well, that’s all for me and good luck with the rest of the quarter. Thank you.

Rod Antal, Executive Chairman, SSR Mining: Good on you. Thank you.

Conference Call Operator: This concludes the question and answer session and today’s conference call. You may disconnect your lines. Thank you for participating and have a pleasant day.

This article was generated with the support of AI and reviewed by an editor. For more information see our T&C.