AMG Critical Materials (Euronext:AMG) Q2 2026 Earnings Call

0:01 Good morning, everyone, and welcome to today's AMG Q2 twenty twenty six Earnings Conference Call. At this time, all participants are in a listen only mode. Later, you have an opportunity to ask questions during a question and answer session. Please note this call is being recorded, and I will be standing by if you should need any assistance. It is now my pleasure to turn the conference over to Thomas Swoboda. Please go ahead, sir. Thank you, Ross. Good day, everyone. Welcome to AMG's second quarter twenty twenty six earnings call.

0:46 Joining me on this call is the entire AMG management board, namely Doctor. Fancinovoo, the Chairman of the Management Board and Chief Executive Officer Mr. Jackson Kanku, the Chief Financial Officer and Mr. Michael Conner, the Chief Corporate Development Officer. We published our second quarter twenty twenty six earnings press release yesterday along with the presentation for investors, both of which you can find on our website. They include our disclaimers about forward looking statements. Today's call will begin with a review of the comments on which which suffers early morning. Today's call will begin with a review of the second quarter twenty twenty six business highlights by Doctor. Schimmelbusch. Mr. Connolly will comment on strategy and Mr. Dunker will comment on AMG's financial results. I think we mixed up the names.

1:47 The financial results will be commented by Mr. Danko. At the completion of Mr. Danko's remarks, Doctor. Schimmelbusch will comment on outlook. We will open the line to take questions thereafter. I will now pass the floor to Doctor. Schimmelbusch, AMG's Chairman of the Management Board and Chief Executive Officer. Doctor. Schimmelbusch? Thank you, Thomas. Ladies and gentlemen, as we stated last quarter, the price increases from earlier this year have begun to support our adjusted EBITDA. During Q2, we achieved €92,000,000 of adjusted EBITDA, 30% more than the $71,000,000 in Q2 twenty twenty five and notably more than double our Q1 twenty twenty six adjusted EBITDA of $44,000,000 We remain optimistic about our ability to benefit from our recent investments as well as the improved lithium market dynamics, While Q2 benefited from very favorable phasing effects, it also clearly shows the earnings and cash generation potential of our platform.

3:13 As ever, we continue to grow our Critical Materials footprint as demonstrated by our press release from earlier this very week. On Monday, we closed our purchase of Synwalt Lithium, one of the major lithium reserves in Europe. This is a major strategic step in consolidating the critical materials industry in Europe by significantly increasing our resource base. By applying AMG's long standing experience in mining, refining and certifying critical materials, we will be able to significantly reduce the project's capital requirement and improve its operating cost position while significantly improving its environmental footprint.

4:09 Another highlight of Q2 was the opening of our new coal metal production facility in New Castle, Pennsylvania on June 17. The facility has an annual capacity of up to 6,500 tons of raw metal, which is deemed a critical materials and everywhere else too. Core metal enhances the performance, durability and heat resistance of advanced alloys. And when AMG's new high purity core metal facility, we are onshoring and with that facility, we are onshoring the production of a material with significant strategic importance to aerospace and energy.

5:03 I will now hand over to Mike Conner. Mike? Thank you, Amos. Good morning, everyone. The second quarter reflected continued momentum as we executed on our strategic priorities against an increasingly supportive backdrop for critical materials. While geopolitical tensions remain elevated, they continue to reinforce the importance of secure, localized and sustainable supply chains. Governments around the world are increasingly prioritizing domestic and allied sources of critical materials, an area where AMG has established a unique competitive position. Despite commodity prices remaining largely at normalized levels, AMG continues to generate strong profitability.

5:51 Our results increasingly reflect the value created through disciplined capital allocation, strategic investments and operational execution, rather than the exceptional pricing environment that drove earnings peaks in previous cycles. In lithium, Bittercell continues to execute a disciplined commercial ramp up, consistently producing battery grade lithium hydroxide within specification while progressing customer qualifications in accordance with customer defined schedules. The refinery also recorded significant lithium hydroxide sales during the second quarter, reflecting the continued progress for full commercial operation. In Meeva, in Brazil, five gs production continues to increase with output expected to reach 130,000 ton run rate this year.

6:44 Also as Heinz mentioned, we completed the acquisition of Zynvault Lithium following the quarter end. In vanadium, our recycling and upgrading capabilities continue to differentiate AMG. In the quarter, we temporarily benefited from securing attractive spot feedstocks, including significant volumes of spent catalyst following the competitor's bankruptcy. Our diversified sourcing strategy provides the flexibility to maximize throughput when opportunity arises. This proves particularly valuable while shipping from The Middle East continues to be limited. In Saudi Arabia, construction is progressing on the initial phase of our Shell AMG Recycling Supercenter, which will expand our global vanadium platform.

7:36 In chrome, we successfully opened our U. S. Chrome metal facility in New Castle, Pennsylvania, establishing the only domestic producer of chrome metal in North America. We see significant opportunities to expand this platform as demand for secure domestic supply continues to grow across aerospace, defense and energy markets. In molybdenum, we're integrating Ora Technologies and advancing engineering to expand our recycling platform. Combined with the business' strong profitability, we're exemplified AMG's strategy of acquiring differentiated technologies and scaling them for our global industrial platform. Finally, subsequent to quarter end, we finalized the divestiture of Graphite Profit Mill and successfully closed our refinancing.

8:27 Together with the significantly oversubscribed equity offering completed during the quarter, these transactions have substantially strengthened AMG's balance sheet and liquidity, providing the capital and financial flexibility to execute our growth strategy and pursue compelling strategic opportunities. Collectively, these milestones demonstrate AMG's ability to execute on both our operational and strategic priorities while strengthening our long term competitive position. I will now turn the call over to Jackson Dunkel, our CFO. Thank you, Mike. Starting on Page four of the presentation, you can see that Q2 'twenty six adjusted EBITDA increased 30% versus the same period last year. This is primarily due to the increasingly strong profitability from our Vanadium and Lithium segments, both of which benefited from significant phasing effects.

9:20 In lithium, it was from the shipment of 12,000 tons of concentrate shifting from Q1 to Q2, and in vanadium, it was from much higher input material in the second quarter. On the lower left, you can see our net income attributable to shareholders of $28,000,000 during Q2 twenty twenty six, than double the $12,000,000 in Q2 last year, aided by a write up of our lithium inventories. On page five, you can see the volume and price movements for our key products represented by arrows, which underscore our segmental results. I will cover these price and volume movements for the individual segment comments. AMG Lithium results are shown on Page seven. On the top left, you can see that Q2 twenty six revenues more than tripled versus the prior year.

10:07 This is driven mainly by higher sales volumes of lithium concentrate and the startup of our Bitterfeld plant, which sold unqualified battery grade lithium hydroxide, as well as higher lithium and tantalum sales prices. Q2 twenty six adjusted EBITDA was $31,000,000 compared to $3,000,000 in Q2 twenty five. The current period benefited in three significant ways. First, from strong production of lithium concentrate second, from the phasing effect I mentioned earlier and third, from the much lower production cost, which is helped by high tantalum price. AMG vanadium results are shown on Page eight. Revenue for the quarter increased by 36% compared to Q2 twenty twenty five due largely to higher vanadium volumes, driven by significantly improved availability of spent catalysts, as well as higher fair vanadium sales prices.

10:59 Q2 twenty six adjusted EBITDA of $33,000,000 for our vanadium segment more than doubled versus Q2 last year. This was achieved mainly due to increased volumes resulting from AMG Vanadium's global sourcing strategy and the purchase of domestic volumes from a bankrupt competitor, as well as higher fair vanadium sales prices in the current period. The results for AMG Technologies are shown on page nine. The Q2 'twenty six revenue of $190,000,000 was 21% lower than the two forty one million dollars in Q2 of last year due to lower sales at AMG Antimony in the current period. Adjusted EBITDA during Q2 'twenty six was $27,000,000 compared to the $53,000,000 in the same period last year. AMG Technologies adjusted EBITDA was particularly strong in Q2 'twenty five because of AMG Antimony's exceptional profitability during that quarter.

11:54 AMG Engineering signed $107,000,000 of new orders during Q2 'twenty six, achieving a book to bill ratio of 1.27 times, which was more than double the 0.63 in Q2 last year. Page 10 of the presentation shows our main income statement items. The key changes on this page are regarding taxes. The tax expense increased from $7,000,000 in Q2 'twenty five to $19,000,000 in the current period, primarily driven by an improvement in operating results, which is partially offset by losses with no benefit in Germany. Our cash tax payments of $30,000,000 in Q2 twenty twenty six were largely due to the very high antimony profitability last year. Page 11 of the presentation shows our cash flow metrics.

12:40 The increase in operating cash flow to $55,000,000 for the quarter was mainly due to profitability in the current period and reversal of the working capital effects we saw last quarter. Our total cash used in investing activities was $33,000,000 for the quarter, and as a result, we are pleased to report that we were free cash flow positive in the quarter. We ended the quarter with $440,000,000 of net debt, and as of 06/30/2026, we had $343,000,000 in cash and cash equivalents. With 165,000,000 available on our revolving credit facility, we had $5.00 $8,000,000 of total liquidity at the end of the second quarter. And our financial strength has only increased since then. Last week, we refinanced our five year $200,000,000 revolving credit facility and issued a new seven year $500,000,000 Term Loan B to refinance our existing Term Loan B, which was maturing in 2028, generating $53,000,000 in net proceeds.

13:38 The interest rate of the Term Loan B is SOFR plus 3.25, a reduction in spread due to the strong investor demand, and we hedged our interest rate by capping it at an all in rate of 6.8%. In addition, the transaction we previously announced to sell AMG Graphite to Asbury Advanced Materials was completed as of July 28 in accordance with the announced terms. We received total proceeds of $64,000,000 from the sale. So despite completing multiple strategic projects this year, as of July 29, we have more than $400,000,000 of cash on hand. With the strength of our balance sheet and enhanced liquidity, we are primed for an acceleration of growth going forward.

14:24 That concludes my remarks. Doctor. Schumbush? Thank you, Jackson. Prices for many of our materials strengthened in the first half of twenty twenty six and the backlog of our engineering business continues at historically high levels. Despite the significant geopolitical instability, we increased our 26% adjusted EBITDA guidance range to between $230,000,000 and $250,000,000 up from our previous guidance between $210,000,000 and $240,000,000 We expect the third quarter to be significantly down sequentially, driven by favorable phasing effects in the second quarter.

15:17 Operator, we would now like to open the line for questions. Please press star and one on your telephone keypad, and you will be placed into the queue in the order received. You may remove yourself from the queue at any time by pressing the pound and one. Our first question comes from Martin Ben Driver from ABN AMRO. Please go ahead. Yes. Thank you, operator. Good morning, Congratulations with the results. I have three questions and I will do them one by one, if I may. And the first one is on vanadium and the sourcing strategy.

16:07 Can you provide some additional color on that sourcing strategy now that you found feedstock from a different source, a bankrupt competitor? That would be question one. And as a follow-up on that, is there an effect with that particular transaction in Q3 and Q4 as well? And what other sources are you targeting in terms of supply? The second question, can you repeat that? Well, the second question was whether that particular transaction with the bankrupt competitor would also affect Q3 and Q4? And then the third question was what other sources are you targeting next to The Middle East than your normal supply from the petrochemical industry?

16:55 Well, I don't think the bankrupt supplier has a significant impact on our very diversified supply strategy globally global supply strategy of ferrovanadium operation in Ohio. So it's nice to have, but not significant. But in terms of phasing, we not expect it to repeat in Q3 and Q4. And in terms of global supply, are focused on The Middle East. Understood. Thank you. And then my second question is about lithium. You mentioned additional sales of unqualified battery grade lithium in Q2.

17:42 Can you provide some color on volumes and whether that will also continue in Q3 and Q4? And next to that, is the business so planned because of those sales nearing breakeven already? So the first part of your question is yes, we expect those sales to continue and increase as the plant continues to ramp up. We're not disclosing exact volumes, but obviously we said significant sales in the second quarter. You can see it in the growth in the sales figures for the segment. And we would expect that to grow throughout the course of the year as we ramp towards the full run rate. Understood. And then my final question on lithium as well and again, Bissell. How should we think of 2027?

18:28 So you're moving towards full production and qualification. We're now in July, almost August. Is there any color you can provide on what we should pencil in for 2027 in terms of production and sales? Maybe a bit more color there would be appreciated. Yes. I think we expect to be operating at full capacity next next year. The qualification process, as we've stated previously, is not really in our control. So we're, to a certain degree, at the mercy of the customer qualification schedule on a customer by customer basis. We expect to start receiving those qualifications starting next quarter and that will increase throughout the end of the year and into next year. So we can't give a really clear split on exactly how much will be qualified versus unqualified, but we expect to be producing battery grade lithium hydroxide at a full capacity for 2027.

19:21 And just a small follow-up. Obviously, the qualified part, there's market prices will apply, maybe some indexation. But on the unqualified, what would be a reasonable price assumption? It would depend on a customer by customer basis. So I can't give you a universal figure that will apply. Obviously, we would prioritize qualified sales. Understood. Thank you very much, gentlemen. And our next question comes from Michael Kuhn from Deutsche Bank. Please go ahead, Yes. Good morning, gentlemen. A few questions from my side. I'll also do them one by one. I would start with the Q2 performance and the increased outlook.

20:09 The initial guidance was for roughly flattish adjusted EBITDA in the second quarter compared with Q2 last year. Obviously, you did much better. Maybe a little more explanation, what were the key surprise factors? And why, let's say, you didn't fully translate those into the guidance because at the upper end, it's $10,000,000 more versus, I would argue, more like $20,000,000 more in the second quarter. So the key surprises were in lithium volumes, as well as lithium price. The other key surprise was total volumes sold in vanadium.

20:59 So our two key units performed well above expectations. In terms of why it didn't translate into a straight $20,000,000 increase to our guidance, as we noted before, we do have phasing effects in Q3 and Q4. So that's why it didn't apply. Yes, we were struggling with that sentence of the phasing effects just to be cautioning analysts to multiply 90,000,000 times four. That's that's fair point. That would have been pretty rich.

21:47 And maybe a follow-up on on vanadium. So I I fully get that, let's say, in in the global context, those those additional volumes are, let's say, not not too significant. Still, I would say, the the supply situation remains difficult. Is there more of those opportunities in the markets where you could do like one off purchases of volumes? I mean, either out of bankruptcies or out of whatever other sources to, let's say, improve the overall feedstock availability? Overwhelming supply structure is contracted under long term contracts with a myriad of refineries and other suppliers.

22:40 So events like bankruptcies are extraordinary and insignificant, as I have said before. This is a very stable long term structure, which is planned. Now we are expanding our footprint in this area, as you know, through a major project in Saudi Arabia, which symbolizes our presence in The Middle East. And we are going through a multiphase expansion scenario in The Middle East for acquiring additional sources of supply in addition to the initial project, which is not based on spent catalysts but on gasification ash in Saudi Arabia.

23:39 So consider our presence in The Middle East to be significant and enlarging. Thank you. At this time we do have a follow-up from Michael Keune from Deutsche Bank. Please go ahead, Michael. Thank you. So as there's obviously the opportunity to ask a little more, happy to do so. Just on the closing of graphite business, you mentioned the improved cash position as of end July.

24:37 Ultimately, in terms of net cash proceeds, how much did you get out of the deal? I think Jackson disclosed it in the script, but it was $64,000,000 of cash proceeds. All right, thank you. And maybe one more or two more on lithium. I mean, if you look at the development of the European lithium landscape, there was an important step forward of of Savannah as of late towards commercialization. And and still, let's say, that there's one step, a technical grade that needs to be done in in in China and out.

25:33 Is there an increasing pressure, let's say, to complete the value chain, which is also part of your medium term win? How could those steps be implemented? And is there any, let's say, political support for that? Well, as you know, and as published several times, we are fully prepared technically and through feasibility studies to make that bridge step in Brazil going through the final stages of that decision making process. But that symbolizes that we are fully prepared technically and organizationally to go from spodumene to technical trade also in Europe with respective preparatory steps underway.

26:45 The value chain in lithium, which we refer to as the highway from Brazil via Portugal to Germany, is optimized in many ways, but and it's taking a considerable management time. But it is a harmony between increased supply of mostly hard rock concentrates, increased technical grade capabilities and then refinery expansion steps.

27:33 And that has to be brought in balance, which is rather complicated because each of these decisions have carefully to be controlled time line. And we are very happy that we have this Chinese conversion capability, friends, underlying friends, because we can that is helpful for optimizing the completion of such a harmonized structure. It is to be expected that this structure is expanding significantly. It is also very high on our priority list because one has to remember that we are 20,000 tons. We are the sole refinery in Europe.

28:32 The European growth in the first half of twenty six year over year is 27% in EV sales. And the battery pack average size has increased 10% by weight in that time frame. Not to talk about the stationary battery expansion, is has significant two digit growth numbers. When you estimate the European sales in hydroxide in 'thirty, 'thirty one, 'thirty two, you have a variety of scenario forecasts, but it's mostly around 500,000 tons.

29:24 We have a 20,000 ton refinery. We are ready to expand, but we are only expanding based on the significant captive contractual supply status because of that, of course, is reducing the risk. This is not to be confused with other value chains in other raw material industries such as copper, where you have custom refineries, which are supplying themselves from all sorts of disconnected legally disconnected producers.

30:16 We want to be we want to manage harmonized value chains with significant equity control by AMG on all steps of this value chains. That's very important for the future. We, of course, have the objective to be the number one producer in Europe in this year for a very long time. Very clear. And very last question in that context. When can we expect a more detailed update on ZYNWOLZ lithium? ZYNWOLZ has been, of course, on our mind for a long time. It reminds me of the observation that it is difficult for venture firms to do large scale investment projects.

31:15 You need a lot of deep management structures and technology base to handle such a project. We have very clear ideas about the development of Synvoid, which we have developed while we were observing 30% shareholder. The most significant there are many significant aspects to this. It's a very important transaction. One aspect is that we have developed while we were in this waiting period, we have developed environmentally significantly improved technology for avoiding waste streams.

32:02 You have lithium hard rock mining, you have, of course, waste stream, which are consisting of number one, that you have ore, which you since you're only 91% sort of ore and 99% is earth, so you have to handle that. But that's relatively benign and uncomplicated, but the complicated part is the chemical waste or when you are applying chemicals for upgrading waste, then you have a chemical waste. And we have a new technology, which is a breakthrough technology, which we own exclusively, to apply to that project.

32:49 That's one aspect. And the other aspect is that we will produce lithium chloride. And when you produce lithium chloride, you know that you have the option from lithium chloride very elegantly to go into lithium metal. So we are studying also an aspect of that development, which related to lithium metal, which of course is an extremely interesting market. Right, great. Thank you very much. And we have a follow-up question from Martin Dendreiber from ABN AMRO. Please go ahead, Yes, thank you, operator. Two questions, please.

33:37 One is on tantalum. Can you help us understand where production stood in Q2? And what should we expect for the second half? Are you, at the end of the year, back to full capacity for Stantalum, or should we perhaps assume that to occur a little bit earlier? And my second question is about AMG Engineering. It will be a very strong performance, also very good book to bill. Are there opportunities to expand the capacity given the strong demand that you see? And if not, why not? You mean the capacity of the second question, the capacity of engineering, Well, to talk about the second question, we have a very strong order intake and order backlog, and that is continuing.

34:38 Half of our business is directed towards North America, United States in particular. A very significant part of other of the rest is best in China. The rest of the world is relatively small. The dominating customer of AMG Engineering in a visualized way is the aerospace engine. Another very dominating aspect is that we enable people, the metal industry of the world, to qualify secondary materials into the necessary high quality, high purity qualification needed for customers like the aerospace engine, which is the most significant it is the most significant customer of the metallurgical critical material industry.

35:55 It's the guiding light. Our engineering company, ALD, Wackholm Technology, G. N. V. H. In Hannover, Germany is the guiding light into the critical material industry as regard to its metallurgical components. Now because of that market is significant and will continue, if not accelerating. The aerospace industry is very strong in its growth perspective and not only within not only as a number of planes or build rates of planes, but also of the increased share of critical materials within that market because the operating temperatures of the aerospace engine are increasing continuously in order to achieve energy saving and CO2 reduction effects.

37:01 And that is a long term trend, which has started ten, fifteen years ago and is continuing and is absorbing a lot of our technology efforts to be specific. High purity metals, enable a higher operating temperature have to be then amended by ceramics in order to have to access a much higher temperature zone. And that is an ongoing optimization process, which is happening very much significantly influenced by our presence in that market. I think we are the number one critical materials company as regard to the aerospace engine globally.

37:57 Martin, in regards to your first question, the tantalum production is a function of the lithium production. It's a byproduct, obviously. At a full 130,000 ton run rate, we would produce roughly 400,000 pounds of tantalum. As we said, we're looking to ramp to full production capacity. In June, we hit that level. The 130 run rate, we're looking to stabilize that in the second half of the year and expect to run next year at the full capacity. Understood. That's helpful color. Thank you very much. And at this time, there are no further questions. I'll turn the call back over to our hosts to close out the call.

38:46 Thank you, Rose, and thank you, everyone. It's a busy reporting day. We've been well with that. So thank you so much for dialing in. All the best. Bye bye. Thank you. This does conclude today's AMG Q2 twenty twenty six earnings conference call. Thank you for your participation. You may now disconnect.