Ann: Production and Financial Position Update, page-24

@dawgfather, So what was that upper end of guidance?

Core's annual cost guidance was A$1,350 to A$1,400/t from the Dec2023 quarterly. At a USD 0.67 that range is US$904.5/t to US$938/t. Core have confirmed costs over FY2024 aligned to the upper end of this cost range (aka ~US$938/t). The March 2024 quarterly noted these estimates were maintained.

The 2023/24 cost structure was working through higher strip ratio material in the upper portion of a pit that gets narrower with depth. From the HY report that cost structure included some exceedingly high production costs. The restart of Grants will be working through lower strip ratio material with a production cost more aligned to the volumes being produced. These factors could take several hundred USD/t off the existing annual cost of ~US$938/t.

I know you are blind to anything but a particular project in Brazil with higher strip ratios than Grants, but can you please explain clearly why a project with restart costs likely to be well under US$900/t is going to need US$1.5k-US$2k/t to have any chance of restarting?

Core might choose to delay restarting until bigger profits occur from that restart decision but that is a choice management make rather than a decision forced upon them by lack of profitability in a restart decision. Given a pause decision has occurred, Core is sensibly looking to see what the market looks like as Mt Holland and KV ore start hitting the market (Mt Holland, Sigma, Arcadia & NAL ores are already in the market). If this supply crashes the market, the restart will be further away. IMO if sufficient demand exists to absorb this supply, a restart would be relatively soon after that.