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Welcome to Barrick's second quarter 2026 results presentation. At this time, all participants are in listen-only mode. As a reminder, this event is being recorded and a replay will be available on Barrick's website later today. I will now turn the call over to Emily Chieng, Vice President of Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Thank you, and good morning, everyone. We hope you've had an opportunity to review the press releases issued before the markets opened this morning. The presentation deck we'll review is also available to download on our website. Presenting our results today are Mark Hill, Barrick's President and CEO, and Helen Cai, Senior EVP and CFO.

Other members of Barrick's management team will be available after our prepared remarks for Q&A. Before we begin, please note that there will be forward-looking statements. This slide includes a summary of the significant risks and factors that could affect Barrick's future performance and our ability to deliver on those forward-looking statements. This material is also available on our website. With that, I'll turn it over to Mark.

Okay. Thanks, Emily, and good morning, everyone. For those who don't know Emily, she is our new Vice President of Investor Relations and joins us from U.S. Steel. Before we share our full quarterly results, I want to begin with the agreement with Newmont we announced today. Actually, I want to go off script straight away to make the lawyers nervous here.

I want to clarify a few misconceptions here. Firstly, the total value of that package is approximately $4 billion. Obviously it includes the proportion of Fourmile, but it also includes contribution of Newmont's properties, Mike and Fiberline, which add, I think it's around 6.4 million ounces as well. It is also the cost of resolving historical disputes and litigation between the joint venture partners.

It also reduces the friction costs of the planned IPO, which will unlock even greater value for the shareholders beyond the cash proceeds from the transaction. As we've said, they will be largely returned to the shareholders.

Moving on, we've reached this agreement after four months of negotiations. It now enables us to focus on delivering value through safely and consistently producing ounces. Our interests now are completely aligned as joint venture partners, which is critical. I did want to actually thank our counterparts at Newmont, Natascha and her team, and of course everyone on the Barrick team for the enormous amount of effort and work that's gone into this over the last four months to reach this agreement.

Now, before I get into the results, there is also a couple of other things I would like to highlight, which I think are the key strengths that have come out of Barrick over the last nine months. First, our leadership team. Over the last 10 months, we have improved the operational performance across the entire business. That is thanks to the strength of our operating site teams, to our GMs and everyone right down through to the mining front.

We have also strengthened our relationship with Newmont, as we just said, positioning us well to grow and develop in NGM further, which is also critical. Second, with the IPO, we are building the only major American pure gold company with high quality, long life assets. This is exactly what investors, including some of the world's fastest growing source of capital, are looking for.

Third, outside of North America, the rest of the world portfolio, which has a significant growth profile, also has a distinctive advantage in our ability to work with our Chinese partners, including, as you know, our joint mine ownership and co-investment. This enables us greater efficiency and supply chain strength, which has helped us control our cost and partnership that improve outcome and reduce our risk. With this context, let me turn to our results for the quarter.

As I said, we have had our third quarter in a row with excellent operating and financial results. We delivered on all four of our priorities for the year, the same priorities outlined at the start of the year. We continue to improve our safety performance. I will get to that a bit later, but there is obviously still more work to be done there.

We delivered our gold production above guidance and met our cost guidance. We advanced our growth projects, Fourmile, Lumwana, and the Pueblo Viejo expansion, which remain on time and on budget. Not often you hear that in the mining industry. We continue to review Reko Diq and commence the flow-through share donation development on July 1, as previously disclosed.

Our delivering on production and meeting our cost guidance also allowed us to deliver strong financial results, which Helen Cai will discuss a bit later. Finally, we achieved major milestones in the preparation of our IPO of our North American gold asset, which is on track to be completed by the end of the year. Let me move to safety, which is still our number one priority. Our goal is that everyone obviously goes home safe and healthy every day.

We saw a reduction quarter-on-quarter in our frequency rate from 0.92 to 0.77. But disappointingly, we still had six LTIs. There is still a lot of work to do. It is completely unacceptable, and we need to focus on our safety until we get to our target of zero harm. All of our leaders, all the way up to the executive committee, including myself, are spending more time in the field and at the mine site. They are doing more critical control verification and fixing more risks on the spot.

On top of that, we have also invested over $90 million this year in technology to improve safety. This includes up to our automation of mining equipment and right down to vehicle dash cams, safety reporting software, and AI analytics. We are also working hard to engineer out as many safety hazards as possible.

So turning to our Q2 highlights. Actually, before I start on the Q2 highlights, one other thing I would like to clarify about earnings, which $0.82, adjusted earnings $0.82 per share, is in line with the Bloomberg consensus. There is some media out there this morning says it not, that we missed, but, I am not sure what the source of that is. Barrick produced 796,000 ounces of gold in the quarter, which was 3% above guidance and 11% over Q1.

The main drivers of that were we progressed the ramp-up of Loulo-Gounkoto ahead of schedule. Pueblo Viejo ramped up faster than expected after the maintenance shutdown in Q1. And we mined record tons underground at Cortez and continued the ramp-up at Goldrush. On the copper side, we produced 56,000 tonnes. We managed costs well and our gold costs, as I said, were within guide.

Our earnings nearly doubled year-over-year, and we more than doubled quarterly shareholder return to $1.5 billion. The strong performance for Q2 is obviously across all of our regions. North America continued to anchor our world-class portfolio. Nevada Gold Mines and Pueblo Viejo both registered year-over-year revenue growth.

Together, they accounted for 53% of our total attributable adjusted EBITDA at a margin of 61%. Our other regions also delivered strong gold production, with meaningful attributable EBITDA at margins of 59%. Copper continued to perform well and delivered comparable margins to our gold business. Moving on to growth. As I said, our growth projects advanced on schedule during the quarter. At Fourmile, we ramped up the drilling to 20 active rigs, and we plan to complete the PFS by the end of 2028.

At Lumwana, we made good progress on the mill expansion, which will double the copper production. We expect the project's 2026 CapEx to come in at the lower end of guidance, and the project remains on budget. We are on track to produce our first copper from the expansion by the end of Q1 in 2028. The Pueblo Viejo expansion also advanced on schedule.

We have made progress on permitting and construction across the tailings facility, haul roads, and water treatment plant. We are also very pleased to report that we now have 90% of resettlement packages being accepted. We continue to review Reko Diq, as previously disclosed, and we have decided we will not start building the plant this year. We have reduced our expected 2026 attributable CapEx. It was $600 million-$700 million, and is now $450 million-$500 million.

The lower spend on the Lumwana and Reko Diq has reduced our group guidance for 2026 total attributable CapEx to $3.8 billion-$4.2 billion. Back to the IPO of our North American assets. As I said, this entity will be a high-quality, pure gold play company, which assets are located exclusively in low-risk jurisdiction. What I am pleased to share is that the Board has selected me to lead the new company as a CEO on launch.

We have completed all operating and separation agreement between Barrick and the new company, and we remain on track to complete the IPO by the end of the year. We expect the vast majority of net proceeds raised to be returned to shareholders. I know several people have asked me in the past. I will now turn it over to Helen Cai, our CFO, who will review our financial performance.

Thank you, Mark, and good morning, everyone. Q2 marked the third consecutive quarter of strong production, cost performance, and financial results. Net earnings were $1.2 billion, a 50% increase year-over-year. Adjusted net earnings was $1.36 billion, which equates to adjusted EPS of $0.82, in line with Bloomberg consensus.

Attributable adjusted EBITDA of $2.5 billion was up 51% year-over-year, with a 59% margin. On a cash flow basis, the second quarter is typically our lowest each year for free cash flow due to the timing of our annual tax and interest payment. This quarter, we also incurred a one-time $200 million payment related to Loulo-Gounkoto. Combined, this led to a 33% decline in year-over-year attributable free cash flow. Excluding this, attributable free cash flow for the quarter would have been over 60% higher year-over-year.

Year to date, attributable free cash flow has been $1.4 billion, more than double the same period last year. Turning to the operations, gold production increased 11% quarter-over-quarter and exceeded guidance. We continue to operate within our cost guidance, reflecting an acute focus on operational efficiencies to offset fuel price pressures.

We closed Q2 with a healthy $1.2 billion of net cash on the balance sheet, giving us flexibility to continue investing in our highest return opportunities and returning capital to shareholders. Turning to our capital allocation framework, we have three priorities. First, managing the balance sheet with discipline. Second, investing in our assets to drive earnings accretive growth. And third, returning capital to shareholders. Our framework is designed to be sustainable through the cycle.

On the balance sheet, we ended the quarter with meaningful access to liquidity, an undrawn $3 billion revolving credit facility, and no meaningful debt due until 2033. Turning to our portfolio, Lumwana and Fourmile are two clear examples where we are strategically deploying capital into organic opportunities that we believe will generate superior returns.

More broadly, we intend to identify similar earnings accretive opportunities to strengthen our growth profile while remaining disciplined in how and when we deploy capital. This is not about growth for the sake of it. It is about creating value over time with a suite of assets that has extraordinary growth potential. And finally, we are executing against our capital return policy. Our dividend policy provides for a quarterly base dividend of $0.175 per share, with an additional performance top-up at year-end to target a total payout of 50% of attributable free cash flow.

We also completed $1.2 billion of share repurchases this quarter, of the $3 billion authorization that was announced last quarter. In the three quarters since new leadership began in October 2025, Barrick has returned $3 billion in dividends and buybacks to shareholders, more than double the prior corresponding period.

We expect a careful execution of our capital allocation strategy to drive further shareholder returns. In summary, our capital allocation framework is disciplined, flexible, and designed to work throughout the cycle. It supports reinvestment in the business, advances growth, protects the balance sheet, and creates a clear pathway for returning excess cash to shareholders. With that, I will turn the call back over to Mark.

Okay. Thank you, Helen. Just on guidance, our 2026 production and cost guidance remain unchanged. For the third quarter, we expect gold production to be higher than Q2, consistent with that plan, and we expect even higher production in the fourth quarter. Copper production should also increase in the second half of the year relative to the first half.

To say it again, since October 2025, we have consistently delivered against our strategic priorities and set a new standard of operational performance. Again, I would like to congratulate our GMs and our people on the site. We continue to focus on controlling costs, capital intensity, and productivity. Based on what we see today, we remain confident in our ability to deliver on our full-year commitments for 2026. Just a couple of things to conclude.

Obviously, again, I am going to finish with the most important thing, which is safety. As I said, even though we have seen significant improvements, everyone is still focused on making sure every employee goes home safe every day. We have improved our operational consistency, which is what I said, and we have delivered on our guidance again. As I said before, we have delivered on all our projects. They are on time and on budget.

I will say again, I am not sure how many times we hear that in the morning. We have advanced our North American IPO on schedule as well. We are basically on track to execute against all the four priorities that we set at the start of the year. Again, I want to say, and of course, we have transformed this relationship with Newmont, which allows it to get full value and expand NGM. With that, I will hand it back to the moderator for Q&A. Thank you.

Thank you. For the Q&A session, we will use the raise hand feature in Zoom. If you would like to ask a question, click on the raise hand button at the bottom of your screen. Once prompted, please unmute yourself and go ahead. We will now pause for a moment to assemble the queue. Our first question comes from Josh Wolfson with RBC. Your line is open. Please unmute and go ahead.

Yeah. Thank you very much, operator. Thank you, Mark, for those introductory comments and some of the numbers that were provided. I wonder if you can maybe break down more of the information behind the different values that would have been attributed to the agreement components. I guess, what would have been Mike and Fiberline within that $1.95 billion, and then perhaps what the adjustments would have been to the prior disputes. Thank you.

Okay. Josh, just to be clear, I am not going to break it down. On the prior disputes, I cannot give a number on that. We would have had to go through a process to actually get to that number. We just got to where we are. Then on the structural changes, now that we have this agreement done, we are actually going to go away and optimize this structure for the IPO.

As you can imagine, that is a bit of a work in process that has been. But the overall value that we had on the table when we ended this discussion was about $14 million, as I highlight. Just one other thing, Josh. The thing I want to highlight is, since I started this job, NGM has a lot of opportunity. You know the assets well, and I am sure you agree with that.

There has been no increase in processing capacity there for years. We are dealing with 25-year-old infrastructure, and then we have something like Fourmile that comes in, which is a world-class asset. The answer is that we are just going to feed that through the current infrastructure and delay the other amps.

Which anywhere else in the world, if you found that number of answers, you would be wanting to bring that in early. My discussions with Natascha and Newmont, right from word go, was how do we get this together so we can optimize NGM? By optimize, I want to look at increasing processing capacity. I want to stop trucking ore all over the state.

And the only way I can do that is if we combine all these assets now and work together to see if we can justify a roaster or an autoclave and what we need to build, what infrastructure we need at Cortez, to process Fourmile and Gold Rush, get our cost structure in place, and increase our overall answers. So where we've landed now, at least we're in a position, in my view, to add a lot of value very quickly without getting into these disputes about allocation of resources.

And obviously, Josh, there'll be a lot of synergies as well, because we're just going to use the same team. We're going to combine them all together, all the same equipment, and we can advance this a lot quicker. And that was obviously my ultimate goal.

Great. Thank you for that detail. Just a follow-up question. With this resolution now completed, is the company considering a different structure in the IPO versus the 10%-15% minority that was historically reviewed? And could you go larger? And, if the company went larger, under what circumstances would there be a shareholder vote?

No, Josh, it'll still stay at 10%. I don't see any of that just the way the company is structured. Anyone correct me if-

No. Sorry, it's George speaking. That's exactly it. I think it's just a matter of looking at the structures that we started looking at right at the beginning, comparing it to the current structure, because as Mark said, it's friction costs within there. And also look at where it's domiciled, et cetera. So there's all these things that we need to go back and look at now that we have the agreement with Newmont. And again, as Mark said, that's where the value comes as well. We have this flexibility and optionality.

Great. Thank you very much.

Thanks, Josh.

Our next question comes from Tanya Jakusconek. Your line is open. Please unmute and go ahead.

Good morning. Can you hear me?

I can hear you, Tanya. How are you?

How are you? Houston, we've made contact, which is awesome. Congratulations on your new role.

Thanks very much.

Can I ask you questions, if I could? The first one is just coming back to Josh's question. Should we be thinking, Mark, that it was $4 billion of the Newmont massive plus dispute, plus the $2 billion that is the top-up for a total of $6 billion? Is that how I should be thinking about the price paid?

No. Tanya, it's $4 billion total package.

Oh, okay. All right. Thank you for that. Should I be thinking about the cash that Newmont is paying for this? Is this going to be part of the cash coming into the IPO, or would this $2 billion be cash that is going to be potentially used for share buyback and/or the top-up dividend at the end of 2024, or 2026, sorry?

Okay. Sorry. You're very hard here. Tanya, I think if I got the question right, the cash we get back would be the majority of the return to shareholders, correct.

Okay. My final question, Mark, just for some of the processes for this IPO still. You mentioned that you've done your separation agreements. I think everything has been filed with the SEC, the technical reports. What are we still waiting for? Is it just approval from the SEC filing the three-and-a-half-year financials, completing the new board? Maybe just the process of what we need to go for this to go live. Thank you.

Actually, Tanya, let me hand it over to George. He's more up to date.

Sorry, Tanya. I would say we're actually very close. But like I said, now that we have this agreement with Newmont and their consent, one of the things we want to do is go back and look at how previous structures and compare that to what we have today. We just want to go do that and make sure we do our diligence and understand the impact of that, because we think there are big savings there. That's where we are at the moment.

Okay. Thank you.

Thanks, Tanya.

Our next question comes from Lawson Winder with BofA Securities. Your line is open. Please unmute and go ahead.

Thank you very much, operator. Hi, Mark. Good morning to you and the team. Very nice operational call. Congratulations on that. Just a couple of questions. To follow up on Fourmile, I noted that the PFS is still on track for completion in 2028. However, with it now vended into NGM, is there any scope to speed up development and potentially have the asset into production earlier than what the initial PEA had indicated or around early 2030s? That is the first question.

Okay. Thanks, Lawson. Look, obviously, my intention is to accelerate this as fast as possible. Now that I sort of got through this process, I think that allows us to accelerate it for sure. We are still going to be limited by permitting timelines and things like that, but where I think we can really advance it is on the processing side as well, right?

Because I am going to advance that, and I have already talked to Natascha about it. We are going to advance that all in parallel. That is why we are driving those declines and doing this drilling. So it may not come on earlier, but hopefully when it comes on, we will be able to ramp it up a lot quicker and to actually a higher production target. That would be my target.

Okay. Very helpful. Thank you, Mark. Maybe I could jump to the IPO. After the initial minority interest is spun out, at this point, have you changed your thinking on what could come after? I think you had indicated previously that it would just be an initial minority interest IPO, and that would be it. Is there any thought to eventually IPO-ing 100% of BNA at this point?

No. Lawson, not at this point. I think we're still on track to do the 10% and just show the value and highlight the value of a dedicated management team. Just by the way, we've already pretty much split the management team and hopefully you've noticed the change in production and safety and things like that with just having that dedicated focus. Anyway, to answer your question, no, there's no update that we're going to go past 10%.

Okay. Very helpful. Then in terms of the process, will there be a marketing process that will kick off in the relatively near future?

There will be, but I don't know what the date is. George, do you know?

Well, again, we just have to go back and look at that. But also absolutely there will be a marketing process.

Okay, great. Thank you very much for taking the questions.

Thanks, Lawson.

Our next question comes from Anita Soni with CIBC. Your line is open. Please unmute and go ahead.

Hi, good morning. Mark, congratulations on your new role and on improving operations at NGM. My first question was with respect to the capital that you were talking about. I think you just talked about declining infrastructure. I am just wondering what the capital would look like for a new roaster or a facility of that sort, and then what can we also expect in terms of NGM capital going forward?

Okay. That's a good question, Anita. On the roaster, I want to re-optimize the whole process flow. You've been there several times, so you've seen what it's like. The roaster, we've actually got Hash looking at it permanently now. I would've said it's $2.5 billion. I don't really know, but it'd be around that number. That will offset a lot of things as you know, we'll be trucking stuff all over the countryside as well, and it would reduce some other infrastructure requirements. As far as other capital, Wessel will help me out. What else is material that's coming up in NGM?

It's really it, Mark. Obviously our development of Fourmile as we guide at the market.

Yeah.

The conceptual PEA is in the range of $1.5 billion-$1.7 billion that we'll be spending over the next few years on Fourmile. Apart from that's really the items that we've got in our capital portfolio. We are planning this year to pull some capital forward for the expenditure that we have on replacing our truck fleets at Turquoise Ridge.

Actually a few project classes also guiding the autonomous hauling that we have at Carlin. It depends following the success that we've had with those projects. We still also expect to land our capital alignment with what we guide a few years ago, at least for North America. Those are the few projects.

Thanks, Wessel. Does that answer, Anita?

Yeah, that's a good answer. I think I also wanted to ask about the Fourmile PEA. I understand you are moving forward with a PFS with a different type of structure, I guess, in terms of what you're looking for infrastructure. But would this PEA, should that not have been filed 45 days after you announced the PEA?

I would venture to say that that's probably part of the reason why you're seeing your share price move, because we don't really have a barometer right now outside of a slide deck that'll give you the bare essentials in terms of how to model this. You're seeing wide degrees of variance in terms of what people are modeling for Fourmile. Would you be able to file the PEA that was put out last year, so at least we have something to go with while this PFS comes out?

Actually, Anita, it's a fair question. Because you reckon that's why our share price is down 7%?

Well, if everyone's debating whether or not there's what the $2 billion is and people are backing out something lower, which is something that you said on the call, then it's because they're not certain of what the Fourmile value is.

Okay. I haven't got a good answer to that, Wessel.

When we issued the PEA, it was conceptual in nature and still up to technical.

Okay. But Anita, you're saying you haven't got enough information basically, that's what you're saying.

Yeah. There were a lot of things that are unknown in terms of mining methodology, unit costs. We didn't know about this NPI. That was one major thing that was embedded in there, but nobody knew about it. I also just wanted to ask in terms of Fiberline.

Sorry, Anita, let me just-

Yeah, sure.

We will take that away and see how we can do a better job of that. I understand what you're asking, so I'll work something out and come back to you.

Okay. I wanted to try one last time on the Fiberline and Mike. Can you give us some round numbers in terms of what that would add to the equation? I'm assuming, by the math, I would assume that Newmont is paying in for Fourmile, but you guys are reciprocally paying for their 38.5% of Fourmile and Mike. It's the net, I guess it's 61.5% that they're vending in of those specific assets to get to a collective $4 billion. Is that the right way to look at it?

Yeah. The right way is, yes, we're paying for 61.5% of Mike and Fiberline and that other settlement amount, which we're certainly not going to get into. Look, Anita, we agree we're just going to go out with a number, and that was quite a bit. So look, I apologize, but no, I can't give you that breakdown.

Okay. All right. I guess with the IPO coming up, people are trying to understand what that significant component of Fourmile is. So any additional information would be helpful. Thank you. I'll leave it there.

Thanks, Anita. Appreciate it.

Our next question comes from Daniel Major with UBS. Your line is open. Please unmute and go ahead.

Hi, team, and thanks for the questions. Sorry, just a clarification on the $4 billion, just to be clear, is that the combined transaction value of 61.5% of Fiberline and Mike and 38.5% of Fourmile, or is it just the Fourmile component? Sorry if that's already been stated.

Sorry. When you net everything together, and anyone jump in here if I get this wrong. To get to the $4 billion number, it is the value of Fourmile, the 38%. Then you have to net off the value of 61.5% of Fiberline and Mike. There is some money in there to settle some legacy disputes, for want of another word, as well. Then if you want to understand the full value, there's obviously some benefit to Barrick by getting that consent and reducing the friction costs on the IPO.

Okay.

I probably make it very complicated, Daniel, but

No, that's okay. Just being clear. Okay, that's fine. You've alluded to some of this already, but if I look at the high level parameters of the 2025 PEA 600,000-750,000 ounces, $1.5 billion-$1.7 billion of CapEx, and $650-$700 all-in sustaining cost. You suggested there's $2.5 billion more CapEx, maybe on downstream processing and maybe some upside to the production. Would it still be fair to assume that the all-in sustaining cost would be comparable to the $650-$700?

Yeah, I would say it's comparable and hopefully if we....

depending where we locate that roaster, you could actually exceed.

There is one point that we would raise, and sorry to Wessel. Alan speaking. The AISC ratings that we put up as part of the conceptual PEA were naturally based at the consensus gold prices at the time, which from memory was around about $2,500 with instant exit. So if you do apply today's long-term average consensus prices of $3,600 an ounce, is about $100 sensitivity for every $1,000 if the gold price moves. So, the right way we look at it is to say the range that we put up previously plus $100 to take into account the fact that the gold price has moved $5,000 since.

Okay. Daniel, just to go back though, just to the engineering side of it. Obviously, the idea is that we increase the overall production capacity in Nevada or reduce trucking. So yes, there will be more capital, but it will increase the production profile and lower the cost. That would be the target.

Okay. And sorry, the line wasn't totally clear. So yeah, so at 3,600, you would add $100 to the 650-700. Was that what you alluded to? Just to be clear.

That is correct. Yes.

And that incorporates the tech NPI sensitivity in there?

Correct. Includes all royalties, including the deck.

Okay. Okay, that is clear. Then, sorry, just final question on this. If we are looking at the valuation of the standalone project or relative to what is implied in the $4 billion and the various elements, is there any, or can you provide some more detail on whether Newmont benefited from any assumptions around their 38.5% share of the infrastructure in that calculation that was imputed in the value of today's transaction?

I'm not sure I understand that question, Daniel.

Okay, so there's a net off against displacing other material from the process plants.

I'm sorry, yes.

How is that adjustment made?

Yeah, that was taken into account by the two technical teams. By the way, the two technical teams, one from Newmont and one from Barrick, sat down with the model for it and all of the data, and went right back and took all of that into account when we came up with the figure.

Okay. Thank you. And maybe just one more if I could. You've obviously, I guess, yeah, Mark, you're going to be leading the IPO vehicle. Can you give us any indication of how advanced you are in recruiting for senior management positions in the parent company?

We're advancing that discussion, right, for the next leader of Barrick. We'll be updating you, I would say, shortly, is the right term. We'll update the market shortly. It's an advanced process, Daniel.

Okay. Thanks so much for the questions.

Thanks, Daniel.

Our next question comes from Bennett Moore with JPMorgan. Your line is open. Please unmute and go ahead.

Hey, good morning, Mark and Helen. Congrats on the strong quarter. Thank you for taking my question. I want to pivot to a slightly different topic here. I'm wondering if you can discuss in more detail ramp plans for Loulo-Gounkoto, specifically in regard to the push into open pit ore, what sort of CapEx may be required to support this and your risk appetite to do so.

Okay. Thanks, Bennett. I'm going to hand it over to George.

I think the best way to explain Loulo-Gounkoto at the moment is, as we've said, we've ramped it up quite successfully. What it has become is it's become self-sustaining. Therefore, any capital and growth at the moment that we are funding is self-sustained funding. Our expected growth for next year would start coming from the Baboto pushbacks, and the open pits on probably early or middle of the second quarter. That's, I think, most I can say at the moment. We are still looking at optimizing those plans. But certainly, we would be starting to move into the open pits in the first half of next year.

Thanks.

All right. Thanks for that context. Then maybe on the production cadence overall, I know you gave some commentary, Mark, on the back half for both gold and copper, but NGM and PV tracking towards the high end, LG tracking ahead. So what level of conservatism do you feel is kind of baked in at this stage?

Well, I don't think it's conservatism necessarily, but, Bennett, look, we're going to hit our guides, as I said. Just, I suppose to put something else on the table, we've had Veladero down for, I think it's two weeks now. We had a weather event where we had to evacuate everyone. I'm sure you probably saw it on social media and things, out of Chile and Argentina.

So that has hit us, and Porgera has been down for the opposite reason, because Wiley Creek Dam dried up and we had to shut the whole plant down. While I'm still confident we're hitting guides, and you're right, NGM's in a good place and so is PV, we have had some other issues throughout the portfolio. Both of them are actually Mother Nature events. They're not actually operational problems. I still think the guidance is fine, but it's certainly not conservative.

Understood. And then real quick, just wondering how turnover trends at NGM during the quarter, if you're still in the mid-teens range?

Who's got that number? It was 14%. Someone else brought this up. Does anyone know what the answer is? I'll have to get back to you on that, Bennett. It's a good question, and it's something we are actually focused on, is making Barrick and especially NGM the employer of choice, right? It's not that long ago that everyone wanted a job at Barrick.

We are working on that. As I said, the culture at NGM, despite what might have been in some articles, has, in my opinion, turned around completely, right? You can tell that just by the performance that I said. Their production performance, their safety performance, just when you go there, the attitude of the workforce is certainly better than it was. I'll get you the actual number if you can note that down then. We'll come back to you.

Understood. Thank you. Best of luck.

Thanks, Bennett.

Our next question comes from Matthew Murphy with BMO Capital Markets. Your line is open. Please unmute and go ahead.

Matthew, I cannot hear you if you are talking. Matthew, can you hear us?

Our next question comes from Bob Brackett, with Bernstein Research. Your line is open. Please unmute and go ahead.

Good morning. A broader question, then maybe I will follow up with the NGM. The broader question would be, if I think about the ex-North America business, is there anything you are contemplating in terms of portfolio management on that asset base? Is that going to be slowed down by the IPO process?

Sorry, Bob, just to explain that to me a bit more, what do you mean by that?

Think of all of the assets you have. There is a lot of natural partners or natural owners of some of your assets that sit outside of North America. Does the North America IPO process sort of take all of your attention, and therefore, we shouldn't expect a lot of portfolio management for the non-North American businesses as we proceed, say, into the year-end or early 2027?

Look, actually, Bob, the rest of the world portfolio is actually one of our biggest growth things. We talk about NGM a lot, but actually just at our recent board meeting, we had a whole session on growth for the rest of the world because of the

That's why

potential. You've seen what's going on at Lumwana and even around Kibali and what we can do there. The current plan is definitely grow the rest of the world, and that's what the focus will be. Seb, if you want to chime in there.

Yeah, I think you've covered it, Mark. I think the most important thing on the rest of the world is that firstly, we are looking how we can best optimize that portfolio, and in terms of what Mark suggested around the partnerships that we're able to leverage.

Also we have a real embedded growth profile, especially brownfields growth around most of our operations. You have already embedded infrastructure and of course, that's probably the lowest cost ounces you're going to add into your production profile. Then, as you said, we've got the Lumwana expansion on the cards.

But there, Bob, there is. I'm not sure how familiar you are with those assets, but there is a lot of potential around those current assets, which we're trying to crystallize and put into a proper plan.

Very clear. A quick follow-up. On the agreement with Newmont, are there any contingent payments involved at all, say, for hitting exploration upside, or can we consider it pretty much done independent

No

of future exploration success?

No, it's done, Bob.

Okay, very clear. Thank you.

Thanks.

Our next question comes from Steven Green with TD Cowen. Your line is open. Please unmute and go ahead.

Yeah. Thanks, Mark, for taking my question. I just wanted to follow up a little bit on how you intend to optimize NGM and potentially accelerate Fourmile. I think Lawson and Anita asked most of my questions, but maybe you could just talk a little bit about permitting requirements and what will be required there.

Okay. Thanks, Steven. Look, on the permitting, obviously, we want to get the permit for[inaudible], obviously, out first. After that, when I look at this, which again, is why it's critical that we got this joint venture sorted out. I have to understand what we can do as far as processing before I can even start the permitting. I'm trying to accelerate that for that very reason.

It's probably not a bad time to get permits in Nevada as well. I can't give you a clear answer on the timing on the permits and that sort of thing. But now that we've got this agreement in place, we are going to sit down and completely optimize Nevada and that ore flow. I know Newmont is supportive also of, what's the word? Increasing processing capacity. Steven, we always get into this same discussion. We're going to have to thrash out which is autoclave versus roaster and where it should be positioned. I just haven't got a clear answer on that, but that's what we'll be accelerating starting tomorrow.

Okay, thanks. Just to follow up again on Fiberline and Mike. I believe you said there were roughly 6.4 million ounces in those properties. Is that correct? Are those inferred ounces?

Actually, anyone know what the breakdown of the 6.4 is? I was just going through the presentation before this. I'll get back to you on that, Steven.

Okay, thanks. Where roughly are those properties and kind of how far advanced are they?

Fiberline is close to the infrastructure at Turquoise Ridge, and I think that is at a reasonable status. It's an open pit, so it would be a matter of a satellite deposit. Mike, at this stage, I haven't put a lot of value towards that, mainly for-

Okay, great. Thank you very much.

Thanks, Steve.

Our next question comes from Martin Pradier with VERITAS Investment Research. Your line is open. Please unmute and go ahead.

Hi, thank you for taking my question. I wonder if you have given any thought about floating 10% of the ex-North America as well.

Floating 10% of?

Floating 10% of. Basically now you're going to have almost two companies, the North America and everything else, right? The rest of the world.

Correct.

Could you, down the line, float 10% of the non-North America, the same way you're doing now, the IPO for the North Americans?

Okay. No, Martin, I've got to be honest, we have not had that discussion. It's never come up, so it's certainly not on the table at the moment.

Okay. The second question I have is, in other expenses, there was this $200 million for Loulo-Gounkoto, because you are applying, if I understand correctly, that 2023 law retroactively. Was that part of the original agreement? If it was, why it was not included in the previous quarter? Is this a new development?

No, look, this is a bit of a fluid situation, as you can probably imagine. Let me hand it over to Helen to explain that.

Hi. Thank you for the question. The nature of the spending is additional royalties, penalties, and associated interest based on the retrospective application of the 2023 mining code, specifically for the year of 2024 and 2025. Previously, we had already settled anything related to 2023 and earlier years. This is specifically for the 2024 and 2025. In terms of the amount paid, we paid cash $200 million in April, and also we had a further payment demand of $48 million that was received in July. I hope that answers your question.

No, I'm just curious why it was not included in the previous quarters. It was part of the original agreement. It wouldn't have been provisioned or something?

Yeah. Maybe you can add to that.

I think maybe to simplify, the original agreement only covered up to 2023. We continued applying our conventions through that period where we were negotiating and in dispute. We still applied our original conventions, and so this was effectively, as per the agreement, it only applied the retrospective application to 2023, and therefore we had to do a reconciliation with the government for 2024 and 2025. This was that payment, effectively.

Okay. That's very clear. Thank you.

Thanks, Martin.

Our last question comes from Lawson Winder from BofA Securities. Your line is open. Please unmute and go ahead.

Yep. Thank you very much, operator. Thank you for taking the follow-up. I'll try to make this really quick. So one, you noted the revisions to the NGM joint venture agreement. Can you give us a little bit more color on the extent to which this would give Newmont additional say in various aspects of the operations, including the release of technical reports and whatnot? Whatever detail you're able to disclose I think would be very helpful.

Well, I think there's a couple of things. Firstly, just as a general thing, it's not actually in the joint venture agreement, but the way we've approached this is completely different. Newmont will have access to whatever information and the site, and we've already done that with Francois and now with David, their technical leads.

Then they come and give any feedback they can and any suggestions, which is always helpful. As far as actual rights go, the main one is around they do have a right to, and Joe, correct me if I get the language wrong, but when we appoint the general manager of NGM, we have to get their consent to who that is. Which I don't have an issue with that at all. I think that's fair enough.

The other part was, which we agree, which I also think would be quite helpful now that we've reset this relationship and actually want to advance this as quickly as possible, is that we'll likely embed in our executive team at NGM a Newmont employee, which I think it'll go a long way just with the transfer of information and things like that, and they will feel more comfortable with what's going on. So at a high level, that's what we agreed.

There was some other things around excluded property committees and other things like that, but really that's been taken care of with the fact we've brought Fourmile and Mike on and those things into the joint venture. So it's probably less relevant.

Okay, that's very helpful. If I could ask follow-up on the question about the CEO search for Barrick Mining parent. Can you share with us if there's a preference between an internal or external candidate?

Well, my preference is always internal, but at this stage, we haven't got to that conclusion yet, who it is. So there's internal and external candidates. That's all I really can say. My preference is obviously internal.

Okay, great. Thanks very much, Mark.

Thanks a lot, Lawson.

I will now turn the call over to Emily Chieng.

Yeah, sure.

Okay. Thank you. I just have an emailed question that I would like to read out. Given some feedback from shareholders, are you considering a spin-out of North America to existing shareholders rather than an IPO structure? Shares of Nevada and PV are distributed to current shareholders rather than diluting existing holders.

Okay. Who asked the question?

Daniel.

No, I know Daniel. A lot of people ask that question. The short answer is no. Anything else, Emily?

That's it. Thank you. I'll turn it back to the moderator.

Thank you.

Thank you. That concludes our event for today. You may now disconnect.