Kuya Silver Webinar | Bethania Mine: High-Grade Silver Production

Kuya Silver Webinar | Bethania Mine: High-Grade Silver Production

[Music]
hi everyone welcome to another K report
webinar featuring kuya silver I’m your
host Corey Fleck your host over at the
KE Report website and podcast where we
cover daily Market moves as well as
company updates such as companies like
kuya silver this webinar is produced in
conjunction with Focus
Communications Kya silver is traded on
the csse under the symbol KU y a on the
otcqb under the symbol KU Y A F and on
the Frankfurt exchange under the symbol
6m R1 I’m joined by David Stein
president and CEO as well as Christian
Aro the chief operating officer at Coya
silver now this webinar focused on the
move into production at the Bethania Pro
I thank all of you for already sending
in some questions to me for everyone
tuning in live you also have the ability
to ask questions throughout this webinar
by using this webinar software either
the chat function or the Q&A function
I’ll be monitoring those throughout this
webinar and interjecting questions here
and there as both David and Christian
present on this move into production
we’re going to give uh the room a little
little bit of time to populate here as
all of you are just tuning in we thank
you for all taking time with us to learn
a bit more about the quya silver story
there will be a recording made available
for this webinar so if you miss anything
you’ll be able to recap all of that now
I know a lot of you want to know about
financial metrics like cost cash flow
numbers we’ll get into as much of this
as possible and as much as the company
can disclose as they are again just
moving into production here so David
Christian thank you very much for
joining us I’ll hand the floor over to
you you guys can kick us
off thanks Corey uh our pleasure to be
here we haven’t done one of these in a
while and uh I think it’s a great form
to uh both to give uh investors that
know us a chance to uh update them and
also I think we’ve got a lot of new
people online today as well so uh very
very pleased to see that um so I’ll
start and go through a bit of uh the the
intro the the overview of the company
and then I’ll hand it over to Christian
to do more uh of a bit of a detailed
presentation on the uh on the mine
operations right now and then I’ll kind
of wrap it up at the end with uh some
comments on exploration which is uh you
know extremely exciting and we’ve made
announcements on both the the mine
operations and expiration just in the
past week so we’ll be able to you know
bring everybody up to current you know
up to present day on all of those all
those various
items um so let’s get started uh before
we do we um we’ve got our our notices
here um we uh are going to say a lot of
forward-looking
statements and uh and so please take a
look take at your meure uh you can read
over this statement it’s on our website
we do uh put our our presentations on
our website very easy to find kuya
silver.com uh so you can read all this
information uh and with
that let’s get started
so we have uh we’ve got two uh big
solver
projects and we’re going to mostly be
talking about bethia today almost
exclusively but we do have our silver
Kings project in Northern Ontario as
well in the historic Cobalt Ontario
silver mining
camp um but uh you know what we like in
and our strategy is these high-grade
silver districts and to
find uh projects and properties that
have the potential to go into
production uh and also get a commanding
land package uh so that we can grow
through exploration and you know
ultimately kind of a hub and spoke
production model as well with with
multiple mines feeding a centralized
plant that’s something that the silver
business gen
uh seems Seems to it seems to work very
well in the silver business um because
so many Silver Mines are these highgrade
veins like what we have in Peru
one thing we like to really emphasize
with with investors is the fact that we
we are able to do you know we are able
to do development and increase
production which is the yellow line at
bottom as well as doing exploration
exploration is very
important um and as most of you know
many of you know uh the vast majority of
Junior mining or Metals come companies
out there they only do
exploration um
and the problem with that is that
there’s sort of No Light in the end of
the tunnel in terms of generating your
own cash flow uh so that one day you
know you you don’t need to keep going
back to investors and issuing more
shares so we feel like our strategy is
you know is is is better it’s it works
especially well in again in the silver
business where you can start mins
without a lot of
capital and that’s what’re exactly what
we’re doing with Bethania so you can see
you know the various stops along the way
um including what we’ve already done and
what we’re what we’re about to do
here in the in the you know in the next
few months and years uh every stop that
we that we take here adds value to our
to our
shareholders uh whether it be you know
expanding our resources through
exploration at
bethia um you
know drilling our second project silver
Kings or most importantly and what we’re
going to talk mostly about today is the
development of the bethan mine getting
it into production and then growing
production from from there there from
that initial
State all right now let’s focus in on
bethia
um we
we really since the very beginning in
fact since before we went public we’ve
been taking you know this approach to
building bethia and really building a
company a mining company and it just so
happens that bethia is our is our first
and our Flagship asset but there’s sort
of a a model that so many other
companies have done before us we’re not
inventing it um and it works very well
and it works especially well with
high-grade vein deposits whether it be
gold or
silver
um and that’s exactly what we’re
embarking on now we’re kind of you know
pretty much done phase one here uh uh
just getting into production now and
then and that’s the big drisking factor
where you go from you know not having
any production not really knowing what
you’re doing to being in production
developing that expertise training your
people getting all the permits you know
that all needs to be done first so we’re
basically at the tail end of that
Journey now and we’re about to you know
start
production um once you get into you know
uh once you get into you know kind of a
steady state production then the next
big growth factor for you is going to be
to start reinvesting in
Exploration and by doing that you’re now
building you know
the next expansion of the mine or a
longer mine life or
both and so that’s something that we’ll
you know look forward to do in the you
know in the coming months and years from
now after we you know after we’re you
know more complete on the on the bethia
ramp up we’ll start to get more
aggressive on
exploration and you know at Bethania we
are very blessed with so many targets to
drill so much lwh hanging for fruit to
go after uh there’s no question in my
mind that bethana is going to be a lot
bigger it’s just a matter of time and
money to go out and do all that
exploration
work um once you have bigger resource
then you can go back now and and kind of
redesign your mind now we can make it
bigger and increase
production and you can do so organically
and what’s really nice is even if you
know even if there’s some expense to
expanding your plant even if there’s
some time that it takes to permit that
you’ll be making money the whole time
it’s not like you have to sort of sit
there and burn cash and wait for that to
happen you know we’ll be continually
making money you know if it takes 12
months if it takes 18 months to expand
we’ll be making money the whole time and
that’s obviously a much better position
for shareholders to be in than you know
the other one the other
position um and then
once the mine is expanded to the point
where you know you’re happy with it then
you go with what I call phase four which
is the repetition phase so now we’re
going to take that success and repeat it
either at the same asset by doing more
exploration and doing another expansion
or it could be a second mine uh you know
in our case we’ve obviously got one in
the pipeline already silver Kings not
ready to go into production today even
not even next year but you know several
years from now it could be so that’s
really the model that we’re following
and there’s many successful companies
that have done just exactly this David
if you could just elaborate a little bit
more on that point three that whole
expanding of the mine and production
there what sort of metrics make you move
ahead with that is it production levels
is it cash flow levels is it simply cash
in the bank what sort of things push you
into that third
phase okay well for us what the third
phase will look like is we’ll already be
producing at 350 tons per day steady
state we’ll have done some exploration
you know and expanded our resource and
now we’ll be looking at okay at what
point do we want to go beyond 350 tons
per day and you know the great thing
about the Bethania project is it’s quite
flexible um so for example if if we
wanted to double production we would we
would look at doing a basically a
duplicate circuit to our
plant um if we wanted to go something
even bigger than that we would do
probably the same design but just make
the equipment
bigger um if we wanted to do a smaller
expansion we could potentially do a
blend of toll milling and our own
plant uh processing at our own plant so
we’ve we’ve actually got a number of
different options for us you know to do
anything from you know a small expansion
let’s say 350 to 500 tons per day to a
bigger expansion maybe as much as a
th000 tons per day which I think would
be a good longer term goal for us to get
to a th000 tons per day
now uh what that will look like is we’ll
be we’ll be obviously monitoring our
Resource as we as we uh as we drill and
as we
expand um and you know I think for a
high-grade vein mine you don’t really
want to be any more than 10 years of
mine life I think um because you know as
we know was very highly likely that
we’ll keep finding more whether we’re
extending the veins at depth or finding
new veins along strike or in different
zones in the case of
bethia um so uh you know so I think you
know at some stage if we get
to uh if we get to 30 million ounces
let’s say then we want to be designing a
plant that will have the throughput to
produce at least three million ounces a
year maybe more right uh if we get to 50
million ounces we’re looking we want to
do probably 5 million ounces Plus a year
and that’s to me that’s that’s a good
kind of ratio to to aim for um and uh
you know right now we’re at 14 million
ounces and we’re we’re going to be you
know doing about you know about one
tenth of that annually maybe a little
less but that’s uh that’s what we’ve
designed to start off with okay uh when
it comes to phase one and two here just
a quick question you’re in phase one
right now do you do phase one and two
together um
right we’re not doing phase one and two
together is there a circumstance where
you would yes um if if we were in a like
a RI roaring bull market where access to
Capital was really
easy and you know we we were well funded
and we had a market cap that was 10
times the size of what we have today uh
five to 10 times the size uh then I
could see us doing one and two at the
same
time uh basically con concurrently but
in instead we’ll be doing them more
consecutively because we’re really
looking at conserving capital building
up a cash position with our mine
operations before we start you know
moving aggressively more into
exploration okay
thanks but obviously that’s something
that can also change as the
market develops you know uh as well
access to Capital like you said right
need Capital to move forward with
especially with the exploration
okay I’ll try and speed up because I
spent a lot of time on that slide but um
here’s where we’re located Lima can see
where I’m pointing wo is a big city
that’s very close to the mine about
500,000 people um we’ve got Road access
to the mine we’re in this belt of silver
Le zinc mines um there there’s you know
even more to the north and south of of
this belt as well uh just put put some
ones that are closer to us on on the map
and um yeah that’s uh we’re you know
we’re in a great part of Peru Central
Peru um again lots of access to to
decent
infrastructure here’s our land package I
think this is really important now we’ll
talk more about exploration later but
it’s really important to demonstrate
that you know this is this project is so
much more than just the Bethania mine
itself um you know if if you if you want
to just kind of see the footprint of the
beanium line it’s right
here that’s supposed to be a rectangle
but it’s basically right there um and
then you know all the other red lines on
here and including you know including
this expansion to the to the east here
that’s all additional stuff that we have
not drilled yet that we know is there
because of our our mapping and our
surface sampling that we’ve done over
the years um and so
we’ve been able to methodically put
together this land package it it
currently is about 4,300 hectares around
the the mine um and you know the the
actual surface area of what what is the
mine today and our resource today is
probably about 15 or 20 hectares okay
out of four over 4,000 that we have to
explore
so that’s that’s just to emphasize that
we really have a huge District here uh
and and we know we’re not just like
saying that out of hyperbole we’re
proving it every time we go into the
field we find more veins we find more
mineralized systems and um and we’re
able to uh uh make this project a lot a
lot bigger in terms of the geological
footprint all right here’s our resource
model um again for those who are
unfamiliar um when we did our drill
program uh back in 2021 we really
focused around the mine workings because
we wanted to build a 3D model that we
could then go in and build a mine plan
around so we did exactly that we did uh
you know quite a bit of drilling in this
in this area small area here um that got
us our our measured and indicated
resource or sorry indicated and inferred
resources uh which then we built our our
mind plan around
and and here’s our resource um so you’ve
got about you know 6 million ounces
equivalent indicated and 8.3
inferred most of that is actually silver
metallic silver this is a real primary
silver deposit um about 70 to 75% of the
value is in actual silver and the rest
of it will be in other metals including
lead zinc copper and
gold but it is important there are very
few primary silver deposits out there
even some of the ones that market
themselves as silver are often mostly
gold or mostly zinc this is a real
silver
deposit um we had so many vein systems
when we did our resource uh that we we
ended up subdividing our our resource
into three vein systems we call them so
that’s Espanola doso Victoria and what
this is is these are major mineralized
structures that run basically east west
through the property so they’re all
subparallel Victoria does kind of cross
crisscross over do sit a m but they’re
all more or less going in the same
direction
and then they have branches and spays
that kind of come off of them in various
in various parts um and and so uh that’s
what makes up our resource about half of
it is above the Mind workings and half
of it is is immediately below uh and
everything is at depth uh and we’ve done
very little drilling at at depth so far
very little shallow drilling or very
little drilling deep drilling I should
say so between those three vein
systems uh they they’re modeled to a
depth of between 180 and 230 meters
depending on which vein system um and
you know these types of intermediate
sulfidation systems can go hundreds and
hundreds of meters deeper you know 500
meters 700 meters kilometer even um some
there are there are some examples of in
in Latin America so uh so this is uh got
a lot of potential to go a lot deeper
and that’s probably the easiest thing
for us to do to to grow our resources is
to just drill deeper just drill right
here where the resource is and keep
going in depth uh we’ve got great
results in our last drill program at the
bottom levels of the
mine but we do have a lot of other
targets as as well including on the
other side of the hill where we call got
the hilltop Zone we’ve uh mapped and
sampled a whole cluster of veins over
there uh some of which have very very
high grades of surface so that’s likely
likely G to meet up with the main
Bethania system we haven’t done enough
drilling to kind of figure out how that
all works yet but um it’s so close it’s
got to be all one system really and it’s
just a matter of now doing a lot more
drill ing on the property uh especially
off to the east to basically extend the
strike length so that’s another lwh
hanging fruit Target for us and we
haven’t even left them the property yet
the original mine concession so that’s
that’s kind of the resource again we’ll
we’ll come back to that later when we
talk more about expiration but let’s
turn it over to Christian now and uh
talk about the the Mind
development okay hello everybody for us
he’s very
this is a very exciting moment to be
talking to you the first for the first
time of what we have been doing in the
mine what we have been
accomplishing since uh we started the
company until this year that we uh
launched our reconditioning program for
the underground facilities and
infrastructure at at bethana mine so I
would like to give you a first an big
overview of where of what what happened
and then we will dral down into the
details so in terms of development kuya
completed uh the first tranch of
Strategic investment from trafigura um
that include the ofte agreements that
are
already already agreed with trafigura in
term in in terms of the quantities terms
then we also completed the 3.5 million
placement in December 2023 and the and
since then we had continue work working
towards the start of production and once
we started the reconditioning and the
development we also started the
Improvement on the surface surface
infrastructure that will allow us to
have a feasible and viable operation
very soon as you will see here we are
targeting to start production and toll
Milling basically mind production and
then toll Milling by half of this year
so we will begin with a toall Milling
operation as per the base case the
alternative case that is um explaining
in the PA as well and how we are going
to do this we are going to start with a
1,000 uh ton
batches uh from the mind with to the
process plant and then we’re start we
are going to ramp it up until the 350
tons per day Target that that we have
our plan and the target is that we will
get to 350 in 12 months the recondition
at bethana mine uh had been going very
well we are very happy with all the team
and everybody’s excited working working
in this uh task we have accomplished an
outstanding 550 meters fully
reconditioned 70% of them in dos de mayo
and we have been working the decline
that will be the first area that we will
Target for production so we are very
happy with the team there have been
challenges that we have been all
brainstorming how to solve it and now I
will send in a while I will show you
some more where we are and what we have
been
accomplishing we still keeping the same
all in sustaining cost that we have in
the PA for the first 16 month we have an
average head head grade of 13.8 however
as you know in this narrow vein system
we are confident that this is an average
we are going going to go go above it and
the silver
production is as expected in terms of
ones once we get to to 350 tons per
day so let me give you uh update that
shows the progress that we have been
doing in terms of meters okay week by
week and then how how do we plan to end
uh in the very very near future right
now we are here at this point at 591 M
rehabilitated until Monday
so the first sto that we will start
working is in level 640
Espanola this level will be the first
one that we start production we target
it as I said half of half of the year
but very soon after that we start with
the development of the level 6 67 in
Victoria for the ones that are familiar
with vaia you will know that we have two
basically directions or branches one
goes towards Espanola the other goes
with through dosu so we get to Espanola
first but we are very happy that we are
now arrived to the intersection with
Victoria 30 mters after we accomplish
the 60 this the Stope the first sto at
640 we are going to start going up to in
the M race and continue to and open our
second store our second store will be a
uh will be in the race at 640 still in
Espanola okay and this will allow us to
have the 640 and the 640 race both in
Espanola and we will be get very close
to being on production uh
Victoria later we are going to start the
Strategic Crossing to do of the
okay also at the at at the same level
and we are going to start we are going
to start with our third store the third
store will still be in Espanola ve but
at the same time we will launch the
first sto in a vein that is different
from Espanola Victoria then as you will
see three months after we started the
first sto we will start the fifth sto at
the do de Mayu so we plan to have all
these okay and the good thing is that
the progress this this line here for the
guys who who who are
following uh the progress you will know
that we are expecting the production to
continue and then improve because once
we start opening the stove we’re going
to have production and Rehabilitation at
the same time until we get to this point
where we have five sto operationally
and more important the three main vein
system that David described will be
already will be
mined one of the main challenge okay
nowadays uh has been headcount basically
attracting Personnel to work
in outside this has been worldwi is not
a problem specific to Bethania it’s not
a problem specific to anybody all of you
guys who follow Min should know that
it’s less attract active every time so
we are glad to report that we have
successfully been able to meet our
headcount requirement right now we have
47 person so we have ramp up very fast
for that we have improved our
accommodation facilities we have we have
very nice accommodations up there and
now we are also working with the
community to have extra accommodations
with the community as part of our
commitments so we can continue the ramp
up towards production we we we think
that all this curve until week 11 has
helped us to prepare logistically okay
and in terms of service how we are going
to start catering for more people more
shifts and more uh basically level of
activity outside because we are going to
have the recondition and production at
at the same time what
is really
good so let me show you in terms of the
uh GE geologically how how we are going
to start
production this is the Espanola ve we
have the cross-section here and this
dotted line uh black dotted line the
decline so we had already rehabilitated
the decline and we are going to get to
this point the the yellow star marks the
first stop that we are going to be
exploding at Espanola at Espanola V and
this this Stope okay will be only 30 M
away from the second sto that is the
going up the the race still in Espanola
with that race that that help us
logistically but also it terms of it
help us in terms of ventilation it help
us in term operational capabilities
Material Handling so this is a very
strategic strategic Milestone that we
need to
accomplish let’s go into details now how
how the first stop will look that
picture that you can see in your right
shows the wall that we are going to mine
so as we are going to use an ascending
uh ascending cut at field method we are
going to basically cut a diagonal okay
to
simplify to simplify it I will draw here
we are going to cut a diagonal here and
the stove will be in this direction and
perpendicular to the screen we are going
to continue the development where does
this happen in this area that is uh that
has the red start so we had already this
is
the layout that I was telling you okay
of this the first the main two sections
that we have the one that go to do mayo
and to Espanola Espanola had was in
better conditions we have already
changed the
Timbers we’re using Timber support that
you can see in the picture so according
to our GE technical study and stability
analysis we Espanola vein was in better
shape than do Mayo that’s why we have
70% meters in do Mayo but we are going
to get to the first St in
Espanola The Rock quality was as
expected so we the RMR has been as
expected the highly fractured Rock has
been has been uh founded as expected
water flows has been as expected so that
how do has allowed us to work fast to
the first Stope and also that has allow
us to fully stable and dewater the the
dos de Mayo entrance so we will start
mining very soon the our path towards
Victoria V if we see the cross-section
down there you will see that these red
ones uh the boxes are area that had been
historically mined and now we are going
to be here down there that the other 30
meter race is that one that go up here
we’re going to see that in the next
slide here so we will continue through
Espanola going down and then we are
going to go up the decline will continue
to go down okay this with the same slope
and we are going to go up the
logistical portion at this time is very
important we are going to start we have
a a strategy for the material handling
using conventional method that will go
up to the decline okay with the with
the winch up up there in the end let me
show let me draw here the winch will be
here in the entrance Okay so we are
going to have a cycle that we have a
horizontal portion at level 640 okay and
then we are going to go up we we plan to
have five Cycles okay out of those five
Cycles three of them will have material
and two of them will be for service
meaning we need to you know we need to
bring Timbers we need to bring tools or
ways out up so with the with this cycle
we will be a able to get all the
material out to to this to this area
here and we are designing a system that
will allow us to bring to bring the to
complete the cycle
faster this same
logistical uh strategy will continue
until we get to 100 tons per day 100
tons per day is uh is the capacity that
uh let me show you here
so the capacity that were the current
status continue being good and then when
where we need to start making changes in
the mining strategy M design M
infrastructure mining method remain the
same so this is a graph uh that show the
progress in four different phases phase
one has been successful complete we have
already reconditioned the galleries that
that we required to initiate the process
the decline is had been dewat fully
reconditioned and operational the mining
Gru is now is now operational and the
mine race that are required for V for
ventilation because we have ventilation
the two levels where we have natural
ventilation and then we have the
compressors uh that will pump uh air
into the lower levels right now we are
in phase two phase two will be completed
very soon and we are going to start
production at Espanola vein at 640 as I
was explaining you then we start with
phase three phase three is where we
enable and activate the three vein
systems so with those three vein system
at the same time and with the same
Material Handling method we plan to get
to 100 ton per day in the next seven
month Although our uh we are going to
get to 350 okay the our main challenge
is to get to this 100 tons per day
because by that time we have we need to
have everything ready to jump to phase
four phase four implies upgrading
Material Handling system meaning more
vertical uh transportation that will
that will bring that will mean more
platforms more horsepower as well the
the ventilation system will need to be
expanded that that will include
different fresh air and re and
circulation infrastructure and we are
going to increase the number of stopes
so from the five sto that we have here
we are going to go all the way to 12
stopes until we get to 315 month 12 so
as you can see from zero to 100 we it
take us seven month but from 100 to 350
the learning curve will have already
been flat we have a very B more Ste and
we plan to get it fast to get there
faster so Christian that phase three
that that’s critical right when you’re
at that phase that’s when you’ll have a
pretty good handle on numbers production
numbers a bunch of financial numbers
around that time right yes for us uh
phase three is critical phase three is
where we are going to have everything
ready to make the big jump let’s say
okay I know that we are still a small
scale mine okay in this phase but for us
this will be uh critical because we are
going to have people working in three
different fronts okay that for a mind
like this is like
a Swiss watch basically we’re going to
be in a in a very small in a very small
way working work world class in three
different fronts with a very wellth
thought material handle system and
continue with the ascending cut and
field method that allow us to optimize
the way we are going to to to mine
remember that we are going to mine
through this ascending catam field and
it help us to
get to get highly selective it means
that it is possible to work with highr
uh highr section that with other method
will have been not mined uh it will be
mainly forgotten there however it allow
us to get to the to everywhere and this
method will be Carri out with the we be
minimizing the amount of weight that we
need to take out because in these small
minds Material Handling is one of the
main challenge because the moment you
are taking waste you cannot take all if
you only have one or two adies let’s say
however
with the method we are going what we are
implementing we minimize that and we
maximize the amount of or that is going
up okay that makes sense thank
you okay so and then we start phase four
that is the ramp the ramp up yes okay so
then now it’s for uh David will explain
you about the exploration exploration
upside we also we want to hear about
blue sky exploration upside here so I’m
sure we’ll get into that but let’s let’s
go on the exploration side of things
okay thanks um yeah look this is really
important
because
um you know obviously uh getting into
production and getting up to you know
350 tons per day over the next year is
is a massive would be a massive
achievement for the company uh we you
know we believe I know there’s some
questions about this we’ll be making a
lot of of money at that at that rate um
but nevertheless uh we see this as being
a much larger operation you know uh
three plus years down the road and of
course how we’re going to get there we
need we need to we need to demonstrate
exploration and and we are um but I’ll
show you you know that there’s a lot
more we can do so we start again on the
on the the original mine property here
uh so this is the bethia property in
long section uh
currently you know the um you know the
entire uh the entire mine the ENT our
entire resources just in this block here
um now keep in mind that there’s been
several million ounces mined out of here
already by previous
owners then on top of that even after
our our resource estimate we’ve actually
found some new veins uh on in this area
in this block that we didn’t know about
and so we didn’t drill them
um like for example the Carmen vein
which I which I put on the on the slide
so there you know this is you know our
our resource if you add indicated infer
together is is 14 million ounces you add
another some you know three four million
ounces that’s been mined out you know
add maybe something for the carbon vein
Etc you’ve got a a block here in this
very very small area that’s somewhere
you know easily between 15 and 20 Mill
million ounces of geological endowment
and you know it’s completely open uh
open depth uh our our best holes that we
drilled in our Pro program were our
deepest um the vein seems to be getting
thicker and the veins seem to get be
getting thicker and higher grade at
depth
um and uh and so uh and again if we look
at other similar systems to this uh you
know they can they can go hundreds of
meters
deeper and we don’t seem to have any you
know shallow structures at depth that
would cut us off either you know at
least at least based on our knowledge to
date so it’s looking very good here that
this could at least double a depth um
and that’s without without even looking
at the along strike portion here now the
along strike portion is very interesting
as well because we’ve got so many veins
just over here not that far away from
the mine above 500 met another cluster
of veins here uh structurally controlled
and you know related to the Bethania
mine structures themselves uh and uh you
know we’ve we have no resources here uh
we’ve done quite a bit of surface
sampling um but you know we need to do a
lot more work there there was a little
mine in here as well actually an
artisanal mine we know about called
Espanola do but we we never went in to
it we haven’t done any anything with
that um but we know there someone at
some point in the last 50 years did
produce here so this is the the M
Property you know if if you look at uh
you know 15 to 20 million ounces of
potential here no guarantees you you
look at the doubling at depth and then
doubling again along strike you know you
could have a much much larger system
here without even leaving the original
beanum mine property and just to be
clear even though we’ve got very very
exciting discoveries and Prospects on
some of the satellite zones this is our
top priority this is where the low
hanging fruit is this is where we can
add a lot of ounces very cheaply once we
do get the drills turning again how much
more work is needed to bring those up to
drill ready status
then well this is drill Bethania mine
targets are drill ready
I mean like for example to drill the
death potential we’ll probably have to
look at um building in some
infrastructure underground to drill and
then drilling from
underground uh for example uh that would
be an obvious thing to do that way we
can get you know deeper without having
to drill really long holes from
surface um but Target to long strike
what about those and then we would drill
those from service yes but are those
ready to be drilled then oh yes they are
ready yeah we we’ve mapped the veins at
surface there’s no no almost nothing
more we can do uh other than drill them
okay do you need permits you have
permits for that look we’re not looking
at doing any drilling right now uh it’s
more of a budget issue than a permitting
issue okay um but as we start generating
cash flow from the mine then we’ll start
siphoning some of that off to do more
exploration and and so that’s that’s an
important part of our organic growth
strategy
that you know allows us to look at you
know doing this drilling as we as we
start making more and more money from
the mine
okay now stepping back from the Bethania
property itself you know that that map
that I showed you was just the the mine
property at the in the lower right hand
corner
here we do have the two other zones
caras carus Norte off to the West here
and you know we’ve done a fair bit of
sampling surface sampling there um and
you know if you stacked those they they
appear to be parts of two parallel uh
structures that go uh to the to the
Northeast but um if you stack them you
know together alongside they’d be about
1.1 kilometers long the strike length
which is actually very similar to
Bethania um so you know we potentially
could have another Bethania
uh over here and uh and then even more
recently we
uh we announced just last week this uh
this this Tito Target or actually what
it was earlier this week sorry it’s so
fresh um the Tito Target and uh this is
a this is something that was noted in
the literature uh government literature
um you know just as a DOT on the map
really we didn’t really much about it we
we our our geologist went and did a
really nice comprehensive field program
in February uh really visited a whole
bunch of the areas on the property but
ended up focusing quite a lot of
attention on this
Target and uh you can see we we were we
traced a
um uh we traced a uh a vein a single
vein uh you know more than 600 meters
taking samples along the way
many of which were over a th000 grams
per ton equivalent silver equivalent uh
with very high silver but some but High
some high uh byproduct Metals as well
and you know again if if you want to
sort of compare that to what we have at
at bethia that’s actually longer than
the strike length of the whole Bethania
mine a little bit longer um and uh you
can see there’s we found these other
structures that kind kind of Branch off
and then there’s a few more off to the
West you know if if you if you look off
to the to the West here we um you’re
looking now at at a multi-kilometer
structure here you know between these
parallel uh veins or faults mineralized
faults that are probably all related to
each other in the same you know the same
uh mineralizing system so uh this is
looking like a really exciting uh
Prospect for us uh I would say I mean we
we I would say that this this probably
jumps the queue in terms of our our our
targets for uh for future
exploration um you know not to displace
the bethani mine but you know I think it
would come right after uh because the
grades we’re seeing here are are among
the highest that we’ve seen anywhere in
the property and uh uh it’s also very
close to Bethania so it’s a really
really nice Target we’re super excited
about it um and honestly this is this is
almost as new to me as it is to you
because we just got the data few few
days
ago so I mean wrapping up here um I
think you know Bethania is is perfectly
positioned on the lon curve uh to
generate a lot of value here in the
coming months um you know this sort of
Final Phase on the be on the on the lon
curve which sort of tracks a Mining
stock over its
life uh is really important because this
is this is the time when you go from you
know being a cash flow or cash burning
Junior company to uh you know a cash
flow positive company uh where now you
can you’ve got you know you’ve got cash
flow to allocate to drilling to you know
in our case we want to build a mill um
you know maybe even
beyond that we we look at you know
dividends and BuyBacks um those are just
simply not options when you’re not
making any money so uh so that’s why a
company becomes a so much more valuable
once they get that first mine into
production and that’s that’s where we’re
at cash flow that’s what everybody wants
hey David that’s what everyone’s been
asking about yeah yeah well especially
after you know after such a a a really
tough bare Market
um all right so here’s our cap structure
just updated for you know recent
closings and stuff like that um so we’re
sitting in about 40 million market cap
um with uh you know traffic era now
entering as a as a large shareholder uh
six six and a half
percent okay time to get into some Q&A
oh let’s do quick management team then
management team I’m not going to say
anything about this just to show this to
to people onine online uh great team you
know you’ve you’ve you you’ve heard from
two of us today um but you know
everybody on here is worth uh worth
talking to if you have the opportunity
and uh we’ll just leave it there this is
on our our website if you if you want to
look at people’s bios in more detail and
that’s it okay hey thank you David let’s
get into some of these questions and I
think we need to start off with some of
the financial questions here uh in terms
of margins what what sort of margins can
be expected here at
bethia yeah I I think the best way to
answer that is to is to go back to our
pea and then and then talk about what’s
going to change um and if if we go back
to our
pea uh once we get into kind of steady
state
production uh you know our all in
sustaining costs would be we’re look
were were estimated at you know in in
sort of the 10 to12 range depending on
the year and the grade Etc you know in
that sort of range um now when we start
toll Milling that’s going to add
another2 to3 three dollar uh per ounce
just for the additional cost for the
trucking and the and the Milling uh the
Milling fee so you know you’re still
looking at something that should be
under $15 all
in and if you you know if we’re selling
the silver at 27 28 obviously there’s a
pretty healthy margin there okay that
kind of ties into break evens then too
in terms of silver price and volumes
more around I guess the volume side of
things can you give us some insights on
when the break even what the break even
might
be sure I mean one thing to keep in mind
is that uh you know as you as you ramp
up production there there there are
always going to be some fixed costs and
so as you ramp up production you can
divide those fixed costs by more more
tons and more ounces and so you know
you’re your all in sustaining cost if
you just look at it like a month or a
quarter basis it’s going to start really
high and then it’s going to come down to
whatever that steady state is that we
just talked about so you know uh given
the the margin though uh that we do have
which is which is pretty pretty big um
you know I would expect that we’ll be
you know cash flow positive very quickly
um within a few months exactly what
month I I you know I can’t really say
but um but certainly it won’t be we
don’t have to like fully ramp up the
Mind B to make money uh as I said by
then we’ll be you know we’ll be making
you know almost 50% margin at that point
so um um so we’ll start turning a profit
way way before that okay yeah because
that was a question will you be cash
flow positive by the end of the year
sounds like you might
be yeah we we we think we’ve got a good
shot at that for sure um okay yeah
absolutely uh question regarding this
traffic gura off take what’s is the
agreement based on future spot prices in
essence I think what this question is
getting at is how much upside does kuya
have in terms of this traffic gear off
take to higher silver
prices I mean we basically have full
exposure to higher silver prices um the
off-take terms are going to be based on
global
benchmarks and that’s
really uh that really addresses more of
the cost of how much it costs
to uh to uh to to sell the material to
ultimately to a refiner but but you know
but traiger is in the middle there and
they need to make their money too uh as
a as a Metals Trader so so that’s that’s
kind of how that works is there there’ll
be there’ll be costs for the treatment
costs uh per per ton there’s a refining
cost for every ounce of precious metal
that you have in your concentrate uh and
then there are some other calculations
that go into that but basically that’s
it and that and those rates are fixed uh
based on global uh bench Ben marks uh so
you know we won’t have anything that’s
sort of any any different than really
any other bigger minor would have uh
that’s selling our simil our same
concentrates which are our the two
concentrates we’re going to be producing
are they’re they’re literally the most
common uh you know concentrates that
that you have outside of the copper
business so because we’re not we’re not
producing copper concentrate yet but um
but the the silver lead or lead silver
concentrate is going to be most of the
value of our of our uh con of our uh
it’s going to be most of our
Revenue I should say uh just from that
concentrate probably 80 85% of our
Revenue will come from that one
concentrate and that’s because we have
so much silver um and then we’ll produce
a zinc concentrate as well and and those
two concentrates are very it’s a kind of
a very L liquid concentrate Market
they’re very highly traded all over the
world uh lots and lots of smelters need
those concentrates in Asia China and
Europe Etc so that’s kind of how that
works okay uh now are all the sales
covered in this off take agreement
including future production from other
nearby deposits like
carmalita look I mean we uh we have we
have uh minimum tonnages that we’ve
committed to uh for the first several
years and you know we’ll we’ll meet
those however we we need to okay uh in
terms of that concentrate then question
regarding some of the new areas to be
explored and even new discoveries do you
see any relevant zinc and Lead values
potentially in these
areas yeah you know we we get we get
high lead and zinc in every pretty much
every single sample we take uh along
these veins and and the only variation
is that some of these zones seem to be
more gold rich or copper rich and some
some don’t have any gold copper so the
gold copper seems to be quite variable
um like at at caral caral Norte we had
two samples that we that we took on a
vein that had over five grams gold uh
which is very high for us I mean it’s
it’s it’s a it’s a silver vein system so
we don’t expect to get multi- multi-gram
gold and we and we did there um and then
we take lots of samples that have no
gold so uh but we we almost always have
high lead in zinc in these silver
veins um and it’s just a matter of of
how
much okay um question on funds then do
you have to raise any additional funds
before you become operation
start cash
flowing our plan at the moment is that
we don’t um and you know obviously uh uh
we think we’ve got a a nice uh cash
position right now um and you know there
there’s always I suppose things can go
wrong but we’re we’re working very hard
to make sure they don’t okay now in I
guess a reasonable not over promising
here but people are wondering when
exploration drilling could start I know
you’re focused on building the mine here
getting cash flow positive when could
exploration drilling reasonably start
though I think uh
realistically uh if we look at just
doing it from mind cash flow you’re
looking at early
2025 uh by then we should be making you
know enough money from the mine that we
can you know put aside
uh you know a few hundred thousand
500,000 a month something like that and
start just doing you know basically
drilling every month just keep the
drills
turning Forever at that point um and uh
yeah but I honestly uh unless we get
like either a really like hot Silver
Price Market that could obviously
because the you know our cash flows are
related to the silver price so that
could bring it up by a few months if we
get a higher silver price so that’s that
would be the caveat there okay but still
that that ties back into that other
question where you do still have the
upside of a rising silver price
environment let’s talk more uh broadly
about Peru here any changes in
geopolitical RIS in
Peru well I mean Christian here can can
talk about chis let’s hear from you yeah
I think I can talk about that it’s
important I think uh it’s important to
know that
in Peru let’s say in 2023 had been uh in
a decline a little bit in terms of
economics
0.6% okay but as Moody was saying as
well it has been showing great size of
dynamism at the beginning of this year
2024 because it has proven to be
politically stable regard regardless of
the situations that has been happening
in the whole region I wouldn’t say I
wouldn’t focus on Peru only so our
current experience uh annual growth with
1.4% and is important that’s according
to Peruvian economic Institute uh but
it’s important that the public
investment is increasing the external
investment is also increasing and Peru
has set up to facilitate and make it
easier the mining permits commod like
any kind of natural resource permits and
uh regulations not to relax them but to
make it more straightforward that has
made uh huge success like last week uh
at the beginning of this week we heard
about Anglo America and Kayo getting
their water permit that’s uh that’s a
great sign that the south of Peru that
was where the focus of any kind of
social problem was located is now fully
operational rehabilitated where we are
located we’re in central Peru a very Pro
mining are area and uh overall I don’t
see any kind of uh risk only
improvements okay hey guys thank you
very much for your time here we’ve run
through all these questions we are at
our time limit for this webinar I hope
all of you tuning in have found this
valuable this is a big stepping stone
for the company moving into production I
could tell by how focused a lot of you
were on the economics around here some
of the financial data we’re going to be
watching closely as some more news comes
out and as some Financial metrics come
out as this bethia project starts cash
flowing for the company so David
Christian thank you very much for taking
time putting together this presentation
and addressing all of these questions if
you have any more questions you can
email the team you see that email
address there you can also email me
personally flek report.com and I’ll get
the kuya silver team to address those so
David Christian thank you for joining us
everybody thanks for tuning in to this
webinar thank you thank you bye bye
[Music]

Kuya Silver President and CEO, David Stein and COO, Christian Aramayo, provide the latest update from the Bethania Silver Mine as the company prepares for the commencement of production in 2024.

Visit our website: www.kuyasilver.com

0:00 Introduction
7:00 Kuya Strategy
14:38 Excellent Access & Rich History
16:55 Bethania Resource Overview
19:09 Bethania Mine Growth Potential
24:11 Underground Reconditioning Progress
28:25 Española Vein Production
33:25 Development & Production Timeline
38:28 Exploration Upside
42:49 Drill Ready Targets
45:07 Tito PH Target
47:40 Where is Bethania on the Lassonde Curve?
48:59 Share Structure
49:49 Q&A