Earnings Transcript for SVM - Q2 Fiscal Year 2013

Executives: Jonathan Hackshaw - Director, Investor Relations Rui Feng - Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Maria Tang - Chief Financial Officer

Analysts: Brad Humphrey - Raymond James

Operator: Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Silvercorp Metals second quarter fiscal 2013 earnings conference call. I would now like to turn the meeting over to, Mr. Jonathan Hackshaw, please go ahead.

Jonathan Hackshaw: Thank you, operator, and good morning, everyone. Welcome to Silvercorp's investor conference call for the second quarter of fiscal 2013. Joining me today on the call are, Dr. Rui Feng, Silvercorp's Chairman and Chief Executive Officer; and Maria Tang, Silvercorp's Chief Financial Officer. We will begin the call with a review of our financial, operating and development highlights for the quarter. And then, we will open the call up to questions. Presentation slides are available as part of the webcast or on Silvercorp's website. To advance to slides, please click on the forward arrow. Before we begin, I'd like to draw your attention to the Slide 1 and remind you that during today's call, forward-looking statements will be made relating to future production, development and exploration, capital expenditures, business expansion plans and other items. Such forward-looking statements are subject to risks and uncertainties, many of which are detailed on our 2012 Annual Information Form filed on SEDAR. There can be no assurance that such forward-looking statements will prove to be accurate, as actual results and future events can differ materially. Turning to Slide 2, I will now review the second quarter financial highlights, which are expressed in U.S. dollars. During the quarter, the company recorded net income attributable to equity holders of the company of $9.5 million or $0.06 per share compared to $18.5 million or $0.11 per share in the second quarter of fiscal 2012. This decrease is due to a combination of lower sales, higher production costs and fluctuations in foreign currency. Turing to Slide 3, for the first six months of this fiscal year, the company recorded net income attributable to equity holders of the company of $15.6 million or $0.09 per share compared to $44.1 million or $0.25 per share in the second quarter fiscal 2012. On Slide 4, in the second quarter of fiscal 2013, cash flow from operations was $23.9 million or $0.14 per share compared to $35.2 million or $0.20 per share in Q2 2012. After paying dividends of CAD$4.2 million and capital expenditure of $14.1 million, the company ended the quarter with $136.6 million in cash and short-term investments and no debt. Slide 5, for the first six months period ended September 30, 2012, cash flow from operations was $43.2 million or $0.25 per share compared to $69.1 million or $0.40 per share in the second quarter of fiscal 2012. Turning to Slide 6, on our second quarter operational highlights, the company produced in total 1.3 million ounces of silver and over 2,500 ounces of gold. At the Ying Mining District, Silvercorp mined over 205,000 tons of ore during the quarter, 13% more than in the second quarter of fiscal 2012. Metal production totaled 1.3 million ounces of silver, 1,300 ounces of gold, 13.4 million pounds of lead and 3.4 million pounds of zinc compared to 1.4 million ounces of silver, 900 ounces of gold, 16.5 million pounds of lead and 3.2 million pounds of zinc in Q2 2012. Grades were 224 grams per ton for silver, 3.4% for lead and 1.2% for zinc compared to 271 grams per ton for silver, 4.6% for lead and 1.2% for zinc in the same quarter last year. Compared to the second quarter of fiscal 2012, production from our HPG, TLP and LM Compared to Q2 2012, production from HPG, TLP, and LM satellite mines in this quarter increased 10% to compose 43% of total production at the Ying Mining District compared to 33% in the prior year. The comparable reduction in production from the SGX mine is also a result for mechanical problems with one of the shafts that impacted production for 20 days during the quarter. As a result lower overall grades were noted in this quarter, but the problem has been resolved. Total and cash mining costs per ton in the second quarter of fiscal 2013 was $62.56 and $53.27 respectively, compared to $57.23 and $45.74 respectively in second quarter of fiscal 2012. The increase in cash mining cost was due to the following

Operator: (Operator Instructions) And your first question is from Brad Humphrey from Raymond James.

Brad Humphrey - Raymond James: Just a really quick question on the mining method, could you tell us what the dilution rate was before and what you expect it to be going forward at the Ying mines, given the new mining method?

Rui Feng: The dilution rate with the shrinkage method will be up to almost 50%. I think the resuing method will be almost 50%. With this shrinkage, more shrinkage and dilution we reduced and we are mining much wider ways now, and we used to do mining average about 0.6 meter wide. And looking forward we probably be able to mine average over 1.2 to 1.4 meter wide (inaudible). So the dilution will be around 15% to 20%, we estimate. And the AMC 43-101 Report has take into that really effect are already in technical reserve.

Brad Humphrey - Raymond James: Can you remind me, what's the grade look like going forward?

Rui Feng: I think we're looking forward to like 200 on average, to be around the 250 grams to 260 grams silver, like 8.5 ounce of silver. So we look forward like next year we'll be able to produce meaning some at 8, 8.5 ounce of silver. So with the recovery rate we will be able to produce about 7 ounces of silver.

Operator: There are no questions registered at this time.

Rui Feng: Okay. That's great.

Jonathan Hackshaw: Thank you, operator. To wrap out, I'd like to thank everyone for joining us again for today's conference call. We look forward to reporting to you again when we release our results for the third quarter of fiscal 2013. Have a good day and good bye.

Rui Feng: Thank you. Bye.

Operator: Thank you. That concludes today's conference call. Please disconnect your lines at this time and we thank you for your participation.