Ramaco Resources Q4 2024 Earnings Report

Ramaco Resources EPS Results

• Actual EPS: $0.06
• Consensus EPS: $0.42
• Beat/Miss: Missed by -$0.36
• One Year Ago EPS: $0.24

Ramaco Resources Revenue Results

• Actual Revenue: $170.90 million
• Expected Revenue: $166.59 million
• Beat/Miss: Beat by +$4.31 million
• YoY Revenue Growth: -15.70%

Ramaco Resources Announcement Details

• Quarter: Q4 2024
• Date: 3/10/2025
• Time: Before Market Opens
• Conference Call Date: Tuesday, March 11, 2025
• Conference Call Time: 9:00AM ET

Ramaco Resources (NASDAQ:METC) engages in the development, operation, and sale of metallurgical coal. Its development portfolio includes the Elk Creek project that covers an area of approximately 20,200 acres located in southern West Virginia; the Berwind property covering an area of approximately 62,500 acres situated on the border of West Virginia and Virginia; the Knox Creek property, which covers an area of approximately 64,050 acres is located in Virginia; the Maben property covering an area of approximately 28,000 acres situated in southwestern Pennsylvania southern West Virginia; and the Brook Mine property that covers an area of approximately 16,000 acres located in northeastern Wyoming. The company serves blast furnace steel mills and coke plants in the United States, as well as metallurgical coal consumers internationally. Ramaco Resources, Inc. was founded in 2015 and is headquartered in Lexington, Kentucky.

Ramaco Resources Q4 2024 Earnings Call Transcript

Key Takeaways

• Ramaco delivered its strongest fourth quarter of 2024, with record volumes sold, cash costs under $100/ton and $33/ton margins that were ~50% above Central Appalachian peers.
• Q4 adjusted EBITDA rose to $29 million (from $24 million in Q3), net income reached $4 million (vs. breakeven) and EPS was $0.06 (vs. –$0.03), driven by a $6/ton cash cost decline and ~100,000-ton sales increase.
• The company closed the year with $138 million of liquidity, an undrawn revolver and net debt/EBITDA of just 0.5×, positioning it defensively and offensively for market opportunities.
• The Brook Mine rare earth project in Wyoming now features a 1.7 million-ton critical mineral resource, with full-scale mining to start in July and a pilot processing plant under construction this fall pending Fluor’s techno-economic report.
• While met coal prices remain under pressure from Chinese steel exports, the idling of ~16 million US tons, European mine outages, extreme weather and potential steel tariffs could tighten supply/demand and lift prices in H2 2025.

Presentation

[Operator]

note that this event is being recorded.

[Operator]

I would now like to turn the conference over to the Chief Financial Officer, Jeremy Sussman. Please go ahead, sir.

[Jeremy Sussman, Executive VP & CFO at Ramaco Resources]

Thank you. On behalf of Ramaco Resources, I'd like to welcome all of you to our fourth quarter twenty twenty four earnings conference call. With me this morning is Randy Atkins, our Chairman and CEO Chris Blanchard, our EVP for Mine Planning and Development and Jason Fanning, our Chief Commercial Officer. Before we start, I'd like to share our normal cautionary statement. Certain items discussed on today's call constitute forward looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995.

[Jeremy Sussman, Executive VP & CFO at Ramaco Resources]

These forward looking statements represent Ramaco's expectations concerning future events. These statements are subject to risks, uncertainties and other factors, many of which are outside of Ramaco's control, which could cause actual results to differ materially from the results discussed in the forward looking statements. Any forward looking statement speaks only as of the date on which it is made and except as required by law, Ramaco does not undertake any obligation to update or revise any forward looking statements whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise. I'd also like to remind you that you can find a reconciliation of the non GAAP financial measures that we plan to discuss today in our press release, which can be viewed on our website, www.ramicoresources.com. Lastly, I'd encourage everyone on this call to go on to our website and download today's investor presentation.

[Jeremy Sussman, Executive VP & CFO at Ramaco Resources]

With that said, let me introduce our Chairman and CEO, Randy Atkins.

[Randall Atkins, Founder, Chairman & CEO at Ramaco Resources]

Good morning and thank you for joining the call. On the met coal side of our business, the fourth quarter was clearly our strongest quarter of the year, both financially and operationally. This was despite continued market headwinds on pricing. We controlled what we could control, which were costs and volume. We also achieved three milestones for the quarter.

[Randall Atkins, Founder, Chairman & CEO at Ramaco Resources]

We had record tons sold. We exited the year with cash cost well under $100 a ton and we ended with record levels of liquidity. All in all, we had a very strong quarter. As a result of this solid performance, especially on cash mine cost, the fourth quarter margins remained at $33 a tonne. This was down just $2 a tonne since the second quarter and despite an almost $30 drop in met coal prices between the second to the fourth quarters.

[Randall Atkins, Founder, Chairman & CEO at Ramaco Resources]

Based on the results from all of our publicly traded peers in Central Appalachia, Ramaco's cash margins were almost 50% higher than the next highest public peer for both the third and fourth quarters. For that, I complement both our non operations and sales teams. The year long negative pricing environment, of course, stretched into the fourth quarter. China continued dumping its overproduction of steel to all world markets. This has hurt prices.

[Randall Atkins, Founder, Chairman & CEO at Ramaco Resources]

Steel companies have cut back their own production and reduced the price they can pay for met coal feedstock. But while the overall steel demand remains weak, there are reasons to hope that the met prices may hopefully increase in the second half of the year. Indeed, we've already seen a bump in the domestic steel HRC pricing from less than $700 per ton in Q3 to $940 per ton today. Looking at the supply side, I'm not sure the investing public understands how much carnage the drop in pricing has done to met coal production in The U. S.

[Randall Atkins, Founder, Chairman & CEO at Ramaco Resources]

Over the past year and is still doing. We believe that by the end of this year as much as 16,000,000 domestic tons of met production will have come out of The U. S. Market since its peak in Q2 of twenty you take 16,000,000 tons out of an overall U. S.

[Randall Atkins, Founder, Chairman & CEO at Ramaco Resources]

Met coal production that was 72,000,000 tons last year, that 20% drop in supply is going to eventually impact the market. The main reason for the production drop at higher cost producers is simply the crushing negative cash burn. This has already caused a number of recent bankruptcies. In addition, there have been two large longwall mines that experienced ignition events that caused those mines to remain offline and in one case to declare bankruptcy as well. Also in January, we began to notice an increase in inbound European customer interest for spot availability.

[Randall Atkins, Founder, Chairman & CEO at Ramaco Resources]

We believe this was primarily due to an increase in demand from Ukraine as a result of the closure of the country's only domestic coal mine. And also in Poland, a large mine had an ignition event about the same time. The aggregate impact of all these factors has created a noticeable tightening of supply in The U. S. Going forward, we expect to see more domestic idling of high vol production destined for Asian markets.

[Randall Atkins, Founder, Chairman & CEO at Ramaco Resources]

Current netbacks are cash negative for high cost operations. Several producers in this spot probably can't renew all of their annual Asian contract business, which would typically begin next month. Absent a large increase in pricing, we expect another round of high vol supply cuts over the next few months. I would also note that Australian producers in terms of volume shipped from Queensland are off to their worst start of the year going back for several years. The cyclone last week will not help.

[Randall Atkins, Founder, Chairman & CEO at Ramaco Resources]

On the demand side, everyone is watching potential impacts of tariffs on steel imports.

[Randall Atkins, Founder, Chairman & CEO at Ramaco Resources]

Our

[Randall Atkins, Founder, Chairman & CEO at Ramaco Resources]

own analysis is that tariffs might produce roughly 2,000,000 to 3,000,000 tons of potential increase in domestic coal demand. This happens when tariffs limit steel imports and domestic blast furnaces then ramp up production to fill the gap. You are starting to see that already in the run up in domestic HRC pricing. I'd also like to touch on our balance sheet. We have recently been maintaining record amounts of liquidity.

[Randall Atkins, Founder, Chairman & CEO at Ramaco Resources]

It was about $140,000,000 at the year end. We regard keeping this high level of dry powder as both defensive as well as offensive. In a tricky market environment, it's prudent to have liquidity to meet whatever conditions might arise. We also want to position ourselves to execute on opportunities that might present themselves during market distress. One item I want to emphasize is that despite the current market gloom, we remain positive over the medium and longer term on our plan to increase future production.

[Randall Atkins, Founder, Chairman & CEO at Ramaco Resources]

When we can finally see some stronger market clarity, we are ready to add roughly 2,000,000 tons of low vol production in relatively short order. Specifically, we would proceed with both the 1,500,000 ton deep expansion at our Maven Complex and also continue mining into the number three and number four sections at our Maven Complex, which would add another 500,000 tons. These low vol additions would allow us to increase overall production to roughly 6,500,000 to 7,000,000 ton level within a twenty four to thirty six month period once we start. This would also shift our overall production slate to a majority of low vol production, which we feel gives us a strong quality posture for the future. Now switching gears to our Wyoming operations, I'm pleased to report that our rare earth and critical minerals project is moving forward at an accelerated clip.

[Randall Atkins, Founder, Chairman & CEO at Ramaco Resources]

We have been delayed for months in receiving third party chemistry and metallurgic test results. Almost all of that test data is now back. We expect later in April to release both Fluor's preliminary techno economic analysis as well as an update from Weir on geology grade and concentration. When these reports are released, this will provide not only granular technical information on the development, but also the economics and CapEx estimates. I would note that to date considering the outsized potential impact on us, we have spent a relatively modest $10,000,000 directly on this project.

[Randall Atkins, Founder, Chairman & CEO at Ramaco Resources]

Upon release of these reports, we will have a great deal more to say and may indeed hold a special call on this as we did last year. To give you a sense of how we feel about the data that's coming in, we have decided to begin full scale mining in July to provide the rare earth material for a pilot processing facility we will start construction on this fall. We are of course mindful of the U. S. Government's interest in rapidly creating a domestic supply of critical minerals.

[Randall Atkins, Founder, Chairman & CEO at Ramaco Resources]

I can disclose that we are in ongoing discussions with several arms of the federal government regarding our development. On the Wyoming front, we are pleased to have received a $6,000,000 match fund grant recommendation from the Wyoming Energy Authority, which is to be applied towards building our pilot plant. While we wait to disclose all the technical data with the release of the floor and the Weir reports, I will provide some preliminary results today. The overall size of the resource is now estimated in the range of 1,700,000 tons. This increased from the 1,500,000 size we disclosed last year and now includes results from all rare earths and critical minerals we will be focusing on.

[Randall Atkins, Founder, Chairman & CEO at Ramaco Resources]

We will continue additional coring and exploration on the overall area. As you remember, to date, we have only tested about a third of the site at predominantly shallow depths. We will now core at deeper levels, which frankly in many instances have shown higher concentrations of rare earths than its shallower formations. But anyway you look at it, given both the size of the unconventional deposit and the fact that it is found in softer non radioactive material makes this a generationally unique development. As we view the project today, we will concentrate our commercial efforts specifically on about seven rare earths and critical minerals.

[Randall Atkins, Founder, Chairman & CEO at Ramaco Resources]

These comprise about 30% of the material discovered to date that are estimated to to generate over 95% of the revenue. On the rarer side, we will focus on the heavy and medium magnetic oxides of neodymium, presidinium, dysprosium and terbium, which are all showing extremely strong rates of recovery. On the critical mineral side, as discussed in December, Fluor informed us that the Brook mine may be the only primary source mine in the world for gallium, germanium and scandium. Indeed, scandium may be one of the strongest revenue components of the product mix. As you know, gallium and germanium were banned by China from export to The United States last year.

[Randall Atkins, Founder, Chairman & CEO at Ramaco Resources]

One last point which should bear some emphasis though, we will approach this project with the same conservative business discipline that has characterized all of our investment decisions. This is a new and complex business. It is one with a far different macro competitive overlay than coal. Indeed, here the Chinese have a monopoly on the space and want to make it commercially difficult for anyone else to even get a foothold. But with that said, the Brook Mine would be the first new rare earth mine in The United States in over seventy years.

[Randall Atkins, Founder, Chairman & CEO at Ramaco Resources]

There is clearly a need for this strategic product. But as I said, we will approach the investment and financing of what could be a transformative business in a measured fashion and ensure that it delivers a strong return to our shareholders. So to wrap up my remarks, while the world met coal markets still remain weak, we're cautiously optimistic that our price levels are near bottom. By late summer, we hope they begin to move higher throughout the back half. I'm also again incredibly proud of the Ramaco team for being able to improve our operational sales and financial metrics throughout 2024.

[Randall Atkins, Founder, Chairman & CEO at Ramaco Resources]

And to end by emphasizing again, this culminated in the fourth quarter being our strongest of the year despite being the period with the weakest pricing. We're looking forward to 2025 improving as the year moves along. And lastly, on the rare earth front, I will leave it to be further updated next month. With that, I'll turn the floor over to the rest of our team to discuss finances, operations and markets. So Jeremy, please start with a rundown on finance.

[Jeremy Sussman, Executive VP & CFO at Ramaco Resources]

Thank you, Randy. As you noted, fourth quarter twenty twenty four operational results were the strongest of the year despite metallurgical coal indices being the weakest. One testament to all of the hard work of our mine employees is that cash margins have declined only $2 since Q2, while met coal indices have fallen $30 per tonne. To get into specifics, Q4 adjusted EBITDA was $29,000,000 compared to $24,000,000 in Q3. Q4 net income of $4,000,000 compared to breakeven in Q3.

[Jeremy Sussman, Executive VP & CFO at Ramaco Resources]

Class A EPS showed a $0.06 gain in Q4 versus a $0.03 loss in Q3. The primary reasons for the increase in both Q4 EBITDA and EPS were the $6 per ton sequential decline in our quarterly cash costs and the almost 100,000 ton increase in tons sold. On the cost front, we exited $20.24 in the mid-90s per ton range, which was the best among our publicly traded peers. We've always said that one of the pillars of Ramaco going back to our preproduction days was to operate in the first quartile of The U. S.

[Jeremy Sussman, Executive VP & CFO at Ramaco Resources]

Cost curve. Indeed that is where we now stand. On the tons sold front, we exited the year at a 4,500,000 ton per annum run rate for the highest level in company history despite challenging market conditions. Looking forward, we're maintaining all of our 2025 guidance other than bumping up our book tax rate to 25% to 30% that we'd expect to pay minimal cash taxes in the current environment. In terms of our guidance, we're maintaining a meaningful spread between the low and high ends of production, sales, cash cost and CapEx guidance.

[Jeremy Sussman, Executive VP & CFO at Ramaco Resources]

This is in large part due to current market uncertainty. To give you a little more color, if weak market conditions were to persist throughout the year, we'd likely come in towards the lower end of all four of these metrics of production, sales, cash costs and CapEx by trimming back on some higher cost production. At the same time, we hope that market conditions improve, especially in the second half of the year, given all of the potential supply curtailments that Randy discussed. Looking specifically at Q1 of twenty twenty five, all of us in Central Appalachia encountered two very challenging weather events. First, we experienced freezing temperatures for two weeks in January and then saw historic flooding in February.

[Jeremy Sussman, Executive VP & CFO at Ramaco Resources]

As a result, cost per ton sold are anticipated to come in towards the high end of the full year guidance range in Q1. When coupled with the normal typical inventory build ahead of the Great Lakes opening in the spring, Q1 tons sold are anticipated to be $850,000 to $950,000 with Q2 shipments up by more than one third sequentially. Moving to the balance sheet, our liquidity at year end of $138,000,000 was up more than 50 year on year. This was by far the highest year end liquidity in company history. We also had nothing drawn on our revolver at year end.

[Jeremy Sussman, Executive VP & CFO at Ramaco Resources]

At the same time, our overall credit metrics remain quite strong with net debt to adjusted EBITDA of just 0.5 times on a trailing twelve month basis. The bottom line is that despite challenging market conditions, our cash margins remained relatively unchanged for the past few quarters despite the meaningful decline in pricing. At the same time, we ended the year with record liquidity and minimal net debt to EBITDA. I'd now like to turn the call over to our EVP for Mine Planning and Development, Chris Blanchard to discuss operations.

[Christopher Blanchard, Executive Vice President of Mine Planning and Development at Ramaco Resources]

Thanks, Jeremy. Thank you to everyone who joined us this morning. As we've discussed, it's nice to be able to talk about positive performance at the operations even if the underlying market wasn't as strong as we would all prefer. The fourth quarter operational performance and the improvement seen throughout the full year was the result of both the diligent efforts of the entire team and commitment to the development and growth plans we put in place late in the preceding year. 2024 was always projected to be a transitional year as we completed development mining in some of our older and thinner reserves at our legacy mines and transitioned into new areas with favorable geology throughout the year.

[Christopher Blanchard, Executive Vice President of Mine Planning and Development at Ramaco Resources]

Among the most significant milestone was the completion of the construction of our Maven plant, which ended the need to transport raw coal to our Berwind complex and reduce net trucking costs by over $20 per clean ton. Work continues at Maven completing final construction and optimization projects at the plant itself, but we are now processing on a regular schedule and working through the raw coal inventories we had stockpiled at the complex. Company wide, while individual mines production levels fluctuate normally as their conditions ebb and flow, we saw month over month increases in overall productivities throughout the fourth quarter. Some of this was attributable to easing employee turnover rates as the overall coal markets have cooled from what was an extremely tight labor market in the Central Appalachian region. Continuing into 2025, the labor market is still tighter than its historical average and the reductions in the industry and the belt tightening has not yet translated into an abundance of skilled coal miners available.

[Christopher Blanchard, Executive Vice President of Mine Planning and Development at Ramaco Resources]

Pricing continues to languish in its current range. However, on our growth plan, we are still continuing to advance several development projects so that we're positioned to execute when there's a rebalancing of market dynamics. The biggest group of projects relate to the Maven complex. This will involve the development of the underground reserves, which will ultimately ramp the complex up to 1,500,000 clean tons per year. At Maven, the permits are being advanced and work related to opening these underground mine continues.

[Christopher Blanchard, Executive Vice President of Mine Planning and Development at Ramaco Resources]

We believe that these mines can be brought online and ramped within twelve to fifteen months when they are green lighted. Much of the lead time then will be the procurement of the underground mining equipment. Also at our Berlin complex, several capital projects continue related to new ventilation shafts and a new portal area in the heart of Ramaco's fee coal position at this mine. These safety related and cost saving projects will continue. This will allow the Berlin mine to have the proper ventilation, safety and logistical infrastructure to operate at its full planned capacity of four super sections when market conditions allow.

[Christopher Blanchard, Executive Vice President of Mine Planning and Development at Ramaco Resources]

We expect the first of the three new air shafts to be on the line late in the second quarter of twenty twenty five after receiving the final federal permits needed for

[Christopher Blanchard, Executive Vice President of Mine Planning and Development at Ramaco Resources]

the approval of this work.

[Christopher Blanchard, Executive Vice President of Mine Planning and Development at Ramaco Resources]

Indeed, across all of our operations, we have started to see some of the permit backlog unwind and our minor permit revisions and additions to again be approved in a timelier manner. Turning briefly to 2025, as Jeremy mentioned, in Q1, the extreme winter snow and freeze events followed by historic flooding did impact operations and shipping. In West Virginia, the impacts to McDowell, Logan and Wyoming Counties where we operate were devastating. Beside the impact on actual mining operations, the damage to homes of the families of our employees was heartbreaking. We continue to work with some of the most stricken for relocation and recovery of their homes.

[Christopher Blanchard, Executive Vice President of Mine Planning and Development at Ramaco Resources]

Also throughout the region, we continue to work with charitable organizations and local groups supporting the recovery however we can. More directly at the mining complexes, the biggest impact of this weather was hundreds of collective employee shifts missed during January and February. We also had some additional downtime and costs associated with the flooding in February, primarily from unusual accumulations of water in the sealed or inactive areas of our underground coal mines, as well as some slowing of surface and plant operations. Fortunately, as we enter March, all of these conditions have abated and subsided and we have resumed our normal operational cadence. We continue to watch the markets and hope for price improvement.

[Christopher Blanchard, Executive Vice President of Mine Planning and Development at Ramaco Resources]

In the meantime, we remain disciplined in operational performance and costs to focus on those areas we do have some level of control over. We're positioned to be nimble to adjust as necessary to the economics of the market. To discuss all these factors driving the market right now, I would like to turn the call over to our Chief Commercial Officer, Jason Fannon.

[Jason Fannin, EVP & CCO at Ramaco Resources]

Thanks, Chris, and good morning, everyone. Today, I'll share our views on coking coal and steel markets as well as our sales outlook. Global coking coal markets have continued to weaken from a pricing standpoint with average coking coal index prices down approximately 6% since the start of Q1. If current index levels remain flat through the March, Q1 index averages will also be down 6% versus Q4s. As of March 10, the U.

[Jason Fannin, EVP & CCO at Ramaco Resources]

S. East Coast index values were $182.5 per ton per low vol, $179.5 per ton for High Vol A and $166.5 per ton for High Vol B. Published U. S. East Coast price indices have drifted lower over the last two weeks.

[Jason Fannin, EVP & CCO at Ramaco Resources]

We believe these levels are not at all reflective of the supply side tightness in Central and Northern bankruptcies, mine idlings, operational cutbacks and the extreme weather experienced in much of the Central Appalachian coalfields during January and February. The Australian premium low vol index currently sits at $181 per ton, a level last seen briefly in September and before that not since mid-twenty twenty one during the China ban on Australian coal imports. The second tier low vol coking coal index is priced at $142.5 per ton and has significantly underperformed relative to premium grades. As a result, many Australian producers in Queensland and the broader region are experiencing severe margin compression. We believe the majority of mines in Queensland are operating at breakeven cash costs or worse.

[Jason Fannin, EVP & CCO at Ramaco Resources]

We are also witnessing profitability issues in The U. S. Producers with an inability to control higher costs are struggling. We have already seen a fair deal of idlings, bankruptcies, layoffs and associated supply rationalization because of the continued poor pricing environment. Over the next few quarters, the dominant theme for smaller and less well capitalized producers will likely be weak profitability and continued supply cuts.

[Jason Fannin, EVP & CCO at Ramaco Resources]

Investors will have an increased focus on liquidity management across the industry. This will be especially impactful for those smaller and or private producers who are more heavily exposed to seaborne markets and perhaps are overlooked by public markets and industry reporting agencies. If these weak market conditions continue, we believe the next phase will be more significant supply cuts, which may lead to a rebalancing of market dynamics. This will present many opportunities for Ramaco to capture market share, establish additional long term customer relationships and continue to grow our sales book. The weakness in coking coal prices is primarily a reflection of poor profitability at steel mills worldwide rather than oversupply of met coal.

[Jason Fannin, EVP & CCO at Ramaco Resources]

Queensland for instance has seen its lowest shipment volumes in over a decade start to year, yet prices continue to decline. According to MSHA data, quarterly production of coking coal in The U. S. Has declined successively since Q2 of twenty twenty four. This underscores the broader struggles of the global steel industry, which remains in a prolonged downturn.

[Jason Fannin, EVP & CCO at Ramaco Resources]

The key factor in this dynamic is the surge in Chinese steel exports, which continues to pressure global steel mill profits. Since early twenty twenty two, annual Chinese steel exports have been 104,000,000 tons on average, peaking at an annualized rate of nearly 150,000,000 tons in October, a huge increase which has impacted steel pricing on a global scale. So far this year, Chinese domestic demand has failed to rise enough to push down steel exports from these astronomically high levels. We therefore continue to look for green shoots in the Chinese economy as it relates to potential steel consumption growth in their domestic market. Fortunately, many leading indicators have rebounded.

[Jason Fannin, EVP & CCO at Ramaco Resources]

This suggests the cycle is turning up again, although it will likely take some time for excess steel exports to decline meaningfully. In the Atlantic Basin, Ramaco's term volumes and demand from our usual specialty customers remain solid, while at the same time The U. S. Steel market is staging a prolific rebound in response to the Trump tariffs. With integrated blast furnace production currently holding a cost advantage over electric arc furnace operations, we may see domestic producers ramp up blast furnace output in response to rising steel prices.

[Jason Fannin, EVP & CCO at Ramaco Resources]

This would likely result in higher domestic cooking coal consumption, which provides a natural hedge against weak pricing in the seaborne market. The potential for increased domestic demand later in the year aligns well with our sales strategy for 2025. So far, we have committed 3,500,000 tons for sale during 2025. We have booked 1,600,000 tons to North American customers at an average fixed price of $152 per ton and 1,900,000 tons to the seaborne market at mostly index linked pricing. Most of our uncommitted volumes are associated with production in the back half of the year as we are largely sold out in the first half.

[Jason Fannin, EVP & CCO at Ramaco Resources]

This leaves us with the flexibility to take advantage of evolving market dynamics and layer in additional sales opportunities with pricing arrangements we view as favorable from a risk versus reward standpoint. Turning to an overview of Ramaco's various seaborne markets, recent mine outages in The U. S. And in Europe have caused a tightening in U. S.

[Jason Fannin, EVP & CCO at Ramaco Resources]

Supplied markets as buyers seek supplemental met volumes. This trend began before the various major mine outages in The U. S. And Europe as well as prior to the extreme weather in Central Africa in January and February and continues today. The broader European steel market began 2025 on an upbeat tone with rising steel prices as potential safeguard measures threaten to cut off cheap competition from imports.

[Jason Fannin, EVP & CCO at Ramaco Resources]

While the European steel industry remains fragile due to slowing economic growth, we see indications that policymakers may shift away from long standing fiscal conservatism toward expansionary pro growth strategies. This would create a much needed tailwind for investment and spur downstream steel consumption. South American markets continue to be stable with modest demand growth expected as steel safeguard measures provide support for increased pig iron production in 2025. Ramaco's term contract order book in South America continues to perform well and we have seen increased spot tenders from a few buyers particularly on the low volatile side. Looking ahead, we expect Indian coking coal demand to strengthen later in 2025 supported by the addition of 11,500,000 tons of new blast furnace capacity.

[Jason Fannin, EVP & CCO at Ramaco Resources]

Over the past two years, coking coal demand has lagged behind India's overall steel consumption, largely due to increased seaborne met coke imports. However, with the implementation of met coke import quotas late last year, we anticipate coking coal consumption will better align with blast furnace iron production trends going forward. Additionally, we are closely monitoring potential Indian steel import safeguard measures, which if implemented could enhance domestic steel mill profitability and support higher coking coal prices. In terms of our market strategy in the Pacific Basin, we continue to engage and supply a core group of customers in Asia.

[Jason Fannin, EVP & CCO at Ramaco Resources]

This is

[Jason Fannin, EVP & CCO at Ramaco Resources]

a group with whom we fostered long term relationships even as the price environment in The Pacific has become challenging for many U. S. Suppliers. As market headwinds persist, we are adopting a cautious systematic approach to our remaining uncommitted volumes. We plan to allocate these volumes to the highest return sales opportunities while continuing to supply our long term customer base, all with a focus strategically on future growth.

[Jason Fannin, EVP & CCO at Ramaco Resources]

With that said, I would now like to return the call to the operator for the Q and A portion of the call. Operator?

[Operator]

Our first question comes from Nick Charles from B. Riley Securities. Please go ahead.

[Nick Giles, Senior Research Analyst at B.Riley Securities]

Thank you, operator. Good morning, everyone. Guys, congratulations on the lower cash costs and the successful additions of production at Elk Creek in 2024. My first question, if I saw correctly, you have some seaborne volumes fixed at $111 per tonne. And so I was hoping you could add some color around where you see netbacks today for your various qualities.

[Nick Giles, Senior Research Analyst at B.Riley Securities]

I think you mentioned that current Atlantic indices aren't fully reflective. So, where do you see the highest return opportunities in the current market? Thank you very much.

[Jason Fannin, EVP & CCO at Ramaco Resources]

Nick, on the 111

[Jason Fannin, EVP & CCO at Ramaco Resources]

there, those were excellent prices that have settled out for January and February. Large portion of that were from a couple of our Asian high vol contracts that have since rolled off. That's the impact you're seeing there in that fixed price number. To your question on where we see the highest returns in the current seaborne market, certainly as in The Atlantic. We factor out the freight differential to The Pacific and then frankly the near parity now with the Pacific indices versus the Atlantic indices, there is a differential there.

[Jason Fannin, EVP & CCO at Ramaco Resources]

In terms of current netbacks, just broadly speaking, where indices are at today, I think our high vol, you're in the $125 per net ton range back at the mine with low vol up, I'd say, dollars 3 to 5 above that.

[Jeremy Sussman, Executive VP & CFO at Ramaco Resources]

It's Jeremy here. If I could just add a couple of things to that. So just on the 111 number, I'd say about 40% to 45% of what was shipped in January and February on the export market was to Asia. That's about double sort of our normal Asian cadence. So I'd say it's a little bit wonky from that perspective.

[Jeremy Sussman, Executive VP & CFO at Ramaco Resources]

But regardless of sort of the netbacks and whatnot, I mean, I think the key is our cash margins are call it $33 a tonne, that's down $2 a tonne since the second quarter and certainly about 50% or more than 50% higher than I think the next highest in Central Appalachia when you kind of average Q3 and Q4 and frankly competing with the Alabama longwall long margins. So all in all, again, kudos to Jason, Chris and their teams for keeping our margins very strong on a relative basis.

[Nick Giles, Senior Research Analyst at B.Riley Securities]

Jeremy, Chris, I appreciate all that additional detail and for the clarification. Maybe just on the growth side, in your guidance, you've noted that you could respond to higher prices with some of the growth projects you have at your disposal. And so could you remind us of the capital intensity of each of those? And what would you ultimately need to see to move forward? And then is any of this potential growth CapEx included in your current guidance of $60,000,000 to $70,000,000

[Jeremy Sussman, Executive VP & CFO at Ramaco Resources]

Sure. A few questions there, Nick. So I guess, first from the standpoint of our total capital, our guidance is about $60,000,000 to $70,000,000 I'd say our normal sort of maintenance CapEx is around $9 to $10 a ton. So sort of embedded in that is about $20,000,000 of growth capital. I'd say it's split pretty evenly between Elk Creek and Berwind.

[Jeremy Sussman, Executive VP & CFO at Ramaco Resources]

I mean, there's a few million in addition, but at Elk really it's basically increasing the infrastructure for the most part to make sure that we can get to 3,000,000 tons on a sustainable basis. And at Berwyn, Chris discussed a number of the projects that basically allow us to mine full out ultimately in the third and fourth section. So I guess what I would say is, if market conditions remain weak, there's probably some room in our CapEx to come down. At the same time, as Randy sort of detailed in his remarks, there's a lot of carnage out there. And certainly, we do think that the market is poised to move higher in the second half of the year.

[Randall Atkins, Founder, Chairman & CEO at Ramaco Resources]

Yes, I'll make one other comment. So I mean basically in this kind of a sideways market in terms of committing new capital to growth, we basically as I said want to see some clarity whether that's one or two quarters of stabilized pricing or hopefully even increased pricing remains to be seen. But the nice thing about where we're teed up at Maven, of course, we already have a prep plant in place. We've got probably for the deep portion about a $30,000,000 spend, which would be graduated over a period of time. That's not a one year spend.

[Randall Atkins, Founder, Chairman & CEO at Ramaco Resources]

That's probably more like a two year spend. And at Berwind, we're essentially just continuing through an existing mine to add more sections. So that's a relatively modest spend, I'd say, in the beginning about the $10,000,000 range. And that's once again not a one year spend, that's probably a two year spend. So our cap requirements for these additions are in relative terms pretty darn modest.

[Randall Atkins, Founder, Chairman & CEO at Ramaco Resources]

I can't think of too many people who can add 2,000,000 tons for essentially $40,000,000 in CapEx. So that's how I'd look at it.

[Nick Giles, Senior Research Analyst at B.Riley Securities]

Jeremy, Randy, thanks again for all the additional detail. Good to hear you have that optionality. Maybe just one last one on the rare earth side. I mean, this is seemingly a project of tremendous scale. So what kind of order of magnitude should we be anticipating as far as development CapEx?

[Nick Giles, Senior Research Analyst at B.Riley Securities]

And is there a CapEx level you'd be able to point us to that's required for the construction of the pilot plant later this year?

[Randall Atkins, Founder, Chairman & CEO at Ramaco Resources]

Sure. So the way that I teed it up, I think both in our earnings release as well as in my remarks, we will have a pretty granular description of not only the technical aspects of the deposit, the grades, the recovery rates, but also of course the economics and the CapEx, which are inclusive in the Fluor techno economic report. That's been hung up bluntly because there's such an overwhelming demand for people doing testing of various rare earth projects that the labs that do the chemistry and metallurgic analysis for those are quite backed up and we've been having delays in getting the test results back. We've got those results back and Fluor is telling us by the middle of the latter part of next month, they will have completed the report. And so instead of front running that report by kind of drip and drabbing out CapEx numbers and pilot plant numbers, we'll let the report speak for itself.

[Randall Atkins, Founder, Chairman & CEO at Ramaco Resources]

And as I said, once we put that out there, we'll be even happy to have a sort of a separate rare earth call, which we've done before to go into far more detail than we would on this call certainly today or certainly even on a normal earnings call where we're talking about our met operations as well.

[Nick Giles, Senior Research Analyst at B.Riley Securities]

Fair enough, Randy. Well, guys, I appreciate all the color. Nice work and continued best of luck.

[Jeremy Sussman, Executive VP & CFO at Ramaco Resources]

Thanks, Nick.

[Operator]

Our next question comes from Chris LaFenma of Jefferies. Please go ahead.

[Chris LaFemina, Equity Research Analyst at Jefferies Financial Group]

Thanks, operator. Hi, guys. Thanks for taking my questions. Just want to ask first around the reduction in unit costs. I mean, that's been an impressive performance there.

[Chris LaFemina, Equity Research Analyst at Jefferies Financial Group]

And obviously, it's helped offset some of the weakness in prices. But I'm wondering to what extent, let's assume that met coal prices begin to really recover in the next year. Does some of the cost reductions that you've realized so far begin to reverse? That's my first question.

[Christopher Blanchard, Executive Vice President of Mine Planning and Development at Ramaco Resources]

So largely the that's Chris. I'm sorry, this is Chris. But largely the cost reduction has been driven by the move from more challenging geology and some of our older mines into thicker horizons where the clean tons per foot is higher and it drives down the unit cost. Obviously, we've seen a little bit of benefit, I guess, by the lower sales price in our royalty costs and other sales related. So that would reverse as the prices go back up.

[Christopher Blanchard, Executive Vice President of Mine Planning and Development at Ramaco Resources]

But absent a spike in pricing, we wouldn't expect to see major labor increases, which is what sort of drove a lot of it in 2022, '20 '20 '3. So I think structurally the lower cost should be in place with just the normal moves around sales related.

[Randall Atkins, Founder, Chairman & CEO at Ramaco Resources]

And Chris, this is Randy. I'd add, as you heard from our remarks, we are seeing a lot of supply reductions out there. So in the space, not only vis a vis labor, but some of the other types of equipment, steel related and other, we're seeing a softening somewhat in the market. So we would not expect that trend to reverse given the amount of supply coming out of the market unless there's really, as Chris said, a real spike because if we're just going to see somewhere around 15,000,000 to 20,000,000 tons come out of the central app and Northern app markets, that's going to create a large hole for not only suppliers, but also the labor markets.

[Chris LaFemina, Equity Research Analyst at Jefferies Financial Group]

And does that capacity come back online in a better market or is some of this capacity you think permanently gone?

[Randall Atkins, Founder, Chairman & CEO at Ramaco Resources]

I think, Chris, a lot of that capacity may be gone on a permanent basis. The one thing, of course, a lot of people don't appreciate as much is really the depletion that's in the Central Appalachian Basin. It's a mature basin and a lot of these mines, particularly for a lot of the larger legacy producers, are in mines that are very mature. And they are coming not to the end of their useful life. They're certainly coming to a point where the geology is declining.

[Randall Atkins, Founder, Chairman & CEO at Ramaco Resources]

That's why we've got relatively new mines, sort of fresh geology and thicker seams, which is obviously an advantage to us from a cost perspective.

[Operator]

Our next question comes from Nathan Martin of The Benchmark Company. Please go ahead.

[Nathan Martin, Senior Research Analyst at The Benchmark Company LLC]

Thanks, operator. Good morning, guys. Congrats on the fourth quarter results and the continued cost per ton progress. And maybe just kind of starting there and more of a clarification question. You mentioned the commissioning of the Maven prep plant in the fourth quarter reduced those trucking costs by roughly $20 a ton at that complex.

[Nathan Martin, Senior Research Analyst at The Benchmark Company LLC]

However, I know you guys have previously talked about a number around $40 a ton. Is there more savings potentially there or is that just maybe a clean versus raw ton comparison? Just wanted to get clarification.

[Christopher Blanchard, Executive Vice President of Mine Planning and Development at Ramaco Resources]

Yes. So good question. This is Chris again. The trucking cost on a raw basis was converted back to clean, it was about $40 a ton. So we're avoiding that.

[Christopher Blanchard, Executive Vice President of Mine Planning and Development at Ramaco Resources]

However, until we build the rail loadout directly on-site, we're now trucking our clean coal, which has approximately the same unit cost of $20 per ton. So when we build our loadout and load the railcars directly at Mabon, then that additional $20 will come out as well.

[Nathan Martin, Senior Research Analyst at The Benchmark Company LLC]

And Chris, when do you expect that to be complete?

[Christopher Blanchard, Executive Vice President of Mine Planning and Development at Ramaco Resources]

Well, that we are the project is, I guess, I would say under consideration. We're going ahead with engineering work and some of the design work on that, but probably not this calendar year.

[Nathan Martin, Senior Research Analyst at The Benchmark Company LLC]

Okay. But is it right to assume that that would potentially improve those costs even more?

[Christopher Blanchard, Executive Vice President of Mine Planning and Development at Ramaco Resources]

Yes, absolutely. As soon as that project is put in place, we'd expect just on the top side of $20 cost savings.

[Nathan Martin, Senior Research Analyst at The Benchmark Company LLC]

Okay, perfect. Thanks for clarifying that. And then maybe just sticking with the cost per ton, you guys just talked about some of the variable costs associated with price. What price range are you assuming in your full year cost per ton guidance range?

[Jeremy Sussman, Executive VP & CFO at Ramaco Resources]

We're just hey Nate, it's Jeremy. We're just generally using the forward curve for planning purposes.

[Nathan Martin, Senior Research Analyst at The Benchmark Company LLC]

Okay. Thanks, Jeremy. And then maybe finally, you guys have touched on this a bit, but I wanted to ask, how would you rank or prioritize your capital spending today? Obviously, liquidity position is strong, you've got the dividend policy in place, but we continue to see this prolonged weakness in the market. You mentioned there could be some opportunities for M and A because of that.

[Nathan Martin, Senior Research Analyst at The Benchmark Company LLC]

You're also continuing down the path of the rare earth process at the Brookline. So how do you see balancing growth whether it's internal or external shareholder returns and then protecting your business during this downturn?

[Randall Atkins, Founder, Chairman & CEO at Ramaco Resources]

Sure. This is Randy. I think to your question about M and A, as I've said before, we're not too fond of the M, but we're happy to look at the A. So in this kind of a down or distressed market, we will try to be opportunistic if we see situations where particularly reserve plays or perhaps infrastructure plays that might become available at opportunistic prices, we'll take a look at that. That's something you can't really plan.

[Randall Atkins, Founder, Chairman & CEO at Ramaco Resources]

You can hope for, but you certainly don't expect. As far as our normal cadence for growth CapEx, I think we've explained that we've got a very modest growth CapEx laid out for '25, obviously reflecting the market. We're not ready to push the start button on some of these projects at Maven and Berwyn until we see a little bit more clarity. As far as what's going on in Wyoming, we have been frankly surprised at how modest our spend has been to take this project to where it is for about $10,000,000 I think it's been a very well used amount of our capital to advance a project that has transformative potential. But as we move forward right now, we've gotten a recommendation from the Wyoming Energy Authority for $6,000,000 which is certainly appreciated.

[Randall Atkins, Founder, Chairman & CEO at Ramaco Resources]

That will be focused on the prep plant or the pilot plant rather. We don't have too much additional drilling that we have to do. We'll probably continue to drill throughout the years because this is such a prolifically large site that to really prove it up is going to take a good deal of time. Somebody remarked to me, it's almost like you've got a Permian Basin of rare earth. So you've got a lot of work to do to geologically scope it out.

[Randall Atkins, Founder, Chairman & CEO at Ramaco Resources]

As far as the pilot plant and the future commercial plant, those will be dictated in some instance by the nature of the process we will ultimately use chemically and metallurgically to actually refine the rare earth and the critical minerals. We're going through that testing now. Obviously, the pilot plant is designed to refine that testing and come up with a solution that will be optimized as we move forward. So, we don't have too much capital that we've allocated to that for '25. And on the mining, the same thing.

[Randall Atkins, Founder, Chairman & CEO at Ramaco Resources]

We've already started doing some of the mine mobilization there now. We'll start really moving some dirt around probably in June and July timeframe. And then we'll start construction on-site for the pilot plant sometime, I would say, late summer, early fall. We're going to basically bifurcate the pilot process because we're going to have some of it designed and tested off-site in a test facility at one of our chemical testing third party laboratories. And then we'll take that process and essentially move it to the Wyoming site and that's what will start to occur this fall.

[Nathan Martin, Senior Research Analyst at The Benchmark Company LLC]

Very helpful, Randy. I guess just one thought there too. Is that pilot plant CapEx included in the current $60,000,000 to $70,000,000 CapEx range for this year?

[Jeremy Sussman, Executive VP & CFO at Ramaco Resources]

Yes, yes it is.

[Nathan Martin, Senior Research Analyst at The Benchmark Company LLC]

Okay, perfect. All right, got it. Very, very helpful. Appreciate the time.

[Randall Atkins, Founder, Chairman & CEO at Ramaco Resources]

And honestly, we did not include originally the $6,000,000 that we've now been recommended to receive an award from Wyoming. So that's an extra bit of wind in our sails, so to speak.

[Nathan Martin, Senior Research Analyst at The Benchmark Company LLC]

Got it. Appreciate it.

[Jeremy Sussman, Executive VP & CFO at Ramaco Resources]

Thanks, Nate.

[Operator]

Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, this concludes our question of the session. I would now like to turn the conference back over to the Chairman and CEO, Randall Atkins, for closing remarks.

[Randall Atkins, Founder, Chairman & CEO at Ramaco Resources]

Well, I'd like to thank everyone for being on the call today. We will certainly look forward to our next earnings call and then also hopefully to in the interim have a call with you all related to our rare earth project. So once again, thanks very much.

[Operator]

Thank you. The conference has now concluded. Thank you for attending today's presentation and we now disconnect your lines.

Participants

Executives

• Jeremy Sussman, Executive VP & CFO
• Randall Atkins, Founder, Chairman & CEO
• Christopher Blanchard, Executive Vice President of Mine Planning and Development
• Jason Fannin, EVP & CCO

Analysts

• Nick Giles, Senior Research Analyst at B.Riley Securities
• Chris LaFemina, Equity Research Analyst at Jefferies Financial Group
• Nathan Martin, Senior Research Analyst at The Benchmark Company LLC