Aya Gold & Silver (TSX:AYA) reported second-quarter financial results on Friday. The transcript from the company’s second-quarter earnings call has been provided below.
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Summary
Aya Gold & Silver reported Q2 2026 revenue of $97 million, a 151% increase year-over-year, with net income at $35 million and cash flow at $48 million, demonstrating strong financial performance.
The Zgounder mine achieved a mining rate of 4,900 tonnes per day, exceeding the original nameplate capacity, with a record milling rate and an ore stockpile of 374,000 tonnes.
Cash costs at Zgounder decreased to $17.69 per ounce from $18.64 in the previous quarter, while Boumadine’s cash cost was $10.58 per ounce, supporting strong cash flow generation.
The company maintained a cash position of $183 million at quarter-end after investing $38 million in exploration and sustaining capex and repaying $48 million in debt.
Aya Gold & Silver confirmed its production guidance, expecting to meet its 2026 targets with strong performance in Q3 and Q4 anticipated.
Boumadine’s feasibility work is ongoing, with a PEA update expected in September, positioning it as a strategic project for future growth.
The company made strategic acquisitions of 259 square kilometers of exploration ground in Morocco, reinforcing its first-mover advantage in the region.
Aya Gold & Silver’s NASDAQ listing was a success, increasing trading volume and attracting new institutional investors.
Full Transcript
OPERATOR
Good morning everyone. I will now turn the call over to Elizabeth Amoui, Aya Gold & Silver Director of Corporate and Financial Communications. Please go ahead.
Elizabeth Amoui, Director of Corporate and Financial Communications
Thank you, Operator. And welcome to Aya Gold & Silver’s second quarter 2026 earnings conference call. Joining me today are Benoit La Salle, President and CEO; Hugo Landry-Tolczyk, Chief Financial Officer; Elias Elias, Chief Legal and Sustainability Officer; Rafael Baudoin, Vice President of Operations; and David Lalonde, Vice President of Exploration. We will refer to a presentation available via the webcast and on our website as we will be making forward-looking statements during the call.
Please refer to the cautionary notes in the presentation, news release, and MD&A, as well as the risk factors in our annual information form. Technical information in the presentation has been reviewed and approved by Rafael Baudoin, Aya’s Vice President of Operations, and David Lalonde, Aya’s Vice President of Exploration. Qualified persons as defined under National Instrument 43-101 Standards of Disclosure for Mineral Projects. And following the presentation we will have a Q&A session.
I would now like to turn the call over to Benoit La Salle.
Benoit La Salle, President and CEO
Thank you very much. Welcome everyone to our Q2 2026 conference call. It is another very strong quarter for Aya. We have pre-released the production results for the quarter. You recall that the production for Q2 is 1.7 million ounces of silver equivalent, which is a 61% increase year over year, and it’s a 12% increase quarter over quarter. That translated into very strong financial results. So our revenue for the second quarter of 2026 stands at $97 million, which is an increase of 151% year over year.
Our net income for Q2 is at $35 million, which is also a very strong increase from the previous year. And our cash flow is at US$48 million, which is a 522% increase from the previous year, Q2 2025. So we have a very strong quarter in revenue, strong quarter in profit, strong quarter in cash flow. And this, as we all know, due to the seasonality in Morocco. Q1 is always a little bit lighter because of the weather. Q2 comes out of the winter and is a stronger quarter.
Q3 is stronger than Q2. Sorry. And Q4 has been historically our strongest quarter. So we’re very pleased with the first half of the year as we will review some of the numbers now for the KPI, the key performance indicator of the mine. The Zgounder mine has performed extremely well. The mining rate continues to improve and it’s up 7% quarter over quarter. And I’m pleased to say that the mining rate on a daily basis achieved 4,900 tonnes a day. You recall that the plant was designed for 2,700 tonnes a day.
And one of the key elements was to make sure that the mining rate was going to be aligned with the nameplate of the plant, which was supposed to be 2,700. We know now it’s a lot higher, but the mining rate is at 4,900 tonnes a day. We had record performance achieved from the underground and the open pit. So we’re extremely pleased with the outcome. The grade through the plant was 141 grams per tonne, which is right where we wanted it to be. And another element which is important is because we’re mining more than we’re processing.
We have an ore stockpile of 374,000 tonnes that is extremely important. It’s the buffer that is there. If we reduce mining rates for more development, especially on the underground where we want to go to the lower levels. We have 374,000 tonnes of ore stockpile at the plant. We have record milling rate in Q2, which again reflects our strong execution. Q2 average is 3,900 tonnes a day, compared to the previous quarter at 3,600 tonnes a day, and to last year, same quarter over quarter was 3,000 tonnes a day, and that we know the nameplate was 2,700.
So we’ve moved in the ramp up from 2,700 to 3,000 last year, started the year this year at 3,600 tonnes a day, and are now at 3,900 tonnes a day, and expect this to grow up a little bit again for Q3 and Q4, strong recoveries as well at the plant and other KPIs above 90% recoveries and above 90% availability. So all of our KPIs are green. We manage them on a daily basis, on a weekly basis, on a monthly basis. Currently everything is in the green. We’ve also brought in a temporary crushing contractor to improve the throughput.
And we’re adding a new crushing section to the plant and that should be ready by the beginning of 2027. Moving to the next slide, which is the selling price throughout the quarter. You recall that Q1 was exceptional as silver reached $120 per ounce in January. Of course, since then we’ve seen a strong correction. So for the average selling price for Q2 2026 is $68.29. So it’s $15 less than Q1. But it’s very close to the average of the quarter. You understand that the average of the quarter is very hard to meet in a decreasing price environment because you don’t sell every day.
So in a decreasing price environment, you’re a little bit below the average. The average for the quarter is a little bit above $70 and we’re at $68.29. We were above the average in Q1 because it was increasing at the time. So that was a little bit easier to be above the average. But it’s still an extremely good selling price, knowing that Q4 last year we were all very happy with $59.23. So again, a strong selling price in Q2 for Zgounder, and actually the selling price at Boumadine for some just reason was a little bit better at $70 an ounce.
But we have a payability there of 50%. So the selling price was net at $35. Because you remember we’re selling tailings which has a lot of difficult elements. So when you look at the cash cost, we were expecting cash cost to come down at Zgounder because we are now on a steady rate, increasing actually the throughput, but on a steady rate. And yes, we’re very pleased that for Q2 2026, the cash cost at Zgounder is at $17.69. That’s something coming from $18.64 in the previous quarter and $20 in Q4 of 2025.
So again, these are small details. Better efficiency and we are working on cash costs. But at $17.69, knowing that this is a brand new plant, the development cost, the additional cost, sustaining costs are extremely low at Zgounder. It’s probably $3 an ounce maximum. Not even that in Q1 and in Q2. So you’re looking at a cash cost of $17.69 which is a very, very good position to be in. To the next slide at Boumadine. Just quickly, Boumadine is a bit of an add-on to Zgounder.
We’re processing the old tailings. It’s a reclamation operation. It had no capex. Very low cash costs. At $10.58 an ounce, it just generates cash flow. We’re a little bit lower on the production front. And we knew Q1 again. When you have a lot of rain and tailings, of course it’s a bit more complicated because it’s… it’s slushy. So Q1 and Q2 were a little bit lower. We knew Q3, Q4 are going to be a lot higher. But we still manage to produce 187,000 ounces of silver equivalent.
And we made a margin of $20. As I said, we sold it for $35 an ounce. Our cash cost at Boumadine is $10.58. We made $20 an ounce. So 20 times 185,000 ounces of production. It’s still $3.6 million of free cash flow coming to Boumadine to pay for the operation and for the drilling. So it’s a very nice add-on to Zgounder which we have in operation and accelerating in Q3 and Q4. Looking at the next slide is the cash position at quarter end. We started the year in January 1st we had $136 million in the bank of free cash.
We always have $16 million of restricted cash which is part of the EBRD loan package. We started with 136 and in the first six months of the year we generated $119 million of operating cash flow. So 136. We add to that 119 of operating cash flow, we have 38 million of exploration and sustaining capex. Thirty-eight million. We paid down $33 million of EBRD in the first six months. We had one payment and we also paid down a $15 million short-term debt that we took last year on Boumadine.
Just it was available and we took it on, that was paid back. So we paid 33 million back. We’ve invested 38 in exploration and sustaining capex and we finished the quarter with $183 million. Of course you know, we report in US dollars, so 183 million, and we have 16 million in restricted cash which technically gets applied to the EBRD loan at the end if we want that. So we had a strong cash flow. H1 we have limited capex as we know. We have a large exploration program, but that’s part of our value creation strategy.
We did an early repayment of the 15 million to EBRD and we’re left with 183 million that is ready to go to the development of Boumadine, which will start towards the end of this year. So very, very strong quarter. On the next slide, just a summary of the first six months. If you look at the operational performance as a company, we produced 3.2 million ounces of silver equivalent at a consolidated cash cost for silver equivalent of $17.59. Zgounder did 2.8 million and Boumadine did half a million.
So if, and we will talk about the guidance, but we’re already half year and half the way to the guidance. So we are totally aligned with the guidance that we presented to you at the beginning of the year. We’re totally aligned with the guidance. Zgounder has a cash cost for the first six months of $18.18. Boumadine has a cash cost of $10.85 per ounce. So we’re fully aligned and we’ll review the guidance in a minute. But we’re half the way into the year and we’re half the way into our guidance.
The revenue for six months stands at $205 million US. The net income is $84 million US dollars. The basic EPS is at $0.58 and the operating cash flow for six months stands at $119 million US. The guidance which you have on the next slide was presented to you at the beginning of the year. Our production guidance is 5.2 to 5.8 at Zgounder and at mid year is at 2.8. So you see that we’re tracking right on production guidance. Boumadine is at 1 million.
We’re at half a million right now, 400,000. But we know that Q3 and Q4 for Boumadine are going to be a lot easier. No rain and much, much, much easier warm weather. Boumadine currently is between 40 and 50 degrees some days. So it’s very dry. So easy to work on tailings. The Zgounder average cash cost we had guided at $21.50. We knew that Q1, Q2 would be a bit lower because of the strip in the pit. And the strip has a direct effect on our cash costs.
So we’re not changing our guidance there. On Boumadine we were at $10.10, we’re at $10.40. So we’re very, very close. The sustaining and growth capex is at $36 million. It’s about half and half. Half is sustaining, half is growth. New crusher, new installation, an ore sorter. Different things that we’re putting in which are really growth capex and sustaining. The development of the underground and exploration expenditure is at $60 million. That hasn’t changed. Maybe a little bit more due to the new assets that we’ve acquired. The new permits, which I’ll review in one minute. So the guidance is confirmed. We’re well into it at the mid-year point and we continue to be very positive about what’s coming in Q3 and in Q4. So, going forward on the strategy and the operational priorities at Boumadine, which is now the main leg of value creation for Aya Gold & Silver: all the independent consultant firms have been engaged on all key feasibility work streams — metallurgy, energy, water supply, logistics, TSF location, feasibility study — all of that is now ongoing and will be ready next year. At the same time, the updated PEA is being completed as we speak and will be ready for publication early in September as we all come back from Labor Day weekend. So we’re into it right now. We are into the mine plan, we are into the financial model for the PEA review. At the same time, feasibility is being completed and we’ve already started the RFP process on mining, on construction, on electricity. So all of that is ongoing. So the investment decision has been made.
The project is extremely profitable. We will also confirm CAPEX in the revised PEA, which will be available in one month. And so Boumadine is a strategic project for us and we’re working on this thoroughly and to come with the revised PEA in September. Zgounder, you saw its optimization of this Zgounder mine. It’s working well. The open pit, the underground, the grade control, all of that is going extremely well. We’ve put in additional ventilation, we’ve put in additional safety equipment.
We had to complete the first phase of the TSF because we were putting through more material in the tailings due to the fact that we went from 2,700 tons per day planned in the feasibility study to today 3,900 tons a day, even 4,010 a day. So, of course, the direct effect of that is the TSF gets filled much sooner than expected. We’ve completed the first phase of the new TSF, which is the same one but just with bigger capacity. That’s been done. We actually did it on time and below budget.
And the new crusher expansion is being installed. It’s going to get commissioned this fall and it will be ready for early 2027. On the exploration front, you know, and that’s slide 12 on the exploration front, you know, we do spend US$60 million a year. We are drilling 200,000 meters at Boumadine. We’re drilling 30,000 meters at Zgounder. As of now, the drilling at Boumadine is at 93,000 meters. We know that the first half of the year, again, winter Ramadan is a little bit slower.
We have a third contractor coming in with three machines or three drills. We are going to be up to 15, 16 drills turning at Boumadine. And we expect to complete the 200,000-meter program as we have. And if everything goes well, maybe a little bit more. The big highlight of the quarter was the new zone that we discovered parallel to the main zone where we had an intercept of 51 meters at 890 grams per tonne silver equivalent. That is clearly not currently in the resource model.
There’s additional drilling that will be done this year on this. But this is a significant discovery parallel to the main zone. We’ve also continued to drill the main zone and the TZ zone and we’ve increased the length of the structure now to 5.4 km. So that keeps increasing. And we’re, you know, we have many other targets where we’re doing mapping, we’re doing prospecting to support future drilling programs on the Boumadine large project, which is over 1,000 square kilometers of ground under the exploration license and the reconnaissance license of 600 square kilometers.
So we have a very large land package at Boumadine and we keep increasing the land package. At Zgounder there’s 30,000 meters. As of now we’ve done 10,000 meters. You saw some results in June. There’ll be more results coming out in September. As Zgounder is steady state, drilling is giving us always very good results. We continue to see the high-grade mineralization. The structure is much wider than originally anticipated. So when we came in we thought it was a 20-meter-wide structure.
It isn’t, it’s much wider. We’re now pushing to the west to see under the fault. We are going to be drilling there in the next few weeks, few months to see if it’s continuing under the west fault. We’re also drilling to the northeast. So it’s a very, very strong project. Geology is getting to be better understood. We are using AI extensively to understand the regional play and there will be some regional drilling ongoing this fall. And we’re going to be looking hopefully for some very positive results.
And to close, I’d just like to talk about the acquisition that we’ve announced. Last week we’ve announced the acquisition of 259 square kilometers. We’ve already always been saying that in Morocco there’s tremendous potential. Some families have ground, some families have many projects and they have done very little exploration. They’ve walked the ground a little bit, done very little exploration, mainly have done a lot of the infrastructure work, but did not have the expertise to do the exploration work.
So we were able to acquire from two families a 259-square-kilometer portfolio: a district called Zagora, which has the potential for copper, lead, zinc and silver; Agadir Melul, which is copper, silver and gold, and some probably rare earth as well; and Gulmin, which is lead, copper, gold and silver. Those are very, very good projects. You should know that we look at projects every week. People come to us, show us ground. We’re very selective, very, very selective, because we already have over 1,000 square kilometers of ground between Boumadine.
But this is something, when we showed that to the team, they said, no, this is very, very interesting and we should move and acquire this. We have acquired this for 10 million dirham, so US$1 million, and the budget is about $800,000 this year to do what we always do, which is satellite imagery, spectral, stream sediment. We’ll see if we do some geophysics a bit later. But this is low-cost acquisition, low-cost exploration. We have a team, there was already a team and we have, you know, some of our team is available to do this.
We’re not taking anybody away from Boumadine because we’ll have in total 18 to 20 drills turning. We will be producing 240,000 samples. So it’s something that, you know, we’re not taking away from these two assets to go and do the exploration on this new ground. This will have its own team. It reinforces our first-mover advantage in Morocco. We are, with management and of course ONHYM, the largest player in the country. These are all district-scale exploration footprints.
They’re all put together very large packages of permits. And for us it just creates a pipeline of opportunities for the future. You will see us acquire additional ground very similar, some close to other, close to Boumadine. But we are always looking at assets because we really believe that Morocco is underexplored. We know it is underexplored. We believe that there’s more Zgounder, there’s more Boumadine, there’s more Imitin, which is owned by management, which is a world-class silver asset.
There’s more of that. There’s copper deposits, there’s more silver deposits and we have our first-mover advantage. And you will see us continue making small acquisition — like very small — but some very, very good ground that we like. So this completes the formal part of the presentation. I will turn it over to you, operator, for the Q&A period.
OPERATOR
Thank you. If you’d like to ask a question at this time, please press Star 11 on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. To withdraw your question, please press Star 11 again. Please stand by while we compile the Q&A roster. Our first question comes from the line of Bryce Adams with HR Dunn.
Bryce Adams, Analyst at HR Dunn
Hey, Benoit and team, good morning. Thanks for taking my questions. I just wanted to ask a couple of questions on the Zgounder outlook. In the disclosure, it talks to increased strip ratios in the back half of this year. So the question is, what do you think the strip ratios increase for Q3 and Q4? And then the same question for next year as well. For 2027, is that an accelerated stripping campaign next year? And then just similar on some of the outlook, you talk to slower mining rates in the underground.
What are the expectations there? Thanks.
Benoit La Salle, President and CEO
Yeah, thank you, Bryce. Ralph is with us this morning. As you know, he’s our VP Operations, so I will let him answer this. The strip ratio for quarter three and four, the life-of-mine strip ratio and why we believe there will be a slower throughput in the underground over the next few quarters. Ralph?
Rafael Baudoin, VP Operations
Hi, Bryce. Yes, happy to comment on that. Let’s start with the open pit. On the year to date in the open pit we’re around a strip of 10 and we’re quite aligned with our 43-101. In the long term we expect the strip to increase to around 16 in the next six months. And we expect to land the year closer to 13, which is quite aligned with our long-term expectation for the open pit. As for the pushback, we have several pushbacks planned through the life of mine for the open pit and we have one coming towards end of year that is in our mine plan this year.
We might push it earlier next year. We’re taking our time to assess what’s the best path forward. So the open pit is quite under control to the point that we have options. We can do it this year, we can do it a bit later, the start of next year — that is yet to be finalized depending on how things continue to progress. So the open pit on long term we expect a 13 strip ratio, some months closer to 8 like we had in the beginning of the year, some months closer to 16 depending on where we are and what’s the best way to mine it, as we go on the detailed planning on our rolling three-month plan.
As for the underground, I want to nuance that, as we are focusing on new zones and we want to really focus on continuing to develop the infrastructures for the lower levels. We’re on plan. We are closer to the 1750 level as we speak and we need to go all the way down to 1625. We have a healthy stockpile, we’re mobilizing extra crushing capacity that for the meantime is compensated by a crushing contractor. So we want to be comfortable underground.
We are right now comfortable. We worked a lot in the last two years to get to that point. And we want to keep it like that. So right now underground, we have about a 1,200–1,500 ton per day rate, which is fine. The reason why we prefer to slow it down is because we have that option in hand and we want to really focus on developing the sublevels to open more stopes and to be in this comfortable position. So as the open pit continues to sustain essentially a solid portion of the mill throughput, with the extra crushing coming on hand, we have an ore sorter also coming that we want to commission later this year.
So on the underground, it’s not so much that we will reduce the throughput — a little bit, yes — but it’s really sustain and even, I would say, accelerate the infrastructure development for sublevels.
Bryce Adams, Analyst at HR Dunn
Okay, thanks for all of that, Ralph. And I understand that you’re still putting together the 2027 open pit mine plan at the minute. My model has a strip ratio of 20 to 1 for next year. Do you think that that is too conservative?
Rafael Baudoin, VP Operations
Yeah, we’re not planning for a 20 to 1 mill strip ratio for next year.
Bryce Adams, Analyst at HR Dunn
All right, thanks. Yeah, we can adjust for that. That should help our numbers. And then last question for me is just on silver sales. Sales lagged production a little bit in Q2. So, Benoit, is that a catch-up for Q3? Has it already been caught up in July? And do you think that that’s a tailwind for the next set of financial results?
Benoit La Salle, President and CEO
Yeah, thanks, Bryce, for this question, because I think that was something that the market was kind of puzzled with. Is the selling price. I let you go. Who runs treasury and sales with the team? The answer is with us, because I think the market needs to have a clear understanding of why our selling price for some of you was a bit lower. And maybe, Hugo, you want to go at it?
Hugo
Yeah, sure. So the average sale price of silver, if you will, the LBMA average sale price for the quarter was $73. We were a bit over $68 at Zgounder. We also have to look at the timing. If you look at June specifically, price fell quite precipitously from over $70 to below $60 at the end of the quarter. And when we produce, we have to produce and then sell. So for sure, a third of our quarterly production was sold quite low compared to the average of the quarter.
So that impacted the revenue slightly. We’re 6.4% under on average of the LBMA average price. And then on volumes, there’s a few things. We had a little bit of inventory and we can see it in inventory. And on Boumadine, we sold less than—if you take our million ounces and you divide that by four quarters—we sold less in Q2, but that’s definitely going to be caught up here in Q3 and Q4. Things are going very, very well. And then the remaining of the inventory that we had at Zgounder has been sold in July.
And so, yeah, I think Q3 is looking good, especially at Boumadine. We’ll see a significant catch-up from the first half. Yeah, we were learning. We were learning. It’s our first time doing this reclaim. But I think now we’ve hit the winds at our sails now, so I think that’ll be caught up here in Q3 and Q4.
Bryce Adams, Analyst at HR Dunn
Okay, perfect.
Thank you very much. Sorry.
Benoit La Salle, President and CEO
Yeah, thanks, Bryce. And maybe I can add, because to what Hugo just said is we can see the whole sector did not like the price in June. So, like, there was a lot of waiting. And because we looked at other companies, the way they’ve done it, and we all kind of got caught with that very quick deceleration or reduction of price. And hence the average selling at 68 at Zgounder and 70 at Boumadine is a little bit below the average of the quarter. But in a decreasing market, it’s very difficult to be on the average because you keep coming down as you sell, and it’s much easier to be above the average on an increasing market.
But again, as I mentioned in my little presentation, we’re very happy with 68 and 70. We prefer 82 in Q1, but with a cash cost at 18 or 16 and AISC plus 3 or 4. I mean, we’re still very happy. And look, in six months, we generated 119 million of operating cash flow. So we like the silver price. We like where it is. We will prefer it in Q3 and Q4 to be much higher. But look, time will tell.
Bryce Adams, Analyst at HR Dunn
Yeah, for sure. Thanks, Benoit. Great color. I know we’re focused on the details here, but at a higher level, it’s a very healthy market and strong results from Aya Gold & Silver. So thanks for taking my questions.
Benoit La Salle, President and CEO
Thanks, Bryce.
OPERATOR
If you’d like to ask a question at this time, please press star 11 on your touchtone phone. Our next question comes from Justin Chen with SCP Resource Finance.
Justin Chen, Analyst at SCP Resource Finance
Hi, guys. Congratulations. Good to see the cash flow, especially compared to what the initial CAPEX was. My first one’s on—you mentioned adding a crusher at Zgounder. Just curious if you think that in the long run what type of throughput that could enable, or is it more just to maintain upper threes to 4,000 tonnes a day?
Benoit La Salle, President and CEO
Thanks, Justin, and I’m going to pass it over to Ralph, but I just want to highlight your comment. You’re absolutely right. 119 million of operating cash flow on a CAPEX of 140 million. I forgot to mention that in the presentation. Thank you so much. I think we have the best return on investment of the whole industry and Boumadine is going to look similar. So thank you for highlighting this. It’s appreciated.
Rafael Baudoin, VP Operations
Hi, Justin, this is Rafael. Happy to have a word on the crusher. So to be clear, to start, we’re not missing a crusher at Zgounder, right? Nameplate is 2,700. Plant is well designed. Now we’re pushing it. The easiest way to push it is to add some crushing capacity because that can be done afterwards and it’s quite different from another ball mill, for example. We often have a bit of rain in the beginning of the year, which makes it difficult to push the mill as high as it can go.
Now, if we go back to our 43-101 we published, we committed to increase throughput from, say, 3,600 to 3,800. We’re already there with the help of the mobile contractor. The idea with the crusher addition is to be independent. Now we have the help of a contractor. It’s doing a great job. Costs are very reasonable for the gain we get from it. The idea is to add a tertiary crusher to sustain our current throughput and, who knows, maybe even increase it a bit.
That’s to be seen. Quarter on quarter, almost every quarter except for one, over the last six quarters we’ve increased throughput of the mill. I don’t think we’re at the end of that, but we’re certainly getting a bit close and the next two quarters will tell us up to where we can continue to push it. We see days comfortably above 4,000. That hasn’t materialized yet as an average over the quarter. We’re trying to get there. Hopefully we’ll get there.
But to answer your question directly, the tertiary crusher was part of our commitment to stabilize the mill at 3,850 tonnes per day, and we’re already there. So I don’t think it’s a stretch to think we can beat that. And that’s what we’re trying to do.
Justin Chen, Analyst at SCP Resource Finance
Gotcha. Thanks, Raf. And then looking ahead to the Boumadine updated PEA, are there any changes in scope that you’re considering, perhaps on the throughput side, on the open pit/underground split side of things? Or is it primarily an updated CAPEX estimate and maybe we’ll see changes on payabilities.
Rafael Baudoin, VP Operations
So the updated PEA is what it is. It’s an updated PEA. So we have a new resource. There’s new ways to calculate the NSR. There’s payables that are changing, but materially the project remains quite a bit the same. I would expect some changes on the open pit side, on the underground side. We’ve done quite a bit of drilling since our previous resource, but the PEA is mostly focused on the resource, Justin. And any other large change, if there would be, would be closer in the feasibility study.
Justin Chen, Analyst at SCP Resource Finance
Okay, gotcha. Thanks. And just one last one. I think we had a big rainy season, or I guess wet season, this year. I guess that positions you really well for the second half in terms of water supply. Just kind of clarifying given, well, in Europe, it’s been very dry, but I think this year was good.
Rafael Baudoin, VP Operations
In Morocco, we’re already in August. We’re getting—we’re halfway or even past the halfway point of the dry season. Our water reservoirs are full, so we’re very comfortable on that end. And we just completed phase two of our tailings facility, which also allows for a little bit of water storage. So as we speak, the river flows at Zgounder and we are continuing to fill a bit, or to keep full, I should say, our water storage. So, yeah, I mean, water is not something we are concerned with in the short and the medium term.
Justin Chen, Analyst at SCP Resource Finance
Okay, perfect. Thanks, guys. Really appreciate your time. And I’ll be off the line.
Benoit La Salle, President and CEO
Thank you, Justin.
OPERATOR
Ladies and gentlemen, that concludes our Q and A period. I would now like to turn the call back over to Benoit for closing remarks.
Benoit La Salle, President and CEO
Thank you, operator. Thank you for all the questions. Look, it was a very strong quarter. We were very pleased with the team, as Ralph and the study will be ready in a couple of weeks. It’s mainly a new resource model and introduction of the new payability of the metal. Some people were questioning historically, metallurgy. Well, there’s no metallurgy issue as we are sending all of the concentrate to a smelter. So metallurgy is not an issue. Payability is important, and we will have the new payability numbers in the PEA.
So big catalysts coming—or the catalyst that arrived in Q2. We didn’t mention this, but the U.S. listing has been a tremendous success. The NASDAQ listing, it did increase our G&A this quarter. Some of you may have seen a little bump in the road of our G&A, but that’s being taken care of. But the U.S. listing in Q2 is a major, major success. Our volume has gone up. New funds became shareholders, some became shareholders between 5 and 8% of the company.
It has really changed our distribution and our shareholder list. So we’re very pleased with the listing. And so that was a major catalyst in Q2, of course, drilling. We had great results in Q. But what to expect going forward is the Boumadine study, which will be in early September. That is important because that’s also the base for the feasibility study that will be done for H1 of next year. But at the end, we’re starting Boumadine. We’re going to break ground at the end of the year for electricity, the power line, for water, for the camp, for location and all that.
So it is an ongoing construction project. Ralph has built a team in Canada. We have a team in Morocco that’s also been put together, the construction team and all of that. So it is really shaping up to be the big project for 2027, 2028 for us, and it’s continuing to grow. The drilling is ongoing at Zgounder, the drilling is ongoing at Boumadine. David will have updated results available in September. And we’re going to see many of you at Beaver Creek or at the Denver Gold Show.
So we’ll have updated results from Boumadine and from Zgounder. Also, you can expect more acquisition of ground. Morocco is becoming a very, very good jurisdiction. When you compare that to a lot of Africa and South America, Morocco is a key jurisdiction for mining. And we do see some people coming in, but, you know, we have a first-mover advantage. We’re buying. We will be acquiring more ground—and ground that David and his team like and believe that there’s tremendous potential.
So just in closing, you remember we always talk about the three pillars of the organization: geology, people, and jurisdiction. I think every quarter that we see every increase in commodity price, it just tells us that we are in the right jurisdiction with the right mining code, with the right people, with the right government supporting mining. The geology is exceptional, absolutely exceptional. And we will continue to show you that there’s more and more Boumadine and more Imiter in Morocco, and the talent pool that we have is just expanding at all times, and people are very happy to come and join Aya in Canada or in Morocco.
So it’s a recipe for success. We’ve done very well so far. I mean, since we took over six years ago this has been a tremendous success, but we believe that there’s a lot more to come. I would say the best is yet to come, and that’s a lot of pressure on David and in geology, but I think the best is yet to come. Jurisdiction is great, and look, we will see you for the Q3 call. We’ll see many of you before in Denver, but look, we’re really looking forward to a strong third quarter.
Very good geological results and production results and financial results in Q3. Thank you very much. Thank you for being there today and your support, and we’ll see you in a few weeks in Colorado. Thank you.
OPERATOR
This concludes today’s conference call. Thank you for participating. You may now disconnect.
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