Cameco Corporation Aktie

Thank you for standing by. Welcome to the Cameco Corporation Annual Meeting of Shareholders. It's now my pleasure to turn the meeting over to Jenny Hoffman, Corporate Secretary. Ms. Hoffman, the floor is yours.

Thank you, operator, and welcome to everyone attending today. We are pleased you have joined us for our shareholder meeting. Our head office is located in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, which is on Treaty 6 territory, the traditional territory of Cree Peoples and the homeland of the Métis.

I would also like to acknowledge that we have mines, industrial facilities and offices on treaty areas in both Northern Saskatchewan and Ontario. I'm doing this to reaffirm our commitment and responsibility to building meaningful relationships and to improving our own understanding of local indigenous peoples and their cultures.

Now turning to the meeting. I will outline the agenda and various procedures and guidelines. There is time set aside following the formal business of the meeting for questions of a general nature that pertain to the business and affairs of Cameco. Those persons attending and participating as registered shareholders or as duly appointed proxy holders are entitled to ask questions then. You're encouraged to put your questions in now, and we can address them at the appropriate time.

In terms of the agenda, following her remarks, our Chair, Catherine Gignac, will call the meeting to order and address various preliminary matters. All the items of business to be voted on will be moved. We will then take questions from registered shareholders and duly appointed proxy holders on all the items of business. They can be submitted by using the messaging platform available on your screen.

Registered shareholders who wish to vote at the meeting and cast a ballot online should have logged into the webcast by entering their 15-digit control number on their proxy form and the password cameco2026, all in lower case, with no spaces. Proxy holders, including beneficial owners who appointed themselves as proxy holders should have logged on to the webcast by entering the 4-character invite code provided by Computershare Investor Services, Inc. and the password again, cameco2026, all in lower case, with no spaces.

If you have logged on properly, the electronic ballot will be displayed. The online balloting is now open, and you are encouraged to complete your voting as soon as practical since voting will close within 30 seconds after the conclusion of the formal business of the meeting. Be sure to stay connected to the Internet at all times in order to vote. If you are a registered shareholder or a duly appointed proxy holder who logged on as a guest, you will not be able to vote at the meeting unless you exit the meeting and log back in and using your 15-digit control number and the password.

Once the formal items of business are moved, we will answer questions received through the online messaging platform relating to the items of business. The legal name of the submitting shareholder or proxy holder will be read aloud before the question is addressed. Questions that are redundant or that have inappropriate language or are otherwise unduly disruptive to the orderly conduct of the meeting will not be addressed. Questions of a general nature that pertain to the business and affairs of Cameco will be addressed in the question-and-answer session following the meeting.

Our meeting today does not include a senior executive presentation. Cameco recently hosted its first quarter conference call with the company's senior executives on Tuesday, May 5, 2026, where the senior executives discussed trends in the market, the execution of Cameco's strategy and took questions. A recorded version is available on our website, cameco.com. If during the meeting, we encounter any technical difficulties with the webcast, please remain logged on, and we will resume as soon as possible.

Please note that this webcast may include forward-looking information that is based on a number of assumptions, and actual results could differ materially. Please refer to our management proxy circular, annual information form and MD&A, all of which are available on SEDAR+ for more information about the factors that could cause these different results and the assumptions we have made.

I now turn the meeting over to the Chair of Cameco's Board, Catherine Gignac.

Welcome, everyone, and thank you, Jenny, for outlining today's agenda, procedures and guidelines. My fellow directors and I would like to thank all shareholders who voted in advance and for your continued support of Cameco as we move through some exciting times for our industry. Throughout 2025, positive momentum for nuclear energy continued to build among governments, industries and the general public. Today, we are seeing increased demand for nuclear energy around the world, which is good news for Cameco.

A key driver of the increased demand is the growing recognition of the critical role that nuclear power must play in achieving energy security, national security and climate security objectives, especially as electrification and decarbonization accelerate and concerns about energy affordability and global security persist. With more than 35 years of experience in the nuclear industry, Cameco has designed our strategy of full cycle value capture to be resilient by remaining disciplined, by building a balanced portfolio in accordance with our contracting framework, by profitably producing from our Tier 1 assets and aligning our production decisions across the fuel cycle with our delivery commitments and customer needs, by maintaining the financial discipline required to execute on our plans as market demand evolves, and by exploring emerging opportunities within the nuclear power value chain.

Cameco is recognized for the difference we can make on a global scale, helping provide something the world needs, secure, reliable and carbon-free baseload electricity. We have built a strong reputation as a proven and dependable supplier with diversified assets that give us the flexibility to respond to market demand while staying aligned with our long-term contract portfolio and disciplined supply strategy.

In 2025, Cameco delivered strong financial performance as we continue to build our long-term contract portfolio in a market that is increasingly focused on security of supply. In the constructive demand environment that continued to improve, we executed our strategy with the same measured and deliberate approach that our stakeholders expect from us. We again demonstrated our financial discipline, repaying the remaining USD 200 million outstanding on our term loan and maintaining a strong balance sheet. We also increased our annual dividend to $0.24 per common share a year earlier than planned.

With our Tier 1 production and supply flexibility, we ensured that we met our delivery commitments. At McArthur River and Key Lake, we navigated a year that included challenges tied to the transition to new mining areas, driving our decision to decrease production volume at the operation. However, Cigar Lake responded and exceeded expectations, helping to offset some of the deferred production.

Cameco's Fuel Services segment delivered another strong year with record UF6 production at Port Hope. Looking ahead, we will continue to be disciplined, focusing on maintaining our reputation as a reliable supplier and building flexibility across our portfolio of assets. The positive market conditions that we expect to benefit our core uranium and fuel services businesses are also presenting significant growth opportunities for Westinghouse, which we own in a strategic partnership with Brookfield.

In 2025, Westinghouse continued to demonstrate the value of this investment, including strong underlying performance and a meaningful contribution to Cameco's overall results. We also benefited from a Westinghouse cash distribution tied to its participation in the Dakovna nuclear project in the Czech Republic. And in October 2025, we announced a major milestone, a strategic partnership between Cameco, Brookfield, Westinghouse and the U.S. government to accelerate deployment of Westinghouse reactor technology.

The partnership includes financing with an aggregate investment value of at least USD 80 billion and support for permitting and approvals to construct new reactors across the United States using Westinghouse technology. Westinghouse's AP1000 reactor with 6 units operating globally and another 14 under construction is the modern design-ready, fuel-ready and license-ready solution. Once new reactors enter operation, the maintenance, services and fuel supply they require throughout their 80- to 100-year life cycles create significant opportunities that are expected to benefit both Westinghouse and Cameco.

Today, we are optimistic about the opportunities for growth that lie ahead with accelerating demand for secure, reliable, affordable and carbon-free baseload electricity. The positive momentum is being driven by global factors that we expect to persist for years to come. Geopolitical uncertainty, energy security, national security and climate security concerns are highlighting the multiple benefits of nuclear energy and driving increased demand, leading to nearly 40 countries pledging to triple nuclear power capacity by 2050.

We believe the fundamental support for nuclear power and nuclear fuel is more durable than ever, and we are optimistic about Cameco's role in helping meet the world's growing demand for electricity. But for us at Cameco, how we do business is just as important as the business itself? Our work is rooted in strong values and a clear framework for how we behave as we work to achieve our purpose. We are guided by 4 key values that are at the core of everything we do: safety and environment; people; integrity; and excellence.

From the implementation of our corporate strategy to our day-to-day operations to our approach to executive compensation, Cameco remains committed to integrating responsible and sustainable business practices into our decisions, processes and activities. Along with our focus on maintaining a strong safety culture and prioritizing the health and safety of workers and communities where Cameco operates, we continue to reinforce Cameco's relationships with indigenous communities. We are proud to be one of Canada's largest employers of indigenous people, and we continue to work towards mutual benefit through employment, business development, education, training and community investment.

In fact, just last month, we very proudly surpassed the $5 billion mark in total spend on goods and services for our Saskatchewan operations with northern indigenous-owned contractors and businesses since the time we started tracking that metric in 2004. In 2025, another standout example of our commitment to the community was Cameco's $10 million donation to the University of Saskatchewan, which will support a new undergraduate nuclear fuel cycle program, along with research and innovation in the energy and mining sector.

The donation will also expand opportunities for northern and indigenous communities through programs like the Cameco Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics Pathways initiative at the University of Saskatchewan Prince Albert campus. We are proud of these contributions and know that supporting these activities is not only good for business, but the right thing to do. The Board and I maintain a high level of confidence in Tim Gitzel as Cameco's CEO in the expertise of his senior management team and in Cameco's employees across the organization who are critical to the company's success.

The leadership team is widely respected, conducts itself with integrity and leads with a demonstrated commitment to safety, people and the environment. Their expertise and commitment together with the next generation of leaders they have developed give us confidence that Cameco will continue to execute its strategy and advance our vision of powering a secure energy future.

To conclude, I want to thank my fellow Board members for their dedication over the last year. We have a strong and engaged Board that brings tremendous value to the table, and the Board takes its responsibilities very seriously. We also want to recognize Daniel Camus, who is not standing for reelection this year after reaching our director term limit. We thank Daniel for his strong contributions over the past 15 years, particularly in his role as Chair of the Audit and Finance Committee, and we wish him all the best. On behalf of the Board, thank you again for your continued support of Cameco. We remain optimistic about the future, confident in our strategy, disciplined in our execution and committed to doing business the right way, guided by our values as we help power a secure energy future.

We will now turn to the formal part of the meeting. I am joined by Tim Gitzel, Cameco's CEO; and Jenny Hoffman, Cameco's Corporate Secretary. The purpose of the meeting is to receive the financial statements, elect the directors, appoint the auditors and consider Cameco's approach to executive compensation. The meeting will now come to order. As Chair of the Board, I will act as Chair of the meeting. Jenny Hoffman will act as Secretary of the meeting. Representatives of Computershare Investor Services, Inc. are attending and appointed as scrutineers for this meeting. The Secretary has advised that we have a quorum for the meeting. The Secretary has an affidavit attesting to the mailing of the notice of meeting.

I now declare this annual meeting to be regularly convened and properly constituted for the transaction of business. The first item of business on the agenda is to receive the corporation's 2025 consolidated financial statements and the auditor's report. The financial statements and the auditor's report have been distributed by mail to requesting shareholders and have otherwise been provided in accordance with notice and access requirements.

They are also available on Cameco's website. They are presented to the meeting and no other action is required with respect to them. To proceed efficiently, I have asked the Corporate Secretary to move the matters which are called for in the notice of meeting. Voting on the applicable items of business to come before today's meeting is being conducted online by a single electronic ballot. Voting online has been open since the start of the meeting and will remain open for approximately 30 seconds following the conclusion of the question-and-answer session on the items of business.

Once voting closes, the scrutineer will tabulate the results of the vote for each matter. All items of business in the notice of meeting will now be moved. The first ballot item is the election of directors. Jenny, could you please propose the nominees for election?

I move that each of the proposed nominees as listed in the management proxy circular accompanying the notice of meeting be nominated as directors of the corporation to hold office until the next Annual Meeting of the Shareholders or until their successors are elected or appointed in accordance with the provisions of the Canada Business Corporations Act.

The nominees are Tammy Cook-Searson, Catherine Gignac, Tim Gitzel, Marie Inkster, Katherine Jackson, Don Kayne, Peter Kukielski, Dominique Minière, Leontine van Leeuwen-Atkins.

The next item of business on the agenda is the appointment of auditors and the authorization of the directors to fix their remuneration.

I move that KPMG LLP be appointed as auditors of the corporation until the close of our next Annual Meeting of Shareholders and the directors be authorized to fix their remuneration.

The next item of business is the consideration and approval of the nonbinding advisory resolution accepting the corporation's approach to executive compensation disclosed in the management proxy circular.

I move on an advisory basis and not to diminish the role and responsibilities of the Board of Directors for executive compensation, that the shareholders accept the approach to executive compensation disclosed in Cameco's management proxy circular delivered in advance of the 2026 Annual Meeting of Shareholders.

We will now take questions from registered shareholders and duly appointed proxy holders pertaining to the business of the meeting. Jenny, please read any questions received related to the items of business. As a reminder, proper questions not related to the business of the meeting will be addressed in the question-and-answer session following the meeting.

Madam Chair, there are no comments or questions to be addressed related to the business of the meeting. Discussion of the items of business is now closed. Please complete your ballot now. There are 30 seconds remaining for you to do so, after which your ballot will be automatically submitted.

[Voting]

Majority of votes cast in favor of their election, each of the director nominees are elected. Due to the number of proxy votes received prior to the meeting, I can advise that the motion for the appointment of auditors and the resolution on an advisory basis that the shareholders accept the corporation's approach to executive compensation have passed. Jenny, could you please advise on the vote results?

Thank you, Catherine. The preliminary vote report shows support for the appointment of auditors of at least 93% and support for the advisory vote on executive compensation of at least 98%. The final vote report will be filed on SEDAR+ on or before May 8, 2026.

Thank you, Jenny. As there is no further business for the meeting, I declare that the meeting is terminated. We are pleased to have this time to answer your questions of a general nature pertaining to the business and affairs of Cameco. If you have not already done so, use the messaging platform available on your screen to submit a question. Jenny, can you please review the protocol for the question-and-answer session?

Yes. We will read questions that are submitted and the name of the shareholders who submitted them. We will also consolidate questions of the same nature. Cameco will not address any questions or statements that are, amongst other things, related to material nonpublic information of the company, irrelevant to the business and affairs of the company or out of order or not otherwise suitable for the conduct of the annual meeting. All as may be determined by the Chair in her reasonable judgment. For additional information about the conduct of this question-and-answer session, please see the Asking Questions section on Page 13 of the management proxy circular.

Thank you, Jenny. Could you take us through any proper questions that have been received?

Madam Chair, there are no questions to be addressed.

As there are no questions, I would like to thank all of you for attending. I also would like to take this opportunity to thank all of Cameco's shareholders for your support. Your ability to engage with our Board and management team is important to us. Before we sign off, I've asked Jenny Hoffman to review some of the ways that you can get in touch with us.

Thank you, Catherine. Our website, cameco.com, is an important and useful source of information. You can access our quarterly disclosures and join quarterly investor webcasts and conference calls by navigating to the Invest section of our website where we maintain an archive of all recent investor disclosures.

You can also e-mail questions to the Corporate Secretary or to our Investor Relations department directly at any time. Contact information for that is available on our website. You are also welcome to mail a confidential letter to the Chair of the Board or the Chair of any Board Committee. Further details on that are set out on Cameco's website and are included in our management proxy circular. This now concludes our event. Thank you for your continued support of Cameco.

Thank you for standing by. This is the conference operator. Welcome to the Cameco Corporation First Quarter 2026 Results Conference Call. [Operator Instructions] The conference is being recorded. [Operator Instructions]

I would now like to turn the conference over to Cory Kos, Vice President, Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Thank you, operator, and good morning, everyone. Welcome to Cameco's First Quarter 2026 Conference Call. I would like to acknowledge that we are speaking from our corporate office in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada, which is on Treaty 6 territory, the traditional territory of the Cree people and the homeland of the Metis. I would also like to note that today is May 5, which has red dress day here in Canada, honoring the lives of missing and murdered indigenous women, girls and Two-Spirit People. It is a day to raise awareness, strengthen understanding and commit to continued action grounded in respect and responsibility.

With us on today's call are Tim Gitzel, Chief Executive Officer; Grant Isaac, President and Chief Operating Officer; Heidi Shockey, Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer; and Rachelle Girard, Senior Vice President and Chief Corporate Officer.

Tim will provide some commentary to start the call and we will open it up for your questions. Today's call will be approximately 1 hour, concluding at 9 a.m. Eastern Time. Our goal is to be open and transparent with our communications. So if we do not have time to get to your questions during this call or if you would like to get into detailed financial modeling questions about our quarterly results, we will be happy to respond to any follow-up inquiries.

There are a few ways to contact us with additional questions. You can reach out to the contacts provided in our news release. You can submit a question through to send us a message link in the Invest section of our website or you can use the Ask Question form at the bottom of the webcast screen, and we'll be happy to follow up after this call. If you joined the conference call through our website event page, there are slides available, which will be displayed during the call. For your reference, our quarterly investor handout is also available for download in a PDF file on our website at cameco.com.

Today's conference call is open to all members of the investment community, including the media. During the Q&A session, please limit yourself to two questions and then return to queue. Please note that this conference call will include forward-looking information, which is based on our current assumptions and actual results could turn out differently. You should not rely too heavily on forward-looking statements, and we do not plan to update them after this call, except as required by law. For more information on the assumptions we've made and the risk factors involved, please see our most recent annual information form and MD&A.

With that, I will turn it over to Tim.

Well, thank you, Cory, and hello, everyone. Thank you for joining us today to discuss Cameco's first quarter 2026 results. Last week, a number of us were in Ottawa attending the Canadian Nuclear Association's 2026 Conference. The annual gathering brings together a broad cross-section Canada's nuclear ecosystem from operators, governments and regulators to investors, supply chain and indigenous partners with more and more attendees joining from the global nuclear industry each year. It's a useful barometer for where our industry stands here on home soil, at a great place to understand where nuclear policy and investment are heading next. I can say without a doubt that the tone in Ottawa was well aligned with what we're seeing globally. Constructive, confident and increasingly grounded in execution. Less discussion about aspiration and much more focus on delivery.

And it's because we're aligned around a common understanding energy security, national security, economic competitiveness and emissions reduction are not abstract objectives. Their immediate priorities and reliable baseload power is essential to achieving them. Against the backdrop of continued geopolitical tension and volatility across the global fossil fuel supply chains, nuclear power generation is increasingly being recognized as critical infrastructure. It was particularly encouraging to see the level of confidence expressed in proven deployable technologies and established supply chains, including strong support for the AP1000 reactor as the benchmark for modern, large-scale construction-ready nuclear power.

That emphasis on certainty and execution aligns directly with Cameco's strategy and how we create long-term value. The broader industry backdrop remains as constructive as I have seen it at any point in my over 40-year career. Electricity demand continues to rise, while governments are navigating an increasingly complex geopolitical environment, placing a premium on secure, reliable and domestically aligned energy systems.

In that context, nuclear energy is uniquely positioned, providing long-term energy security supporting national security objectives and delivering reliable carbon-free baled power at scale. We're seeing that momentum turning into action. Operates are advancing. Life extensions for existing reactors are being approved, two building decisions are approaching final investment decision, investments are being made in supply chains, and there's a renewed focus on fuel security. These developments are clearly structural, not cyclical.

That said, as we've consistently emphasized, durable demand growth does not automatically result in sustainable supply. Long-term contracting levels remain below replacement rates and history tells us that meaningful investment in supply only occurs when contracts are in place that support economics through the full market cycle. This reality continues to reinforce the importance of discipline on the supply side, a principle that remains central to our strategy.

Turning to the first quarter, results were consistent with our expectations and with the annual plan we set coming into 2026. Quarterly performance in our sector always reflects the variable timing of customer deliveries and the sales mix and Q1 2026 was no exception. Year-over-year improvements were driven largely by timing and improved uranium pricing rather than by any fundamental change that would impact our underlying outlook. And it's important to reiterate that we manage this for long-term sustainability, not short-term headlines.

Our full year guidance for 2026 is unchanged. And performance is expected to rebalance to those expectations over the course of the year. We remain focused on disciplined execution, risk management and long-term value creation. Our balance sheet continues to be a core strength and an important strategic asset for the company. Liquidity remains robust, provides us with the flexibility to manage risk, support operations and respond as markets evolve. That financial discipline allows us to align marketing, operational and capital allocation decisions with long-term fundamentals remaining patient through the noise in the short-term market.

Operationally, our assets delivered solid performance in the first quarter. At our Canadian uranium operations, production remained on track, keeping us positioned to meet our full year guidance. And we're preparing for the extended third quarter shutdown planned at the Key Lake mill during which we will tie in new infrastructure designed to enhance future supply flexibility. That work reflects our continued focus on investing prudently in the long-term resilience and reliability of our operations ensuring they remain well positioned through future market cycles.

At JV Inkai in Kazakhstan production progressed in line with the plan. A few of us from Cameco were actually in Kazakhstan last month, celebrating 30th anniversary of the operation alongside our JV partner, Kazatomprom. Inkai remains an important component of our operationally flexible and disciplined approach to supply, where we meet our sales commitments through the strategic management of our inventory, which can include production purchases and material borrowed under product loans.

In our Fuel Services segment, production during the quarter was solid and again, aligned with our expectations for the year. While average realized prices declined modestly compared to the first quarter of last year, it reflects normal contract timing dynamics. The conversion market remains tight, supported by demand and a renewed emphasis on security of supply. As customers prioritize reliability and trusted suppliers, we remain well positioned with the long-standing relationships, integrated capabilities and disciplined contracting strategies that support the long-term sustainability of the business.

Listing House delivered improved underlying performance compared to the first quarter of last year as reflected in higher adjusted EBITDA despite reporting a net loss driven by normal quarterly variability and the continued amortization of acquisition-related intangible assets. The long-term outlook for our Westinghouse segment remains very strong. Interest in AP1000 technology continues to build across multiple global jurisdictions, driven by its exceptional proven operating record, standardized design, advanced passive safety features that are table stakes for a modern reactor and its construction readiness.

We're continuing our work with Westinghouse and the U.S. government to announce plans to deploy Westinghouse technology and we're making meaningful progress in discussions and negotiations to grow the U.S. fleet with AP1000s. As I mentioned earlier, governments are placing value on certainty, certainty of schedule, certainty of cost and certainty of performance and the AP1000 reactor clearly stands out. As new build activity progresses, we continue to expect some lumpiness in Westinghouse's quarterly and annual results reflecting the scale and timing of large projects.

But that variability is underpinned by the core business of maintaining and fueling more than 1/3 of the world's already operating reactors and it does not change our confidence in the long-term value of the investment or its role in supporting demand across the nuclear fuel cycle. Looking ahead, our outlook for 2026 remains unchanged. We continue to expect consolidated uranium production of between 19.5 million and 21.5 million pounds, fuel services production of between 13 million and 14 million kilograms and a return to full planned production levels at JV Inkai.

With respect to the ongoing geopolitical conflict in the Middle East that has disrupted key global trade routes, I'd highlight that our operations do not directly rely on materials being sourced from that region. We expect to maintain reliable access to the commodities we require. However, we are experiencing some cost increases. At the moment, we do not anticipate the cost increases will have a material impact on our 2026 financial results, but we will continue to monitor conditions and manage our supply chain to mitigate potential risks.

Across the company, our focus remains on disciplined execution, preserving flexibility and aligning our activities with the strengthening industry fundamentals. We remain very positive on the long-term outlook for nuclear energy and for our industry, reinforcing that nuclear energy's role is expanding, commitments are becoming tangible and execution is increasingly the measure of success.

Our Tier 1 assets and integrated fuel and reactor life cycle strategy and a strong balance sheet, uniquely positioned Cameco to navigate the evolution of the market while creating long-term value for our shareholders, customers, partners and communities. And speaking of partners and communities, just before we go to questions, I wanted to highlight a recent achievement and a real point of pride here at Cameco. This past month, we surpassed $5 billion in goods and services procured from indigenous and northern Saskatchewan contractors since the time we started tracking that spend in 2004. These are great people and great companies based in communities near our Northern Saskatchewan operations, and we remain committed to maintaining these vital mutually beneficial relationships as Cameco continues to grow.

So thank you to everyone on the call today for your continued interest and support. And operator, we're now ready to take questions.

[Operator Instructions] Our first question is from Orest Wowkodaw with Scotiabank.

Can you please give us an update on the status of the definitive agreements with the U.S. government with respect to the Westinghouse announcement from last fall? I'm just curious if this is something we could expect in the coming weeks or months? Or could this take much longer to reach the finish line?

So we continue to work on them. Obviously, our legal teams are working together with Brookfield and Westinghouse and the U.S. government. And so they're progressing, I would say. But that -- I mean, we're not waiting on those to move all the rest of the pieces along. We're working with the U.S. government almost on a daily basis, I would say. I'm looking at Grant because he's on the Board and on the committee. So it's all moving along. We're excited about it. And I don't know, do you have anything to add to that?

It's important to frame out the U.S. as really being in the midst of an electron supercycle, Orest. It's astonishing. The commitment to build new energy infrastructure in the United States. And we see it every day with the demand for electricity and as it just continues to grow from the hyperscalers as well as the onshoring and the remanufacturing and the electrification of things that have never been electrified before.

And so when Tim says we continue to advance several projects, it really represents the Department of Commerce agreement is one, we announced that last October. Remember that's a commitment for the U.S. government to finance, permit, license, get to FID on a minimum $80 billion spend on AP1000. And that project continues to move along. The definitive agreements are certainly one of the work tasks that's underway, but it was a binding term sheet.

So we are -- we are fully engaged in advancing that even though the definitive agreement isn't quite in place yet because of the strength of the binding term sheet. So under that particular project, there is an effort underway to look at what are the long lead items that are required in order to stand that project up? And is there a way to put in an order for the long lead items to really get the supply chain going.

And then another pillar out of that project is, what are the models that reactors could be built under that DOC contract? And where would they be located? And those models could be a range of things from a federal build, own and operate to a federal build-own transfer model all the way to perhaps a financing of an existing nuclear operator who simply is just looking for financing.

And then the third pillar under that DOC project is just securing the financing. Remember, the original intent was the financing under that project would come from foreign direct investment pledged into the United States as part of the effort to buy down tariffs by countries like Japan or South Korea or others. So that project continues to go along. But there is a traditional path being pursued in the United States as well. That traditional path led by utilities supported by the Department of Energy under the traditional loan program office now called Energy Dominance financing office, and that's actually separate from what the DOC is working on.

And there are a number of utilities. Five or six of them in very advanced stages, pursuing this more traditional model of going to the DOE looking for loan program office, EDF financing, and similar to the DOC project, this what is interested in advancing project delivery by considering things like ordering the long lead items ahead of time. So when you step back and look at it, the U.S. isn't just talking about potentially 10 reactors under the DOC program. There -- potentially telling about another 10 under the DOE more traditional approach.

And of course, Westinghouse is just centrally involved in both of those. And those just reflect what I said at the outset, U.S. is in the midst of an electron super cycle. And the role that AP1000 can play in that is absolutely central. And I would say we've never been more excited by the prospect of new build in the United States.

Orest, the only thing I'd add to that is one of the big pieces that we're working on is standing up the supply chain in the U.S. And there was a group, I think, Grant, 40 different companies about 2 weeks ago, we're on the hill with Westinghouse, just going around talking about the supply chain. And so that's really progressing well. In the United States, we're doing the same in Ontario, standing up the supply chain in Saskatchewan. We had, I think, 3,000 people show up at a supply chain conference. So working on that at the same time. So we're ready to go.

And just as a follow-up, I mean that all sounds very encouraging. Are you suggesting that we could hear announcements of up to 20 U.S. reactors over, I guess, the next couple of years? Is that realistic here?

Well, as we continue to work through this unique channel of the Department of Commerce really focused on energy security as well as the more traditional channel of utility led through the Department of Energy through the loan program office, EDF. These are two separate programs. If they merge at some point, we shall see. But at the moment, the denominator of reactors that's being talked about in the U.S. is actually 20%. It's not $10 million. That's a big lift. It's a lot of work.

And so when folks say, when our announcements coming, you can imagine the amount of effort that has to go into all of the negotiations and all the contracting around that. But I guess, the point I want to emphasize is the effort by multiple parties by us as a reactor vendor, by us as a fuel supplier by the utilities looking for the electrons, the hyperscalers and the industrial users, the constructors as well as federal and state governments this is perhaps an unprecedented coalition that we're seeing right now to really launch a revival of nuclear new build in the United States. And it is -- I echo your comments. It is very exciting.

Next question is from Alexander Pearce with BMO Capital Markets.

So we've seen increasing pressure on sulfuric acid supplies globally. Obviously, a key operator for you in is a fairly large user of acid. Maybe you can just provide a bit of an overview on any impacts you've had specifically within your operations? And is it something you think could actually impact uranium supplies globally?

Alex, we haven't seen any real impact here in Saskatchewan when we buy more sulfur and make our own asset up at our sites. And so we're pretty comfortable with where we're at. We obviously see some cost increases, nothing of a significant nature for the moment. Kazakhstan, probably a different movie just over there a few weeks ago, and they've been talking about building a new acid plant that's supposed to come into play in the next couple of years. I'm not sure how fast that's moving along. We don't see a whole lot of evidence of that. So I think they would be a little trickier there where their whole production portfolio is based on in-situ recovery using acid. So we're watching that. I'd just say we're watching it really closely.

For JV Inkai, in particular, we continue to see probably preferential access to any of the supplies that seem to be in shortage. Over the years, we've talked not just about acid, but we've talked about piping and casing and drilling. We've talked about submersible pumps, et cetera.

And what we've seen is that Kazatomprom has made really wise decisions to allocate scarce resources if they're becoming scarce to the best-performing joint ventures and, of course, JV Inkai is among, if not the best performing joint venture. So we are not seeing an impact on JV Inkai, in particular, but should shortages become more severe on the asset side than we do expect it probably to hit the overall national production, but we do, like JV Inkai's position in this as one of, if not the top joint venture in the country.

That's great color. And maybe for my second question, I can just talk about some of the uranium you've borrowed in your facility. So you've taken another 750,000 pounds this quarter, things up to just over 4 million pounds in total. How should we think about this facility going forward? And should we think of it alongside the market purchase guidance you've given?

We have been saying for quite some time that we manage our sourcing of our committed sales through a number of different levers. And of course, the big lever is production. But we also have the ability to draw down inventory. We have the ability to buy material and sometimes we buy it in the spot market for immediate delivery.

Sometimes, we buy material on the forward curve. Out into the future, and then we can take delivery of that material whenever we need to take delivery of that material or want to take delivery of that material. We also have the opportunity to borrow which your you're referencing. And we're constantly managing these levers based upon a very simple calculation of what's best for us.

Right now, it just made sense for us to borrow a bit more as opposed to buy in the market because you'll recall earlier in the spring, you had some financial entities raising money, buying in the spot market, tightening the spot market up and it made more sense for us to turn to borrow material rather than to buy. And then as the market started to come off because there was a small royalty company putting material relentlessly into the spot market.

That gave us an opportunity to go back and buy a little bit more. So we're just constantly reacting to what the market gives us. And when somebody's foolish enough to sell into the spot market. We will wait and take advantage of that. And if the spot market is going up because financials are in there buying, then it may make more sense to borrow.

But ultimately, the point is we've always done this. This is how we manage through our committed sales. It's why we remain in supply discipline because we have all of these tools available, and we'll just continue to make the decisions that are most appropriate for us.

The next question is from Brian Lee with Goldman Sachs.

I wanted to go back to the first question around Westinghouse and U.S. government progress. Grant, I know -- and Tim, you provided a lot of color there, but your partner Brookfield, I think, last week on the earnings made some pretty granular comments on specifically making progress on establishing frameworks under which initial orders can be made for AP1000.

II think they also noted a focus on progressing key work streams and hoping to make announcements in that regard soon. So I was wondering, can you give us a sense of what those key work streams or frameworks might be that you're working on? And are those the key bottlenecks here in terms of anything kind of getting officially signed deal delivered?

Thanks, Brian. I'll ask Grant to comment on that.

Yes. And maybe, Brian, if it's okay, I won't call them bottlenecks because I think this is just norm course of the type of coordination that has to occur. I mean the United States market for new build, it's not like a Poland or even a Canada where you have central government prepared to back nuclear, you have a state-owned utility who's been given permission to expand its balance sheet to build I mean the U.S. is trying to build new nuclear in very much an industry-led but government-enabled way.

And in order to do that, you just need a lot of parties to come together at the same time. And right now, one of the critical areas of focus is standing up that supply chain. And I think we all know that if there's just an announcement for two AP1000, the supply chain will respond, but it won't respond as robustly as if there's an order for 10. And so there's an understanding that, look, there's going to be a lot of AP1000s built in a lot of different countries. That's going to require a supply chain.

So getting ahead perhaps of identifying exactly where the reactors are going to be in the model they're going to be built under is one of the work streams that was probably being referred to that you referenced in comments by Brookfield. And so the idea there is, can you coalition a group of utilities along with reactor vendor, Westinghouse along with perhaps some industrial users or off-takers of the energy to put together some structures that allow for this ordering of long-lead items commensurate with or at the same time in parallel with just trying to figure out exactly where the reactors are going to go.

This is unique and uniqueness also creates a little bit of extra time in order to figure out what the right model is. So these are the kind of tools that are being utilized, they're being utilized for the first time. There's a lot of effort going into it, a lot of interest going into it. And I think if there's a north star among the U.S. government that is pushing these efforts, whether it's DOE or DOC, it is full commitment to achieving the executive order from last May to have a minimum 10 large nuclear power plants under construction by 2030.

And in order to do that, making sure long lead items are in the queue is going to be one of the key work streams. So there's a lot of effort going on, and it's exciting. It's work that indicates that the desire is there. And I would just go back to the point I made at the outset, this notion of an electron super cycle in the United States. This notion very significant investments going in to build 100-year baseload carbon-free power is probably at an unprecedented level. And we're just really excited about Westinghouse's position in it.

That all makes sense. And then maybe this is less on your side of the aisle, but I also noticed Brookfield announced the partnership to work with the nuclear company for development of AP1000 sites. So as you spoke to standing up the supply chain, the downstream, the development side of things starting to get that figured out as well. And I think that includes VC Summer in South Carolina. So can you maybe speak a bit to what the implications are there for Westinghouse and AP1000 visibility and then maybe what the nuclear company brings to the table here for that enterprise?

Just a few very limited comments on it because not directly involved in that. And I would say that VC Summer actually is not a part of the broader conversations that we just had, the DOC program or the DOE program, it is a separate project and Brookfield had stepped in to participate in the evaluation of what it would take to finish the construction at VC Summer. That's not a greenfield project. Many of the supply chain items that would need to be ordered for greenfield are already there at VC Summer. It really is about setting the quality and the condition of that site, putting together a plan and an estimate to complete and then seeing a South Carolina wants to go forward with.

I think the partnership with the nuclear company makes a lot of sense in that they have built up a lot of capability around AP1000 construction, a lot of folks who were there for the completion of the Vogtle units or now with the nuclear company, that makes a lot of sense if you're looking to complete a project that was started years ago. But I would just kind of tuck it a little bit to the side, it is a unique project on its own path, one that we should watch for.

But probably in the long run won't be indicative of greenfield AP1000 construction. It is a different beast in that you're going back and finishing something that had already been started. So we're obviously cheering for them. It's a great project. It could be an amazing project for South Carolina, but it is different than building greenfield AP1000s.

Brian, can I just add -- I'm sorry, I'm going to go a little bit off track from that. Just we're focused on the U.S. a fair bit with Westinghouse. But I can tell you, the whole world is out there with geopolitical mass, I would say that is the world these days, a lot of people looking for energy security, national security that we talk about, of course, climate security.

And so we -- Grant and I and others have been traveling the world, we're meeting with countries all over the world. And I don't think the U.S. government isn't watching what the competitors, the Russians, the Chinese and others are doing out in the international markets. And so we're spending a lot of time out there. We've got a lot of other countries that we're working in Poland, Bulgaria, just a couple of them, Slovakia, Slovenia, we had a group in Croatia.

And then, of course, our very own Canada right here, that we just came back from the CNA conference, 2,000 people attending that Westinghouse being all over that one. And we're certainly encouraged by what Ontario has planned for new units. I think 4 big units at Bruce and OPG looking at 10 units at Westleyville, our very on Saskatchewan. here looking now at large units going to make a technology selection fairly soon, we think. And then we had some meetings in Alberta, where Alberta, the minister was there, and they're looking at 4 big units up in the Peace River country.

So certainly, U.S. important, yes, but I can tell you the rest of the world is out there as well. And we provide -- we're not state-owned. We're not government-owned. We're an independent Western supplier. That can not only supply the reactor fuel it for the 80 years to 100 years that it's going to be running. So I just wanted to add that does that's on our mind every day as well.

The next question is from Bob Brackett with Bernstein Research.

We saw the announcement back in March around Paducah and global laser enrichment, could you put that announcement into context, maybe in the context of technical readiness levels and where we are with GLE?

Grant?

Global Laser Enrichment continues to be a very exciting project for us. Folks have heard Cameco say over the years that we want to be in the enrichment business, and we will be in the enrichment business. So we continue to advance that project. We think it represents the best-in-class next-generation enrichment technology. The non-center fuse, the supplier and technology diversification that the market is looking for.

At the moment, we're TRL 6, which verifies the technology works at that nuclear reliability level that 99.96 Sigma level of reliability that really is required in order to start thinking about this as a commercial alternative to classic center fuse in Richmond. When we look at the commercial case for GLE, it continues to remain all eyes on Russia. Right now, if you look at the global supply of LEU and the capability to enrich, there is no shortage there's a lot of capacity in Russia and capacity being built up in China that at a global level keeps the market fairly balanced.

So when you look at the traditional LEU market, it really is your confidence in whether the policy decision to keep the Russians out of the Western market remains. And so in the meantime, rather than trying to figure that one out, we just continue to advance this on the basis of it being a tails re-enrichment project. And what I mean there is we have the rights to take the depleted UF6 gas, that is in the inventory of the Department of Energy and take that gas and re-enrich it back up so that it would be at a natural UF6 standard.

So think about GLE really in its first instance as an above-ground mine producing 4 million to 5 million pounds of uranium per year. Disguise is a 2,000-ton conversion plant at a time when the conversion price is at historic levels and of course, Western origin uranium is becoming more and more important on a go-forward basis. So for us, it really is a great project to advance as a uranium mine and a conversion plant and watch how the LEU market and quite frankly, the Hallyu market unfolds. And we'll just continue to advance it in that very disciplined strategic way that you become accustomed to with Cameco.

A quick follow-up. Remind us of your ownership options around GLE and your partnership with Silex?

We are 49% owner. Silex is 51% owner. We do have the rights to go up to 75% ownership of that technology at a time of our choosing. And right now, that time is not now. We're just looking at continuing to advance, go through 7, 8 and 9, which if you think about them different than technology readiness Level 6 is, as I mentioned, it is the proof that this is a nuclear reliable and verifiable enrichment technology.

But technology readiness level 7, 8 and 9 are -- answer all the really interesting questions about whether it can be deployed commercially with an advantage over the existing or incumbent technology. So those are important questions to ask. Those are the normal next stage in technology development. And we're just -- we're happy with our ownership position as we evaluate those stages and our partner, providing 51% of the capital in order to do that and the spend in order to do that just makes sense for us right now as we answer those questions. And over time, we have rights and -- but it just doesn't feel like the right time to pursue those.

The next question is from Max Hopkins with CLSA.

On the -- potentially the USD 80 billion to Westinghouse and assuming that gets vested from the government, is there potential that the Westinghouse shares completely divested from Cameco or is there a lot of room there in the next coming years for you guys to position your ownership differently in Westinghouse?

You can speak to the deal on the structure.

Yes. With specific reference to that DOC deal, remember that as part of that agreement, there was an element of this notion of -- and I think the financial times called it patriotic capitalism, which the current U.S. administration has been pursuing, which is the idea that if they do something extraordinary to support targeted strategic businesses, the U.S. taxpayer has a right to participate in the performance of that.

And that was reflected in the participation interest that we talked about at the time of that agreement. And remember, there are two really important vesting conditions for that participation interest. The first is that there has to be a minimum $80 billion commitment to finance, to get to final investment decision to permit and license AP1000 reactor new builds. So that's a huge obligation for the U.S. government.

That's vesting condition number one. If that condition is met, the investing condition number two is that prior to January 2029, and subject to a verifiable underwritten IP evaluation the value of Westinghouse's equity has to have grown from the $4 billion when Cameco and Brookfield Renewable acquired it to USD 30 billion. So if -- a minimum $80 billion is spent on AP1000s and valuation of $30 billion is discovered, then the U.S. government would have a right to a participation interest and that participation interest is subject to a netting of $17.5 billion of cash distribution.

So it really only reflects the remaining $12.5 billion of value between sort of what was created by Cameco and Brookfield since we owned Westinghouse and the extraordinary effort that the U.S. government would play. So ultimately, the U.S. government could, if they fully exercise the participation interest get about 8% of Westinghouse. Now what's clear is both Cameco and Brookfield have just a ton of optionality on what to do. We don't have to sell any shares into an IPO.

It would be the participation interest of the U.S. government that would see that IPO, we could sell down a portion. I can't speak for Brookfield, what they may or may not do. if there was a minimum valuation of $30 billion at Westinghouse, but ultimately, Cameco has nothing but optionality in front of us about what we want to do with our ownership of Westinghouse. We're not forced into any decisions we can continue to focus on the business and how it integrates with the core for Cameco.

And ultimately, if somebody came along to any corporate and said, they're willing to spend $80 billion of their own money. And if they can demonstrate that them spending $80 billion on your business, more than quadruples the value of their business. Only then can they buy into the joint venture? I think you do that deal every time. So we continue to be excited about it, and we continue to like what it means for Westinghouse's value. But in terms of what we do with Westinghouse going forward, we have nothing but optionality on that.

And under any scenario, Max, we maintain governance rights of the company between Brookfield and Cameco, we maintain the governance rates.

Fantastic. Very clear. A lot of people have been asking that. And secondly, on that, I guess, India uranium deal quite interesting. Is that assumed to be at market price or close to market price at time of delivery? And then are you seeing a lot more I guess, customers coming forward in the longer term looking to market pricing going forward?

Well, we are certainly happy with that India deal that we've had in the works probably for the last 5 years, Brent, I would say, and it was not blocked by any commercial reason. It was blocked for political reasons. So we're happy to get that over the line.

Yes, absolutely on commercial terms, market terms at time of delivery. And so that's a good one. And we're seeing a lot more -- we've got lots of discussions with lots of utilities underway now. We're not at replacement rate, as you'll hear Grant say many times, we're still not there. I think it's 12 or 13 years in a row now we haven't hit that. So there's a lot of pent-up demand, 3 billion-plus pounds that have to be procured in the next not even 20 years. So we think the market looks pretty strong going forward.

It's probably worthwhile to spend a few minutes talking about the term market and using the India contract is a bit of a comparison. Certainly, we have seen big sovereign buyers like India, like China, really have a preference for market-related contracts. And we think the reason for that might be because if you're a government employee and Department of procurement services, for example, in India, there's some risk in going with a base-escalated contract because there might be times where that base-escalated contract is above the market price of uranium.

And that seems like a pretty risky position for you to put yourself into. And so we find those big sovereign interests tend to just prefer market related. We'll just pay whatever the market is at time of delivery because you can always point to the market and say, "Well, that's the price and somebody isn't individually taking on risk."

Some of the more traditional buyers, Max, we're seeing want to fix the price. There is an interest in base escalated out there right now. And I simply believe that that's because if you look at the supply-demand fundamentals, there are far more question marks around where the supply is coming from than where the demand is. So the idea that $90, $91.50 is actually relative to uranium. When you think about the price that's required to incent the transition to new supply. That's probably a belief that more and more utilities have.

From Cameco's perspective, we prefer market-related. We prefer contracts today that aren't trying to price on a base escalate term. We prefer contracts that are being priced out into the future because we also look at that supply stack. And we believe that there's a lot of uncertainty to the supply stack. And we believe that, that just means stronger pricing is coming, and we want to take advantage of that and be leveraged into it. So the India contract comes along. It aligns exactly with what they want to do as a big sovereign buyer, it aligns perfectly with the way we want to position our contract portfolio to be market-related and leverage to this transition on the supply side that needs to happen and will only happen with higher uranium prices.

The next question is from Andrew Wong with RBC Capital Markets.

So lots of talks in the U.S. government and AP1000, so there's also a lot of bills being considered globally outside of the U.S. So just wondering if you could provide any update on the sense of time lines for some of the major regions like, for example, Poland or Bulgaria, which might be more near-term decisions?

Yes, Andrew, it's nice to see you on the last week. Grant?

When we think about the new build programs, we actually think about two categories, Andrew, and that is the first would be the jurisdictions that have already picked in AP1000 and are now going through kind of that more traditional path to final investment decision. And you just gave two really good examples on Poland and the other being Bulgaria.

And I just -- I think watching the progress of those two jurisdictions and watching the commitment they have to their own energy security and really the urgency they have to their own energy security, we are expecting FID in those jurisdictions. Whether that ends up being here in 2026 or early 2027, it's more imminent than it was this time last year for sure, as they continue to work on the front-end engineering and design.

And then there is a group of markets that haven't chosen the technology yet. They're going through technology selection in Canada would be an example on that list and a very good example on that list. So I think 2026 is going to have both announcements around of programs that have already picked the AP1000. And I think 2026 is going to have more markets that pick the AP1000 to then go into some sort of decision making estimate to complete process to get to the FID.

And ultimately, the reason is very simple. It is the only gigawatt scale, Gen III+ ready to deploy reactor that you could commit to today and start to work on today. It's a reactor where I know you've seen it, Andrew, Vogtle 4 is the reference unit Vogtle 4 has been completely laser mapped by the Vogtle team by John Williams and his team. We know where every bit of kit goes. We know there's no field run left. There's no uncertainty about where any of the parts or any of the wires are run.

It is absolutely deployment ready at a time when we're back in an energy crisis. And that's an important thing to remember, the last time we saw a major build-out of gigawatt scale reactors was during a Middle East energy crisis. And here we are again, so we just really -- we just really see a lot of enthusiasm for the AP1000 because it has an undisputable competitive advantage.

Okay. And then just, I think, more of a broader question on just press reporting and just the prices that we see in the market. if we look at like fixed long-term prices during the low 90s, but then when we look at market-related floors and ceilings, those contracts have floors that are they generally closer to the other term price and the ceilings are which are probably higher. So that would suggest a stronger price environment than just the fixed price term contracts might indicate. So do you think the market needs more pricing transparency around how we look at floors and ceilings and market-related contracts? How could we get that? Could there be more of a public way of reporting floors and ceilings?

Andrew, that is -- it's a great question and one that I think we've talked about it a lot at Cameco, but it's one where we have so much new interest in the nuclear story in the Cameco Westinghouse story that it's a good reminder to go back and reinforce some of these messages. When people look at the long-term price of uranium, and it's at 9,150 today, the average between TradeTech and UxC, we always have to remind ourselves that it is only informed by the portion of term contracts that are base escalated.

The portion of contracts that are market related do not inform that underlying long-term price discovery. So what you're describing is what the rest of the market is telling us. In 2025, only about 30% of the total volumes of uranium that were contracted by everybody, not just Cameco, but across the market, were base-escalated. So really, we have a long-term price of uranium that's only being informed by 30% of the volumes contracted. The 70% are telling us a very different story. The 70% are telling us that there are a lot of utilities that are getting their heads around already paying 3 digits for uranium.

And what I mean there is the point you made. Market-related contracts typically have floors, they typically have ceilings. Those floors are typically in the mid-70s escalated, those ceilings are now in the mid-150s getting to 160 escalated. And when you look at the midpoint between those market-related contracts, you're now already between $115 and $120 per pound of uranium.

In other words, there are contracts being signed where somebody is running the value at risk, putting a normal distribution between the floors and the ceilings and understanding that the price of uranium needs to be higher to ensure that the supply of uranium is there for when it is required to go into a fabricated fuel bundle. Normally, our market would see an effort to move that long-term price to the midpoint of the market related.

And that would just evolve through regular contracting. But your point is a good one. It would be interesting to see a price reform on long-term price or adjustments to long-term price where we actually were calculating the midpoint of long-term prices. And we were posting the midpoint of long-term market-related prices instead of just the base escalated long-term price, and we would actually see price of uranium that is already 3 digits, which is realistically where 70% of the market already is.

So we continue to work on it. We continue to talk about price reforms on the spot side as well. But it's a market that tends to move a little bit slowly, so more voices are better on this, but it would certainly be helpful in helping investors understand there is a very constructive pricing dynamic going on today.

The next question is from Brian MacArthur with Raymond James.

Two questions. First of all, back to the product loans and inventories. How deep is that market? And as we go forward, as the market gets tighter and tighter, is there going to be availability for you to do those product loans? And secondly, the source of uranium enter that equation, i.e., is that all Western material that you're being able to do product loans? Or can you do it on what I call state-owned enterprises, and therefore, there's an impact on source when you put it out to the other side.

The ability to borrow material is really a function of one of Cameco's competitive advantages, which is we have licensed facilities to store material. It's yet just another thing that sets us apart from a uranium only producer from somebody who just has a single project.

They've never done anything before, never mind milled or marketed uranium versus Cameco, which produces a heck of a lot of uranium and then mills it and then refines it and then converts it then fabricate it into fuel and is obviously connected through the Westinghouse chain which means there is material that other people own that is parked at our facility. And when you park it at our facility, we have the ability to charge transfer and storage agreements, but we also have the ability to negotiate loan opportunities, opportunities to borrow the material.

So the world is always going to need these licensed facilities, we're not making any new ones. They're pretty constrained. They're very, very strategic assets. And as long as we have them, we'll have the ability to use loans as a potential source to meet our sales commitments when it makes sense for us.

In terms of origin, I won't get into a lot of detail other than -- as you know, we exclusively sell under long-term contract, which means we know exactly what organs and product forms we need, and we know where we need them. So when we think about things like loans, we are thinking about making sure it meets what's required under our long-term contracts. And so far, that's in a very, very reliable source for us. As long as we have this unique capability and these unique strategic assets, we will be able to take advantage of it.

Great. Very clear for that color. My second question just relates to -- and I know financial questions aren't what we normally do, but I did notice the average inventory cost this quarter goes down $10 a pound, and I realize it moves around as you bring in product and production and whatever. Was there anything special this quarter? It's just the $10 drop on inventory is pretty significant, and I would say pretty helpful going forward.

Brian, I'm going to ask Heidi Shockey, our CFO, to answer that.

Brian. Yes, it's just really a function of the timing. So in Q4, we would have had quite a few purchases that you would have seen coming in from JV and in Q1, of course, most of our supply that added to inventory was all on the production side. So it's just really the timing of what's going into inventory at any given time. So that will fluctuate throughout the year as we progress.

This concludes the question-and-answer session. I'd like to turn the conference back over to Tim Gitzel for any closing remarks.

Well, thanks, operator, for that. And apologies to those that I can see still on the list of questioners. There's a long list, and we can probably see on for another 2 or 3 hours, but please feel free to follow up any time with any of us. We're always happy to talk to you and to answer your questions. So thanks, everybody, who joined us today. We appreciate as always your interest.

We think at Cameco, we're really well placed to support the next chapter of nuclear growth while protecting and extending the value of our assets for shareholders, customers and communities, and that's exactly what we're going to do. So thanks again, and have a great week.

This brings to an end today's conference call. You may disconnect your lines. Thank you for participating, and have a pleasant day.

Thank you for standing by. This is the conference operator. Welcome to the Cameco Corporation Fourth Quarter 2025 Results Conference Call. [Operator Instructions] The conference is being recorded. [Operator Instructions] The Q&A session will conclude at 9 a.m. Eastern Time. I would now like to turn the conference over to Cory Kos, Vice President, Investor Relations and Communications. Please go ahead.

Thank you, operator, and good morning, everyone. Welcome to Cameco's Fourth Quarter and Annual 2025 Conference Call. I would like to acknowledge that we are speaking from our corporate office in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada, which is on tree 6 territory, the traditional territory of the Creek people and the homeland of the MAT. With us today are Tim Gitzel, Chief Executive Officer; Grant Isaac, President and Chief Operating Officer; Heidi Shockey, Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer; and Rachelle Girard, Senior Vice President and Chief Corporate Officer. Tim will provide some commentary to start the call and we will open it up for your questions. Today's call will be approximately 1 hour, concluding at 9:00 a.m. Eastern Time. Our goal is to be open and transparent with our communications. So if we do not have time to get to your questions during this call or if you would like to get into detailed financial modeling questions about our quarterly and annual results, we'd be happy to respond to any follow-up inquiries.

There are a few ways to contact us with additional questions. You can reach out to the contacts provided in our news release. You can submit a question through the send us a message link in the Investors section of our website. or you can use the Ask a Question form at the bottom of the webcast screen, and we'll be happy to follow up with you after this call. If you joined the conference call through our website event page, there are slides available, which will be displayed during the call. For your reference, our quarterly investor handout is also available for download in a PDF on our website at cameco.com.

Today's conference call is open to all members of the investment community, including the media. During the Q&A session, please limit yourself to 2 questions and return to the queue. Please note that this conference call will include forward-looking information, which is based on a number of assumptions, and actual results could differ materially. You should not place undue reliance on forward-looking statements. Actual results may differ materially from these forward-looking statements, and we do not undertake any obligation to update any forward-looking statements we make today, except as required by law.

As required by securities laws, we also need to make you aware that during today's discussion, the company will make references to non-IFRS and other financial measures. Cameco believes these measures provide investors with useful perspective on underlying business trends and a full reconciliation of non-IFRS measures is available at www.cameco.com/invest. Please refer to our most recent annual information form and MD&A for more information about the factors that could cause these different results and the assumptions we have made. With that, I will turn it over to Tim.

Well, thank you, Cory, and good morning, everyone. Thank you for joining us to discuss Cameco's Fourth Quarter and Full Year 2025 results. Earlier this week, the U.S. government Department of Energy requested a meeting in Washington, D.C. which turned out to be overlapping with our earnings call this quarter. So due to the exceptional circumstances, I'm recording these introductory comments just before we release, and then I'm catching a plane to Washington. Needless to say, continuing to advance our landmark partnership agreement signed last fall with the U.S. government to build Westinghouse reactors remains a priority. So I'll lead in with my remarks and hand off to Grant, Heidi and Rachelle for the Q&A portion of today's call. .

We're into the second week of February now, but I'll start by wishing everyone a belated Happy New Year. As I reflect on this past year, on one side of the coin, we saw ongoing geopolitical turmoil, incredible volatility and general uncertainty seemingly at every turn. But on the other side of that same coin, we also saw resilience, people, institutions and industries adapting, refocusing on the fundamentals and continuing to make meaningful progress and long-term decisions despite the noise. I'm reminded that progress like this doesn't happen overnight. It's built through consistency, strong communities, great people and a lot of discipline. If I were to summarize the past year in the context of our business and our strategy, I would say that 2025 reflects disciplined execution across the organization.

Disciplined because we remain anchored to our long-term strategy, we've learned to look past the distractions of near-term volatility and shifting market themes. And I believe the execution shows up clearly in our business today. Cameco was invested across the fuel cycle, and we are delivering meaningful value to our owners, customers, partners and communities. We operate world-class uranium mines in what we call Tier 1 because they've proven to be Tier 1, not only in terms of the quality of the deposits, but the established economics of the operations. Beyond our flagship mining assets, we also maintained proven Tier 2 operations that are currently in care and maintenance, providing future flexibility. Our long-term production plans are further supported by our advanced exploration projects and by some of the best uranium exploration properties on the planet.

We operate refining, conversion and fuel fabrication businesses with the decades of expertise required to be a long-term partner that customers can rely on. We continue to explore our way into next-generation enrichment through our investment in global laser enrichment, where tangible progress is advancing the technology for use in tails re-enrichment. And through our investment in Westinghouse, not only have we added more fuel cycle and reactor life cycle expertise, we have insight into the future of nuclear fuel demand like never before. Through that investment, we are continuing to advance deployment of the industry-leading Gen III+ AP1000 reactor in Western markets. It's a proven construction-ready design and not unproven concepts, so it aligns with our focus on disciplined execution.

Turning to our results. The quarter and the year reflect a strong finish to 2025, supported by robust contributions from all segments of the business, improved realized pricing and continued value creation from our investment in Westinghouse. As anticipated, the fourth quarter was an important contributor to full year performance, reinforcing the benefits of our long-term contracting strategy and our measured approach to production and supply. Looking more broadly at the market, 2025 marked another year of accelerating momentum across the nuclear fuel cycle. On the demand side, we saw an inflection not because of a single data point, but because policy, fundamentals and contracting behavior increasingly moved from rhetoric to action. Governments, utilities, industrial energy users and the public have recognized nuclear's essential role in delivering secure, reliable and carbon-free baseload power.

On supply, however, we're not yet seeing a comparable inflection. Long-term contracting volumes in 2025 remain below replacement rate levels, reinforcing the need for continued discipline. Utilities are focused on securing dependable supply in an environment where secondary supplies are thinning and potential new production paces long lead times, inflationary pressures and geopolitical uncertainty. While long-term contracting activity increased late in the year, we are simply not prepared to satisfy that demand at today's economics, which do not support sustainable supply. Our discipline is intentional. History tells us that real price discovery occurs when contracting levels reach or exceed replacement rates. We continue to negotiate contracts and unlock value by selectively adding to our long-term portfolio while preserving significant uncommitted volumes to be priced when more demand comes to the market.

The pounds we are adding have pricing terms that provide downside protection, but allowing us to retain exposure to improving demand. To start 2026, we have commitments to deliver an average of about 28 million pounds of uranium annually over the next 5 years. Average realized prices continue to improve, reflecting the strengthening long-term market environment. We ended the year with approximately 230 million pounds committed under long-term contracts. Considering the reserves and resources we have in the ground, we are preserving significant uncommitted productive capacity to deploy as fundamentals continue to strengthen. That alignment between long-term contracting and our supply sourcing remains a cornerstone of our strategy.

Touching briefly on the results we released this morning. We reported -- our annual revenue increased to about $3.5 billion in 2025, up 11% compared to 2024. Adjusted EBITDA was about $1.9 billion, which was up 26% from the previous year and adjusted net earnings of just under $630 million represent a 115% improvement compared to 2024. Needless to say, we are very pleased with the outcome. The theme of disciplined execution can be seen in our financials with discipline, providing us with the flexibility to manage risk, support operations and respond to opportunities as markets evolve.

Our balance sheet remains a core strength, ending the year with approximately $1.2 billion in cash and short-term investments, $1 billion in total debt and strong liquidity supported by consistent cash flow generation. Operationally, in our uranium segment, we produced 21 million pounds on a consolidated basis in 2025, exceeding our revised annual guidance. Cigar Lake once again demonstrated its world-class performance producing above expectations, while McArthur River and Key Lake delivered in line with our revised plans following the development delays earlier in the year. Importantly, while production volumes from our Canadian mines were lower than initially planned, our supply flexibility and long-term planning of our supply sources allowed us to meet delivery commitments and continue to capture value.

Our supply levers include inventory, loans, spot purchases when appropriate and committed long-term purchases like the production we buy from our JV Inkai asset in Kazakhstan. In 2025, despite a rocky start to the year and a pause in production in January last year, JV Inkai met its annual production target. We took delivery of 3.7 million pounds, representing our share of 2025 production as well as 900,000 pounds that remained in Kazakhstan from our share of 2024 production. Our Fuel Services segment delivered another strong year as well, including a record UF6 production at Port Hope. Pricing in the conversion market remains at historically high levels. supported by tight supply, growing demand and a renewed focus on security of supply.

With the tension stemming from a supply deficit and conversion, we continue to add long-term contracts with pricing that underpins the sustainability and the value of our operations. Our investment in Westinghouse continues to exceed the acquisition case expectations. In 2025, Westinghouse delivered strong underlying performance, including a significant increase in adjusted EBITDA. We received cash distributions related to both the strong results as well as an additional distribution in 2025, tied in part to its participation in the Korean nuclear project in Czech Republic.

While we do not expect comparable distributions in 2026, the Korean consortium continues to advance the Dukovany project, which Westinghouse will be involved in along with work on another 2 reactor project at the Temelin site in Czechia. Westinghouse's outlook remains strong and reinforces the long-term value of our investment. During the fourth quarter, we announced a strategic partnership between Cameco, Brookfield Westinghouse and the U.S. government aimed at accelerating the deployment of Westinghouse reactor technology. backed by at least USD 80 billion in planned investment from the U.S. government. This initiative underscores the growing alignment between policy, energy security and the only proven nuclear technology that is ready to deploy today.

Following the term sheet signed in October, constructive discussions are continuing in support of reaching a definitive agreement. As I said, I'm on my way to Washington for the ongoing discussions literally as you listen to this call today. For Cameco, this partnership also supports long-term demand across the fuel cycle, and enhances our insight and ability to meaningfully participate in the global nuclear build-out. Looking ahead, we expect growth across the nuclear fuel cycle to continue, driven by electrification, decarbonization and energy and national security priorities. These are all themes you've heard us repeat call after call. But it's important to reinforce them because they reflect the durability we have not seen before in nuclear. And as the focus on the sector grows, commitments will increasingly be measured by delivery.

Plans for future uranium supply, along with headline grabbing narratives, promising greenfield conversion and novel enrichment technologies continue to attract attention. But the next phase will be defined by execution. Execution is the proof behind commitments and the foundation of trust. And this is where Cameco's experience, assets and discipline matter. In 2026, we expect to produce between 19.5 million and 21.5 million pounds of uranium and between 13 million to 14 million kilograms of uranium product in our Fuel Services division. JV Inkai is planning to ramp up to its full capacity of 10.4 million pounds this year, our share of which is 4.2 million pounds. That's accounted for as a committed purchase along with other long-term purchase commitments.

We plan to buy up to 3 million pounds, keeping in mind that we expect to use our various supply levers efficiently, so we're not forced to buy in the spot market if it doesn't make sense. We expect to deliver between 29 million and 32 million pounds of uranium in 2026 with an average realized price between CAD 85 and CAD 89. Fuel Services deliveries are expected to match production at 13 million to 14 million kgU. And our outlook for our share of adjusted EBITDA from Westinghouse is approximately USD 370 million to USD 430 million, representing continued strong performance, albeit lower than in 2025. Remember that back in the second quarter of 2025, we accounted for the significant payment related to the Korean reactor built in the Czech Republic, which was USD 170 million for our share related to that specific project.

It's a good reminder that as new build activity gains momentum, you can expect some degree of lumpiness in the results from Westinghouse with these big reactor projects pushing forward. So to conclude, we believe the risk to supply continue to be greater than the risk to demand, we believe that Cameco as a disciplined operator with proven Tier 1 assets integrated capabilities across the nuclear industry and a strong balance sheet, is well positioned to deliver long-term value. So thank you for your continued interest and support. And operator, the team is now ready to take questions.

[Operator Instructions] The first question today comes from Brian Lee with Goldman Sachs.

Maybe first off, just around this new guidance framework for the Westinghouse business. I think that makes a lot of sense given all the activity that's happening and now it's not going to be linear. But can you maybe give us some sense of the framework or ballpark range of what kind of the financial impact of each project is? And presumably, you're talking about 2 packs, so it does seem like the Westinghouse guidance for 2026 is including it says in the MD&A, 1 project going forward in the U.S. this year. So maybe just thoughts around how we should think about the sizing of the financial impact from each of these projects? And then maybe any color around potential projects in Bulgaria, Poland, maybe even Canada as well. I have a follow-up.

Yes. Thanks, Brian. It's Grant. I'm going to maybe start with your second question, and then we'll work backwards into the specific guidance. I mean Westinghouse continues to be a very exciting space for us. We see nothing but enormous upside for the leading gigawatt scale Gen III reactor, we think the opportunities continue to grow. So we remain very disciplined at Cameco. We don't put stuff into the forward guidance until it is at FID. But let's just think about what's on the docket. When we look at the U.S., I think everybody knows about the $80 billion project to build 8 to 10 reactors in the United States. But don't forget there were a number of conversations in flight with utilities who had been working with the Department of Energy, energy dominance financing group. So we're not talking 8% to 10%. We're talking about a bigger number in the United States that are under consideration. Perhaps another 10 in addition to the U.S. government program.

We know that Canada wants to build 4 gigawatt scale reactors at Bruce Site C, but we also know that they're talking about another 10 at the West Leeville site, so potentially 14 there, added to 10 plus 10 perhaps in the United States. We know Poland wants to build AP1000s. They picked it for a 6 reactor program. We know Bulgaria wants to build AP1000s. We know Slovenia is having a very good look. We know Slovakia is having a very good look. And of course, we participate in every Korean new build, and Tim in his comments flagged that not only have the Koreans advanced the Dukovany site in Czechia, but are also looking to advance the Temelin site with another 2 reactors and then we could even expand it a little bit further and talk about new builds in other jurisdictions, parts of the Middle East, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates. The point being the upside case for Energy Systems is very, very significant, and we're seeing a lot of activity in that area. But many of those are not at FID yet. And so they're not in our guidance.

What we wanted to do was very prudently say, look, Westinghouse is a mature investment for us now. We guide the Cameco core on an annual basis. We're going to guide the Westinghouse core on an annual basis and then kind of provide a framework for how each of these reactors plug in. And that framework that we've shown in the past, on a per reactor basis and good of you to note that you generally build them in 2 packs, you don't build them as one. So multiply by 2. But on a per reactor basis, you're looking at something around $400 million to $600 million EBITDA for every reactor that gets built. That's through the engineering and procurement part of the Westinghouse scope.

So we almost invite folks, you choose how many reactors you think are going to go forward in that framework in the years. And you can see the big lumpiness that comes from it. So we're just going to guide on a more systematic core-related basis. And then when you look at the Westinghouse guidance in 2026 and you compare it to 2025, it's actually up over our initial 2025 guidance with, of course, the swing factor in 2025 being the royalty payment on the Dukovany units in Czechia, but the Westinghouse core continues to perform as expected. Reactors being saved, reactors being restarted, reactors going through subsequent license renewals plus the nearly 70 reactors under construction right now, let alone those that are on the drawing board.

I guess our point, Brian, is Westinghouse just continues to be extraordinarily well positioned for the tailwinds in the nuclear space.

That's great. I appreciate all that color, Grant. Kind of maybe just my second question around kind of the modeling assumptions here. When I look at the average realized pricing outlook for 2026 in uranium, it appears pretty flattish at the midpoint year-over-year. Can you maybe speak to why there isn't a bit more appreciation happening there? Maybe just it's the timing of contracts, but I would have thought that you'd see some movement on that line given how pricing has generally been on an uptrend in recent years.

Yes, Brian. So let's shift to the other end of the spectrum and talk about uranium a little bit. This is what discipline looks like. You've heard us say for the better part of 2 years now that as we're in a market that is beginning to understand that more uranium is required and needs to be -- needs to come to the market. And you can just see that from the uncovered requirements wedge. If you look at that wedge of uranium that the fuel buyers have not yet bought, that wedge is as big as it's ever been. There is a significant amount of demand that has to come to the market. And that says to an incumbent producer that now is the time to be disciplined. Now is the time to let that demand form and let it come to the market. And those who have been watching the market know that we have not achieved replacement rate across the industry yet.

In fact, we're well below replacement rate. And we, at Cameco, have been in every cycle, and we know that when you're at replacement rate or above, that's when real price appreciation comes. I provide that as context because we've been saying we're being very fussy in the amount of volume that we're willing to place and we're being very fussy with the terms and conditions that we're willing to part with future material. So no surprise, we just haven't been layering in the big volumes because while we're being fussy, not every utility is prepared to agree to our terms and conditions.

So you're not seeing that pickup in the near term because we're preserving those pounds for when more demand is coming to the market. That's our disciplined marketing strategy, and it's also reflected in the disciplined pace at which we then produce into that demand. So this is what discipline looks like. This is how you capture long-term value. This is not the moment to be locking in huge volumes because we think more demand has to come and as that demand comes, it's going to probably price stronger uranium, and that's when we want to do more contracting. And then that's when you'll see a lot more exposure to rising prices.

The next question comes from Alexander Pearce with BMO Capital Markets.

So an easy question to start with Grant. Given Tide's absence from the call, do you think you're getting close to finalizing the agreement or would you expect maybe we could see something in the next kind of quarter or could it be a bit later in the year?

Yes. Just a bit of context around the agreement with Cameco Brookfield Westinghouse and the U.S. government. Obviously, we announced a definitive term sheet at the time of announcement. And then there was work to do on the definitive agreement, and that continues. What the conversation is really about is these 3 projects underneath that are advancing. There's a lot of momentum behind them. The first one is identifying where the 2 packs are going to go and the model that they're going to be built under. And that's work being done by the Department of Commerce and the Department of Energy, and we're only sort of involved around the edges and figuring that piece out.

The second big project is identifying what the order of the long lead items would look like. So there's been a separation, if you will, between the normal process of identifying a site and figuring out the model that's going to be built under and then ordering long lead items. Those 2 have been separated because everybody is working backwards from the Trump executive order that says 10 large nuclear power plants have to be under construction by 2030. So if you wait and do step on first, identify all of the sites and identify the model, and then you order long lead items, you won't achieve the executive order.

We're obviously heavily involved in the conversation about ordering the kit for 10 reactors right now upfront. And then the third project, of course, is just securing the financing to come from Japanese as part of the foreign direct investment commitment. So this isn't about negotiating the definitive agreement. This is about fulfilling all of these next steps, very exciting conversations about what the order for long lead items would look like. I think if we allowed ourselves to be optimistic, we do believe there's a good chance that we will see a long lead item order as part of this program in 2026. And in fact, that will probably coincide with long lead item orders on other programs as well.

So 2026 is set to be a pretty transformative year where announcements turn into action on the gigawatt scale new build section.

So would you suggest that there could actually be some upside to the '26 guide then if everything comes into place and you get the 2 units, et cetera, et cetera?

Yes. Perhaps there could be. I mean, we built a little bit of that into the guidance for Westinghouse, but that's sort of on a small order basis. This concept of separating long lead items from figuring out where each 2 pack is going to be built in the model actually kind of reverses the framework that we put out for thinking about how every AP1000 flows revenue and margin and cash flow, and that is normally you would start to do the engineering work. You would sign the FEED One, which is tens of millions of dollars and then the FEED 2 contract, which is hundreds of millions of dollars all leading to a final investment decision, which would then trigger the procurement side of the business, the ordering of the long lead items that really important procurement process that Westinghouse provides oversight and guidance and quality assurance and all of that on. .

With the separation of the long lead items from identifying where the reactors are going to be built, we actually could see the procurement revenues and margins beginning to flow first. And so that will be something that we'll watch for in 2026. And obviously, we'll be very vocal about what that means to the Westinghouse business. should we find ourselves in a position of securing orders for substantial orders for lots of reactors and their long lead items.

The next question comes from Orest Wowkodaw with Scotiabank. .

Could we spend a few moments just talking about the production outlook at specifically McArthur River. I'm surprised to see the potential impact here in 2016. It looks like your guide would suggest that output could be as much as 4 million pounds below the 18 million pounds design. What -- I guess, can you give us more color what's going on there and whether this issue is expected to be resolved this year? Or could this continue into future years?

Yes, Orest. Great question. And we'll spend a little bit of time on it, of course. So if you think about McArthur River, even with the guidance we put out for 2026, it makes McArthur, the second largest uranium mine in the world by quite a margin. So between Cigar and McArthur. this is a lot of uranium production that Cameco is responsible for. And it really reflects just how strong the production team is there. So we announced in September of 2025 that we were seeing delays at McArthur River. And we also said at the time that you can't divorce our plans to produce from where the market is at. And so when we look at today's market, that's not at replacement rate, a market where we think a lot more demand has to come, that's a market where we're not yet placing growth pounds or expansion pounds or extension pounds because the demand just simply hasn't been there.

Pricing has been getting stronger and stronger on very limited demand. But ultimately, that demand hasn't been very strong. So that then informs how we think about our production plan. So we look at McArthur River, we look at those delays that we announced in September 2025. And the 2025 production just hit the top end of that revised guidance in 2025, which was good. But ultimately, we just stick to the plan that we put in place in September 2025. We have no incentive right now to accelerate it in any way. So that's not what we're trying to do. We're not trying to take any heroic action at McArthur River. We're just systematically working on the mine development that's required as we as we move into new zones. And we're not being incented by the market.

We're not being told by the market with volumes of demand that it's time to do anything different than systematically go ahead and do that. So we are seeing a bit of a tail on the 2026 guidance. But ultimately, McArthur has produced at 18 before. It's produced at 20 before. It has a license to go to 25. McArthur is an extraordinary asset. We are just timing it and pacing it as part of our demand strategy and our disciplined strategy. And that's all that this reflects.

And could that -- based on that incentive, could that then potentially continue into 27 and beyond if you don't see the market improve?

Well, the market is improving. And we don't guide 2027 in 2026. But our confidence that the team is working on a path to ensure that the development is there for the production when we want it. That confidence is there. It's just in 2026 as we're looking at a market, and I'll just remind everybody on the call term contracting in 2025 ended up being 116 million pounds, well, well short of replacement rate. That tells us more demand has to come to the market. And so we just -- we watch that very carefully. We never front-run demand with supply. And then that is reflected in our -- in the decisions we make about the pace at which we develop our assets. And to the extent that you believe more demand is coming, which means a stronger pricing environment is coming, These pounds are worth more in the future than they are today, which encourages us to remain very disciplined on that plan.

Okay. And does that also mean that the expansion to 25 million pounds likely comes later rather than sooner?

Well, not necessarily. We're doing the work and continue to do the work to fully understand what's required at both the mine as well as the Key Lake mill for when we make the decision to go to a higher level of production. Remember, when we sign long-term contracts, we typically don't start delivery for until 2 years and beyond. It always gives us a built-in runway to respond with our production. And what we're doing ahead of that in a market that we feel is getting stronger and stronger and more demand has to come, but hasn't quite hit replacement rate yet. What we're doing is making sure we understand everything that needs to be done at the mine and mill in order to achieve that higher level of production once it's priced accordingly.

So I would just delink the two. One is just the plan of mine development from the plan for mine expansion, but we have not made that decision yet, and we don't have any time frame for making that decision. That decision is ultimately up to the fuel buyers collectively. And it's ultimately up to them bringing more demand to the market in order to signal that it's time to expand.

The next question comes from Ralph Profiti with Stifel.

The MD&A, and just going back to the last question, did bring up some technical risk highlights around McArthur River Zone 1 and Zone 4. And as you talk about this slow proactive managing of these risks. I just wanted to get a little bit of sense on the technical risks around sort of production capability limits in the short term and whether or not you would still characterize some of the technical limits as being transient and temporary? Or is this more of a mine development risk that could take sort of multi-years to figure out versus production capability irrespective of what the market is telling you.

Yes. Ralph, I think I inderstand your question to be, are we flagging risks that would prevent us from, say, being on a disciplined production strategy? So in the MD&A, we are identifying the factors that led to that announcement in September of 2025 that we weren't going to meet our plan at McArthur River. So that was things like encountering a clay zone that was proving to slow down the rate at which we install freeze capacity and therefore, build up a frozen ore inventory and that was slowing down the rate at which we were developing into that zone. Once we fell behind that plan, our strategy doesn't encourage us to try to catch up. So we're just working systematically at the development that has been a, I would say, rephased or repaced as a result of those risks.

So those risks have not changed, and they've not gone up, they're not suddenly -- it's not suddenly a riskier environment. It's just our response to it is measured with the market. And should we see a market that starts to bring more demand and more demand brings stronger and stronger price discovery. Like it is right now, we're continuing to see strengthening floors and strengthening ceilings and market-related contracts. We're continuing to see that long-term price go up. If we see an acceleration of that process, that's what would encourage us to accelerate the mining plans at McArthur River. But these are linked. The pace at which we bring production on also sends a signal to the market. And right now, the signal we prefer to send is that production is matched to the demand that's in the market as opposed to trying to front run it.

And kind of my follow-up is along the same lines because you and Tim talked about discipline and the balancing act of contract layering, existing 230 million pounds in the reserve base that backfills that. At what point are we going to see potential Cameco run into sort of stresses on being able to production backfill the next, say, 10 or 15 years of that contract book and the growing demand. At what point does that become stressed?

Well, Ralph, the way we look at this market with a historic wedge of uncovered requirements in front of us and which is, I think, one important part of the macro story. The second important part of the macro story is the ability of the global uranium supply stack to respond. And I mean both the primary production stack and the secondary stack both are declining significantly while demand is strengthening, while there's a big wedge of demand still to come to the market. Ralph, this just sounds like an incredible opportunity for an incumbent producer. It sounds to me like a very constructive pricing environment. And so when you stay stress, it really is sequencing the plans to match the demand that's going to come to the market.

We're very confident the demand needs to come at it. We've seen it can be delayed. It can be deferred, but it ultimately can't be avoided. As that demand comes, as utilities bring demand into the early '20s, mid -- early 30s into the mid-30s into the market, and we capture that demand Ralph, that gives us lots of time to prepare our assets, to prepare our existing Tier 1 asset. And remember, our Tier 1 asset base is not running at full capacity. It gives us lots of time to prepare our Tier 2s in care and maintenance, which aren't even running today. It gives us lots of opportunity to consider where do we have brownfield expansion from those Tier 1s and Tier 2s and it gives us lots of time to consider what the development needs to be for additional new production. But ultimately, it's about being disciplined and not trying to front run that because as we've seen time and time again, those who build up productive capacity and don't have a home for it, end up jamming it into the spot market where it's absolutely value destructive for investors in uranium.

So for us, it is about staying disciplined. When we see that sort of tightness in the market, Ralph, it gets reflected in higher prices of uranium. That's the dynamic that gets us very excited.

The next question comes from Lawson Winder with Bank of America.

Grant. Thank you for your comments today and the update. If I could, I'd like to come back to the Westinghouse EBITDA guide. And then if there's time, just a follow-up on your Fuel Services guidance. But just on the Westinghouse guide, kind of a basic question here. But I mean if you look at the midpoint of this guidance versus the midpoint of the 2025 guidance, it's up 5%. And while I respect that you have changed the way that you're guiding, I mean the prior guide was for 6% to 10%. Is there just 1 thing you can point to that you would say, attributed to that roughly 1% below the prior range?

Well, I would say if you look at what was driving the lower end of that range. And you'll remember us talking about this quite a bit, it really was around the core of the business. So what are the drivers around the core? Where do you get pickup in the core from the existing fleet? And it really was things like reactors that were shut down being restarted. Reactors that were going to be shut down being extended. And then it was reactors going through subsequent license renewals and therefore, doing the work required to run for another 20 years. And also, we've seen an uptick in reactors that are now interested in uprates or super upgrades all growing that sort of core business of Westinghouse, that interest in reactors being restarted, saved upgraded, extended has not gone down.

It's in fact only gone up. But of course, the processes to get there, the time required to get the licenses and the permits to go through the regulatory approvals, maybe has taken a little bit longer than expected so that the orders the immediate orders and the immediate work to do that hasn't picked up quite as quickly. That just means Lawson, it's still in front of Westinghouse. It doesn't mean it's lost. It doesn't mean it's underperforming our demand expectations. It's just the subsequent license renewals and the uprates are just not happening as fast as maybe we would like, but they're still happening because they need to happen. And in fact, we're seeing more of that interest flow into orders entered going forward. So we just continue to be very excited about Westinghouse's position in the core.

I think I might add to that, Lawson, that the newbuild business is really lumpy, and that forward guidance over the 5 years, it's going to move from year-to-year, so it was a 5-year guidance. And because of the lumpiness that we're seeing that every year. And I think we'll see -- continue to see that going forward. So it's not necessarily going to be a direct straight line in terms of growth.

Okay. That's super clear. And then if I could just get your thoughts on the conversion market. Your fuel services guidance is 1 thing and then there's your fuel services contract book. And so you noted 83 million -- or sorry, 83 million kilograms of conversion under contract versus 85 million last year. And we're looking at a conversion market that just experienced an obvious global shortage. I'd be curious to get your thoughts on why the lack of contracting in conversion, just given the backdrop? And then when we think about Cameco's current capacity, is Cameco now close to achieving run rate for the expanded capacity at Port Hope on fuel services and conversion?

Conversion is a fairly good analogue for uranium. So I'm going to spend a little bit of time on it when we think about its contract totally agree. The conversion market is tight. Totally agreed that tightness is likely to sustain for a while and totally agree that this should be signaling more conversion capacity coming into the market from the West. So all of that makes perfect sense loss. And remember, when you think about contracting in the nuclear fuel cycle, price matters, and it's easy to point to a historic conversion price. But you know what else matters is tenure. What matters is how long can you secure on an escalated basis, those historic prices. And the important analog is you actually only get 1 chance to sell new capacity because once you commit your capacity, it's no longer new. And you don't have the kind of opportunity or power in the market.

So for us, conversion is about not just it's at historic price, but now it's about capturing that historic price for as long as possible. And so if there's the next step in the conversion market, it's we want to see the tenor stretch out in conversion contracts. We want to see this historic pricing not for a 3-year window or a 5-year window, but we want to see it for a 10- or a 15-year window. We want to see that market stretch out. So when you think about this notion that we're being fussy right now, we've got these incomparable set of strategic assets, strategic mining assets, conversion, fuel fabrication we want to maximize the value of these assets. And we want to maximize them over a longer term. So because we know new capacity will come into the market. And when it does that new capacity by definition, will actually probably have price downward pressure.

So we want to capture new contracts that protect us and our owners from the downward pressure that will come from new capacity. So if we're holding out in the conversion space, it's not holding out on the price side, it's holding out on the tenor side. And the analog to uranium is you only get 1 chance to sell new capacity in uranium. And so we see those in the -- that are potentially new entrants to the uranium side are saying, okay, well, yes, we're going to sell under long-term contract, but we're only going to sell for 3 years, and then we're going to renegotiate a new contract after 3 years at a higher price. And you probably won't. You only get 1 chance to place that new production. So don't squander it.

So when we look at the conversion market, we're in a unique window. We're in a window where price is strong, and now it's a matter of capturing this historic pricing for as long as we can, knowing that the ConverDyn plant is going to come back online, knowing that we're going to increase production at Port Hope in order to capture some of this demand. And knowing that there remains pressure on Springfield to restart and pressure on the Orano plant to get to full capacity. When there's more capacity in the market, there's less leverage. We just want to take full advantage of our very unique position with our incomparable suite of strategic assets.

The next question comes from Craig Hutchison with TD Cowen.

Just given the huge push in the U.S. to secure domestic nuclear field chain and critical minerals with partners like Canada. I'm just wondering beyond your historic partnership with Westinghouse last year. Are there other opportunities for you guys to work with the U.S. government across the fuel chain, whether that's your conversion business, Global Laser Enrichment or even a potential restart of your Tier 2 assets if there's -- you could establish long-term floors?

Yes, great question. When you think about Cameco, our long-term relationship with the U.S. government has always been very strong. For many years, we were the largest producer of uranium in the United States. If our mines and mills are running in the U.S., we will again be the largest producer of uranium in the United States. The U.S. government has always been interested in our GLE Global Laser Enrichment project, as reflected in the tails re-enrichment program that we have with the Department of Energy, which is a very exciting opportunity to actually secure a source of U.S. uranium and U.S. conversion for the future by simply re-enriching a stock of depleted UF6 that sits as a liability right now for the Department of Energy.

So there's always been a lot of interest. And of course, the U.S. government has a unique demand outside the civilian nuclear space, and that is demand for Navy propulsion fuel, which is demand that's going to find its way into the market right at this time when that gap between demand and supply is very significant. You're going to see national programs looking for naval propulsion fuel. And by the way, folks, that's the same uranium and conversion. It's the same UF6 that needs to go into the civilian program. So we've always had very strong relationships in the U.S. But at the moment, there's a bit of a narrative that U.S. origin uranium for example, is at a premium. And it just isn't right now. I mean we fail to see evidence that utilities are really willing to pay a premium for U.S. origin. They want Western uranium, but not necessarily U.S.

And again, it goes back to my answer previously, you only get 1 chance to sell new capacity. So when we think about those Tier 2s and we think about restarting them, we think about maximizing the value of bringing that capacity back and the leverage that we have in pricing that capacity because once up and running, you got cash and noncash costs and you've got payroll and all of that stuff. You get 1 moment to place that capacity. So if we see a U.S. interest in U.S. origin go up, nobody is better positioned than we are to capitalize on that.

Okay. Great. Maybe just a quick follow-up on GLE. Are there any kind of milestones that you want to point to this year in terms of just derisking the, I guess, the science behind the process?

Science behind the process is derisked, Craig. So when we announced achievement of TRL 6, think about it in the context of what that marks is we can confirm that, that technology in Rich's uranium to that 99.6 Sigma level of nuclear reliability that is critical in order to say that you've got a technology that folks are willing to contract with. So what remains now is TRL 7, 8 and 9, which are where you prove up that this level of reliability can be deployed at a commercial scale for CapEx and OpEx that make it competitive in the Western uranium space. So for us, it is about focusing on these next steps, TRL 7 and beyond and focusing, in particular, on the DOE tails re-enrichment project. Others we'll focus on LEU and high-SALEU.

We will focus on the tails re-enrichment because that's effectively an above-ground mine producing, what, 4 million to 5 million pounds of uranium a year, 2,000 tonnes of conversion at a time when uranium and conversion are scarce and getting scarce or that seems like the best place for us to focus. And nothing I would point to expected in 2027, but of course, we would update on a quarterly basis if there were -- if there was anything notable about it, just continues to be an exciting tails re-enrichment project.

The last question today comes from Mohamed Sidibe with National Bank. .

Just maybe on the Westinghouse guidance and completely understandable on the lumpiness of the Build segment. Just wanted to get a little bit more clarity on the core business segment. I think you noted that you remain excited about that. I know you guided in the past to about 6% to 8% core business revenue growth there. Is this something that we can still think about over the next couple of years as things are getting advanced in that segment. Let me know.

Yes. The core does continue to be exciting. I'll just -- I'll go back and restate a few of the factors that we watch for. Obviously, that core business is fuel fabrication and it's reactor services. 2 really general ways to think about it. Where does the demand come from? Well, every reactor that was shut down that's being restarted is more demand. Every reactor that is going through a life extension is more demand. Every reactor that not only is going through a life extension, but looking for operating very significant more power out of those reactors is more demand. And then, of course, there is other core elements to think about the Springfield project in the U.K., which we continue to evaluate, we continue to assess. We continue to see what the strongest business case would look like, but that would exist in the core of the business. That would be upside to the core of Westinghouse.

And then, of course, you can't forget the AP1000 new builds because every new build becomes 80 to 100 years of core business. So when we look at the core, we see a lot of upside. We're very excited about Westinghouse's position as the leading OEM for light water reactor technology. And we just really like what their position as having the leading Gen III+ light water reactor means for the core going forward. So our enthusiasm is not diminished at all.

And just on the fuel services, if I could ask maybe on the unit cost of sales there on the year-over-year guidance increase. Is there anything that's in plan to try to get back the cost within the 2025 range within that segment?

What I would say about that is that we're just seeing some general inflationary pressures definitely in that segment. And so really, it's going to just kind of be looking at the level of production and the mix there of the various products because there's a number of products that go into that segment.

This concludes our question-and-answer session. I would like to turn the conference back over to Grant Isaac for any closing remarks.

Yes. Thank you to everyone who is able to join us today. We really appreciate it. Obviously, we believe we're exceptionally well placed to support the next chapter of nuclear growth while protecting and extending the value of our assets and shareholders. We continue to see pricing dynamics that are very constructive for an incumbent producer, and 2026 will be an exciting year for us. So have a wonderful weekend.

This brings to end today's conference call. You may disconnect your lines. Thank you for participating, and have a pleasant day.

All right. Thanks, everyone, for joining. We're going to get started here. This next session is going to be a treat. I'm looking forward to this. I want to welcome to the stage, President and Chief Operating Officer of Cameco, Grant Isaac. We got a lot to talk about in terms of the nuclear ecosystem, especially on the heels of Secretary Wright's comments. I think there's a lot of optimism, anticipation, maybe capital to talk about in terms of the implications for the sector.

But maybe just big picture, I wanted to start, Grant, with 2025 was clearly eventful for both Cameco as well as the overall nuclear industry. So what would you say stood out as some of the most needle-moving events, whether at the macro and policy level and then also clearly, the company-specific milestones, what are you most proud of from last year?

Yes, it's a great place to start. Thank you, and thanks to everybody for giving us some time today. 2025 was a big year in the nuclear industry, and it was just actually a continuation of several big years. And I would just summarize it by actually echoing some of Brian's line in the past. Nuclear went from being part of -- well, first of all, being in the wilderness post Fukushima, then it became part of the climate security solution and then Russia invaded Ukraine and people realize it actually is a key part of the energy security solution.

And then it fully emerged as part of a national security solution as well. So it's that triumvirate of security issues that -- nuclear is just incredibly well placed with its attributes, 24-hour baseload, carbon-free, resilient, robust power and then just found its way into discussions over and over again. One of the notable things in 2025 was the announcement that it is time to start building in the United States. We announced a deal with the U.S. government to invest $80 billion into kick-starting new builds of AP1000 reactors, an incredible technology, the world-leading gigawatt scale technology that other nations are pursuing, and it was time to start building in the United States.

So that announcement was big. On the fuel side, it's absolutely linked to the optimism around where nuclear power is going. And another notable thing about 2025 is the world is waking up to the fact that markets actually work after years of unacceptably low prices across fabrication, enrichment, conversion and uranium, there was a lack of investment in the nuclear fuel cycle.

And that lack of investment has meant that fuel is short. And the only way to solve that is higher prices. And so we're looking at a really neat situation where our business model allows us to participate in reactor new builds, build our own demand for every reactor that then becomes core for 80 to 100 years for Westinghouse and Cameco. And we're delivering on that plan, and we're just excited about where it's at.

So this is a January conference. Everyone is trying to look out to 2026 and what the outlook could be. I know you haven't given any guidance, but following on the heels of some of the 2025 momentum, where do you see kind of the best opportunity sets for Cameco here in the coming year and the broader industry?

Yes. When I look ahead, and I'm going to kind of start downstream at the reactor side and then I want to work back up from the fuel cycle or to the fuel cycle. I think 2026 is going to be a big year because I think we are going to see FID on some AP1000s, maybe not in the United States because we're still pretty nascent in this $80 billion program. But I think we are going to see FID in Poland and Bulgaria, 2 nations that have chosen the AP1000. Poland wants to build 6 of them. The first 3 have been site selected. Bulgaria wants to build 2.

They are very quickly moving through the front-end engineering and design process as they accelerate towards FID. I think that's a pretty strong signal for that next wave of U.S. gigawatt scale technology. We have a partnership now with the Koreans. They're no longer a collaborator -- no longer a competitor. They're now a collaborator. I expect them to continue to advance their new build projects, which benefits Westinghouse quite significantly. As that rolls out, I think 2026 is going to start to see higher levels of contracting across the fuel cycle.

I think those are pretty strong signals when you see new builds happening that it really is time to get serious about long-term uranium contracting, and that is an absolutely essential piece. We keep reminding utilities around the world that are interested in nuclear or have nuclear that fuel is one of the long lead items they need to be spending time on. Yes, it's your reactor pressure vessels, it's your coolant pumps, yes, it's your steam generator, but your fuel and your fuel components and contracting for them are also a long lead item.

We expect 2026 to see stronger demand for that reason and are prepared for it. In fact, as you have noted in some of your research, 2025 ended quite strong, including a leaked negotiation we were having with the Indians. And I think it woke up the market a little bit that there is big sovereign demand back in the uranium market. And that has always been a leading indicator of a really robust contracting cycle about to begin. So 2026 is feeling very constructive.

So there's a lot of different pieces to the Cameco business model. Let's dive a bit deeper into some of the segments, starting with uranium, as you alluded to, a strong year in 2025. So Cameco, one of the largest uranium producers in the world by volume. There has been a lot of focus, maybe I would even characterize it as investor pushback at times as to pricing not maybe reflecting the reality of what you've called out for a number of years, it seems like now between the supply-demand dynamics that are only getting tighter. So maybe level set us as to where you think supply-demand dynamics are headed here and then also that question of why utilities aren't as active as it suggests they should be.

The supply-demand dynamics as we look out are actually in a situation right now where we would conclude that the demand forecast that most have out there, like the World Nuclear Association's Fuel Market Report or [ Ux ] or TradeTech, 2 of the price reporters in the business. We believe they're actually understating demand when they build up their profile because really that demand story is typically only built on the current reactor base.

And then you add to it some reactors that are restarting, Duane Arnold, Crane Clean Energy Center, Diablo Canyon Life Extension, you add that in there, subsequent license renewals for other reactors. And then there's new build but only of reactors that are under FID. So actually, the demand case doesn't include the $80 billion project we just talked about. It doesn't include Bulgaria and Poland yet because they're not at FID. It doesn't include Ontario's plan to build 14 gigawatt scale reactors because none of those are at FID yet.

And by the way, the demand story doesn't yet anticipate nuclear being used for generative AI. So we see that our sector trades quite closely with where the data centers are at. That is all upside to the demand story. That's actually not currently baked into the demand story for nuclear. So it astonishes me a little bit how we trade off when the data story trades off a little bit because that's not even built into the forward demand story of nuclear yet.

And then on the supply side, we see a dynamic where we tend to overstate the supply that's going to come to the market because our industry tends to be really bad at disentangling on the uranium side, a preliminary economic assessment on a potential uranium resource from a technical report on a material operating property. And they treat the 2 as equivalent.

And so they see a preliminary economic assessment that says production is going to start in 4 years from now. And it's going to be 20 million, 25 million pounds of production. And there's no license, there's no permit, there's no infrastructure. There's no workforce. There's no contractors. And so when we back out our experience of how long it actually takes to bring in supply, we actually see the gap is bigger. And that gap in relative terms of the amount of material that utilities have not yet bought to run the known reactor base has never been bigger. And that feels like a really exciting time to be an incumbent producer in uranium, but we're a disciplined producer. We still have 30% of our production shut in or curtailed because we are waiting for the fuel buying community to get serious about the prices required to create that next wave of supply.

We never reward our investors by front-running demand with supply. In fact, we create the maximum reward for our owners when we're at or slightly late the market because when we're at or slightly late the market with our production, that's when fuel buyers trip over each other to buy material. That's when demand starts to hit replacement rate and beyond. That's when you start to discover strong pricing that we can lock into multiyear contracts. We're still in supply discipline because we see a very, very robust contracting cycle coming.

I guess in terms of numbers, you mentioned the replacement rate. Contracting for 2025 based on the latest numbers, I think it was like 80 million pounds, a little less than 60% of replacement rate, which does seem unsustainable. Is there that much secondary supply or inventory out there? It just seems like something will come to a head. So can you kind of speak to those dynamics and then what you are expecting for the contract environment going forward?

We've always used as a rule of thumb in our industry. If you want to kind of assess the health -- and I'm talking about the uranium segment in particular. If you want to assess the health of where the uranium segment is at, you simply look and you say, collectively, are utilities entering new forward contracts that are replacing the material they're burning on old contracts? And if they are, that's called replacement rate. If they're above, they're not just at replacement rate, but they're also building inventory by definition. And if they're below, they're chewing through secondary supply and inventory.

Utilities have not been at replacement rate collectively since 2012. So the world has chewed through that historic shock absorber. So those who have been around the story for a long time will often say, but Grant, it's never about primary production in uranium because there's all that secondary supply. There was all that secondary supply. But the situation has been since 2012, utilities largely went on a buyer strike, and they stopped contracting at replacement rate. But the gap needs to be filled with something, and that's something has been a continual drawdown of government inventories, utility inventories and secondary supply such that we're at a moment where the mobile inventory position in the uranium segment has never been lower, and we're not even at replacement rate.

We're at an $86 long-term price of uranium in U.S. dollars. And we're not even at replacement rate. We've been at an $86 long-term price before, but never on the front end of a contracting cycle. We've been -- after there's been a big supply disruption or a demand shock, and we have a lot of above replacement rate contracting in the market. But we've never been at $86 on the front end of a cycle before. This is setting up really nicely. Replacement rate has to be achieved. We have to go beyond replacement rate to start building inventories again. That's a very constructive setup for an incumbent uranium producer.

So the $86 a pound, I think that's a 17-year high even at those low replacement rates. What -- I know you're not in the business of forecasting uranium prices...

Well, I am. I'm just not in the business of setting above...

Advertising, I suppose. But you do set floors and ceilings, and you have a contract mechanism that you have articulated and telegraphed to kind of give a sense to, I think, both the market as well as buyers where Cameco is head at in terms of where pricing is ultimately headed to. So can you kind of give us a sense of where those recent discussions are around floors and ceilings and where you see pricing ultimately headed?

Yes. I'm going to back up a little bit. When we think about the term market, it's important to understand we exclusively sell into the term market. We do not sell any spot material at all. In fact, as a strategy, we are overcontracted. We deliberately sell more than we can produce so that we have demand to deploy in the spot market to buy at our discretion because, quite frankly, some idiot is always going to try to sell into the spot market. And that can be deleterious to forward negotiations.

So we always want to be in a position to pick up that material to the advantage of our owners. So when you think about the term market, it's important to understand there's 2 ends of the spectrum. The first are base escalated type contracts. And the way those work, Brian, is if you came to me and said, "Look, I'm looking for 100,000 pounds of uranium 2028 to 2035, but it's got to be base escalated." We basically would turn to today's long-term price of $86. And that's kind of the starting point of our negotiation.

And then we fight over how it escalates. We fight how it escalates to first deliveries from today, and we fight over how it escalates through those deliveries. And I'll be arguing for things like mining cost indicators and regulatory cost indicators, and you'll be saying, no, it's just CPI and I want you to discount CPI because others are willing to do that. So we'll fight over the escalation. We historically do not like base escalated prices at this point in the cycle. Escalation is nice and $86 is nice, but we think the market is going higher. So what we have a preference for is market-related contracts.

And the way those work, same 100,000 pounds, 2028 to 2035, Brian comes to me. And now we're not trying to price it today. We're just trying to agree the pricing indicator at time of delivery out in the future. And he might say to me, I want it to be the spot price because we're normally in contango or he might say sometimes we're in backwardation, so I want it to be the term price. I never want to take same-day spot exposure. So I might want a rolling average of the spot price or I might want a blend of the spot and term price at time of delivery. But that's what we're fighting over. And then at some point, he's likely going to go, "Oh, but I want a ceiling." And I'll say, okay, well, if you want a ceiling, I want a floor.

And now we're fighting over the collars around the market-related contracts. So priced out into the future, but subject to collars that escalate. This is our preference today. This is where we want to be. 70% of the contracting in the market in 2025 was market related. Only 30% was base escalated. Of that 70%, it's really important to understand that price reporters do not account for that 70% at all. Price reporting, that $86 is only based upon base escalated pricing. So what the market is missing right now is 70% of the information that is basically suggesting uranium is already at 3-digit pricing. And what I mean there is we sign contracts today market related. We've had market-related contracts with floors, escalated floors in the mid-70s.

We've had ceilings as high as $150 escalated. The midpoint between those floors and the ceilings are already $100 uranium, $115 uranium. So there are utilities out there willing to sign market-related contracts. They're running a value at risk analysis between the floors and the ceilings and the midpoint is already 3-digit uranium. But the market only prices the long term on the 30% that are base escalated. So what we have to do as Cameco is even though we have a preference for market related, we have to occasionally agree to a small portion of a contract that's base escalated just so we can say the price reporters, it's not $86 today, we can get $88. And then the next turn, we can get $90. So we have to deliberately walk up that long-term price because the market is ignoring 70% of the information out there.

And when I look at the 70% of the information, it's already telling me we're at 3-digit uranium, which is an exciting place to be.

So nuclear demand inflecting higher, inventory is dwindling, prices already starting to creep higher. So what is the trigger or triggers for the utilities to actually step in and realize that and start to price more aggressively here? Does it need a supply shock? Or what kind of event path do you anticipate?

We're in a market where sometimes people confuse complacency of utilities. The fact that we're not at replacement rate and haven't been for Fukushima, they'll say things like fuel buyers are asleep at the switch or they don't know what they're doing. Nothing could be further from the truth. Our typical fuel buyer is a Masters or PhD trained nuclear scientist. These are some of the smartest people you'll ever have the pleasure of spending time with. You just have to, like in any industry, follow the incentives.

Fuel buyers do not have an incentive to try to call the bottom of the uranium price. They have this wonderful averaging effect, first of all. Like there is no fuel buyer with the exception of maybe the Ukraine right now because of their security of supply contract. They're not getting all of their uranium this year under one delivery. They have multiple contracts. So they pay an average price of uranium, and it reflects contracts signed many years ago, contracts that are in midlife and brand-new contracts, but they pay an average price. They're not paying today's price, right? They pay an average price.

But then the interesting thing is they take their uranium, they put it into a bespoke fuel bundle and then they capitalize it for the time the fuel bundle is in the reactor. So they get these 2 amazing averaging effects. They average down today and they average over time, which means they're kind of insulated from price spikes, which means they don't really worry about them in the way that others do. So if the price has been low and it stays low, they don't do anything. And when the price starts to go up, well, then they start to contract.

That's their incentive structure and then security of supply kicks in. So they don't spend all their time going, oh boy, if I contract today, I can save $2 a pound. They're not rewarded that way. They're just rewarded for security of supply. That means generally, our industry needs to be shocked into action. It doesn't sort of march up rationally to a production economic pricing. It usually requires a supply event, like the flooding of the Cigar Lake event in 2006, 2007, Cigar Lake development project flooded, the market panicked. Fuel buyers all went through the door at the same time.

Uranium went to $136 a pound, $200 in today's terms. Then came off as Kazakh production was incented and came up. Or in 2010, there was a demand event. Chinese stepped into the term market for the first time in the summer of 2010 and bought 152 million pounds of uranium in 1 month. And the rest of the fuel buyers felt like they were going to get left out on future supply. So they all tried to go through the door at the same time. But generally, our market needs to be shocked into action. I don't know where that shock is coming from. It could be the failed promises of restarts of mines.

It could be when greenfield projects don't go as well as people think they're going to go. Could be a demand shock. I talked about the leaking of the Indian contract that we were negotiating. That's a lot of demand that people didn't realize was in the market. I'm not exactly sure what the next shock is going to be. But because this market doesn't have the inventory position it used to have -- this market has never been more vulnerable to a shock than it is today. That historic shock absorber, government inventories like DOE inventories or the megatons to megawatts project for those old enough to remember that in the industry, 400 million pounds of uranium material flowing into the commercial market under the HEU agreement, gone. None of that exists today.

So this market will hit a shock. And when it hits a shock, it has no shock absorbers anymore. And that sounds like a pretty constructive thing for an incumbent producer.

I want to spend some time on the Westinghouse business. A key theme of this event seems to be we're short power. We need it. We need baseload power. So Westinghouse, new nuclear builds. You mentioned at the start, the $80 billion partnership between the U.S. government, Cameco, Brookfield and Westinghouse. Maybe just for starters, contextualize for people how this partnership came fruition, sort of what is the signal here in the next 12 months and then maybe for the next probably decade plus for Cameco and Westinghouse's business?

Yes. I think the genesis or if we think about the origin story for this deal, it really was borne out of a little bit of frustration. We were dealing with U.S. administration that was going. Bulgaria is building gigawatt scale reactors, Poland is building gigawatt scale reactors, the U.K. -- hell, the province of Ontario is building 14 gigawatt scale reactors. How can all of these much, much smaller economies find the launch conditions to build gigawatt scale reactors, and we can't launch in the United States.

Like what's going on here? And so it's a matter of, well, the U.S. system was set up to be a race for the bronze medal. It wasn't set up to be a race for the gold medal. The order book for units 5, 6 and beyond was actually quite big, but nobody wanted to be 1 and 2 following Vogtle. Nobody wanted to be 3 and 4. There was nobody wanting the gold and nobody wanting the silver. And so the U.S. government took the position that maybe it's the role of government to prime the pump here to stimulate the supply chain, to reduce what are often cited as the main risks that are keeping utilities from making this decision, standing up the supply chain for the first time, engaging a constructor and letting them go down the learning curve and making sure they're delivering good unit cost, bringing in the skilled labor and training it up so that it's ready to be deployed.

The U.S. government just looked at it and said, well, maybe that's our role to play here. And besides, we need the electrons anyway. So it sounds like a good project to be engaged in. So as we look ahead, one of the main themes is, the Executive Order from May 23 that spoke to large nuclear power plants said 10 need to be under construction by 2030. In order to achieve that, you need to separate ordering long lead items for gigawatt scale reactors from figuring out the sites they're going to be built at and figuring out the model they're going to be built under.

So the first project is what is the order for long lead items look like, the kit for 8 to 10 nuclear reactors how are we going to finance that? How are we going to put that package together? That is a Westinghouse conversation. The next project is trying to figure out, well, where are they going to be located? And what is the model they're going to be built under? And I think if there's 4 or 5 2 packs, there's going to be 4 or 5 different models of how they're built under. There might be a build, own and operate by the U.S. government to meet national security needs, electrons for generative AI for national security, for example.

On the other end of the spectrum, we might simply take advantage of the utilities that already produce nuclear power that already have a construction and operating license that are already NRC regulated and are ready to go, but just need a financing package in place. And in between, there might be some build-own-transfer models, where you have government taking the lead, but then transferring to a consortium of utilities or transferring to a long-term PPA with a group of hyperscalers, all to solve this problem of 24-hour baseload electrons.

So I think there's going to be a number of different innovative creative models around how we're going to deploy and where they're going to be. And that's just going to take time. We're peripheral to that conversation. We're not really involved in it. And then, of course, it's going to be financed by foreign and direct investment pledge to the United States from Japan and Korea. And so there's a third work stream, which is to pitch to the investment committees that were set up as part of those mechanisms to secure the funding for long lead items and then the new build.

So 2026 should be a really interesting year because if we're going to hit that Executive Order of 10 under construction by 2030, long lead items will have to be ordered in 2026. And we're going to have to identify sites and start moving sometime in 2026 as well in order to hit that objective.

Maybe digging into that a little bit. So we've only built 2 new reactors in this country in the past 2 decades, trying to get shovel in the ground on 10 in the next 5 years. This $80 billion obviously goes a long ways in enabling that. But I guess how much of this is already on the board? Is this all just fresh new builds that are leading to come to fruition starting now? Or is this construction restarts like VC Summer, this is Fermi in Texas? Like maybe give us a contextualization of the volume opportunity and maybe what's sort of on the board already?

Yes. At the moment, the project of $80 billion minimum spend for 8 to 10 reactors. And of course, that's a range because that's dependent on how fast you come down the next of a kind to nth of a kind cost curve. If the DOE is right, and it's the fifth unit that hits nth of a kind, then we can build 10 reactors for $80 billion. If it takes a bit longer, it's probably going to be 8 reactors. That's a contained project. It has nothing to do with VC Summer. It has nothing to do with the Fermi project. Those are all in addition. So you can start to do the math and say, well, are we actually potentially talking about 10 reactors plus VC Summer, that's another 2 plus Fermi, that's -- are we talking about 16 reactors in the United States, plus 2 in Bulgaria, plus 6 in Poland. It goes parabolic really quickly when you start looking at the order book.

So those are in addition to this project. And those are playing for the LPO funding, now called the Energy Dominance Financing department, former LPO, that's hard -- it's going to be hard for me to change over on that one. They have $250 billion already appropriated for nuclear new build -- for energy new build, but will allocate it to nuclear. So there is another pot of money that exists for those types of projects. They are distinct from this.

That's helpful context. Maybe moving on to international. You already talked about Poland and Bulgaria. But I know, Grant, you have a soft spot for Canada as well. Can you kind of speak to the opportunity for large reactors, AP1000 technology in Canada?

Yes. Obviously, Canada is our home. We know the country very well. The CANDU reactors have served Canada extraordinarily well for a very long time. And as Cameco, we're fully integrated in CANDU reactors. We provide fuel to Bruce Power. That's what we sell, a fabricated fuel bundle. We sell all the calandria tubes. We sell reactor components to all the CANDU reactors. We are fully integrated, but Canada has a choice to make. And it's a pretty stark choice.

If it wants to build gigawatt scale reactors and wants to begin to deploy them right now, it has to go with the AP1000 because there is no Generation 3 CANDU reactor. There isn't one designed. Now Canada might be tempted to say, well, we're going to build Generation 1 1970 Darlington CANDU reactors. And they've just refurbished all of those reactors and refurbished them very successfully. So that could be a good strategy for Canada and would be a good strategy for Cameco. It would build out that part of our business, but then it's not an export strategy because no markets in the world want to build a Gen 1 reactor.

In fact, most markets that are looking to build new nuclear have regulations that would prevent them from building a Gen 1 reactor because when Fukushima happened, everybody upgraded their regulatory and safety standards. So if you're going to have an export program, it has to be a Gen 3 reactor or a Gen 3+ reactor like an AP1000, and that doesn't exist today. There is no Gen 3 heavy water CANDU reactors. So if Canada wanted to wait to develop one, it would probably take 10 years to design it. It would probably take 10 years to build the first one. So you're 20 years out from new nuclear or they could start to deploy an AP1000 today because as Eric Chassard, the President and CEO of Bruce Power, would say, being one of the only CEOs who's actually built nuclear reactors in the world, he would say that there are 5 main risks that you have to manage when you make the decision to build nuclear.

The first is design technology risk. The second is fuel risk. Do we actually have a commercial fuel supply for the type of reactor that we're looking to build? Number three is first-time licensing risk. It takes a long time to get a brand-new design license. Number four is regulatory risk, distinct from licensing, like once you have a technology and you have fuel and you have a license, you still have to locate it somewhere. So you have first-time regulatory risk to place it as a product. And then you just have good old-fashioned big product risk and big project risk. And the AP1000 is the only reactor that Canada could choose that takes 4 or 5 risks off the table on day 1. So we're optimistic that Canada will remain a very powerful nuclear country that Canada will make the right technology decision.

And quite frankly, they've already chosen light water reactor technology, the Darlington SMR project is a GE BWRX-300. It's not a Canadian technology. That's not a pressurized heavy water reactor. It's a light water boiling water reactor. So Canada has already made the pivot into light water reactor technology anyway. They've crossed that Rubicon, so to speak.

Maybe in the last few minutes we have here, I mean, we talked a lot about the demand side. Clearly, there is a lot of focus on power demand and nuclear being a part of that equation. How about on the supply side, can we build or can Cameco, Westinghouse, your supply chain build multiple AP1000s a year? Sort of what is that situation?

Yes. Right now, our estimate is that we could launch 4 reactors a year. So if it takes 5 years to build a reactor, 60 months, by the fifth year, we could have 20 in flight and then just kind of keep rolling them over. We'd have to capitalize more of the supply chain to go beyond that, but that works. With today's order book, with today's plans, with where folks want to go, that is enough to get going because it is just absolutely critically important that we do the 3 Ss, and we do them right this time in nuclear.

First one is standardized, right? The U.S. built out 104 reactors through the '60s and '70s, 55 different models across 104 reactors. We cannot do that again. So by standardized, I simply mean it's Vogtle 4 over and over again, right down to the color of the paint in the bathroom. Nothing changes. It's got to be Vogtle 4 over and over again. By sequence, I mean, we have to understand that we don't start a golf tournament by everybody tees off on the first hole at the same time.

So we have to sequence these things such that the big civil project starts on the first 2 pack and then it moves to the next one as the construction team is stood up. And then as the construction team moves on, the nuclear island gets assembled. And then as it moves on, the turbine island comes in. We've got to learn the lessons of the United Arab Emirates, the Barakah plant. We've got to learn the lessons of what the Koreans do when they build or the Chinese. We've got to learn the lessons of the major component replacement in Ontario. So we have to standardize, we have to sequence.

And then we have to make a commitment to simplifying. And I don't mean the design. I don't mean going back and changing the reactor. I mean we've got to do a way better job of passing the learnings on from program to program to program. The U.S. was kind of built out in small islands. We ended up with 55 different models because there wasn't a lot of crosstalk between utilities about what was working and what wasn't working. We have to do better on that. We standardize, we sequence, we simplify. This is a deliverable program.

That's great. We are right up on time. We covered a lot of ground. We could ask you a lot more questions, Grant, but this has been great. I want to thank Grant for joining us and everyone in the audience. We'll wrap it here.

Great. Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you for standing by. This is the conference operator. Welcome to the Cameco Corporation Third Quarter 2025 Results Conference Call. [Operator Instructions] The conference is being recorded. [Operator Instructions] I would now like to turn the conference over to Cory Kos, Vice President, Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Thank you, operator, and good morning, everyone. Welcome to Cameco's third quarter conference call. I would like to acknowledge that we are calling in from both Toronto and Saskatoon today, Toronto was on Treaty 13 territory in the traditional territory of many nations, including the Mississaugas of the Credit, the Anishinaabe, Chippewa, Haudenosaunee and the Windet Peoples and now home to many diverse First Nations, Inuit and Metis Peoples. Our corporate office in Saskatoon, which is on Treaty 6 territory is the traditional territory of the Creed people and homeland of the Metis.

With us in Toronto are Tim Gitzel, CEO; Grant Isaac, President and COO; and Heidi Shockey, SVP and CFO; Rachelle Girard, SVP and Chief Corporate Officer is joining from our Saskatoon headquarters.

I'll hand it over to Tim momentarily to speak to the strong financial results we've delivered through the first 9 months of the year, which have kept Cameco in a solid position amid growing momentum in nuclear markets. Tim will also on the recently announced agreement for the U.S. government to purchase Westinghouse reactors, which is expected to drive significant value to Westinghouse to Cameco, setting up the Westinghouse reactors as the leading technology in the global deployment of gigawatt scale nuclear. After, we will open up to your questions. Today's call will be approximately 1 hour, concluding at 9:00 a.m. Eastern Time.

Our goal is to be open and transparent with communication, and we want to respect everyone's time and conclude the call by 9:00 a.m. Therefore, should we not get to your questions during this call or if you would like to get into detailed financial modeling questions about results, we will be happy to respond to any follow-up inquiries. There are a few ways you can contact us with additional questions. You can reach out to the contacts provided in our news release. You can submit a question through the send us a message link in the Investors section of our website or you can use to ask a question form at the bottom of the webcast screen, and we'll be happy to follow up after this call. If you join the conference call through our website and page, there are slides available, which will be displayed during the call.

In addition, for your reference, our quarterly investor handout is available for download in a PDF file on our website at cameco.com. Today's conference call is open to all members of the investment community, including the media. During the Q&A session, please limit yourself to 2 questions and return to the queue. Note that this conference call will include forward-looking information, which is based on a number of assumptions, and actual results could differ materially. You should not place undue reliance on forward-looking statements. Actual results may differ materially from these forward-looking statements, and we do not undertake any obligation to update any forward-looking statements we make today, except as required by law. As required by securities laws, we also need to make you aware that during today's discussion, the company will make a number of references to non-IFRS and other financial measures. Cameco believes these measures provide investors with useful perspective on underlying business trends and a full reconciliation of non-IFRS financial measures is available at cameco.com/invest. Please refer to our most recent annual information form and MD&A for more information about the factors that could cause these different results and the assumptions we have made.

I will now turn it over to our CEO, Tim Gitzel.

Well, thank you, Cory, and hello, everyone. We appreciate you taking the time to join our discussion today. Hope everyone is doing well and has had the opportunity to enjoy some quality time with friends and family over the past few months, whether that meant settling into the last days of summer or enjoying the early signs of spring depending on where you are in the world. The baseball fans out there, what a ride it was for the Toronto Blue Jays and the L.A. Dodgers in the World Series this past week. As Cory said, we're actually calling in from Toronto, Canada today, and I can tell you the air is still a little heavy. Even though the home team Blue Jays didn't come out with the trophy as the only major league baseball team here in Canada, they certainly gave us all a thrilling run and plenty to be proud of.

We're here in Eastern Canada for this call because we had the opportunity as a Board and a management team to head south to Georgia yesterday, where we took a tour of [indiscernible] Units 3 and 4, which are Westinghouse AP1000 technology and the 2 newest reactors in the U.S. Seeing that technology in action was a powerful reminder of what's possible when innovation, policy and industry align.

Speaking of alignment, I'm delighted to start today by touching on the recent announcement of the transformative partnership between Cameco, Brookfield and the U.S. government and Westinghouse marking a major milestone for the company and for the entire sector, backed by at least USD 80 billion in planned investments in Westinghouse nuclear reactors, we expect this milestone will accelerate the global deployment of Westinghouse's reactor technology, strengthening energy security, revitalizing domestic supply chains, and creating significant growth opportunities for both Westinghouse and for Cameco.

For the nuclear industry, this long-term commitment to new nuclear is a clear sign that the growth story continues to build momentum. It's not just about energy security. It's about powering the infrastructure behind AI, data centers and hard-to-abate sectors with the next generation of clean, reliable electricity.

For Westinghouse, the partnership highlights clear support for its best-in-class reactor technology from the nation that hosts the largest nuclear fleet and has the most significant experience in operating nuclear reactors. Support from the U.S. bolsters confidence for the global jurisdictions that are currently advancing toward AP1000 deployment. And for those countries still deciding on a technology for their nuclear build-out, this partnership should provide an incredible amount of confidence that the Westinghouse designs are the technology of choice.

For us at Cameco, the agreement adds significant support to the industry growth story. It's positive for the outlook for nuclear across North America and globally and therefore, positive for Cameco's long-term contracting and production strategy. If it wasn't already clear from the press release this week, let me reiterate that the agreement signed with the U.S. government is about support for nuclear energy and Westinghouse reactor technology. That's a great development for Cameco and our stakeholders, thanks to our investment in Westinghouse.

We directly addressed some of the misinformation we've seen published in the last few days. U.S. government partnership interest does not extend the Cameco's core business. Although our uranium products and fuel services are certainly well positioned to support the build-out and long-term operation of the global fleet as it grows. Partnership strengthens our footprint to create meaningful value for our stakeholders, but the participation interest by the U.S. government is only focused on the Westinghouse business. It's a rare opportunity to combine policy momentum, proven technology and commercial scale. And we believe it positions both Cameco and Westinghouse to deliver sustainable growth, ongoing innovation and energy leadership for decades to come.

As we look ahead, it's clear that today, nuclear energy is not just maintaining relevance as the global energy landscape evolves. It's undergoing an expansion and meaningful transformation. In that transformation, the entire fuel cycle is now receiving more significant attention than ever, not just the front end of uranium mining. From conversion and enrichment to fuel fabrication and reactor deployment, the momentum is real, and we're frequently seeing new promises of future supply and capacity within each stage. Unfortunately, a compelling narrative alone won't turn a turbine. Execution is key, and Cameco is in an exceptional position to execute and deliver value. With decades of experience operating unique and complex assets, we play a critical role in the long-term health of the nuclear industry. That experience gives us the ability to be selective and strategic, committing unencumbered productive capacity under long-term contracts that align with customer needs.

Our approach ensures downside protection while preserving exposure to future market price improvements. It's a disciplined strategy that balances risk and opportunity built on trust performance and a deep understanding of how to build value across market cycles. This demand continues to grow, driven by energy security, decarbonization and digital infrastructure, we're confident Cameco with assets that are critical to the industry, is well positioned to support the next chapter of nuclear growth.

Turning to a discussion centered on those assets. I want to run through a few brief highlights for the quarter and year-to-date. I'll first note that the update we shared in late August regarding our McArthur River and Key Lake operations, where development delays in 2025 resulted in a decreased annual production forecast. We previously expected 18 million pounds of McArthur/Key and we now expect packaged production of between 14 million and 15 million pounds on a 100% basis. Depending on operational performance at the Cigar Lake Mine in the fourth quarter, we may be able to make up some of the shortfall from McArthur, but we do not expect to make up all of it. We've therefore reduced our consolidated production outlook for 2025, and we now expect our share of production to be up to 20 million pounds of uranium.

Remember that while our mine production is expected to be lower, our supply sourcing flexibility is one of our many competitive advantages. At JV Inkai, which as a committed purchase is among our sources, production is going well. We continue to expect production of 8.3 million pounds, of which our purchase allocation is 3.7 million pounds. A portion of that allocation is currently in transit to Canada, including about 900,000 pounds that had remained a JV Inkai from our 2024 purchase allocation. In our Fuel Services division, our annual production outlook remains on track, totaling between 13 million and 14 million kgU of combined fuel services products.

To meet our sales commitments and deliver full cycle value, we plan years in advance and always provide for flexibility in how we source the supply we need, including production, inventory, product loans in both market and long-term purchases. This quarter reflects our flexibility as we adjusted a number of the supply levers that we have at our disposal, including our planned market purchases and product loans to help offset the impact of the production changes. We will continue to balance all available sources with a focus on value creation, risk management and sustainability.

Moving to Cameco's financial results. After a solid first 9 months, we're in a position for a strong finish to the year, supported by the higher expected deliveries in our uranium and fuel services segments in the fourth quarter and a solid quarter for Westinghouse. Key contributor to the positive performance year-to-date was the increase of over USD 170 million in our share of Westinghouse's revenue recorded in the second quarter. While quarterly uranium and fuel services sales volumes were lower overall, we saw continued improvement in average realized prices in both segments.

As we always highlight, quarterly results will vary due to timing of our customers' requirements, and it's our annual expectations that matter most. As I said earlier, those expectations continue to point to higher deliveries in the fourth quarter.

Looking at our financial position, we've remained disciplined in managing liquidity to support our operations and sourcing decisions. Our discipline enables us to deliver on our strategy, take advantage of opportunities and self-manage risk. We're maintaining a strong balance sheet, guided by our investment-grade rating and supported a strong cash flow generation. So from a financial perspective, we are in excellent shape with $779 million in cash and cash equivalents, $1 billion in total debt and a $1 billion undrawn revolving credit facility. Subsequent to the quarter, in October, we received USD 171.5 million from Westinghouse related to the Korean reactor build in the Czech Republic, which was announced in the second quarter. With our improving financial performance and the receipt of the additional distribution from Westinghouse, our Board of Directors elected to accelerate our plan to grow the dividend and have declared a 2025 annual dividend of $0.24 per common share.

These are incredibly exciting times for this industry, and the outlook is becoming stronger with each passing day. That strength is reflected in Cameco's improving performance as we navigate challenges and seize opportunities. It's about more than just supplying fuel. It's about enabling a future energy system that is secure, reliable and carbon-free. We remain focused on strong partnerships and long-term value creation enhancing energy and national security objectives and advancing nuclear as a cornerstone of the clean energy transition. Not just participating in the energy transition, we're shaping it.

Before we conclude, I'd like to highlight a couple of changes to our executive team. Our Chief Marketing Officer, [ David Dirksen ], has announced his intention to retire at the end of the first quarter of 2026. It has been an absolute pleasure to work with David during his 28-year career with Cameco, over which he has held senior positions in corporate strategy, corporate development, treasury and marketing. On behalf of the Board and management team, I'd like to thank David for his significant contributions not only to Cameco, but to the entire nuclear industry and for sharing his deep industry knowledge and expertise over the years. We wish him the absolute best in his retirement. Beginning January 1, 2026, David will assume the role of Senior Adviser Marketing until his retirement date of March 31, 2026.

[ Lisa Akin ], currently Vice President, Marketing has been with Cameco's Marketing Group for nearly 20 years. She will be appointed Senior Vice President and Chief Marketing Officer effective January 1, 2026. I'm pleased to welcome Lisa with her strong leadership and the market experience that she brings to the senior executive team.

[ Tim Sherk ], currently Senior Director in the marketing group will move into Lisa's previous role of Vice President, Marketing.

So thank you all for joining us today, both on the line and via webcast. We appreciate your continued interest, and we'll now open the floor to your questions.

[Operator Instructions] The first question today comes Ralph Profiti with Stifel.

Tim or Grant, on the issue of the standby product loan facilities, which are part of the supply levers, are those discussions as flexible? And is that material as accessible as in the past, say, the last 1 or 2 years? And what can you tell us about the timing of when those pounds need to be repaid?

Thanks for the question. I'll get Grant to handle it.

Yes, Ralph, I'm just going to use a word you did, which is flexible. We don't have a standard arrangement. It differs by counterparty availability continues to be strong, as demonstrated by the adjustments to our outlook, production was down, but our market purchases didn't go up. And then in terms of what the actual repayment looks like that just differs from counterparty to counterparty, and we just always aim to create the most amount of value under our contract portfolio for doing it. So we're really important tool in our toolbox. I can't emphasize that enough. It is a very unique incumbent advantage that Cameco has that others don't, an advantage we continue to take full use of when required. And ultimately, it comes from the fact that you can only store uranium at a few places. And we just happen to have a couple of those licensed facilities and therefore, it gives us a tremendous advantage.

Okay. And I have a follow-up that's sort of on a different topic. The U.S. seems to be taking a much more of a leadership role when we think about the demand outlook. And do you think that we're close to a market where chemicals production decisions may be viewed differently on pricing dynamics, if that material is sourced from within the U.S. versus non-U.S. production? Or do you still see this as a one-price homogeneous market?

Ralph, that is -- it's a great question. And I would say this market already is recognizing the value of incumbent producers, in particular, sovereign safe jurisdictions. And what I mean there I'm just going to illustrate it by the long-term price of uranium. We see a long-term price of around USD 84 per pound, and folks have heard me say before, when you look at that long-term price, remember, all you're looking at is the information that's collected from those who are willing to fix a portion of their forward sales. Market-related contracts don't inform that long-term price.

We know as Cameco, we can do better than today's long-term price if we were fixing a portion of our supply going forward. Given that, that long-term price is an average, it must mean that somebody is fixing below that clearly indicating that Cameco is capable of driving premiums in the market. So I think that type of market pricing dynamic is already occurring. I think some jurisdictions are having to discount around that. Unfortunately, when the price reporters then report, they like to report the lowest offered as opposed to where the demand is actually sitting. That's just a construct in our market. One that I think is improving, but clearly indicates that stronger pricing is there for not just origin Ralph, but the quality of the supplier. And when we're dealing with a counterparty, they know Cameco has never missed a delivery of uranium, and that's worth a lot.

The next question comes from Brian Lee with Goldman Sachs.

Condolences on Blue Jays on a great series. But on the flip side, kudos on the Westinghouse, Cameco, Brookfield, U.S. government deal. I think a lot of folks are trying to hone in on some of the details here. Not sure what you can share here, but I'll do my best. With regards to the sort of $80 billion agreement here with the government, I guess, there's a lot of questions just around how the mechanics are going to work. It sounds like the government will be responsible for ultimately reaching the FID go, no-go decision? And then maybe thoughts around including the required IPO type of event, if that were to come to fruition between now and January and also what the 20% equity stake from the government and the $17.5 billion of cash distributions. Just maybe walk us through some of the mechanics of how those pieces came together. But just starting from the top of the funnel, maybe first, just government FID, what's involved there? What are the milestones between now and then?

Brian, I'll just say at a high level, we're absolutely delighted to be part of this with our partner, Brookfield, all came together about a week ago, I guess, a week ago, Tuesday, October 28. We signed the deal. I was with a bunch of CEOs from U.S. utilities yesterday, and it's really we've been waiting to kick start the nuclear build in the United States and really around the world. And I think this does it, Grant and Dominic have been very involved with Brookfield and the U.S. government and others and putting it together.

So Grant, maybe you can just walk through -- what we know today, obviously, we're early in the process, and we're working out the details. But what we know today, Grant.

Yes. What this reflects, obviously, is a very clear signal from the U.S. government that it is time. We were I think struggling as an industry in the United States to find lift-off conditions. What is going to get reactors going and not just a first 2 pack, but a meaningful order of reactors that would stimulate sufficiently the supply chain in the U.S. and quite frankly, globally. And I think the U.S. government just recognized that for you to have energy security for it to take advantage of the tremendous technology that is the AP1000, it would need to be a bigger investment than just sort of the next 2.

So what the U.S. government has done is committed to step in and be that stimulant, if you will. Their commitment is to facilitate the financing. And just on that point, I would say we are assured there are a number of options that are available to the U.S. government in order to facilitate that financing. That ranges from direct support through known structures like perhaps the Department of Energy's loan program office, all the way through to project financing dollars that may come from other jurisdictions. We're assured that there is a lot of interest in investing this minimum $80 billion in order to begin the process.

The next step then is to figure out what an order looks like, when are we at FID. And that is part of the next steps of coming to a definitive agreement. We've got a lot of things to work out. We are just absolutely delighted by the fact that this is entirely performance-based. In order for the U.S. government to meet its vesting interest in this potential partnership, they have to deliver and they have to deliver fast. And we just think that's a wonderful alignment for Westinghouse and the U.S. government and therefore, for Brookfield and Cameco with the U.S. government.

After that, if we see FID on this $80 billion minimum worth of spend stimulating the supply chain, getting the reactor technology going, identifying sites removing any of the impediments to approvals and licenses and permits, then the U.S. government will have gone a long way to meet its vesting condition. And that $80 billion then allows it to consider participating in the Westinghouse business.

I'm just going to draw a point on that, the Westinghouse business only. It's not a participation interest in either Cameco or Brookfield, it is only in Westinghouse. And the mechanics of that are very simple. Westinghouse is worth a lot more today than Brookfield and Cameco acquired it. That's recognized in that first claim of $17.5 billion of distributions. They go to the current owners. That is the value that we have been building and we have been investing in. The U.S. government support then would then participate beyond that. And so if you use the example of a $30 billion underwritten value at time of an IPO decision, you have the potential for the U.S. government to be an 8% holder in Westinghouse. The difference between $17.5 billion and $30 billion, which, by the way, seems like a very reasonable participation. That means they have performed. That means they have invested $80 billion, that means reactors are under construction in the United States, which are then creating a platform for a global deployment of this leading AP1000 technology.

And I always think of it as that means the pie is growing, and everybody's slice has just gotten a heck of a lot bigger. So this is set up to be a performance-based fully aligned partnership designed to create energy security in the United States and be a platform for energy security elsewhere. A lot still to be decided, source of funding, site selection. Obviously, we have definitive agreements to complete. But I just want everybody to understand the main takeaway is the United States has decided it is to start building AP1000s and we are very excited about that.

Super comprehensive. Maybe just a second one, and I'll pass it on. A bit more mundane on the pricing side. we've seen term pricing up $4 a pound or so over the past couple of months for U308 after being flat for most of the year. Be curious what you're seeing in terms of contracting activity, maybe expectations here into year-end, given what's been a relatively soft volume environment year-to-date? And then general thoughts around the appetite amongst customers for higher floor ceilings, given these recent moves in term pricing?

We continue to be very constructive on where the uranium price needs to go. It is at the heart of the fact that we remain in supply discipline. We are not in a mood to ramp up production because we think price needs to reflect more fundamental production economics than we're seeing today. I point to the World Nuclear Association's recent fuel report. That fuel report indicates an even bigger gap between where demand is going, demand that has just been absolutely strengthened by the U.S. government partnership that we just talked about. Where that demand is going and where the supply is in fact going.

I would also point out, when we look at something like that gap in the World Nuclear Fuel Report, we believe it actually dramatically understates demand. It does not include the demand that we just talked about. That is not baked into there. It does not include the demand that a lot of people are ascribing to nuclear through AI. And this is a really important point to make. The investment opportunity in uranium does not require the AI build-out. That is an absolute accelerant to it, but it is -- it just requires the known reactor fleet plus the reactors under construction to continue.

And then we look at the supply side, and we say it's grossly overstated. We say that the fuel market report includes stuff that will not be in the market in that time frame and will not be in the market at an $84 long-term price. So we look at these fundamentals, Brian, and we say, now is the time to remain disciplined, allow that market to express more demand because that expression of demand is ultimately going to push prices to where they need to be to incent the next tranche of material that's going to begin to fill that demand. This looks very, very good to an incumbent uranium producer who not only has Tier 1 assets, but is a globally recognized Tier 1 supplier. That term market is just not there yet.

A couple of factors for that. On the uranium side. I would say there remains a little bit more focused downstream in the services, especially in Richmond than there is in uranium. And on the supply side, like let's just be really clear. One of the headwinds on the demand formation for uranium is all of the hyper promises that are coming from those who have projects that have never delivered before, have never done quite frankly, anything before that are promising huge volumes of uranium in a very short period of time. If you're a fuel buyer, you're sitting there wondering if that material is really coming to the market, and it's giving you a little bit of pause.

So there are those on the supply side that are responsible for some of the hesitation that we're seeing among fuel buyers to bring big uranium demand. Now ultimately, this is a good thing because those projects will not be proven out. They will not perform well. And then we're going to see more panic buying in the market, and that's going to discover probably even higher prices. Now is the time to remain disciplined. And that's exactly what you're seeing from us.

The next question comes from Alexander Pearce with BMO.

So you touched on the Westinghouse partnership. Obviously, it does look now like the pipeline is accelerating in terms of new builds. Maybe you can just touch on how Westinghouse is set up right now in terms of capacity for new build projects and what kind of investments do you think need to be made in the business, obviously, to deliver what could be quite a sizable change in new builds?

Well, Alex, obviously, even before this announcement, we had a healthy pipeline of projects. We were just at Vogtle yesterday to do the last 2 that were finished in the U.S. But if you look around the world, there are AP1000s being built today countries in Eastern Europe that we've been working with that plan to build and I can't think of a whole lot of countries around the world that aren't looking at new nuclear build and AP1000 as part of the the build-out. And so this has just added accelerant, as Grant said, lighter fluid to the desire to build new AP1000s.

And so on the Westinghouse side, Grant, you can talk about the Energy Systems Group.

Yes. The key thing to delivering on this kind of vision, Alex. And like Tim said, we were already in flight starting to move forward the pull in new build, the Bulgaria new build participate in the Czech new build. There's important West incomes equipment that goes into that. At the heart of this, our 3 simple concepts. Number one is standardized. Number two is sequence. Number three is simple. If we get that right, it's not clear what the boundary condition is or how much you can put in the pipeline. If you go back to the build-out in the '60s and '70s, you had a situation where Canada was bringing on a reactor a year. The United States was bringing on 7 reactors a year. France was bringing on 8 reactors a year. And of course, now we're seeing the Chinese starting 10 reactors a year.

So if you standardize your sequence and you simplify it, it's not really clear that there's a boundary condition on doing that. If you just look at Westinghouse today, there is capacity to start a number of reactors as long as those long lead items are flowing and you're not doing a shotgun start on every program and you're sequencing it properly. You can then start to build up that supply chain, that stimulated supply chain, then allows you to lever to obviously, a new outcome or a higher level of orders. We're not there yet.

But I'm going to go back to the comments I made about the U.S. government partnership. The key to the $80 billion investment was the understanding that it's not sufficient just to start with the next 2. You have to start with a bigger order is that bigger order is what creates the critical mass to get the supply chain going. And then once that's going, we will understand better what are the investments that need to be made in order to bring that along. But we feel very comfortable that Westinghouse is in a position to start 2, 2 packs a year and put that into the system as long as we standardize, sequence and simplify.

Okay. Maybe I can just ask a question around conversion now. And obviously, you've mentioned -- Tim mentioned that the interest is increasing in the rest of the fuel cycle, too. Is timing now right to restart conversion capacity at Springfields? Or is there actually any additional upside potential in your Canadian operations too?

Yes. Conversion is a very interesting market, and I think it's illustrative of what's coming into the uranium space. The issue for making a decision around bringing new capacity back at something like Springfield is you may be surprised to hear this, Alex, it's not price. I mean, converted prices at historic levels. And we could probably find a handful of utilities globally that would be willing to underwrite the restart of Springfield at a premium to today's historic price but they want to do it for a very short duration contract. Utilities are very smart. They want to stimulate capacity to come into the market and then they want to reprice it when there's more capacity in the market. You and I would do the exact same thing if we were a fuel buyer. That would be our job.

And so for us, it's about blending appropriate pricing with appropriate tender. What we want to see is a longer-term commitment to restarting something like Springfield. And the example I will use is when our friends at Constellation made the decision to restart the Crane Clean Energy Center at [ Three Mile Island ], they didn't do it on SAC. They didn't do it for a 3-year contract. They did it for a 20-year contract with Microsoft that was above market to support the restart of infrastructure. The nuclear fuel cycle should not be looked at any differently for us to restart infrastructure that's in care and maintenance, we need to see pricing as well as tenure that supports that capacity.

And the lesson learned in uranium is you only get one chance to bring new capacity into the market. So we're hearing some very silly statements from some saying, well, we're going to contract, but we're only in a contract for 3 years and then we'll roll that contract over to a higher price afterwards. And you absolutely won't because now you're competing with your own capacity. So in this market, driven by long-term value creation, you need price and you need tenor. And on the conversion side, price is there, tenor is not there yet. Although I'm -- it's feeling pretty constructive that we're going to get there.

The next question comes from Andrew Wong with REC Capital Markets.

So the U.S. government partnership, it's for at least $80 billion of investments, which supports, let's say, 8 to 10, AP1000s. But the wording of at least implies there's potential upside to that. And brand, I think in your -- just your previous commentary on the previous question kind of touches on the longer-term build-out potential here. So the longer-term goal for the U.S. is in other countries is to triple nuclear capacity. Is there a scenario where the U.S. government supports 20 or 30 or maybe more reactors? And is anything that being part of discussions or maybe did that U.S. government partnership spark any conversations with other potential partners on a bigger build-out?

Well, Andrew, great question. This has just been priming the well. Of course, we've been talking to all of the utilities, I think, in the U.S. about nuclear for years now, and it really got spruced up earlier this year, I think it was May 23 that the President put out his for executive orders on nuclear, calling for 10 new ones to be started by 2030, which we're now working on, and there's a plan behind those. And then to have, I think, 400 gigawatts of nuclear by 2050. And so I think he's serious about it. We're seeing the indications of this deal we put together last week with Brookfield and the U.S. government.

And now we're -- yesterday, Grant and I talking to U.S. utilities, all of them super interested on, I'd say, excited about this saying, "Hey, how do we get involved? And how is it all going? " So lots of work to do over the next days and weeks, first to get more details on how we're putting it together and then pulling together the utilities and starting to drive it forward.

So the answer to your question is yes, we're just getting warmed up. And I think there's the 94 units and as Grant said, in the U.S., they did that before. They've done it before, and this administration and these utilities want to do it again and the economy needs it. So...

Andrew, we did use the term minimum, and you see that throughout the agreement. I like to think about this as the stimulant for launch conditions in the United States, it is absolutely reasonable to assume that once financing is arranged and permitting and licensing is approved and long lead items are ordered under this structure, that the order book among the traditional utility base, both within the United States and beyond is going to grow because this is at the heart of eliminating what the main barrier was, which is that next of a kind, being that next 2 pack or the next 2 pack after that. We never had a problem engaging people for 5, 6 and beyond. It was just starting the process and the U.S. government has stepped in to overcome that really big hurdle to being the next of a kind, the being the next step.

It's promising a bigger investment than I think anybody was anticipating and we do expect that it will create some followership. There may be other countries interested in foreign direct investment in the United States that might want to partner in a very similar fashion. We've seen early indications of a willingness to engage in this kind of project financing for critical infrastructure at a time when the U.S. government is prepared to support the leading gigawatt scale technology. So we didn't do this as a deal that now we're done with energy systems. We did this as the deal to kick start the very exciting opportunity for Energy Systems, which as everybody remembers, we essentially valued at 0 when we acquired Westinghouse. So the upside to the acquisition case is enormous.

That's great. And then just maybe on -- just switching over to enrichment. PLE recently achieved TRL6 and had it independently verified. So what are the next steps from here? What is the TRL6 demonstration tell us about the economics of PLE? And is this the -- does this mark the start of Cameco's option to increase its ownership stake in [ Jelly ] ?

Yes. Good question. I would characterize TRL 6 a little bit different. And this is a structure that goes all the way to technology readiness level 9, and we're at 6. And 6 means that we can verifiably ensure that we can enrich uranium to the nuclear reliability level, that 99.9% 6 Sigma level of reliability. So effectively, it means the technology risk is removed from GLE. Levels 7, 8 and 9 are where you prove up that project risk can be minimized. So there's still more work to do. Ultimately, we wouldn't have pushed it to TRL 6 if we didn't think there was an economic opportunity. You continue to evaluate that as you go. But now the real attention is taking a verifiable technology and figuring out the project delivery of it.

It's an important stage in the nuclear industry because as we talked about with conversion and just talked about with uranium, you sell this capacity forward under long-term contract. You don't build an enrichment plant and then start knocking on people's doors and trying to sell enrichment supply because just like uranium, just like conversion, there's no in-year demand for this stuff. So building it for a spot market exposure is about the stupidest thing you could do.

So what you want to do is start building your capacity into long-term contracts. TRL 6 is a really important milestone because now we can engage more meaningfully with utilities out the support case for GLE, and we've removed the technology risk. Yes, there's still some project risk in it, but we've removed the technology risk. So it really is an important milestone. It absolutely we're proud of the team. we're proud of their achievement. And we continue to believe that this is a world that wants not only supplier diversification and enrichment but technology diversification and wants it from a proven reliable supplier like Cameco.

Next question comes from Bob Brackett with Bernstein Research.

Before October 28, you all in Westinghouse had laid out a fairly clear contracting framework around capturing 25% to 40% of the plant cost with EBITDA margins of 10% to 20%. I note you've repeated that in your investor deck. Is that a stale framework? Or should we continue to think about using that as the framework?

We are continuing to use that as the framework subject to the finalization of definitive agreements with the United States, subject to finalization of securing what that financing package is going to look like, where it's going to come from and subject to the magnitude of initial long lead item orders.

Why I think that framework remains useful. I may go back to something I said earlier, which is the key to delivering new nuclear at the gigawatt scale is to standardize the sequence and to simplify. So even if we pull forward the long lead items on a number of critical nuclear components you still want to sequence the reactor builds accordingly, much like the United Arab Emirates did partnering with the Koreans on the [ baracocite ], for example, much like Bruce Power and OPG sequenced the refurbishments, the major component replacements in Ontario. So it is still a very good framework to use subject to figuring out exactly how we're going to bind this agreement with the U.S. government and the flow and the rate at which the financing is coming.

Very clear. And the follow-up would be the the participation infrastructure allows the government to receive 20% of cash distributions exceeding $17.5 billion from Westinghouse. If I think about Westinghouse's free cash flow year-to-date, it's around $433 million. You've gotten a distribution of maybe $350 million. Am I comparing apples-to-apples that we should think about maybe Westinghouse's free cash flow as feeding the cash distribution, and therefore, there's a lot of room before we get to a $17.5 billion threshold?

You absolutely thinking about it right. And then some of the things that would affect that, of course, are the speed at which the projects are advanced in the United States, therefore, the speed at which the procurement part of the long lead items kicks in. And quite frankly, the success of the Koreans in building APR1400 in other markets triggering royalties that come back to Westinghouse. All of those things would be upside the case.

But you're thinking about the right way, Westinghouse is worth a lot more than when we acquired it, and that's what's being reflected in the $17.5 billion distribution claim for Cameco and Brookfield prior to the U.S. participating in anything.

The next question comes from Craig Hutchison with TD Cowen.

I just wanted to circle back on the partnership with the U.S. government. Obviously, congratulations, a huge deal to see. Is the expectation that the U.S. government will own these reactors longer term? Are they just financing them if they are owning them longer term? Is there a possibility at some point they could sell these to utilities? Just want to try to understand that.

And then maybe as a follow-up question. I know it may be a difficult question to ask, but if the government is spearheading the financing and the permitting, can you give us any kind of rough goalpost in terms of how long you think it would take to permit the new AP1000 in the U.S.?

Yes, 2 really big questions there. I characterize this in answer to an earlier question as really being a catalyst. The U.S. government stepping in and saying, it is time. It's time to get going. So I think the -- we have to have a range of options in mind, one that goes from the U.S. government simply finances somebody else's build, own and operate to the U.S. government does its own build, own, operate or something in between where it's build, own and then transfer to a utility. I think all options are on the table because the driver here is to get 24-hour baseload carbon-free electrons onto the market as soon as possible in order to meet the onshoring demand and meet the AI demand.

So I think there's going to be a number of structures, which is going to make for a very exciting part of this project figuring out how to structure it. It's a little bit tied to your second question, which is how should we think about permitting. Remember, one of the executive orders back on May 23, actually spoke to using federal lands to deploy new nuclear. And doing that under a federal exemption or federal domain exemption. So there could be possibilities of accelerated licensing and permitting or we could take a page out of the DOE lift-off report from last year and simply look to sites that already have pads that are approved for large nuclear power plants but weren't built on as a consequence of the slowdown after 3-mile Island.

So I guess what I'm trying to say, Craig, is there's a lot of optionality here. But what was holding everything up was who was going to finance that next of a kind. And that's what's been unlocked with this deal. But I think if there are 8 plants representing 4 large nuclear power plants as the first initial launch, there could be 4 different commercial structures to go along with it. And that's just the reality that we're all getting prepared for and designing for and figuring out how to bring the right partnerships and the right coordination together to achieve that.

Okay. Perfect. And I guess the AP300 could also be part of the mix, correct?

It absolutely could. Remember, one of the most elegant things about the AP300 is it's part of an AP ecosystem. And if you're a utility and you're looking at new nuclear, the prospect of having a similar -- or the same instrumentation and control environment, the same fuel and fuel handling environment, essentially the same reactor where up to 85% or 90% of the supply chain is identical, that is a pretty compelling business case, especially if we're going to underwrite that ecosystem with the build-out of AP1000.

It's -- our priority here is AP1000 just given the scale of the demand. But we've always said the best way to sell an AP300 is to start building AP1000s.

The next question comes from Gordon Johnson with GLJ Research.

I just want to revisit, I know there's been a lot of questions about the deal with the U.S. government, but I just want to ask maybe the question from a different angle. So looking at what [ AREVA ] did roughly 8 years ago when it spun out its fuel cycle business. And then looking at you're in Brookfield, 49% ownership of Westinghouse. In the deal you announced in the U.S., clearly, you're not getting the $80 billion check up front. But clearly, it looks like every AP1000 built in the U.S. directly benefits your downstream earnings, fuel fabrication, service parts, et cetera. So is it possible that you guys could potentially look at -- look to spin out Westinghouse, given the interest and hype around AI and the potential risk further down the line of the U.S. still?

And then I have a follow-up.

Gordon, I'll jump in here, and I would say, agree and echo one of the points you made at the time of us acquiring Westinghouse, folks will remember that we talked about its alignment with what we do because we love strategic assets. We love assets that are Tier 1. They're proven, they're scarce, they're absolutely mission-critical and Westinghouse had those assets on the fuel side. And so it just fits beautifully with McArthur River, Cigar Lake, Key Lake, and all the assets that Cameco already had. It was a bundling of just the world's best nuclear fuel assets together in a joint venture, which we absolutely love.

Why did we love the Energy Systems? Because of the AP1000, a reactor where the design was locked down, the fuel was locked down. The licensing risk was locked down. The regulatory risk had been dealt with by the good folks at Southern Company, who had built 2 of them, and it really was just down to project risk. So Westinghouse had everything we liked. And what we particularly liked was as we grew Energy Systems, it grew the core of the business. So we have a business model where the growth of Energy Systems actually grows the whole business.

In other words, as the U.S. government partnership showed, we can grow our own demand for the core of our business, and that is a great place for us to be and to be in control of. When we think about the value of Westinghouse, we are always looking to make sure there is no trapped value for our shareholders. There is definitely a unique interest in investing just in Westinghouse. And it's hard to -- Cameco is a funny proxy for that. Brookfield is probably an even funnier proxy to invest in just Westinghouse. So we're always mindful that the last thing we want to have is trapped value within this family of assets that we put together to benefit shareholders.

So let's just say, we're going to keep all options on the table. This partnership agreement does not force us to leave Westinghouse in 2029. We don't have to sell any of our share or we may, if the value of Westinghouse is so significant come 2029 when that window opens up and every option in between. But we will just maximize the optionality for the maximum benefit of Cameco shareholders.

That's helpful. That's very helpful. And then just one last one for me. I would like to know -- and I'm getting a lot of these questions from investors. When will the market see signs of serious contracting from utilities? Like what's the precursor because that is the precursor for U308 prices to go up. So what signs should we be looking for a serious signs of contracting, long-term contracting from utilities from your standpoint?

Thanks, Gordon. Grant?

Ours is a market that has, time and time again, proven that it does not respond to forward forecasts. It responds to the reality of the contracting environment that it's in. Conversion is at historic pricing because a couple of years ago, so much conversion capacity has been shut in, that when utilities went into the market following the Russian invasion of Ukraine, looking for conversion, it was not there. Uranium has not discovered that yet for 2 main reasons.

One, you have a group of uranium producers who have come back to the market, small volumes, but did not do the hard work of building homes for that supply and stuck it into the front end of the market, into the spot market, which then allowed traders, intermediaries to compete for some of the long-term demand that was coming into the business. In other words, nobody has shown up yet to contract in uranium and discovered that there isn't a willing counterparty and in some cases, a counterparty willing to discount. On the other hand, there are utilities that are looking at the supply stack. They're looking at the promises of big supply out into the future, and they're saying they're willing to take the chance.

So this was my point earlier, Gordon, that there are some utilities who are actually believing some of the definitive feasibility studies that are out there, and they're looking out into a window and they're saying there's going to be a lot of producers who haven't done any contracting today, they're going to build big assets, and then they're going to be flopping around the market trying to place it. So I might as well take advantage of that. That has not been proven to be a failed strategy yet. So if we want the uranium price to reset like we have in other parts of the supply chain, everybody who's invested in a producer who is undisciplined, who is over promotional and sensational needs to tell that management team to understand how the market works and that they're not helping the formation of price in this market.

The next question comes from Lawson Winder with Bank of America.

Can I just fit in a question on McArthur River? And just how would you handicap the potential from McArthur development delays to then fall into 2026 and impact '26 production? And then similar vein, but just looking at Cigar Lake as a potential offset, you've highlighted the potential to produce up to an additional 1 million pounds from Cigar Lake versus the original 2025 guidance of 18 million pounds, 100% basis. What are the factors driving that? And could that also show up in 2026?

Thanks. Great question. Grant was just up there, Grant, of course, is our Chief Operating Officer, in addition to everything else he does. So you just visit the McArthur and had to look underground.

Yes, I did. I was up there, McArthur Key Cigar, Rabbit. And Lawson, it just was a good reminder for me, just how extraordinary our assets are and how strong our incumbent position is and how grateful we are that we don't have a greenfield project that we have to try to build right now because it's difficult. It's difficult to build new. It's difficult to execute on that. And all of that will eventually be reflected in uranium pricing. It's too early for us to put out our guidance for next year. We normally do that in our Q4. So that will come out in February.

When you think about McArthur River or you think about Cigar Lake or any of our assets, you can never divorce our operating decisions from our strategy. And as I've said a number of times already today, our strategy is that we remain in supply discipline because as the last question reflected, this market has not even brought replacement rate demand into the uranium segment yet. So we're not going to front run that.

That means we're not going to make heroic decisions with our operating assets when the market is not yet valuing it. So we produce for our committed sales. We look at McArthur River, we see that there have been some challenges setting up the mining areas, not mining, but setting up the mining areas. It's complicated mining. It requires a certain amount of freeze infrastructure before we go in and develop underneath that region infrastructure. So there have been delays setting it up, and we're just in a position of supply discipline. We're not going to take any heroic actions. We are just going to pace this out at the pace that the market is signaling.

Whether that affects 2026 or not, it's too early to tell, but it would require a change of our strategy, which would require more demand in the market for us to do anything different than we're currently doing now. A responsible uranium producer has a strategy to mine, mill and market uranium as a united strategy, not you just produce as much as you can and you hope to God the market is there for it. That is a failed strategy.

This concludes our question-and-answer session. I would like to turn the conference back over to Tim Gitzel for any closing remarks.

Well, thank you, operator, and thanks to everybody who joined us today. We appreciate it. As Cory noted in the intro, if you have any detailed follow-up questions related to our third quarter results or any questions that we didn't get to answer today, please send those in, we'll be absolutely happy to address those directly.

Just to wrap it up, we're seeing continued momentum through pronuclear government policies, energy-intensive industries, taking action to decarbonize and public sentiment around nuclear that is increasingly positive and better informed. These trends point to a global convergence nuclear is essential for safe, constant secure and reliable power and Cameco is exceptionally well placed to deliver on the promises of nuclear.

So thanks again, everybody, for joining us today. Stay safe and healthy, and have a great day. Thanks.

This brings to an end today's conference call. You may now disconnect your lines. Thank you for participating, and have a pleasant day.

Thank you for standing by. This is the conference operator. Welcome to the Cameco Corporation Second Quarter 2025 Results Conference Call. [Operator Instructions] The conference is being recorded. [Operator Instructions] The Q&A session will conclude at 9:00 a.m. Eastern.

I would now like to turn the conference over to Cory Kos, Vice President, Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Thank you, operator, and good morning, everyone. Welcome to Cameco's second quarter conference call.

I would like to acknowledge that some of us are speaking from our corporate office today, which is in Saskatchewan on Treaty 6 territory, the traditional territory of the Cree People and the homeland of the Métis. Today, we're also dialing in from Toronto, which is on Treaty 13 territory, in the traditional territory of many nations, including the Mississaugas of the Credit, the Anishinaabe, the Chippewa, the Haudenosaunee, and the Wendat Peoples, and now home to many diverse First Nations, Inuit and Métis peoples.

With us in Toronto are Tim Gitzel, President and CEO; and Grant Isaac, Executive VP and CFO. Joining from our Saskatoon headquarters, we have Heidi Shockey, Senior VP and Deputy CFO; and Rachelle Girard, Senior VP and Chief Corporate Officer.

I will hand it over to Tim momentarily to briefly discuss the positive momentum that continues to drive more and more interest in the nuclear markets and the excellent financial performance through the first half of the year that has kept Cameco in a solid financial position. After, we will open it up to your questions. Today's call will be approximately 1 hour, concluding at 9:00 a.m. Eastern Time.

While our goal is to be open and transparent with our communication, we do want to respect everyone's time and conclude the call by 9:00 a.m. Therefore, should we not get to your questions during this call, or if you would like to follow up and get detailed financial modeling questions about our first half results, we'd be happy to respond to any follow-up inquiries. There are a few ways to contact us with additional questions. You can reach out to the contacts provided in our news release. You can submit a question through the Send Us A Message link in the Invest section of our website or you can use the Ask A Question form at the bottom of the webcast screen, and we will be happy to follow up after this call.

If you join the conference call through our website event page, there are slides available, which will be displayed during the call. In addition, for your reference, our quarterly investor handout is available for download in a PDF file on our website at cameco.com. Today's conference call is open to all members of the investment community, including the media. [Operator Instructions]

Note that this conference call will include forward-looking information, which is based on a number of assumptions, and actual results could differ materially. You should not place undue reliance on forward-looking statements. Actual results may differ materially from these forward-looking statements, and we do not undertake any obligation to update any forward-looking statements we make today, except as required by law.

As required by securities laws, we also need to make you aware that during today's discussion, the company will make a number of references to non-IFRS and other financial measures. Cameco believes these measures provide investors with useful perspective on underlying business trends and a full reconciliation of non-IFRS measures is available at cameco.com/invest. Please refer to our most recent annual information form and MD&A for more information about the factors that could cause these different results and the assumptions we have made.

I will now turn it over to our President and CEO, Tim Gitzel.

Well, thank you, Cory, and good morning, everyone. We appreciate you taking the time to join our discussion today. Hope everyone is doing well and has had the chance to enjoy some quality time with friends and family over the summer or winter, depending on where you are in the world today.

Our industry is typically quieter during July and August, but with all the attention nuclear has been getting, especially in the past couple of months, we've had very little downtime. In fact, as Cory mentioned, Cory, Grant and I are calling in from Toronto today, where we are once again meeting with government representatives to talk about nuclear power.

We're excited to be working not only with our local, provincial and Canadian governments, but with policymakers from the U.S. and from around the world. These types of discussions and the actions that they generate are critical to expanding nuclear energy in Canada and abroad and ensuring the industry is supported by a secure nuclear fuel cycle.

Canada's significant uranium resources and nuclear service infrastructure not only makes our country a key player in the global nuclear fuel supply chain, but it also positions Canada as a leader in enhancing global energy security and supporting clean energy solutions.

With our operations across the fuel and reactor life cycles, we believe Cameco is positioned as a central pillar supporting the wave of new nuclear plans announced in recent months. Here in Ontario, OPG has received full approval to begin construction of the first of 4 planned SMR units, representing what could be the first commercial grid-scale SMRs in North America. In the U.S., the resurgence of interest in nuclear has resulted in plans to build 10 new reactors across various states, creating opportunities for Westinghouse and its AP1000 reactor technology. Those North American announcements are in addition to a number of others from across the globe, including 3 reactors in Poland, 2 reactors in the Czech Republic that are now approved to break ground, additional interest from the U.K. and consideration of new nuclear in Sweden and Finland, to name just a few.

The advancing dialogue to build safe, secure and clean nuclear plants is coming amid the supportive shifts in government policies alongside broadly favorable developments such as the World Bank lifting its long-standing ban on nuclear financing. With the continually improving demand picture and a growing number of new build announcements, clean electrons have remained on the critical path to addressing global energy security concerns. And if nuclear energy is on the critical path to those clean electrons, then Cameco, with our Tier 1 assets in stable jurisdictions and strategic investments across the entire nuclear fuel cycle, is a key component on the critical path to global energy security as well. It's exciting to see the market beginning to realize the value of Cameco and the potential for our investment in Westinghouse.

As we get started today, I want to highlight, as we always do in this industry, the importance of maintaining a long-term view. Geopolitical and trade-related developments may continue to introduce short-term uncertainty, but our strategy has consistently demonstrated resilience in navigating those types of challenges. The alignment of our marketing, operational and financial decisions has proven to be a real strength as the nuclear fuel market shifts its focus towards security of supply.

First and foremost, we've maintained a disciplined and patient approach on the marketing front. We are layering in long-term contracts for both uranium and conversion services that are designed to protect us from weaker market conditions while still providing exposure to the price improvements needed to support future supply investments. And as customers commit to those contracts, it directly informs our operational planning.

We invest in supply to ensure fuel is made available in step with demand. In the past, we've seen how unencumbered supply creates an overhang, slows down contracting and negatively impacts prices. In fact, even the expectation that uncommitted supplies will be available, credible or not, can stall momentum. So Cameco will never front-run the market.

To support our marketing activities and underpin long-term operational planning, we are also dedicated to financial discipline and maintaining a strong balance sheet. That provides us with the flexibility to invest when and where needed and allows us to be patient as the contracting cycle continues to evolve.

The bottom line is our actions are deliberate, our decisions are value-driven and our strategy is built to deliver long-term success. And when we see that the risk to future supply far outweigh the risks to long-term demand, we're confident that we're on the right path with the right strategy.

Even with long-term uranium prices holding near decade-long highs, we're still not seeing the level of long-term contracting needed to support both brownfield expansions and the new projects required to meet future demand. Utilities still have a significant amount of uranium to secure to meet their fuel needs through 2045. And now that we're halfway through 2025, it appears likely that it could be yet another year where utilities consume more uranium than they contract in the forward market.

Both spot and long-term contracting are down in the first half of the year relative to 2024, pushing more material into a period of significant uncovered demand and even greater supply uncertainty. And we don't expect to see a move to just-in-time delivery for nuclear fuel. Long-term contracting is essential in our market. It enables continued investment in supply, and it aligns with both the long-term economics of uranium mining and the processing time it takes to transport, convert, enrich and fabricate a nuclear fuel bundle. Looking ahead, we believe that procuring uranium will become a top priority, a shift that is not only necessary but unavoidable.

Moving to briefly highlight Cameco's second quarter and the first half results. Our overall financial performance across the uranium, fuel services and Westinghouse segments was strong and has improved our overall 2025 expectations. As we always highlight, quarterly results will vary, and it's our annual expectations that matter.

Aside from a slight increase in our expected annual average realized price driven by a rise in market prices, the most notable shift was in our full year expectations from our Westinghouse investment. We now expect our 49% share of Westinghouse's adjusted EBITDA to be between USD 525 million and USD 580 million driven by the USD 170 million increase in our share of Westinghouse's second quarter revenue. That improvement was tied to Westinghouse's participation in a construction project for 2 nuclear reactors at the Dukovany power plant in the Czech Republic, which I mentioned earlier.

While all the recent nuclear project announcements have the potential to positively impact our core uranium and fuel services business, we believe the Czech project, in particular, points to significant prospective growth opportunities that lie ahead for Westinghouse.

As was expected at our uranium operations, this year's second quarter timing of planned maintenance at the Key Lake mill resulted in lower uranium production and a higher unit cost of sales compared to the second quarter and the first 6 months of last year. We continue to expect both McArthur River/Key Lake and Cigar Lake to each produce 18 million pounds this year on a 100% basis.

However, uranium mining isn't easy. And as we've highlighted at the beginning of this year, our current uranium production plan assumes that ground freezing and development in new mining areas advances as planned, that we maintain access to adequate skilled labor and that new equipment is commissioned on time. So as we monitor those risks, we will plan accordingly to ensure we meet our commitments.

In addition to the production sources we operate, JV Inkai in Kazakhstan remains on track for its target production volume of 8.3 million pounds on a 100% basis. From that volume, our purchase allocation is 3.7 million pounds this year, and shipments from JV Inkai are expected to begin in the second half of 2025. Similar to our Canadian operations, no mining method or production source is ever without risk. JV Inkai's annual production target requires it to successfully manage the availability of sulfuric acid, procurement and supply chain risks, transportation challenges, construction delays and inflationary pressures on production costs.

At our fuel services division, our annual production outlook, which includes UF6 conversion, UO2 conversion and heavy water reactor fuel bundles remains on track for between 13 million and 14 million kgU of combined fuel services products.

Looking at our financial position, we've remained diligent in managing our liquidity and our capital structure to deliver on our strategy to take advantage of opportunities and to self-manage risk. We're maintaining a strong balance sheet guided by our investment-grade rating and supported by strong cash flow generation. So from a financial perspective, we are in excellent shape with $716 million in cash and cash equivalents, $1 billion in total debt and a $1 billion undrawn revolving credit facility.

These are incredibly exciting times for the nuclear industry. We're seeing a global shift in how nuclear energy is perceived with nuclear power included as a critical part of the solution to energy security and the clean energy transition. In the face of ongoing geopolitical uncertainty and increasingly complex global trade dynamics, the importance of sourcing nuclear fuel from trusted, experienced and sustainable suppliers like Cameco has never been more clear. It's about more than just fuel. It's about enabling a future energy system that is secure, reliable and carbon-free. With our world-class Tier 1 fuel cycle assets and our strategic investments across the reactor life cycle, we believe Cameco is uniquely positioned to help power that future.

So before we move to Q&A, I wanted to highlight a few changes to our senior management team that will go into effect on September 1, which we announced this morning. Grant Isaac will be appointed Cameco's President and Chief Operating Officer, with our current Chief Operating Officer, Brian Reilly, retiring in 2026. In the meantime, Brian will be assuming the role of Senior Adviser, Operations in order to retain and transfer his operational experience and knowledge to the team over the coming months. Heidi Shockey, currently Senior Vice President and Deputy Chief Financial Officer, will be appointed Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. Liam Mooney, currently our Vice President of Safety, Health and Environment, will be appointed Senior Vice President and Chief Legal Officer. And Sean Quinn, our outgoing Chief Legal Officer, who will also be retiring in 2026, will assume the role of Senior Adviser of Special Projects, so we can capture his expertise as well. I will remain as CEO and will continue to guide this company through the most exciting times that any of us have ever experienced in this industry.

So thank you all for joining us today, both on the line and via webcast. We appreciate your continued interest, and we'll now open the floor to your questions.

[Operator Instructions] The first question today comes from Orest Wowkodaw with Scotiabank.

A question about Westinghouse. Since the acquisition, obviously, the outlook for nuclear globally has improved considerably. Yet your 5-year CAGR guidance for the business hasn't changed at 6% to 10%. Can you give us some color on why that is? And is it just a function of that most of the -- is it more of a timing issue where you expect most of the upside from new business to show up after that 5-year mark? Or is there anything else we should think about in that? And I do recognize it excludes the windfall IP settlements from the Koreans. But just curious on how to think about that growth range in the context of all these positive announcements on nuclear.

Orest, this is Tim. Thanks for the question. It's a great question. And I'm going to pass it over to Grant in a minute. Grant sits on the Board. He's one of our directors on the Westinghouse Board. So he's deep into that subject. But before I do, just if you'll allow me, I just want to make a statement on -- last night, we got some news from one of the communities up north. We've been fighting forest fires up there. It seems perpetually since May. They just keep coming and coming. And there's an ongoing wildfire situation and evacuation that we heard about last night yesterday at the Northern Village of Pinehouse. Pinehouse is a community we're very close to. We had to -- unfortunately, they had to evacuate the community last night and our good friend, Mayor Mike Natomagan and everyone living up there, we're thinking of you today.

At Cameco, we've been fortunate that our sites have remained safe during the wildfire season, though many of our employees, contractors and partners have indeed been impacted, and we're certainly always mindful of the challenges they face and continue to face. And I just want to say, to our workers who are helping in those communities, thank you for the work that you're doing, and we're thinking of everyone up north. And hopefully, we get a lot of rain pretty soon. So I just want to start with that, Orest, sorry to interrupt.

And Grant, I'm going to turn it over to you on the Westinghouse question.

Yes. Thank you, Tim. Orest, you actually did a great job answering your own question. When you think about Westinghouse, there is no doubt that whether it's the core of the business that's responding to reactors being restarted, reactors going through subsequent license renewal and all the exciting business that is generated for Westinghouse because of that, then there's the energy systems piece and the Dukovany units, really the first indication of that strong prospect for Westinghouse's technology, either directly through the AP1000 or through the Korean offering, really playing a critical part in growing nuclear power, it's all very exciting.

But when you think about our forward guidance, it's done on the basis of that conservative approach that Cameco always uses. And what I mean there is a lot of projects looking at new builds in energy systems have not yet hit FID. And that for us is a critical moment for starting to build it into the business plan. So whether it's the 6 reactors in Poland or the 2 in Bulgaria or Slovenia's evaluation or the 10 announced for the United States or the evaluation of gigawatt scale reactors in Canada, which could be up to as many as 14, depending on which assessment you look at, none of those have hit FID yet, and therefore, they're not in the forward plan. Once they're in the forward plan, we would start to, I would say, significantly have increases to that outlook. They're just not there yet. And even some of them, as they start to hit FID, would be outside that 5-year look.

So there is a wall of business that's building for Westinghouse, but from a very conservative point of view, we don't include it until things are at final investment decision. And if we did, there would be a really silly upside growth rate that just, I think, would be irresponsible for us to do. We continue to be very happy. And in fact, maybe the final comment I would make on Westinghouse, the only part of the business that's underperforming the acquisition case is the part of the business that would have been doing decommissioning on reactors that are shutting down. So we are delighted that, that part of the business has effectively been all rolled up because nobody is even considering doing that anymore. So thank you for your question, Orest.

And just as a quick follow-up, I mean, the USD 170 million IP windfall this quarter, that looks to be repeatable. How should we think about that in terms of potential cadence on when we could see that come again over the next couple of years? Like, is this something we should be baking into our estimates in terms of upside additions on an annual basis now?

That particular mechanism applies to markets that the Koreans are leading the development in. So when the Koreans are pursuing new build opportunities, those new build opportunities bring with them Westinghouse's participation through these kind of upfront arrangements, through a scope of work that Westinghouse would be delivering alongside the Koreans, and then obviously, through the growth of the core of the business as a fuel fabrication and reactor contract for 80 years kicks in after the new build is done. The first Korean project is the Dukovany site. But remember what the Koreans actually captured was a 4-reactor plant in the Czech Republic, 2 at Dukovany, 2 at Temelin. So in fact, we are expecting more news just to come out of the Czechia new build project alone over the next couple of years and then watch any other market that the Koreans are continuing to develop because it would be a very similar structure.

The next question comes from Brian Lee with Goldman Sachs.

Kudos on the nice execution. Maybe a real quick question on the model to start. Noticed the quite significant upside and strong results on the EBITDA performance for the uranium segment. I think part of that was the low-cost inventory. Can you kind of walk us through the mechanics in the quarter of that drawdown and what maybe the trend line could look like for that part of the segment into the second half of the year?

Grant?

Yes, Brian, I'm going to ask Heidi to jump in there. But before Heidi jumps in, really, you need to think about that uranium segment performance as this enormous incumbent advantage that Cameco has. I will remind folks that we responded to a weak market condition that we saw in the past by leaving inventory in the ground, by going into supply discipline. And I would also remind folks, we're still in supply discipline in that we don't even have our Tier 1 assets running at full production. And the reason for that is really simple. It's that the demand on the uranium side hasn't showed up yet in order to justify that. So all of that means, as we capture more and more demand and we have the opportunities to really develop that Tier 1 production base, it's just going to continue to improve our cost structure, more produced material from lower cost sources flowing into our financials in the uranium segment. This is the very positive consequence of having as much standby capacity as we do, which was deliberate and strategic and responsive to the market.

So just wanted to provide that strategic context, but Heidi, if you want to speak to the dynamics.

Sure. Thanks, Grant, and thanks for the question. I guess I would just point out, first of all, that our inventory will vary. So as much as our inventory is a little lower this quarter, it's just a matter of kind of the timing of when production falls and also when our supply of other purchase commitments fall. In terms of the cost overall, I guess I would point a little bit to our purchased pounds. So in our outlook, we're guiding to about 11 million or 12 million pounds to be purchased this year. And year-to-date, we've only purchased about 2 million. So a lot of purchasing yet to come. We are seeing the benefit in the first half of the low-cost production, as Grant pointed out. Some of that will balance out through the remainder of the year. And so if you look at our outlook of where our unit cost of sales is expected to land, that might be helpful if you're looking at your model.

No, that's super helpful. Appreciate that, Heidi. And then just second question, and I'll pass it on, is there's clearly a lot of activity in the new nuclear development space. You talked through a number of them geographically. And I think it's well appreciated, you guys don't want to sort of front-run and put it into your numbers without seeing dirt being moved and FID and so forth and so on. Can you give us a sense, though, of whether it's region by region or specific areas where there's been more advanced development, kind of what the gating factors are to some of this activity materializing into projects that you would consider putting into your official guidance?

And I think in the past, you've talked a little bit around timing for some of the potential ones in Poland, Bulgaria. I think another one was talked about in Slovakia just recently, but maybe a little bit more color around kind of the cadence and what developments you're expecting here in terms of those getting to the finish line.

Yes, Brian, it's Tim. It's almost overwhelming to some extent, the number of different countries and companies and industries that are today talking about nuclear. And I think we're drawn in many different directions as we try to get to those countries and companies. I mean, just generally, and I'll let Grant speak about what Westinghouse is looking at because that's a different movie, but I mean the U.K., France, Hungary, Czech, China, India, Canada, big player, U.S., we were just down, Grant and I, were down 2 weeks ago in Pittsburgh with the President of the United States and the Secretary of Energy and talking about new nuclear. He signed 4 executive orders calling for a quadrupling of nuclear power in the United States, 400 units by 2050. He wants 10 AP1000s started by 2030, a bit of a monumental task that we're going to try and undertake. And then you can go Egypt, Turkey and the countries, the 3 you mentioned, I think of companies, Google, Amazon, Microsoft, Meta, AWS, it's a load, for sure. So lots of interest in nuclear, lots of projects moving forward and Westinghouse is right in the thick of it.

Grant, I don't know if you want to add anything.

Yes. Brian, I think you were right in identifying that some markets just feel more traditional, and they seem to have a bit of an advantage. So for example, what's going on in Central and Eastern Europe, this is a part of the world that has actually always been very familiar with nuclear. It's a part of the world that never stopped building nuclear. It's just they were building Russian reactors and now are looking for an alternative to the Russian reactors. But that means that there's almost a bit of an advantage for those markets because you've got state-owned utilities with strong state support, and that's the classic model for building nuclear. So watch Poland. I think Bulgaria is really eager, too. They had the second announcement, but I think they're really eager to get to FID before Poland. So watch that space closely. And watch Slovenia. They just have that inherent advantage of that strong state orientation and strong state focus on supporting the grid.

Other markets are really starting to evolve new models. In the United States, watch for things like multi-utility, multi-investor, multi-customer fleet models as opposed to the one utility that steps out and says, "We're going to do it. We're going to build gigawatt scale. We always do it in a 2-pack. So it's a pretty big undertaking. And we're going to do it on the back of our rate base," for example. So new models are being worked out in some of the new markets. That's taking, I would say, a little bit of time. It's not diminishing the enthusiasm in any way, but it's taking a little bit of time. And then ultimately, when you start to add up these numbers and you get to dozens of planned gigawatt scale reactors between what Westinghouse and the Koreans can do, one of the questions that often gets asked is, can we do it? And you didn't ask it, but if you had a third question, I'm pretty sure that that's where you were going to go. So I just want to preempt it a little bit just to say, yes, we can.

The key to new build in the West and in the regions like Central and Eastern Europe is standardization and sequencing. And what we see over and over again is utilities looking at what is the right sequence, looking at a reactor that's already designed, already licensed, already been built, they can go and they can look at it, they can see it operating. And this commitment to standardization and sequencing will be the key to a successful launch of gigawatt scale new build, and everybody fortunately seems to be united on capturing those 2 key components.

The next question comes from Lawson Winder with Bank of America.

Congratulations to everybody starting new roles with today's announcement. If I could, I would like to ask about the commentary in the release on McArthur. So there was some commentary along the lines of some slow development in the first half of the year and potential risk to guidance. Could you maybe just elaborate on what's going on there and kind of the range of potential outcomes and bottlenecks through H2 that will ultimately determine your ability to hit that 18 million pounds guidance?

Yes. Lawson, Tim, mining not an easy venture. We've said that a million times and don't let anyone ever tell you that mining is easy because it's not. So we're going into some new areas in McArthur. We've mentioned that in our MD&A and some of our other disclosure. Whenever you go into a new area, there's potential new risks. And so you've seen and you know our ground freezing method. We have to make sure it's frozen tight before we get in there to start mining. So we're working on that. You heard me off the hop talk about availability of labor or at least indirectly. The fires this year have not been easy on us. And we've lost a little bit of electricity, got it back. We lost communications, got it back. And then unfortunately, some of the communities where our employees live like Pinehouse, when they're fighting fires, we send the employees home to help out at home. So availability of skilled labor is always a tricky part for us. And then we're just commissioning some new equipment.

So I'm not making any excuses here. I'm just saying mining is hard. That's what we're doing. We have not changed our guidance on production for this year. Overall, things are going well, but there's just risk in mining. So I think that's what I can tell you, Lawson.

Okay. I mean thanks for flagging it, and just walking through that detail is helpful. Just as a follow-up, I'd like to ask about GLE. You provided some disclosure in today's release that ultimately, you continue to expect first production in 2030. You've reached Level 6 readiness at the test loop facility. What I wanted to actually ask about is GLE selection for Department of Energy funding. Could you just talk to that process and what the potential upside is and how you expect that funding to look? Like, could it be grant money? Or could it be some sort of repayment on CapEx? Any color there would be really, really helpful.

Yes. We haven't reached TRL Level 6 yet, but Grant, go ahead.

Yes. GLE is underway on TRL6 evaluation. And just a reminder to everybody why that's important is because it's a technology that we know works. It enriches uranium. But ultimately, what you need to prove is it works at that nuclear reliability level, meaning when you turn on the machines, they are doing what they're supposed to be doing at that sort of Six Sigma level of nuclear reliability. And that becomes the basis then for really getting into serious conversations about investing in the technology and serious conversations about contingent contracts, for example, for the outputs of a new nuclear technology. So very exciting. We continue to be really committed to finding an entry point into the enrichment space as Cameco. So all of that is going well.

You asked about the DOE programs, and I can provide a bit of color, but I probably can't provide a lot of really strong direction on it. The DOE has not really made any decisions yet. I think the industry is getting a little bit frustrated that they haven't made those decisions. And then in terms of the mechanisms, there's a bit of industry pushback on what they might look like. And let me just give you one example. The DOE had proposed that maybe the best mechanism for them to support new Western fuel cycle technologies is to kind of stand in the breach as the buyer of last resort, meaning if industry wasn't yet prepared to support a new technology through a contingent contract, the DOE might be there to buy that material in the absence of industry demand. And on the surface, it sounds like a great idea, Lawson, but it's something that we're just not huge fans of at Cameco because we've seen in the past what happens when the DOE has excess material. And we've seen what happens when they sell it into the market in a way that's not attuned to the commercial timing in the market. So the last thing we want to see is the DOE buildup an inventory ahead of industry demand and then live with the uncertainty of what they're going to do with it.

So to your question, we and others in the industry have been pushing for more direct support. We've been saying things like, if we in the West don't want to be standing on January 1, 2028, scratching our heads and going, "Where is all the Western capacity that we were supposed to be investing in," then the DOE should think about deploying some of the budget monies that have been allocated to those who are prepared to put their balance sheet to work, through co-investments, the 50-50 cost share of the advanced reactor development program. That's a great model for something like GLE. The industry is prepared to put its balance sheet. Government is prepared to support those first movers. So more to come on this space, but I would say it really comes down to the DOE just hasn't made decisions yet. And until then, we continue to evaluate this on its technical capability and its commercial case. And just like every other segment, we would have no intention of front-running high-quality industry term demand with supply that didn't have a home. So we remain disciplined.

The next question comes from Alexander Pearce with Bank of Montreal.

So my first question is just around inventories and obviously, you've drawn inventories down to just over GBP 7 million now. And you've highlighted, in the next quarter, I think you've got a maintenance shutdown at Cigar Lake, potential delays around McArthur and Inkai deliveries also towards the end of the year. So how comfortable are you with that level? Is that a new normal? Or should we assume more purchases in this quarter to try and kind of push that number up?

Thanks for the question, Alex. Grant?

Yes. You always need to think about our sourcing into our contract portfolio. It's something we do on a much longer-term basis than even just the calendar year. The advantage of our focus on -- we do not produce unless we build a home for it, means we actually have a lot of line of sight for a long period of time on what our commitments are and when and therefore, how we need to source it. So we always talk about sourcing from production. It's obviously our preferred method. We carry an inventory for when there's moments where there's a mismatch between delivery and production. Or if there's risk to production, we carry in inventory just for that. We also make purchases in the market at times when we feel uranium is cheap, and we buy forward if somebody is willing to fix the price. We act like a very greedy utility in those circumstances. And then we always reserve the right to bring those long-term purchases forward and take possession of them if we need them for sourcing in the more immediate term.

We can buy in the spot market for immediate delivery. That's just yet another tool we can use. We have the ability to borrow material from those who have material on account with us if we needed to. And then obviously, we could always get into a conversation with the utility. And what I mean there, Alex, is that we run the company from a risk mitigation point of view so that we're never like a clumsy buyer in the market, but we will be a very strategic buyer in the market. And we've seen some supply come in, in the face of no demand, the spot prices come off. And quite frankly, if people want to sell material at $70 to with all of the tailwinds facing nuclear, with the reality that today's uranium price does not yet reflect the fact that uranium is the product for which there's no substitute. It does not reflect the fact that the risks to supply are way greater than the risks to demand. It doesn't reflect the fact that restarts are proving to be really, really tricky in our industry. It doesn't reflect the fact that greenfield is not going to happen on the time frames and budgets that people are proposing.

So if people want to part with uranium today, we will be a very strategic and deliberate buyer. We do have pounds, we have to buy, but we'll always pull those other sources in a way that makes the most sense for us and just be very opportunistic and continue to, I would say, run the best trading book in the uranium space as we take advantage of those who are selling when we, quite frankly, think they shouldn't be.

Great. And then maybe if I can just build on Orest's question at the start. So in terms of that guidance range you provided for Westinghouse, the 6% to 10%, is it fair to say that the upper and lower bounds for that range is more to do with the timing of the existing pipeline that you see coming in. Obviously, there's some flex in terms of when that happens rather than a different number of reactors for the kind of upper and lower range.

Yes. And I wouldn't say there's a whole lot of flex on the lower part of that range. That lower part really reflects the core of the business, picking up the fabrication reactor services because of restarts, because of subsequent license renewals. The core actually has some potential upside to it as well, things like the conditions for bringing back the Springfields conversion service in the U.K. Well, that would actually sit in the core of the business. The energy systems piece, which captures the new builds, it's got a lot more upside to it if the reactors that are being evaluated hit FID. So for us, we look at it as a floor. The ceiling is just really subject to capturing some of these stated interest in building new reactors, turning them into revealed interest through final investment decisions. We just continue to be very, very excited with where Westinghouse is going and really are grateful every day that we're part of this business.

The next question comes from Andrew Wong with RBC Capital Markets.

So just going back to like the nuclear new build opportunity, obviously, a lot of significant opportunities here for both the industry and Westinghouse. So I guess 2 questions here. One is, does the nuclear industry have the capacity right now to meet that potential build pipeline, whether that's in labor or heavy equipment or forging? And then just also similar for Westinghouse, there's a lot of opportunities here potentially even, if you look across all the projects, 20-plus AP1000 builds or even going into the 30s, in fact, if you include everything, is there enough capacity for Westinghouse to meet that demand?

Yes, Andrew, earlier, I answered what I thought might have been Brian's question to say, does the industry have the capacity to do it? And I look back through the '60s and '70s at a time when we were building 20 reactors, 25 reactors a year. It can be done, and it can be done as long as there is a really strong commitment to standardization and sequencing. And if there is, the ability to develop a long lead item platform, the ability to prepare the labor, the ability to sequence the construction programs, it means that we can deliver on all of this promise.

And I would just say, for those of you that are in Ontario, look no further than the refurbishments of the CANDU reactors. They are demonstrating, OPG and Bruce Power, what happens when you standardize and sequence and the achievement that can be made in the West. So we can do it. It really is just about getting started and getting started in a smart, standardized and sequenced way. And as I said to Brian, the great news about all of this talk of nuclear new build is everyone understands, standardizing to a common design and sequencing properly is the key. And as long as we stick to that, I don't know what the upside case is, but it's tremendous.

Okay. Great. And then maybe just turning to the uranium markets. Can you just provide some more insights into your contracting discussions today? Are we still seeing floors and ceilings at that $70 to $130 level? And then just on just the contracting activity in general, understandably, volumes are low in H1 because of the macro uncertainty. And that's calmed a bit, but I think macro uncertainty is probably the environment that we'll be in for quite a while here. So what do we need to see happen for that contracting activity to pick up?

Yes, Andrew, I'm amazed we're 49 minutes into our call, and this is the first question about the uranium market. So thank you for that. Guess what, I'm prepared to answer it. The uranium market, I said a little bit earlier, and I just want to reiterate it, that when you're looking at how things are setting up, some folks are inclined to say, "Well, the term contracting is pretty low year-to-date and even the spot market is pretty low year-to-date," and look at that as bad news. And I actually look at it through a very different lens. It just simply means that demand is being delayed, it's being deferred. It's accumulating into a future window where there are even greater risks to supply. And therefore, that means or suggests that pricing power is going up, not going down.

When I look at the reasons for the uranium market to be a little bit slow, they still point to the geopolitical bifurcation or multi-furcation of the market. There's more attention being paid downstream right now than there is upstream. There remains more concern about where the critical services are coming from relative to uranium. And I think some in the uranium segment are actually harming themselves. I mean we do continue to see new entrants or restarts that are being hyper promoted. And of course, I'm not criticizing anybody, I understand why they do it. But if you're a fuel buyer there and you know that enrichment is really short. And every time you turn around, you're being told, "The U.S. is going to start producing massive amounts of uranium," or "These new projects are going to come on in the next 2 years," you're inclined to go, "Okay, maybe I shouldn't worry about uranium quite yet." I would worry, but we haven't seen that fully transpire in uranium. So we remain patient, and we remain actually really optimistic that when the demand starts to come and utilities realize that the volumes they're looking for aren't there or they realize that the duration or the tenor of the available material isn't what they thought, we're going to find ourselves in a very similar situation that we went through in conversion. So that, to me, is the really good analogue.

So all of that means is we remain patient. We remain disciplined. The market knows what we want for market-related callers. We want those floors that start with $70s. We want those ceilings in $130 escalated. When there's been such little term demand in the market, it means that others are willing to be more aggressive, but that doesn't include us. We build a contract portfolio to protect us from these kind of softer market moments, and we hold out to capture the value of our incumbent advantages, we're more bullish on where this is going than we were at this time last year. The longer the contracting is delayed, the more demand that's going to come into the market all at once, and we love those moments from a uranium contracting point of view.

The next question comes from Mohamed Sidibe with National Bank Financial.

So my question mainly relates to the Inkai deliveries that are expected in the second half of the year. Could you maybe talk about some of your confidence level in receiving your portion of that production in the second half and maybe as it specifically relates to the transportation risk in the region?

Yes. Over the last number of years, we had been flagging that while the Trans-Caspian corridor was working, it really lacked predictability and certainty, and we just were never sure. But I would say our partner, Kazatomprom, has just become better and better at utilizing that channel. That's given us the confidence to suggest that our deliveries for the 2025 production as well as the remaining 2024 production will start to flow in the second half of the year. We obviously will update in Q3 if that's not the case.

It goes back to our sourcing conversation. We have multiple ways to deal with making our commitments. And so when there are delays coming out of that part of the world, we'll just use alternative sources, and then we'll capture the full economic value of that material. But in general, the Trans-Caspian route is becoming a little more certain, a little more predictable, but nothing like producing from Cigar Lake and moving it out of Northern Saskatchewan, which is probably the highest-reliability uranium on the planet.

And then if I could maybe follow up on specifically the core business in Springfields and just as it relates to the entire geopolitical situation there, have you seen enough development within the European market that could potentially get you thinking about restarting Springfields or going towards that direction?

Certainly, a very constructive conversion space and certainly a lot of interest in additional Western conversion to come to the market. Generally, what we need to see is a closing of the bid-and-ask spread on new conversion capacity. And what I mean there is not necessarily the price. There are, I would say, a lot of utilities that are willing to pay today's conversion price, today's long-term conversion price, and maybe even a slight premium in order to lock in new capacity. But utilities are smart. They're saying, we're prepared to do this for 3 years. Well, we actually need a much longer contract than 3 years in order to do this.

We've seen this game before. Utilities love to contract with new entrants, whether it's the uranium space or conversion. And they love to sort of entice them with what look like premium contracts for a very short duration because then once that capacity is in the market, it's going to bid the price down. And we just simply aren't going to fall for it. If we're bringing this capacity back, the capacity has to come back under a pricing and under a tenor that makes sense and captures full value. So the bid-ask is not so much on the price side, it's what is the long-term commitment to that supply source and therefore, the strongest underwriting condition for new supply. And then don't forget the longer Springfields stays down, the more value accrues directly to Port Hope. So we're in a pretty good position here in the conversion space.

The next question comes from Anita Soni with CIBC.

Firstly, congratulations to Grant and Heidi on their promotions and great to see you, Tim, continuing on in your role. Secondly, a lot of the questions have been asked and answered, great answers. The only nuance that I wanted to ask about was the wildfire situation. And is that having an impact? Is that contributing to that cautionary language that you had around the production at Cigar Lake and at McArthur River? Or is that just completely separate? I'm just trying to understand like how temporary or long term sort of that caution that you have is in terms of should we be thinking about it for 2026 as well as 2025?

Yes. Anita, the fires are not really the principal cause. It's those other factors I mentioned. We're breaking into new mining areas the ground freezing has to take. The labor issues, that's a bit related to fires, that they come and go because they're looking after their own places. We're commissioning new equipment. So those things are in play right now. The fires are peripheral, I'd say to that. We'll get through that. Like I said, we haven't changed our guidance. And certainly for next year, it has no effect on that. So we're just working through some of those issues right now this summer. And if there's any news, we'll bring it to you, but we're going to carry on as we have in the past. So hopefully, that helps.

The last question comes from Brian MacArthur with Raymond James.

I'll be quick because I know we're at the end. Mine goes back to Lawson's questions. Just on GLE, Grant and Tim, you've talked about how tough it is to do things. How confident would you be to get GLE in by 2030? And the second part of that is, is the thought process still you're going to treat some secondary material first? Or has that all changed as we go forward? Any color would be great.

Yes, Brian, glad you got in right at the end here. With respect to GLE, we continue to work on a path that is the fundamental agreement with the Department of Energy. By 2030, subject to obviously further discussions with the DOE around timing, we would be in a position to re-enrich the depleted UF6 tails that are a legacy liability, quite frankly, of the old gaseous diffusion plants, but once re-enriched are an important source of U.S. uranium, both uranium and conversion. That would be our intention, and that would be our focus right now because that is the primary obligation of GLE.

GLE could do straight down the fairway LEU to replace the Russians. GLE could do higher assay enrichments in order to provide fuel for some of the advanced reactor designs that require a high level of enrichment. But in those other 2 cases, we would need to see the demand for that service. We would need to see the appropriate contracting, the appropriate pricing in order to underwrite the investments required to do those 2 additional services, whereas the DOE tails arrangement is an agreement we have with the DOE to produce 2 products we know really, really well, uranium and conversion, and that remains our focus, that's the path we continue to be on, subject to obviously verifying TRL6 and then subject to putting in a strong investment case because the uranium and UF6 market is there for that product.

Right. So the capacity at first would be just for the tails and then you'd add additional capacity like it's scalable to do the other stuff if you wanted to.

Yes. I mean the only thing that could change that, Brian, and it kind of goes back to the question that was asked earlier about what the DOE is up to, if the DOE realizes that it really wants LEU instead of re-enriched tails, then the DOE has the ability to support that through some funding decisions. We would obviously encourage that, and we would respond accordingly. But at the moment, the primary focus is the tails re-enrichment.

This concludes our question-and-answer session. I would like to turn the conference back over to Tim Gitzel for any closing remarks.

Okay. Well, thank you, operator, and thanks to everybody that was with us today. As Cory noted at the start, if you have any detailed follow-up questions related to our second quarter results or any questions at all that we didn't have a chance to answer, please just send those into us, and we'll be happy to answer them.

We believe that the evolution of supportive government policies, the tangible actions of energy-intensive industries and positive public conversations are all pointing to the same conclusion: nuclear energy is a critical solution for providing clean, constant, secure and reliable power to electrify global economies. As a proven reliable supplier with decades of experience, Cameco, along with Westinghouse, is uniquely positioned to power that safe, secure energy future.

So thanks again, everybody, for joining us today. Stay safe and healthy, and have a great day. Thank you.

This brings an end to today's conference call. You may now disconnect your lines. Thank you for participating, and have a pleasant day.