Centrus Energy Corp. (LEU) Q4 2025 Earnings Report, Transcript and Summary

Greetings. Welcome to Centrus Energy Fourth Quarter and Full Year 2025 Earnings Call. [Operator Instructions] Please note this conference is being recorded. I will now turn the conference over to Neal Nagarajan, Senior Vice President, Investor Relations. Thank you. You may begin.

Good morning. Welcome, and thank you to all of our callers as well as those listening to our webcast. Today's call will cover the results for the fourth quarter and full year 2025 ended December 31. Today, we have Amir Vexler, President and Chief Executive Officer; and Todd Tinelli, Chief Financial Officer, Senior Vice President and Treasurer. This conference call follows our earnings news release issued yesterday. We filed our report for the fourth quarter and full year on Form 10-K earlier today. All of our news releases and SEC filings, including our 10-K, 10-Qs and 8-Ks, are available on our website. A replay of this call will also be available later this morning on the Centrus website. I would like to remind everyone that certain information we may include on this call today may be considered forward-looking information that involves risk and uncertainty, including assumptions around the future performance of Centrus. Our actual results may differ materially from those in our forward-looking statements. Additional information concerning factors that could cause actual results to materially differ from those in our forward-looking statements is contained in our filings with the SEC, including our annual report on Form 10-K and quarterly reports on Form 10-Q. Finally, the forward-looking information provided today is time-sensitive and accurate only as of today, February 11, 2026, unless otherwise noted. This call is the property of Centrus Energy. Any transcription, redistribution, retransmission or rebroadcast of the call in any form without the express written consent of Centrus is strictly prohibited. Thank you for your participation. And I'll now turn the call over to Amir.

Thank you, Neal, and thank you to everyone on today's call. 2025 was a milestone year for Centrus, punctuated by December announcement to begin commercial centrifuge manufacturing to address the commercial LEU market and our substantial backlog. Shortly thereafter, in January, the Department of Energy selected Centrus for a $900 million HALEU enrichment award. Our build-out officially ushers in America's return to domestic commercial uranium enrichment, with a derisked, deployment-ready technology that can service both commercial and national security needs. Our first new cascade of centrifuges is expected to come online in 2029, with subsequent cascades to come thereafter. We are continuing to identify and implement opportunities to reduce both our lead time and the unit cost. This effort is being implemented day 1. But first, let me turn to our results. There can be a significant amount of quarterly variability in our results due to the nature of our business, and we therefore believe our annual results are more indicative of our progress. For the full year 2025, we achieved $448.7 million in revenue, a gross profit of $117.5 million and a net income of $77.8 million. The majority of our current revenue is derived from our LEU business, and during the third quarter, Centrus received waivers from the Department of Energy to continue to import LEU for all currently committed deliveries to U.S. customers in 2026 and 2027. This announcement provided greater clarity and helps derisk that side of our business. Now turning to our future commercial enrichment business and our go-forward roadmap. Our base case build-out will address our substantial commercial LEU enrichment backlog of $2.3 billion and the requirements to the Department of Energy under the HALEU enrichment award. Considering all factors, our base case will include 12 metric tons of HALEU. Further capacity additions will be progressive and depend on both our offtake demand and our capital resources. Importantly, I am pleased to announce that as we continue to pursue additional low-cost capital, our base case build-out is expected to be sufficient to reach our nth-of-a-kind cost. We initially launched our commercial centrifuge manufacturing to address the growing demand for commercial LEU, where we have time to market advantage. Demand for LEU from existing and growing electrification needs will only continue to increase ahead of any AI data center advanced manufacturing or hyperscaler demand, while LEU supply is rapidly becoming more constrained. Near-term domestic LEU demand alone is set to increase by approximately 6.5 million SWUs, stemming from Russia's exiting the market and the additional demand from restarts, uprates and new pledged reactors. The LEU pricing curve, which has experienced a 24% compound annual growth rate from 2019 to 2025, is an indicator of this increasingly constrained market and pent-up latent demand. National security is another potentially important market. We are currently the only production-ready option for the national security establishment. And in the fourth quarter, we were notified by the National Nuclear Security Administration of its intent to sole-source certain uranium enrichment activities from Centrus. This could represent another source of low-cost capital. Speaking of funding, the $900 million HALEU enrichment award has the potential to exceed $1 billion, and still needs to be finalized through negotiations. This potential funding, which comes through a procurement and involves neither debt nor equity, would serve 2 important points. First, it would be another pool of low-cost capital, and we are grateful to our government for recognizing the importance of Centrus to the market. And second, it is supporting the 12 metric tons of HALEU capacity ahead of a commercially-viable advanced reactor market. We are positioned to capitalize on these opportunities because we have been laying the groundwork over the previous 12-plus months. More specifically, these operational efforts include: First, our November 2024 supply chain readiness program. Second, successfully completing phase two of the HALEU operations contract by contractually delivering 900 kilograms of HALEU UF6 to the Department of Energy and producing well over 1 metric ton of HALEU UF6 for the department as of end of 2025. Third, adding approximately $300 million to our $2.3 billion contingent LEU backlog and making strong progress towards removing these contingencies. Fourth, announcing that we are creating more than 300 new jobs at our Piketon facility, and then hiring more than 50 of those new hires in Q4. In 2025, we added over 140 employees combined in Piketon and Oak Ridge. Fifth, initiating design work on our training, operations and maintenance facility in Piketon, which will include the significant renovation and rehabilitation of existing facility. And sixth, continuing to identify and implementing opportunities to reduce our lead time and unit cost, a day 1 activity. Likewise, from a financial standpoint, these efforts include: First, uplifting to the New York Stock Exchange to attract a more diversified set of institutional investors. Second, validating foreign direct investment is another potential source of low-cost capital by signing an MOU with KHNP and POSCO International. And third, raising capital to support the build-out, ending the year with a cash balance of approximately $2 billion. Todd will discuss this in greater depth shortly. Moving forward, we will continue to capitalize on our time-to-market advantage in the domestic LEU market and our first mover advantage in the global HALEU market. Operational excellence is nonnegotiable. Our first cascades time line includes a significant amount of time, effort and investment at both our facilities to build on our operational momentum. And as part of this effort, it is with great pleasure that I'm able to announce that we just recently entered into an agreement with a best-in-class partner, Fluor, who will serve as our primary EPC in Piketon. In an effort to provide stakeholders with greater clarity, we are prepared to provide the following full year 2026 guidance. From a financial perspective, for the year, we are providing the following guidance. Total company revenue of $425 million to $475 million and total capital spend of $350 million to $500 million. And from an operational standpoint, we are providing the following guidance. First, finalizing contracts with our most critical partners, with a focus on those who will require long-lead procurements, significant scale items and complex parts. These will be suppliers for either parts or equipment at either facility. Second, workforce additions across both facilities to total at least 150 net new employees. At least 100 new employees in Oak Ridge or roughly 25% of the announced 400, and at least 50 new employees in Piketon. Jobs across both locations will include engineers, assembly technicians, maintenance technicians, enrichment operators, lab technicians, project management and project controls. And finally, and this will be a big achievement from a design perspective, we will be releasing our first Certified for Construction work package in Piketon. This is where the design for a key plant system has completed necessary reviews and is formally signed and stemmed for used by construction crews. We additionally expect to have the majority of our construction partners mobilization completed in Ohio by the end of the year. We expect to be able to provide more details as we continue to make progress, including a time line for the completion of our first centrifuge produced by our commercial scale manufacturing process. This will be another groundbreaking milestone as it represents the supply chain coming together and its ability to produce a centrifuge. With that, I will turn the call over to Todd, and then come back with some final thoughts. Todd?

Thank you, Amir, and good morning to everyone on today's call. Let me first walk you through our results, before providing more detail on some of what Amir discussed as well as our financial guidance. 2025 was another great year of execution both on the operational and financial fronts as we fortify and prepare the business ahead on this industrial build-out. Total revenue for 2025 was $448.7 million, a $6.7 million or a 1.5% increase over full year 2024. The LEU segment generated $346.2 million in 2025, relatively flat versus $349.9 million over 2024 levels. Importantly, while uranium revenue decreased 54% year-over-year to $55.6 million, due in part to a large onetime uranium sale in the fourth quarter of 2024, SWU revenue increased 21% year-over-year or $51.9 million, driven by a 23% increase in the volume of SWUs sold. The Technical Solutions segment delivered $102.5 million in 2025, an increase of $10.4 million or 11% over 2024 levels, driven by a $10.5 million increase in the revenue generated by the HALEU operations contract. Total gross profit for 2025 was $117.5 million, a $6 million or roughly 5% increase over 2024 gross profit. The LEU segment's full year 2025 cost of sales decreased $21.3 million or 8% to $234.7 million. The 2025 LEU segment gross profit increased $17.6 million or roughly 19% to $111.5 million in 2025, driven primarily by an increase in the volume of SWUs sold and the increase in the margin on SWU sales due to contract and pricing mix, partially offset by a decrease in uranium gross profit. The Technical Solutions segment's 2025 cost of sales increased $22 million or 30% to $96.5 million, driven primarily to a $22.8 million increase in costs incurred under the HALEU operations contract, partially offset by a decrease in costs related to other contracts. That segment's 2025 gross profit decreased $11.6 million or 66%, to $6 million, due to the aforementioned factors. Phase two costs incurred subsequent to November 2024 have not been subject to a fee as this portion of the contract remains undefinitized and is subject to final resolution. Importantly, we had a schedule and permitted fourth quarter shipment from Russia that did not leave as expected due to a shipping issue. That shipment, which was pushed out to the first quarter of 2026, would have driven down the average cost per SWU and positively impacted gross margin and net income. In addition, in the year, we experienced non-reoccurring G&A costs of $3.6 million and $1.1 million related to voluntary tax withholdings and CFO transition costs, respectively. To provide a better picture of our earnings and account for potential variances and future shipments as well as our quarterly earnings fluctuations, next quarter we will begin to present financials in both a quarterly as well as a trailing 12-month format. Turning to our backlog. As of December 31, 2025, the total company backlog stood at $3.8 billion and extends to 2040. The LEU segment backlog was approximately $2.9 billion. This includes future SWU and uranium deliveries, primarily under medium and long-term contract fixed commitments, as well as the $2.3 billion in contingent LEU sale contracts and commitments with $2.1 billion of the total under definitive agreements and $200 million of the total subject to entering into definitive agreements. Our Technical Solutions segment backlog is approximately $900 million as of December 31, 2025, which includes funded amounts, unfunded amounts and unexercised options. The options relate to the company's HALEU operations contract. Turning to our capitalization. In 2025, we raised gross proceeds of $533.6 million through 2 ATM programs. We raised gross proceeds of $390.4 million through our recently announced November 2025 ATM program at an average of $269.21 per share. Combined with our cash generated by our business and oversubscribed August convertible senior note issuance, we ended the year with an unrestricted cash balance of $2 billion. And as Amir noted, we were recently selected for the $900 million HALEU enrichment award, which could increase to just over $1 billion with $170 million of additional options. We are still in the process of negotiating our final contract with the DOE, which will be based on milestone payments. With our funding and our line of sight to customer demand, as of now, we plan to have HALEU production online before the end of the decade and to produce 12 metric tons of HALEU per year thereafter. Our war chest provides Centrus with the ability to begin funding our operations to stand up our supply chain while making the necessary investments in our facilities, machinery, partners and workforce as part of the build-out. Going forward, we will continue to prudently shape our balance sheet to support this large first-of-a-kind industrial build-out of one-of-a-kind centrifuge technology that can meet both commercial and national security requirements. We believe we are sufficiently funded to meet our near-term capital requirements, and our current LEU backlog and potential HALEU enrichment award should allow us to meet our milestone of reaching nth-of-a-kind cost. We are simultaneously pursuing other avenues of low cost of capital to continue to strengthen our capital stack, including national security-related funding, future prepayment or offtake arrangements and potential foreign direct investments. Maintaining a healthy cash balance provides additional flexibility to negotiate with any of these potential partners while also moving us to removing the contingency around our LEU enrichment backlog. Turning to guidance. As Amir discussed, we are providing both financial and operational guidance. Let me dive deeper into the financial points he discussed. For 2026, we are providing the following financial guidance. Total company revenue of $425 million to $475 million, with the midpoint of $450 million representing flat year-over-year growth. And total capital deployment of $350 million to $500 million. 2026 capital deployment will also include prepaid expenses that do not appear as CapEx, but impact free cash flow as we invest in our partners as they scale up ahead of our production. With that, I will turn it back to Amir.

Thanks, Todd. Our strategy to build both LEU and HALEU capacity is a clear signal to potential customers that Centrus has achieved an important inflection point and is prepared to meet future enrichment needs. Absent Centrus, the market must rely on the duopoly of state-backed competitors with a shared signal point of failure centrifuge manufacturing risk. Providing Centrus with orders derisks customers' businesses and provides us with the clarity needed to stand up our operations. On the LEU side, the technology was already proven, and so too now is our role in the LEU enrichment supply chain. The projected gap between supply and demand for both domestic and foreign utilities continues to widen. In the U.S., we continue to see signs from the administration, through regulators and through utilities, that demand will only increase as they seek to unleash American energy dominance and energy security. On the HALEU side, we are now going to build out capacity and capitalize on our first mover advantage. We're already in conversation with hyperscalers for future prepayment or offtake-like agreements, another potential source of low-cost capital financing. Here, we demonstrate that we expect to have at least some capacity ready before the end of the decade and ahead of the advanced reactor market maturing. And for our government, we thank you again for the award and look forward to supporting the national security establishment to our fullest ability. We are embarking on a vital industrial build-out to support the global nuclear industry's growth and America's energy independence. We look forward to updating you with more as we embark on this exciting new step. With that, I will turn the call over to the operator for questions. Operator?

[Operator Instructions] Our first question is from Ryan Pfingst with B. Riley Securities.

Maybe we could talk about the time line a little bit more. It sounds like you're looking to improve on the 42-month forecast that you've talked about in the past. Could you talk about some of the potential initiatives that might help pull that forward, whether it's more funding, other federal programs or anything else we should be aware of?

Ryan, appreciate your question. Thank you for calling today. You're pointing to an area that is increasingly important to us, obviously, as we now embark on actual manufacturing of centrifuges and fulfilling some of our commitments. Execution is becoming and has become a priority for us. And so the -- as I've stated earlier in the remarks, continuous improvement and the ability to reduce unit cost and go faster is paramount as we build out our capacity. We have to do it in parallel. And I will tell you that we have quite a few folks dedicated to this, and we're dedicating resources to this. And it is evident to me that we already have a good list of opportunities that we're executing on. We have a good list of partners that we've announced, for example, Fluor, which we're very proud of that partnership, they're best-in-class, and others that we're working with that we have not announced and in the future we'll make announcement related to that. All this to say that being able to go more efficiently, reducing unit cost and going faster is a priority for us, as I said, day 1, and we're executing on it in parallel. And stay tuned for more updates as we continue with the process.

Our next question is from Rob Brown with Lake Street Capital Markets.

Congratulations on all the progress. On the commercialization side of the -- LEU commercialization, is that capacity ramp sort of similar time line with the HALEU ramp? And when does that kind of reach a point where you have that backlog turn from contingent to sort of final?

Thanks for calling in and for the question. Let me just maybe repeat the question and make sure that I'm answering the right one. Your question, first of all, is around the contingency associated with our sales and when does that turn into a firm commitment? Did I get it right?

Yes, correct.

Yes. So this is not something that at this point we will get into a lot of contractual details. Needless to say that we, as I stated before, we have the intention and the plan and we're progressing towards fulfilling our commitments. This backlog of LEU commitments that we've announced, it's extremely important to us. And again, I will not comment specifically on the details of the contractual arrangements, but this is exactly what we're executing towards. And we have every intention to meet our commitments.

Our next question is from Eric Stine with Craig-Hallum Capital Group.

So maybe just on the CapEx, I appreciate the CapEx guidance for '26. If you could talk about, if possible, maybe the linearity of that CapEx expected throughout the year. And then also, as we think about the number that you gave, is that kind of a representative number on an annual basis as you work towards that initial 2029 operational date? Or I mean, is this a number that is more representative, it's the first year and you likely -- it either increases from there or is lower going forward?

Yes. What I would say is, looking past 2026, obviously, our CapEx spend manufacturing process gets more linear. Currently, right now, this -- the number that we have provided for guidance is capital spend. So that does include some long-lead procurement, potential prepayments on supplier agreements and also engineering work at our Piketon facility. So the first year is not indicative of the linear spend that I anticipate seeing in '27 through '29 period due to those factors. What I will say is as we move through the year, any time that we see an adjustment, we'll reflect that in the guidance and we'll try to keep you -- that's why we want to inform the investors the best way we can on where we're going to be over the next 12 months, but also on what demand shakes out to be from a plant standpoint at both manufacturing and Piketon, and we'll work towards fine-tuning that guidance. But initial year does include some prepayments and long-lead procurement.

Our next question is from Jed Dorsheimer with William Blair.

Congrats on the progress. I guess for my one question, just the -- achieving the nth-of-a-kind, I'm just wondering if I'm reading into this correctly. I had always assumed that maybe it took the 3.5 million SWU to achieve that. And it sounds like that's not the case, that you can achieve that target with less capacity. And so I'm just curious if you might be able to give a little bit more framework on the relative capacity to achieving the nth-of-a-kind target.

Yes. Jed, thanks for calling in. Good question. The nth-of-a-kind move will be achieved way before the 3 million SWUs, as you mentioned. I would have to say that, in my view, that this is an important announcement to make to the analysts here, to shareholders and investors. As you know, one of the greatest obstacles for any new entrant into the market is the nth-of-a-kind cost. And the fact that we are commencing, we're building towards a certain volume and capacity, and the fact that we are able to get through the first-of-a-kind in this short period of time, I think, is remarkably important. As always, I'm very careful. We're not disclosing full cost. And so I will -- I'll stop there. But I believe I answered your question. And like I said, the fact that we're crossing the nth-of-a-kind cost is a big announcement and a big achievement for us.

You did.

Our next question is from Joseph Reagor with ROTH Capital.

Most of my questions have been answered, but just to kind of touch on looking forward a couple of years. Has the government started to come around on this Jan 1, 2028 cutoff for Russian imports? Has there been any willingness to discuss that given domestically you guys should be first to market, that there isn't really going to be supply in 2028, 2029 domestically?

Yes. Well, another good question, and thank you for calling in as well. I can give you my perspective from interfacing with customers, potential customers, be they on the LEU side or on the HALEU side, in other words, the existing commercial fleet or the advanced reactors that are being built. It seems like there's a lot of demand that is being stacked up in around those years towards the end of the decade. We are seeing a lot of demand there. On the government side, I really can't report anything because there's nothing really to report. We're not -- there's nothing out there in the public domain that expresses any concerns. But as you know, the real concerns and the real push will come from the customers, the industry, the utilities themselves if and when the problem presents itself. Some of the leading indicators, as I mentioned earlier, we are already experiencing in the form of intense discussions and discussions around HALEU. As you know, we're bringing HALEU supply ahead of advanced reactors being commercially viable. And so that creates a lot of demand as well. Just as a reminder, HALEU is not only enrichment of HALEU; it requires a significant enrichment of LEU and LEU capacity as well. So you have a force multiplier there that will only kind of reveal itself in the next few years. But back to your original question, nothing to report from the government side. And if the government will take note of it, it would most definitely will have to start from the utilities and the customers themselves pointing it out as a problem.

Our next question is from David Choe with UBS.

I guess really quick, the '26 guide is flat year-over-year for revenue. Just wondering if you could kind of remind us of some of the contract dynamics for your long-term supply arrangements, and then also if and when we should expect to see any kind of step-up in line with some of the changes we've seen in long-term SWU prices in line with some of the indices.

Yes. So our guidance is flat. We picked the midpoint. And obviously, there's a number of factors, obviously, around that guidance. As we mentioned on the call, we did have 1 shipment that obviously impacted our year-end results for gross profit all the way down to net income and earnings per share. And these are some of the challenges that we face just with normal shipping delays. I would say this was not due to any permitting or any waivers that had to go along with any Russian material. But we see upside to our potential guidance. The market continues to improve itself. We've seen some record-high spot prices in SWU. We hope those dynamics continue. And a lot of our supply is contracted, both from 2 foreign sources. We feel comfortable with our -- on our supply side. Our goal is to maximize the margin on the revenue side and sales to our customer.

Our next question is from Jeff Grampp with Northland Capital Markets.

My question is regarding the time line that you guys have put out to initial enrichment capacity. I'm curious, are there more important milestones or roadblocks that would more tangibly derisk the time line that you guys have put out that you could communicate along the way? And what might those be? Just kind of wondering how you guys are able to communicate publicly progress towards derisking that time line.

Yes. Well, thanks for calling in. Another great question on execution here. So if you think about lead times to production, a lot of it has to do with our own cycle times, our supplier cycle times, the lead times that we can get our suppliers to commit to, how we configure our supply chain. All of these are being worked on, as I said, as we speak right now and in parallel with our actual initial build of the centrifuges. We do, as I said earlier, we do look at different partners, different ways that we can be more efficient and faster. I foresee that when those mature and there's something to report, we certainly will be very transparent in how we announce them. We will uncover efficiencies that -- as we go through the process, and I'm sure that there will be more announcements that will be made. I believe I answered the question. I think it's important to note that we do see demand peaking around the time of when we are bringing our capacity. And to the earlier question by the earlier analyst around issues around misalignment of supply and demand, we're predicting that that would be the case. We predict that there would be issues around supply and the ability to meet the demand. And so we're doing everything in our power to be able to expedite that to the market. And again, the example that I used there, if we start seeing real committing demand for HALEU, which we're already in discussions with several OEMs and we're starting to see that happen -- especially after we got the announcement out on the award for the $900 million from the DOE, we're seeing great engagement from a lot of the OEMs. Once those start becoming reality, and I predict they will very soon, then that creates a huge demand for LEU as well. And so I think all of that is going to become a lot clearer as we step through the major milestones this year and in the next few years.

And I just will add that the importance of our supply chain is critical. We're working very diligently on making sure our supply chain meets national security needs. So those steps in order to meet that supply chain requirements, we have to be careful with. We have to be prudent and make sure that we cover all of our bases. Once we achieve those supply chain requirements for national security, it allows us to move a little quicker. And so we'll continue to provide updates throughout the year and in future quarters on how those milestones can be tracked, and we'll hold ourselves accountable.

Our next question is from Vikram Bagri with Citigroup.

It's Ted on for Vik. Could you talk about the HALEU production target that you have? On a metric ton basis, it looks like it's roughly enough for an initial load for 1 of the advanced reactors. So could you just confirm whether that quantity includes both an assumption of market demand as well as the demand that you see from the DOE task orders?

Yes. Thank you for that question. The way I read your question is around the capacity and what that capacity actually means for the industry in terms of the ability to satisfy some of the initial [ requires ] or what they may be. We got to remember the intent of the DOE program was to stimulate the market. So here, we had a market where there was not necessarily demand that anybody could commit to, and the Department of Energy had wisely said, "Well, what we're going to do is we're going to invest, we're going to create the capacity, and then we're going to allow the OEMs to contract for that capacity." And exactly as they planned, we're starting to see that. We're seeing the OEMs now lining up and having discussions and conversations for the capacity that's going to become available. More specifically to what does that number represent, it depends on the design. It depends on the specific OEM, the size of the reactor. It depends on how they're going to configure their supply chain and what enrichment they would require. I will point out 2 things to you, that, number one, we did say that it is our full intention to have both LEU and HALEU capacity, and we're progressing on those fronts. And it is our intention to serve the commercial and national security needs, and we're progressing on those 2 fronts as well. And so there's really no specific answer to that other than the fact that we will continue expanding our plans if need be. And we're pushing as hard as we can to be -- to get as much offtake as possible and then demand as possible. And if need be, our plans would be expanded accordingly. This is a good kickoff and starting point for us in terms of our capacity assumptions.

Got it. Very helpful. I have one follow-up, just in terms of the guidance. Could you just remind us how pricing is set in the contracts? Are you able to talk about what portion of the planned deliveries for 2026 already have the cost of supply fixed?

Yes. So in our guidance, we don't comment on the contractual makeup of our contracts. What we have said is we do have secure supply from 2 foreign sources, and that allows us to get comfort around our guidance and secured that we have everything in place, both waivers and, as I said, normal shipping channels to move forward.

Our next question is from Stephen Gengaro with Stifel.

I was curious what you could tell us on this front. When we think about the CapEx you're spending to build out capacity over the next decade, how do you think about the evolution of SWU prices to sort of support the economics behind it? And I know you're not going to give me an exact number, but like how do we think about SWU for HALEU and LEU? And just in your mind, like how does that dynamic play out?

Yes. Good. Thanks for that question, Stephen. Thanks for calling in today. I think it's an important topic to discuss because we talk a lot about cost, which is a very important part of the project and the elements that we're considering. Likewise, the SWU prices out there and our ability to contract for higher SWU prices or more favorable SWU prices is a major consideration for us. So I think the question of how do you see the SWU prices sort of momentum in the market, I think, is something we discuss and debate and monitor very closely internally. The SWU prices, in my view, are going to adjust down only if 1 of 2 things happen. Well, if 1 of 2 things happens. Either demand goes down, in other words, we're going to start shutting down reactors, or basically the supply side is going to outpace the demand. I sure hope that the former does not happen. There's no indications of that. And for the latter, most of the announced expansions, either it's us or our competitors, is based on contracted SWUs. So there is really nobody out there that is building what I'd call just-in-case or ready-to-serve SWUs that they will be eager to get off and sell on the market. All this to say that my view is that as supply becomes tighter towards the end of the decade and as utilities start going out for bids, I think that would continue to apply upward pressure on SWU prices. And so that obviously strengthens our business case. That strengthens our investments and our case for our shareholders. And that really is how I view the situation. Now this doesn't even include some of the some of the extra and bonus and opportunities that are out there. So if advanced reactors become a dominant force in the market, somebody comes out and announce a major build of advanced reactors, that is going to apply even further pressure on not only HALEU, and as I mentioned earlier, on LEU SWU capacity as well. I think that that would be a big upside and a big opportunity as well. We went through a major geopolitical event where the largest producer of enrichment in the world has really been -- not going to be trading in the Western market. And I think the ramifications and the ripples of that are not going to be settled for a long time in my view.

Our next question is from Sameer Joshi with H.C. Wainwright.

Congrats on the good progress. The question is about the $900 million from the task order -- DOE task order. Given that advanced reactors are likely to come online towards the end of the decade, should we expect this 10-year contract to be really be 5-year contract and like to get the money up front-loaded?

Thank you for calling, and a really good topic to talk about. So we, as I mentioned earlier, we now are in discussions with numerous folks about their needs, what we can supply, and some commercial discussions are taking place as well. The way I view it is we will be looking to maximize the commitments from suppliers. Obviously, longer-term commitments are more favorable to us. That would be reflected in the pricing as well. I mean when you look at contract pricing, it takes all of that into account. Your question was about front-loading some of these contracts from a cash perspective. I mean, obviously, these are all the things that we constantly try to optimize and we will continue to try to optimize in the best interest of our shareholders, particularly that most of the SWUs that we're selling is what I call expansion SWUs. These are SWUs that we're investing capital in. And so absolutely, we will be looking to optimize all of these things. Beyond that, comments about any specific contracts or terms and conditions, I'll refrain from discussing here.

Our next question is from Bill Peterson with JPMorgan.

Amir and Todd, thanks for all the details, including the guidance primers for the year. I was wondering if you can double-click on what opportunities you have to pull in the 42-month time frame you spoke of, as well as, I'd say, to build out more broadly? I guess what I'm getting at is, what's under your control versus suppliers or other third parties? How much is contingent on additional financing, negotiations with suppliers and partners, or, I think you alluded to earlier, government approvals related to national security?

Yes. Bill, thanks for that question. I think that what you're double-clicking on is exactly the areas of the most important conversations we're having internally right now. As I said, execution is paramount, meeting our commitments is paramount. In parallel with that, we got to be able to generate opportunities and do better than what we committed to. If you look at what are those opportunities, and I'm just going to use general terms and general themes, we're very unique in that we are building our own centrifuges. We have the capability, obviously, to build our centrifuges. We have partners that are suppliers. And so a lot of what we do is really within our control and we have a pretty wide range of motion in being able to generate the opportunities. So for example, things like cycle time around some of the components that we manufacture, working, incentivizing and structuring contracts and relationship with suppliers, to incentivize them for shorter lead times, and ensuring that we structure our oversight, ensuring that we structure our own processes to yield best quality first time, best yield that we can. To me, this is fundamental, elementary manufacturing excellence. And we are partnering, bringing people that specialize in it, utilizing every piece of knowledge and experience that are out there to come and help us. And so far, we have been pleased with the progress. And as I said earlier, we are really looking forward to making more announcements around how we're doing, who we're partnering with and what value that brings to the project and the shareholder. I don't know that I will be able to go more specific than that. But in general, these are the themes that we're attacking. And as I said numerous times, I think this is one of the most important topics that we're applying energy into at the present time.

And I'll just add, one of the important factors on deploying capital is having a well-capitalized balance sheet. Our line of sight to our spend, not only over the next 12 months, but 24 months, allows us to make sure that we can deploy capital without slowing down that time line regardless of market conditions. We do not want to be forced in any downward market conditions to be raising expensive capital and negatively impacting our shareholders. So we'll be optimistic and opportunistic with our balance sheet to make sure we're capitalized to cover ourselves, that we do not slow down that time line in deploying capital to meet our manufacturing rates.

Our next question is from Lawson Winder with Bank of America.

Amir and Todd, thank you for today's update. I'd like to also say congratulations on the $900 million to support your HALEU build-out. In that vein, I'd like to just dig down on something that might be a really obvious question, but I'm just not totally clear on it. And that is, longer term, what is your sourcing strategy for the LEU feed for the HALEU? And maybe put another way, how much of your LEU production will be captive to your HALEU production? And how much of that 3.5 million SWU then will be available to satisfy LEU primary demand? And then further, if the LEU capacity isn't available to meet the HALEU feed, what are the options, particularly given that the Russian supply will be going away after 2028?

Good question. I'm going to answer your question very generally, and please let me know if there is more specific details that I can provide. From a general perspective, it is our intention, our plan, our goal, our strategy to maximize the capacity of the facility that we're building. As I said, we kicked off with a certain base case from which we're going to build progressively. And that would depend on customer commitments, which we are actively soliciting and getting great engagement as of the announcement of the $900 million. Those commitments would be able to drive our continued volume expansion of LEU and/or HALEU depending on the contract type. For our HALEU customers, just from general terms, it would be my intention to would want to optimize the SWUs that we provide, which means that I would try to have a contract that includes providing HALEU and providing the LEU and, obviously, to be able to enrich both. So I'm not really commenting on any specific contract or any specific discussion or negotiation that we have in play, but it is our intention to be able to provide both LEU enrichment and HALEU enrichment to the optimal and maximum capacity that we can. And to your second part of the question, if, for example, hypothetically speaking, if you have a HALEU contract for which you don't have sufficient LEU feed, I mean, that usually, contractually speaking, is not an issue. There is contracting mechanisms either by ourselves or the customers that are able to utilize other suppliers for that. Now I earlier said that I foresee that there's going to be tightness towards the end of the decade. So notwithstanding that comment, we have the ability -- or the customers have the ability to contract feed should that be needed. But to my overall theme, we're going to try to optimize and maximize both because economies of scale for the facility are important.

We have reached the end of our question-and-answer session. I would like to turn the conference back over to Neal for closing remarks.

Thank you, operator. This will conclude our investor call for the fourth quarter and full year 2025. As always, I want to thank our listeners online and our analysts who called in. We look forward to speaking with you again next quarter.

Thank you. This will conclude today's conference. You may disconnect at this time, and thank you for your participation.