Ladies and gentlemen, associated others, anybody who's unsure, can I please have my board? Welcome everybody. As everybody knows, I do not like reading speeches. I hate that. To make sure that everything matches and that everybody's got exactly the same information, I'm gonna do what I do every year. I'm very happy at the end of it to answer questions and have it a little bit more freewheeling. To make sure that everybody has exactly the same information, I'm going to go through the process that we've done for the last couple of years. It's great to see everybody here, by the by. It's now just after 2:00 PM., and I'd like to welcome everyone to the 7th annual general meeting of Duxton Water Limited. This year, we're doing things a little bit differently. We're going to live stream this AGM online. Quick warm welcome and hello to everyone who's dialed into this afternoon's meeting. For those of you who don't know me, my name is Ed Peter. I'm Chairman of Duxton Water Limited. For those who I've met before, which I'm sure many of you sitting around this room, I'm pleased to once again be presenting on behalf of the board of D2O. Just a quick piece of housekeeping, if you haven't already, could I please ask you to put your mobile phones on silent, as I will do right now, since last year, mine went off in the middle of the meeting, which was very embarrassing. Bang, bang. Boom. Okay, now to introduce the board. I've got Mr. Stephen Duerden here, immediately to my left, Dr. Vivienne Brand, sitting between the two gentlemen, and Mr. Mutton, who's gonna be live, but via video or via voice conference, 'cause he's not able to attend today 'cause he's gone through a surgery recently, and so is not here in person. Mr. Brendan Rinaldi, who was appointed in April, 2022, and I've, I'm sure you've all seen his CV in the, in our last announcement. We're very pleased to have him on the board, and it's been a great source of wisdom in the, to the financial markets as it is to everybody else here. Dirk Wiedmann, all the way from Switzerland, who should be on the screen, I believe, for anybody who can't see him, but up there and below, he's also online. Caitlin Adams, who is just over here. Hey, Dirk. Wave to everybody. He's actually a puppet. Don't tell anybody. I'm not supposed to say things like that. You can read more about each of our board members in the company's latest annual report or in the appendix section of this presentation, which has been released to the ASX this morning. Over to the Duxton Water team, who's responsible for running the day-to-day operations of our business. On the top row, we have our investment team. We've got Lachie and Lachie. Tall Lachie and short Lachie. That's up here. We used to call them old and young, but they're the same age, so we can't tell the difference. Then, beyond that, we've got Mercedes, one of our senior analysts, Henry, Harry and Caroline. Down below that, we've got our finance team, where we've got Michael, James, Marcus, Tanya, and finally, from our business development team, we have Sam Venning. Most of the Duxton people are sort of clustered in here, and we'll leave them in peace for the time being. A big thank you to the board and the management team for all their efforts over the last 12 months. You've all contributed immensely to the strong result for our shareholders in what has ended up being a truly challenging year for the global equity markets. I'd like to confirm that we have a quorum, and I'd like to introduce the agenda. I advise that in accordance with the company's constitution, a quorum is present. In accordance with the Corporations Act, I advise that the notice of annual general meeting was dispatched to all shareholders on the 14th of April, 2023. I declare the meeting properly constituted and open. I'll provide an overview of our performance in 2022. Lachie Beech will provide a portfolio update, and then Lachie Campbell will give us a outlook for financial year 2023. We'll look to cover off on the formal items of business and finish up with any shareholder questions. I'm gonna ask you to kindly hold your questions to the relevant section of the meeting. When you arrived at today's meeting, you should have been given either a blue, pink, or white attendee card. If you've not received this card, please go to the registration desk outside at the meeting room and get one. Only those holding a blue or pink attendee card are entitled to speak or ask questions at today's meeting. If you received a blue card, this will be used in voting in the polls, which will be opened at the end of the meeting. Where proxy vote has been given to the chairman without voting instructions, I intend to vote in favor of all resolutions. The Corporations Act and the company's constitution empowers the chair of the company to call for a poll on resolution to put to a general meeting. Today I call for a poll on each of the resolutions to be considered at this meeting. I refer you all to my chairman's report in the company's annual report for the year ended 31 December 2022, and provide the following overview. In summary, we had a great last 12 months in what was quite a challenging year for the stock market. For investors, our business generated a 12% return to shareholders in the 12 months, December 31, 2022, not 1922, that would have been a long time ago. This is comprised of a 6% gross dividend yield and 6% capital gain. During this year, we grew our portfolio by AUD 37 million through a combination of debt and capital growth. We increased our NAV by AUD 0.11 to AUD 1.90 per share, and our share price increased AUD 0.09 to AUD 1.62 as at 31st December 2022. We continue to structure our entitlement portfolio to align with climatic cycle. During this year, we added a further 3.6 gigaliters to our portfolio that now sits at 83.6 gigaliters. Finally, as at 31st December 2022, we had 54% of our portfolio locked into long-term leases. We'll provide more detail on our lease portfolio shortly, but what I will say is that we've had a great success in locking in new long-term leases to start 1st July 2023 with some of Australia's most prominent farming businesses. We look forward to working back to within our long-term lease target of having 70% to 80% of our portfolio locked in to longer-term leases. When we started our business in 2016, our aim was to partner with farmers, both large and small, to offer choice and flexibility when it came to their water. I'm proud to say that over the last six years, we have helped and supported hundreds of Australian farming businesses with their annual water requirements, and we will continue to do so for many years to come. In 2022, the Murray-Darling Basin experienced the most significant flooding event since 1956. We have continued to support our customers through this difficult year, and our thoughts go out to those who have been impacted by the most recent floods. While some expected water entitlement values to fall on the back of the recent conditions, the opposite has occurred. Water entitlements across the Southern Murray-Darling Basin experienced an average price increase of 7% in the 12 months to 31st December, 2022. While returns from allocation sales were lower this year, consistent leasing revenue and realized capital gain from rebalancing the permanent entitlement portfolio has enabled the company to continue to deliver balanced returns. We believe this continued growth in water entitlement prices to be largely reflective of the long-term demand and supply drivers that underpin Australia's water markets. That is, increased plantings of permanent horticulture and reducing supply of water available for agricultural use. Looking back over the last six years, we have experienced some extraordinary events, including extreme dry and wet conditions, a global pandemic, and Australia's steepest tightening of monetary policy in the last generation. In all of this, water entitlement values are trading at near all-time highs. Our portfolio generated an annualized return of 13% on a net asset value basis. This includes dividends paid, of course, since the company's inception in 2016. This is our best performance. While 2022 was a challenging year for global equity markets, we continued to perform well in the market. This is not only due to the defensive nature of our business and balance sheet, but also the fact there isn't a single asset class out there that is correlated to Australian water entitlements. During 2022, the company delivered on both its dividend targets, paying out fully franked dividends of AUD 0.065 per share during the year. This is up from AUD 0.061 fully franked in 2021. In total, company has paid out AUD 0.342 per share of dividends to shareholders since November 2017, with the last nine dividends being fully franked and each dividend being larger than the last. This consistent growth in dividends has resulted in shareholders benefiting from a 5% annual growth rate in dividends since inception. Since the end of 2022 financial year, in keeping with our previously stated dividend targets, the companies paid its 12th consecutive, an increasing dividend of AUD 0.034 per share, of course, fully franked on the 28th of April, 2023. While we have indicated the following on our current dividends guidance out to the end of 2024, after that period, we're gonna return to a 12-month dividend guidance better aligned with standard market practice. That said, we are pleased to reinforce our current dividend guidance for the next 18 months. Interim 2023, we're expecting to pay AUD 0.035 per share. Final 2023, AUD 0.036 per share. Interim 2023, AUD 0.037 per share. It's fully expected that all dividend targets will be fully franked. Financial results. We are pleased to report that in full year 2022, Duxton Water reported its highest ever net profit before tax of AUD 14 million. This was 15% higher when compared to last year's net profit before tax of AUD 12.2 million. The flow and effect of this was an increase in the company's earning per share, which is AUD 0.084 per share in 2022, 18% higher than the previous year. This growth in earnings was reflected as a full... A reflection of several factors: a strong leasing revenue stream, an ability to effectively trade permanent water entitlements, and a favorable interest rate swap valuations that reflected the company's successful management of its interest rate swap portfolio. We successfully delivered on both our dividend targets for the year. Dividends paid to shareholders in 2022, as I said earlier, totaled AUD 0.065 per share. Fully franked, this would've been a little bit over 6% as gross dividend yield. Another key factor for us last year has been to seek new leasing partnerships to further diversify our lease book. While demand for leases in the second half of 2022 was lower than usual due to the extremely wet conditions and the irrigators favoring the spot market, we have seen a significant increase in demand for leases as we've moved through the beginning of 2023. We are pleased to advise that over the last six months, we have successfully executed several new leases with new and existing counterparties. We believe these new leasing partnerships will provide significant upside for both our shareholders and our lessees all at the same time. We look forward to building our leased percentage back to 70%-80% of our book. The normalizing of weather conditions, the increasing demand for leases will be the big driving forces behind us as we move through this next year. Financial results. The company's net asset value from a fair value perspective at 31st of December, 2022 was AUD 1.90 a share. This is up AUD 0.12 from AUD 1.78 per share when compared to the previous year. The largest driver of NAV was the appreciation in the value of our water entitlement portfolio. Throughout 2022, we saw AUD 18 million of capital growth within the portfolio, driven both by high and general security entitlement values. Unfortunately, due to the way that Australian accounting standards work, we are still not able to recognize this uplift in our annual financial statements. Therefore, our statutory net asset value as of the 31st of December, 2022, is AUD 1.22 a share. This metric excludes our AUD 114 million of unrealized capital gains that are sitting within our portfolio. For this reason, the statutory NAV is not an indication of fair market value of the portfolio. We made the decision early in the current water year to sell down the majority of our unleased allocation into the spot market to support summer irrigation. We did this as we took the view that allocation pricing would be more favorable towards the beginning of the water year due to the wet outlook, which turned out to be very correct. Therefore, we only hold allocations to the value of about AUD 100,000 at the 31st of December, 2022. These surplus allocations have either been sold off already or will be carried into the next water year. Financial results. The board has continued to use sensible debt funding within Duxton Water's balance sheet. At the 31st of December, we had a total gearing of about 30% against our portfolio, an effective interest rate for the full year of 2022 of about 3.04%. Interest rates up until May 2022 were at all-time lows, at which point we had an all-in interest rate of 1.4%. This meant we were able to borrow well below lease rates and provide enhanced re-returns to shareholders in the form of higher EPS. Of course, NAV appreciated as water prices increased. While we've been very successful in using hedging instruments, fixed interest rate swaps to fix interest rates over the last four years, we decided to cash in our fixed rate swaps over the last six months. We took the view that the longer end of the yield curve would start to come back on us, which it has. By doing so, this not only crystallized the capital gain, but also protected us against any downward movements on our mark-to-market valuations that would've occurred had we not taken these swaps off. In effect, we decided to take our interest saving upfront in cash as opposed to over the duration of the swaps. While the company is happy to continue holding debt within its balance sheet, the board is aware that we are in a different interest rate environment now than we were compared to 12 months ago. We will continue to manage our gearing and hedging as we move through the economic and climatic cycles. I'm now gonna hand over to Lachie Beech, who will provide you with the portfolio update. Over to you, Lachie. This one's short Lachie, as opposed to tall Lachie. Thank you, Ed. Firstly, I'd like to thank everybody for coming today. Your interest in Spore is much appreciated. For those of you who haven't attended one of our AGMs before or met me, my name's Lachie Beech, and I've been with Duxton Water for the last four and a half years. Today, I'm gonna cover off on the portfolio performance, portfolio diversification, and provide you with an update on the lease portfolio. Following this, I'll hand over to my colleague, Lachie Campbell, who will provide an update on the business outlook for the business before handing back to Ed to close the informal part of today's meeting. Permanent entitlement pricing across the southern Murray-Darling Basin strengthened during the year. On average, increasing in value by 7%. The major contributor to this was general security entitlement values, which appreciated in value anywhere from 10%-50% across most zones. Permanent water pricing has continued to strengthen over the last 12 months, with the D2O portfolio increasing in value by AUD 37 million or 11% during FY2022. Approximately 50% of this value, or AUD 80 million, can be attributed to the capital gain, with the balance coming from the deployment of debt in early 2022. This is an exceptional result for the business, given that the southern Murray-Darling Basin experienced the wettest conditions of the last 60 years. This proves two things. One, pricing for the permanent water assets, which comprises of 99% of our asset base, is driven by longer-term demand and supply drivers, as opposed to shorter-term climatic influences. Two, our diversification strategy of owning a mixture of water entitlements that differ by class, type, and location has continued to work exceptionally well for the company and its shareholders. We will continue to seek well-priced trade opportunities and actively manage the portfolio within the climatic cycle. The Duxton Water portfolio has been assembled in a strategic and targeted manner. The composition allows for a dynamic approach when it comes to delivering on our lease obligations, as well as being able to maximize our return for the capital deployed. The mix of general and high-security assets means that the portfolio will continue to perform well in both wet and dry years, and enables us to support our irrigators right across the basin throughout all seasons. When deploying capital, we look at where future demand is likely to come from and what areas of the river system give us the most flexibility when offering our water supply products to the market. Since inception, Duxton Water has primarily focused in the southern Murray-Darling Basin region, and we believe there's still significant value within this region as the market remains somewhat fragmented. As industries shift and irrigators plan for succession, water parcels will continue to come to market. The company's consistently assessing investment opportunities outside of the southern Murray-Darling Basin. Expanding into these areas outside of the southern Murray-Darling Basin will further diversify the portfolio and continue to add value for existing and future shareholders. The lease portfolio. One of our key focuses for 2022 was to continue building out our relationships with irrigators and expand our lease book. Due to the extremely wet conditions, demand for leases in the second half of 2022 was lower than usual, as irrigators took advantage of favorable spot market prices. Due to the drier outlook expected from mid to late 2023, lease demand has significantly increased. At 31 December 2021, lease revenue was AUD 9.2 million, while at 31 December 2022, lease revenue was AUD 8.2 million. The company's lease percentage was 78% at 31 December 2021 and 54% at 31 December 2022. This is due to leases rolling off, and as mentioned, wet conditions making irrigators favor the spot market. We are pleased to announce that we have since locked in a number of new 5-10-year leases with new and existing counterparties. Long-term water lease contracts provide irrigators with secure water supply, excellent pricing visibility, and all the characteristics of owning the same water entitlements, but at a fraction of the cost of owning them outright. Moving forward, we will continue to engage with existing and new customers in order to lock in further long-term leasing arrangements, which will support both our weighted average lease expiring and our leasing revenue stream as varying leases roll off annually. On the back of the drier outlook and increased demand for long-term leases, we will work back towards our long-term goal of having 70%-80% of our portfolio leased to Australian farming businesses. I'll now hand over to Lachie Campbell. Thank you. Thank you, Lachie. Thank you everybody for your attendance this afternoon. My name is Lachlan Campbell, and it is a pleasure to once again be presenting at our annual general meeting. Since we spoke last year, a lot has changed. We've seen more extreme flooding events, more rainfall, higher interest rates, and declining equity markets, and in all of this, as Ed said, we generated a 12% return back to shareholders in the 12 months to December 31, 2022. I maintain that we are well-placed to continue to meet our investment objectives and deliver stable returns to our shareholders over the course of the climatic cycle. The extreme wet conditions seen over the last two to three years are reflective of a rare alignment of climatic drivers that has only been seen twice in recorded history, causing devastating flooding effects on both occasions, with 2022 being one of those years. Fortunately, a couple of months ago, the Bureau of Meteorology announced that the current La Niña and extreme wet conditions were likely to come to an end by mid 2023, a much-needed reprieve for Australian irrigators. That being said, the weather outlook continues to be forecast drier than average conditions for the coming months, with the Bureau of Meteorology maintaining their forecast of at least a 50% chance of El Niño occurring and a high likelihood of a positive IOD or Indian Ocean Dipole event forming later this year. Last Thursday, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, or NOAA, the U.S.A.'s equivalent to the BOM, updated their forecast to include a greater than 90% chance of El Niño forming over the coming months. The prospect of a drier outlook has caused a significant increase in demand for leases as irrigators prepare for the next part of the climatic cycle. We continue to talk to irrigators of all sizes about the importance of having a tight and strong water security in place ahead of the upcoming anticipated change in climatic conditions. Since 2008, the Australian government has bought back about 30% of water licenses on issue. Now, while these licenses still exist, they're currently in use for environmental projects where they are expected to remain into perpetuity. While the Australian government hasn't been active in water buybacks since 2011, this all changed when the Labor came to power with the support of the Greens in 2022. Since taking office, Labor has declared their intention to make good on the water recovery targets as outlined in the Murray-Darling Basin Plan. In order to do so, they would need to recover approximately 500 gigaliters out of the consumptive pool and allocate these licenses to environmental uses by June 30, 2024. In April 2023 last month, the Labor recommenced voluntary water buybacks for 49 gigaliters across 6 catchments. The objective of this buyback is to fulfill the primary water recovery target of the Murray-Darling Basin Plan. The buyback is open and closes tomorrow. For those of you who are unfamiliar with the concept of water buybacks, they are a mechanism by which the government voluntarily purchases water licenses from willing sellers and transfers them to the Commonwealth Environmental Water Holder. By doing so, these licenses are taken out of the consumptive pool of water available for agricultural use. Secondly, finally, there is a secondary water recovery target outlined in the Murray-Darling Basin Plan, which relates to the 450 GL of enhanced environmental outcomes. As per the current legislation, this target needs to be achieved through infrastructure upgrades. This is where the government comes out to a property, upgrades all their water infrastructure, and in return, the owner of that farm surrenders these water licenses back to the government, as the theory is that they now have a farm that uses less water. The Labor government continues to talk about changing the current legislation to allow this 450 GL to be recovered through water buybacks, and we are expecting a decision on this to be made around the middle of this year. To summarize, we maintain that water is well-positioned to outperform traditional asset classes. It is a defensive asset that offers low correlation and a fantastic inflation hedge and a reliable dividend. Our focus for the years ahead will be to continue to provide our shareholders with a biannual dividend, franked to the greatest extent possible. We will continue to build long-term strategic partnerships with Australian farming businesses. We will continue to seek opportunities to scale and grow our business that will ultimately lead to stronger market liquidity and greater flexibility within our portfolio. We will continue to monitor investment opportunities outside of the Murray-Darling Basin to add further diversification to our portfolio. This will allow us to access new markets, new customers, and ultimately help more Australian farming businesses to unlock their balance sheets and invest into their land and production assets. Finally, we remain confident in our strategy to continue delivering balanced returns to shareholders across all parts of the climatic cycle. I'll now hand back to Ed to close out the informal part of today's meeting. Thank you. Sorry. Gotta bring that way down. It's hard being short. Thank you, Lachie one and Lachie two. I'd like, take this opportunity to say thank you to both of you guys. Well done. Thank you, team, as a whole. This year has not been without its challenges. I'm proud, very proud to say we've navigated our way through with a great result being delivered to all shareholders, including myself as a reasonably large shareholder. As a board, we have great confidence in the outlook of our business. We have a weather forecast that suggests that more normal conditions are not too far away, we hope that brings much-needed relief to Australian farming, to the Australian farming community. We have a clear strategy in place to ensure we can continue to meet our business objectives and deliver value for both our customers and for our shareholders. As a management team, we'll continue to do our best to deliver the most prudent, consistent results we can. We look forward to continuing our strong momentum into 2023, and hopefully well beyond. I table the notice of meeting, which was made available to all shareholders on the 14th of April, 2023. If there's no objection, I propose that the notice of meeting be taken as read. Any objections? Okay. I advise that no notice of any other items for today's agenda has been received. Therefore, I declare that only matters for our meeting today that can be dealt with are those set out in the notice of meeting. We will open a poll after all items of the notice have been introduced and discussed. I will then ask all shareholders holding a blue card to vote on their attendee cards, which will be collected once the poll closes. I'll conduct the meeting by referring to the PowerPoint presentation behind me. Should any member have a question with regard to any of the motions being considered, there'll be an opportunity to ask prior to voting. I now refer to those matters set out in the notice of meeting. I also note that I'm going to read out one in full from my script. We'll then move through the others in short form. Financial reports. The full first item of business today is to receive and consider the financial report, director's report, and independent or auditor's report for the financial period ended 31st December, 2022. I wish to advise that a copy of the company's annual report for the period ended 31st December, 2022, was lodged with ASX on the 28th of February, 2023, and sent to those shareholders who requested a hard copy. A copy of the company's financial year 2022 annual report is also available for download from the company's website. Please note that Mr. Darren Ball from KPMG, the company's auditor, is also present today if you have any questions for him. Darren, you're way back there. We're not required to formally adopt these reports. However, I invite any discussion or questions in relation to the company's annual financial statements. Does anybody have any questions? Darren, it looks like you might be being let... Yep, please. Is there a mic? There's a mic. Good afternoon. I'm Bob Ritchie, appointed to represent the Australian Shareholders' Association. To make an apology to start with, you have always been available to us to meet ahead of AGMs, and this year, due to our own circumstances, we were unable to take up that opportunity. Some of the questions are ones that would have been asked well before the meeting. The first is simple: Do you expect to pay fully franked dividends after financial year 2 024? at this point in time, for everything we see, yes. Thank you. Your descriptions of both the performance and the management fee arrangements are very clear in the annual report. The formulas are clear, but they lack a little bit of clear information. For example, the best one would be the, I think you call it the high point. High-water mark? The high-water- Yes. The high-water mark. If those sort of information can be just slipped into the report in future, that would make it easy for those retail shareholders who like to do their own analysis and check things out. Understood and clear, and I think that shouldn't be that difficult. Thank you. The last question concerns, perhaps you might wanna refer it to the auditor, perhaps not. On page 73, there's the audit management report, which very clearly and well deals with, what do you call it? The, in part, the independent valuer's reports. My reading of it is, I'm open to be corrected, my reading of it is that the work by the independent valuer has been assessed by the auditor to make sure that any impairment that might be due was in fact implemented. That seems to be covered. I don't get the impression that the auditor was also checking that the calculation of the performance fee based on that independent report was, let's say, verified, checked. Verified's the wrong word with audit, of course. They never claim to verify, but checked out by the auditor. If you could give us a bit of an indication about that, it would be very nice. Thank you. Darren, can I pass that one to you? The two parts to the question was around the valuation from an impairment point of view. As we've articulated, within audit reports, we include what we consider the key audit matter, which is what we think is the most significant part of the financial statements, and we outline the procedures that we do with respect to that. In summary, what we do is have our own internal specialists form their own view as to what the valuation is to compare it against what the expert that the business uses. The other part of your question was with regard to the performance fee. As that number forms part of the profit and loss within the business, we do audit procedures around that, including its compliance with the formula within the agreement. We do audit that number. That was also, we can refer to the opinion we provide over the remuneration report in the director's report of the financial statements. Sorry, my voice is just going a little bit. Hopefully that answers your question. Thank you. That's very clear and answered the question well. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for the question. Is there any further questions? Okay, if there's no further discussion on the first item of business, I'll now move on to the next item. Thank you very much, Darren. I can tell you from, having seen Darren and his team, work, they are very, very, very thorough. Definitely we enjoy having them around the office. They, I think they co-count the dust under the desks as well, but we're not gonna go there. Remuneration report. I inform the meeting that the explanatory notes, accompanying notes for meeting and the company's financial statements provides the background and details of the remuneration report. I now move the motion to consider and if thought fit to pass with or without amendment, the resolution as shown on the screen as an ordinary resolution. Please note, the key management personnel of the company, including directors and their closely related parties, are excluded from voting on this resolution as set out in the notes of the meeting. Also in accordance with Section 250R(3) of the Corporations Act, this resolution is advisory only and does not bind the board of directors of the company. The slide behind me shows the details of votes received by proxy. The directors unanimously recommend that the shareholders vote in favor of adopting the remuneration report. I now invite discussion of the motion. Voting on this resolution will be held over until the conclusion of the final item of business to allow the poll to be conducted. Election of a director. That's me. I'm actually gonna pass this one over to Stephen or Viv. Viv, you got it. Thanks, Ed. Good afternoon, everyone, a warm welcome to those listening online as well. My name is Vivienne Brand, I joined the board of Duxton Water in November 2020. I'd like to take a couple of seconds here just to talk about that involvement. When Ed asked me to consider putting myself forward as a member of the board, I was immediately happy to do so. I have a long-standing passion for sustainable use of water and a lifelong connection with the irrigation community dating back to my childhood, making this a really interesting company for me to be part of. Reflecting on my time on the board to date, the standout element to me is the quality of the people behind this business. They demonstrate a high level of intellectual rigor, enthusiasm, and a highly professional approach to doing good business. This is what I believe will hold Duxton Water in good stead going forward, and it's what will contribute greatly to our continued success. Back to the main formal proceedings. Item three, election of Mr. Edouard Peter. More background can be found in the explanatory notes. I now move the motion to consider and if thought fit to pass with or without amendment, the resolution as an ordinary resolution. That Edouard Peter, having retired as director in accordance with clause 17.3 of the Constitution and for all other purposes, be reelected as a director of the company. The slide behind me shows the details of votes received by proxy. Each of the directors, other than Ed, who abstains, recommend shareholders vote in favor of the resolution. I now invite discussion of that motion. Thank you. Thank you. I'll preface the question by saying, this question has absolutely no disrespect for the candidate. He's got excellent qualities. However, in the description in the annual report, his other directorships, the one other directorship is down for an ASX company, and it's one of the Duxton companies, Duxton Farms. My question is, can that list of other directorships be elucidated by dealing with by identifying some of the non-ASX listed companies, which is the usual practice in other companies? I understand that there are some. I've seen one on a website. Thank you. A local investment fund, I think it is. A local fund manager where Ed's a director. Thank you for the question. Ed, would you like to comment? Absolutely. Absolutely. I sit on the boards of other direct Duxton entities as well as Duxton Capital. The other companies that Duxton manages or is involved with, both listed and unlisted, I have tended to have seats on. That said, over the last year, I've started giving up chairmanships and sharing that around. All of the business I sit in directorships of are either Duxton entities or private entities that I've got with myself and my family. I'm happy to address any specific company that you'd like to ask about, it's in line with our Duxton portfolio. Does that answer? Understood. Thank you very much for your question. Are there any other points of discussion? If not, voting on this resolution will be held over until the conclusion of the final item of business to allow the poll to be conducted. I'll now invite Ed back to the stand to carry on with the formal proceedings. Thank you, Ed. Thanks, Viv. Much appreciated. I love all my board members and think highly of them all. I cannot tell you how nice it is to have Vivienne's great intellect from a farming community on the river as part of our team. Okay. I'd like to go to item number four, the election of Dirk Wiedmann. I now move for the re-election of Mr. Dirk Wiedmann. His background again can be found in the explanatory notes. I move the motion to consider, and if thought fit pass, with or without amendment, the resolution as shown on the screen is an ordinary resolution. Please see the screen for details of the votes received by proxy. Each of the directors, other than Dirk, who abstains, recommends shareholders vote in favor of the resolution. I now invite discussion on the motion. Voting on this resolution will be held over to the conclusion of the next item of business to allow a poll to be conducted. Item five, the approval of 10% placement capacity. I now move to item five, approval of 10% placement capacity be forwarded. Again, the background can be found in the explanatory notes. As approval of a 10% placement capacity facility, I can speak English, I swear, is a special resolution. I note that in order to pass, it requires the approval of 75% of the votes cast by shareholders on this resolution. I now move the motion to consider, and if thought fit to pass, with or without amendment, the resolution as shown on the screen is a special resolution. The screen is showing those votes received by proxy. The directors believe that this resolution is in the best interest of the company and unanimously recommend to shareholders that we vote in favor. In particular, the ability of the company to issue new shares under the 10% placement capacity will enable the company to issue shares in circumstances where it might otherwise be submitted to cost, delay, and uncertainty of having to go back to the shareholders for approval. The additional flexibility and speed to conduct capital raising will better position the company to pursue its interests in prevailing market conditions. I should quickly mention here that should this resolution be passed, it doesn't necessarily mean the company will raise capital in line with the resolution. I now invite discussion on the motion. Voting on this resolution will be held over until the conclusion of the final item of business to allow the poll to be conducted. Item 6, the renewal of proportional takeover provisions. I now move to item 6, the renewal of proportional takeover provisions. Again, more background can be found in the explanatory notes. As the approval of the renewal of proportional takeover provisions in the constitution is a special resolution, I note that in order to pass it, requires approval of 75% of the votes ast by shareholders on this resolution. I now move the motion to consider, and if thought fit to pass, with or without amendment, the resolution as shown on the screen is a special resolution. The screen is showing those votes received by proxy. A proportional takeover bid is a takeover bid in which the offer to each shareholder is only for a proportion of that shareholder's shares. The company's constitution includes provisions that enable the company to refuse to register shares acquired under proportional takeover unless a resolution is passed by shareholders approving the offer. Under the Corporations Act, these provisions expire unless renewed by a special resolution of shareholders. Accordingly, the directors consider that the shareholders should have the opportunity to vote on a renewal of the provisions in the constitution. The explanatory statement outlines the potential advantages and disadvantages of the renewal of takeover provisions. On the balance, the directors consider that the possible advantages outweigh the possible disadvantages. That such a renewal of the proportional takeover provisions are in the best interests of shareholders. The directors therefore unanimously recommend that shareholders vote in favor of the resolution. I now invite discussion. Voting on this resolution will take place in the next couple of minutes. Opening of the poll. We will now vote on all resolutions included in the notice of meeting. I appoint Computershare representatives, Gemma Corselia, to be the Returning Officer and to conduct the poll. Gemma has the power to co-opt as her agents, members of her staff of the company. I'm gonna pass over to you, Gemma. Thank you, Ed. Firstly, if there is any person present who believes they are entitled to vote but has not registered to vote, would you please raise your hand for assistance? The persons entitled to vote on this poll are all shareholders, representatives, and attorneys of shareholders and proxy holders who hold blue admission cards. On the reverse of your blue admission card is your voting paper and instructions. I will now go through the procedures for filling in the voting papers. Proxy holders have attached to their admission card a summary of proxy votes, which details the voting instructions for business items on the appointment documents in your favor. By completing the voting paper when instructed to vote in a particular manner, you are deemed to have voted in accordance with those instructions. In respect of any open votes a proxy holder may be entitled to cast, you need to mark a box beside the resolution to indicate how you wish to cast your open votes. Proxy holders should refer to the summary of proxy votes form attached to your voting paper for further information. Shareholders also need to mark a box beside the resolution to indicate how you wish to cast your votes. Please ensure you print your name where indicated and sign the voting paper. When you have finished filling in your voting paper, please lodge it in a ballot box which will be circulated to ensure your votes are counted. If you require any assistance, please raise your hand. Would you please indicate by raising your hand if you require more time to complete and lodge your voting paper? The boxes are coming through now. Okay. Please indicate if you need more time to vote. Okay, back to you, Ed. Okay. Thank you very much. Have we got all votes cast? If everything has been cast, we'll now let the Computershare folks tally up the votes. I'm over the part of this that I actually enjoy, where I don't have to follow a script, which is question time. Please feel free. I can speak English, I swear. Please feel free to ask any questions you have. I'd be very happy to try and answer them to the best of my ability. Questions guys, ladies, gentlemen, associate, others. Please. I think I got this right. El Niño is the dry area, isn't it? It's the dry... What I read on the Internet, they're expecting quite a dry time coming in Australia in the next year. Well, that's the expectation. Now, whether it happens or not, that's the expectation. I would think that the people would be acting on that and buying up water just as a security. What do you call it, insurance against the problem. My real question is how do you allocate the water in a dry season? Is it a percentage like I'm a farmer and I want X number of liters, and you can't supply it because everybody else wants it? How do you go about... Do you just give me a% of what I want or what your allocation is? We tend to do it on a first come, first serve basis, and it's more through the leasing book than anything else. At the moment, we've got about 54% of our assets leased and a whole bunch of inquiries. What we'll do is we'll say that we've got a gig of zone 7 or zone 11 or what have you, that we've got available, and we'd like this price for that water for three years or five years or seven years or 10 years. Basically, we'll negotiate a contract. We do it first come, first serve. We always keep a little bit aside just so we've got some flexibility. Typically, our guidance is we'd like to have 70%-80% of our assets, up from 54% right now, which are leased with visibility. During this wet cycle, we've shortened our book, if you want, and also brought it down. As we go into this next cycle, you'll see that book stretched back out again. We don't sit back and wait. We will be fairly active as we go into this next six months about setting those leases, as a shareholder, gives you great visibility on your income and our ability then to turn around to you and say, "You can be pretty sure you're gonna get these dividends." The reason why the board's very, very happy to give you a lot of forward looking statements around dividends. Our business is, tends to be very boring, 'cause most of the time it's a set and forget. With only about... If we get to where we would like to be, there's only about 20% of our assets, which would be shorter term negotiations. Does that make sense? Thank you. Thanks, Ed, for today. My name is Freddy Brincat, I'm a shareholder. My question is around the past, when my memory suggests that there was some pressure from the government around the commercialization of water contracts, and I think there was a little bit of press regarding Duxton. Could you give us an update 'Cause I haven't read anything about that in the last period. Just where that sits at the moment, and also if there's been any push from government in an attempt to buy back Duxton Water contracts at all? To be fair, there was never any pressure from the government with Duxton Water. We had a specific large irrigator who made some accusations, and that's where those newspaper articles came from. It was basically the same person saying the same thing that led to six articles that said exactly the same thing each time. It was at a point in time where we were in a dry, and it was easy for the person to say, "Oh, these guys are bad." But our business has not changed. There was actually a little bit of outrage from the farming community 'cause we're their source of water. We do the right thing, so we're actually think of it as the water bank for the farmers, and we give them long-term security. Some of the things that were being said were a little bit outrageous. We were apparently building dams and holding water in dams. I'm not sure where those dams are. I'd love to know. There was some pretty bizarre statements made. To be very clear, every single drop of water that we have gets used by farmers. We don't hide it or hoard it or have an underground cellar someplace where we pump it. The accusations that were made were found to be not only a bit ludicrous, but, you know, totally unfounded. When the ACCC came and looked at the industry as a whole, we were actually ourselves and our four competitors were not listed. Since we were listed, we got a little bit more attention than the other three. The four of us all got a big tick in the box saying, "These four companies are doing great good for Australia's farmers." It was a case of... It was a bit silly in the end, if anybody ever finds a reservoir that apparently we have, I'd love to know about it. It would probably have to be pretty big, so I suspect you'd be able to see it from the air to have done what we were accused of doing. But there's no reservoir. We don't have any hidden wells or anything like that. The government was never anti-us. The second part of the question regarding the government ever approaching Duxton to buy back the contracts that we have. The government has never, ever approached us in any way whatsoever to buy back water. The buybacks are open to everybody. We could sell water into them. That's not something that we're at this point in time involved with. The flip side of that is that we would be treated just like anybody else. We don't have any special abilities or roles or hotlines to sell water. It'd be cool to have a bat line on water, but we don't. We're just like everybody else. Malcolm Snell. I'm a shareholder of Duxton, have been from the inception. Thank you. Managed funds, when do you think they'll be able to or will be enticed to buying Duxton shares and putting them in these managed funds? As we grow in size, and we get more liquidity, it makes it easier for institutional investors to invest in us. At the moment, we've got a very large base of retail shareholders. Thank all of you for being shareholders. You're all very much appreciated. We've seen the first smaller institutions in our shareholding over the last 2-3 years. What's very interesting is that this last 6 months, we've had a plethora of interest from larger institutions in doing something with us. I wouldn't be surprised if you don't start seeing... because we're regular, we're boring, we are not, as I said last year, a tech company that has that volatility. We're actually becoming something that is much more favored and much more comfortable in this part of the cycle. I wouldn't be surprised to see people entering and building positions in Duxton Water over this next 12 months, indeed, perhaps over the last six months, as it goes. The market to get into the ASX 300 is about AUD 650 million-AUD 700 million market cap. We're about a third of that. The board has discussed steps to getting us to that level, let's see what happens. I'm just interested in your comments on the fact that, interest rates and our long-term leases, the fact that we've been in a low interest rate environment, and if you like, the gap between the two has been reasonable. We're going forward in an environment with higher interest rates versus locked in long-term leases and how that relationship plays out. Thank you for the question. We've shortened both the WAIL, i.e. the average duration of our lease book, and also the size of the lease book has come down to 54% from almost 80%. As we move into this next part of the cycle, I will give you guidance that we would expect to extend that, but that would take into account the current cost of capital and the current interest rates. We certainly wouldn't be locking in leases less than our cost of capital. We're very aware of that. We're very aware of where we sit in the cycle. If we wanna continue to grow your dividends, which I think the board is very committed to doing, that is gonna be one of the key considerations. We're very comfortable with our positioning and our ability to pass through those interest rate increases and indeed think that we are a perfect inflation proxy. If you take a look at the discounted. All equities have to compete with bonds in terms of an investor's decision. If you get a 5% from your bank on your bank deposit versus 7% on a bond, your implied equity yield has to be 9%. That's sort of the rule of thumb in terms of percentages. From our side, we are very conscious of that, and we're conscious of where we play in that playground. As we do our leases and we are looking at our cost of capital, we clearly have to clear that. Our house view is that we're near the top of the near term interest rate cycle. Let me be very, very, very clear. We think that the long rate will start coming... We might have one more tick on the short end, but we believe the long end is beginning to come down. We think that the very abrupt increase in rates, both internationally and domestically, will have a pretty brutal impact on the economy and that we will see things slow down. That slowdown, we think, won't necessarily see in that 1 year to 3 year space, but you'll see it in the 5 to 10. We're watching that very carefully and, are very aware of that space. I wouldn't be surprised to see that come down further. For those of you who've heard me over the last 5, 6, 7 years since 2016, you might think I'm a permanent bear. I can tell you that I will throw everybody a curve ball. I've made my first bullish statement about long-dated bonds probably since 2016, and I've been starting to look at 30-year treasuries, U.S. treasuries, as an example, because I do think that long end of the curve does have some downside. You can't have had the quickest and most brutal increase in interest rates in U.S. history, European history, and Australian history and not have a secondary consequence, especially on the long end of the curve. For equities as a market, remembering what I said last year about things in the market that would do well versus things that would not do well, which I think I got pretty much nailed. I think we're gonna see a similar type story continuing to unfold. If we were to take a look at current global markets, the total market capital of the planet is around AUD 109 trillion- AUD 110 trillion. That's all stock markets added together. The implied value, if we take a look at current interest rates of the market, is probably around AUD 74 trillion. If we go back in economic history and look at similar circumstances, in that period, what we're tempted to see is the market, broad market comes down, never goes to fair, tends to over-exaggerate in the down. In there's always pockets that do well. Over the last couple of cycles, the things that do well are things like us in agriculture, metals and mining, like I said last year, and energy. I think all those three areas have continued to perform. I think we're at the very beginning of a super cycle in commodities. I think you got another 7-10 years is my personal view. I think that those three spaces will continue to do very well. I'll leave you guys up to picking your own stocks, but for us, I'm convinced when I look at the short term, midterm, and long term, that our particular company will continue to do very well for you and hold or gain value plus pay y while you're waiting. We're very conscious of our cost of capital and not under selling it, if that makes sense. Was that a good answer? Was I clear? I didn't lose you? Hopefully, I made sense there. Good afternoon. My name is Peter Kernow. I'm a retail investor. My question is about the growth prospects of the company. both Lachies alluded to the possibility of investments further afield than the Murray-Darling Basin. Wondering if you could expand on your view about where there might be growth opportunities for the company in the future? If so, how would you look at funding that? Thank you. Peter, thank you very much for the question. Thank you for being a shareholder as well. Across Australia, we've got all sorts of different, and okay, this is pun intended, pools of water. We've got everything from groundwater to other river systems. The Murray-Darling Basin is the most developed of the systems, and certainly, again, pun intended, the most liquid of those pools of water. We have done some little things in areas, either in groundwater, but in groundwater where it's fairly easily tradable and fairly easily movable, but that's small. You're not gonna see us putting 20% of our book into groundwater or a different river system. You will probably see us doing 0.5% here, 1% there, maybe a rocking 2% in something we think is truly undervalued as a different water system. When we talk about opportunities, that's one space you'll see us occupying is different water systems and or a little bit of groundwater here and there. In terms of funding it, if you do your rough math, we tend to pay our dividend out of our cash flow. We tend to look at doing 60%-ish of our cash flow into dividends, see a bit more or a bit less, and I would expect to see us self-fund things as we go forward. We will always, if we trade at a discount, try and keep a finger in the market, in our own shares, but that's another way of returning money to shareholders. Dividends, small amount of share buybacks, and then taking the rest of our free cash and reinvesting in new water. That's where you should see us playing. If you look at the core portfolio, in any one year, you might see us much less than a typical equity manager, but see us turning about 8%-12% of that portfolio. Typically, an equity manager might turn their portfolio 100%, or a very inactive equity manager will be 30. For us, 8%-12%. When something gets very, very expensive in our belief, we might clip it and then try and find something we think is mispriced on the cheap side. That also creates a little bit of cash as we go forward. So that's boring. Stable right now is sort of the way I think about harvesting our free cash, reinvesting, and compounding. I think Einstein called compounding the most important law of physics. I subscribe to that as well. Again, I wish I'd come up. We've got this, you know, new widget that does something and we don't. We're just gonna be boring and just trying to make you money. My name's Colin Pilcher, I'm also a shareholder. I just wanted to make a statement. It's a personal statement, and I... What has impressed me about this company, I think you know what you're doing, and also you take consideration of your clients, your the people you're selling water to, which I think you treat them with respect, and I think long term, that is a good policy and a good way to go. The other thing that I like about your company is your dividends, they are quite healthy at the moment, and they are very dependable, and I like that. I like the dividends coming in consistently, and I think you do a good job with that. You must be running the company well, unless you're borrowing a lot of money to do it. The other question I was going to ask and it slips my memory at the moment, but I'll let it go, and I'll see if I can remember what I was going to say. I think up till now, well done. Thank you very much. Thank you. I thank you on behalf of the board. I think it would be fair. We are, I'll speak for the board, unless anybody from the board would like to say something about the dividends, dividend policy that, you know, we are. We think it's an important part of what we deliver. It is, I think near and dear to all of our hearts to make sure that continues and that the boring, plodding, increasing dividend is a cornerstone of what we're trying to deliver. Viv or Steve or Brendan, do you wanna say something? I think We're all investors in the company, so I like boring, plodding dividends. I think we're all on the same page. The other question that just comes to mind, in my mind, the dividend buybacks, are they having the desired effect or. The share buybacks, for us, it's a case of, we believe that we believe our portfolio is a very good portfolio, and if we trade at a discount, it's the cheapest water in Australia. By having a finger in the market, especially when we trade at a discount, makes sense to us. Not aggressively. We certainly don't want to put any pressure in any direction on the shareholder, on the share price. For us, it's sort of a, let's just buy a little bit 'cause it's cheaper than we could buy if we were buying in the market. Thank you. Any other questions? Peter, you're looking a little bit... Anybody else? On behalf of my colleagues, I'd like to say a huge thank you. Do any of my 3 board members up front or Dirk online wanna say something? All of you. Lovely to see a room full of people here. It's great. Also to answer questions that was raised. All right. Thank you very much for your interest. The results of the poll we'll release to the ASX a little bit later on today. I'd like to thank all of you for coming, all of you who are shareholders for believing. Hopefully, the next.