The increase — which saw volumes climb to 1,313 tons — was underpinned by stronger investment flows from the West, including more high-net-worth individuals, that helped offset waning appetite from Asia, the industry-funded group said in a report on Wednesday. Buying in bullion-backed exchange-traded funds flipped to gains in the quarter after prolonged outflows.

Gold has stormed higher this year, rallying by more than a third and setting successive records. The jump has been driven by robust central-bank buying and increased demand from wealthy investors, with recent gains aided by the Federal Reserve’s shift to cutting interest rates. Purchases in the opaque over-the-counter market were becoming an increasingly important force for prices, according to John Reade, the council’s chief market strategist.

“Demand has switched through the course of this year from predominantly emerging-market OTC buying — high-net-worth individuals — toward very much more Western OTC buying,” Reade said. OTC transactions are done through dealers or between buyers and sellers directly, without an exchange.

Gold — which set an intraday record just above $2,800 an ounce in Wednesday’s trading — has registered gains every month this year, apart from a minor pullback in January, and in June, when prices were flat. “The fact that corrections have been very shallow and short is a keen indication of FOMO buying,” Reade said in an interview, referring to investors’ so-called fear of missing out.

As the rate-cutting cycle gets underway, the WGC expects to see increased allocation to bullion, with geopolitical uncertainty — particularly surrounding next week’s tight US presidential election — adding to reasons why investors are seeking to hold the haven asset.

Investment flows were key to the metal’s 13% gain in the third quarter, with total demand for ETFs, bars and coins reaching the strongest levels since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022. Central-bank purchases continued — with Poland, Hungary and India among the top buyers — even as the pace of official activity slowed. Jewelry demand fell as record prices hurt consumption.

Looking ahead, fiscal concerns — especially about swelling levels of government debt in the US — may become more pronounced as a driver, according to Reade.

There are concerns, including from the International Monetary Fund, “saying the deficit’s too big and really needs to be sorted out,” Reade said. “That’s the primary attraction from the OTC community to increase their gold holdings.”

Total ore reserves at the are estimated at 4.8 million tonnes grading 53.8 grams per tonne of silver, containing 8.4 million oz. of the precious metal. This is part of a total estimated resource that comprises 38.3 million tonnes at 41.3 g/t for 51 million oz.

Wonawinta was previously developed as a shallow silver oxide project with four approved mine pits. Manuka took over the project in 2016 and, following a review period, began implementing a restart plan. The project currently has all mining approvals current and intact, and a process plant fully constructed.

The reserve estimate, says Manuka, gives the company a clear production pathway and the potential for revenues from gold and now silver following the restart of the Mt Boppy gold project located 150 km away from Wonawinta.

Manuka’s team has been infill drilling the current oxide resources on the Wonawinta mining lease while also testing the deeper mineralized sulphide ores (silver, lead and zinc). This was occurring whilst toll processing of the Mt Boppy gold ore is carried out at the Wonawinta plant.

Mt Boppy is the site of a historical mine that operated between 1901-1923, and at one time was one of the largest gold producers in Australia.

According to Dennis Karp, Manuka’s executive chairman, the process plant at Wonawinta has been kept in good working condition and has been on active care and maintenance since the processing of the gold bearing stockpiles hauled from Mt Boppy ceased in February 2024.

“It therefore stands ready to come back online at short notice,” he said, adding that the prospect of restarting Wonawinta following gold production from Mt Boppy provides “an excellent optionality on silver and the potential to take advantage of the very buoyant precious metals prices.”

Manuka is now reviewing its economic model for the Wonawinta mine development, which will include re-entering the two existing pits (Boundary and Manuka) plus the development of two new pits (Belah and Bimble). The company expects to announce the outcomes from this analysis during the current quarter.

Based on the current silver forward curve and an all-in sustaining cost of A$40.51/oz., the mine plan would deliver net operating cash flows of approximately A$100 million based on the ore reserve alone, Manuka estimates.

The financing from the federal agency could be for a 15-year term, the Vancouver-based company said on Monday. No interest rate was given. It follows a $22.8 million streaming loan in two tranches this year from Phoenix-based Monetary Metals & Co. and a $67 million funding deal with Sprott Private Resource Streaming and Royalty in May 2023.

The project is fully funded to start concentrate production by March or April using stockpiles, then ramp up mill throughput to 1,800 tonnes a day in about six months, Bunker Hill executive chairman Richard Williams told The Northern Miner by phone on Tuesday.

The new potential loan could help the mine expand to 2,500 tonnes a day. Depending on engineering studies due next year, the work may include a new 10,000-foot ramp, moving the crusher and installing underground conveyors, Williams said.

“We put a really great team on the ground in Idaho and the American government has paid attention,” he said. “Five years ago this site was rotting in a Superfund (cleanup program), didn’t have a processing facility and had no hope.”

Consolidation?

The expansion may encourage local M&A because it will dwarf nearby output by Hecla Mining (NYSE: HL) and Americas Gold and Silver (TSX: USA; NYSE USAS), Williams said.

“Why aren’t we doing all this together?” he said. “It’s not an accident we’re taking all these steps.”

Bunker Hill received a letter of intent from the bank which is to conduct due diligence on the project. The developer says it will submit a formal loan application to the bank by year’s end.

The first stage of the restart, due to begin by June, carries a $54.8 million capital cost, according to a 2022 prefeasibility study. However, the company said this year it’s choosing a more expensive pressure filtration system for tailings, over the disk filter system in the study, for better environmental management and easier expansion.

Bunker Hill plans an updated resource in next year’s first quarter followed by more drilling as the company preps the initial 1,800-tonne-per-day operation. Expansion plan details are to be published next year and the project might eventually tap the $150 million loan in late 2025 or 2026, Williams said.

Deeper veins

The expansion would increase mining and processing of the Quill-Newgard ore zones, the company said. It would later access the deeper, higher-grade silver-bearing galena veins that were extracted from the mine’s lower levels when Gulf Resources closed it in 1981, Bunker said.

Higher costs for environmental compliance and declining metal prices forced the shutdown, it said. Little production occurred under a new owner from 1988 to 1991, which also faced low metal prices.

“This the first positive statement of investment by the US government into Silver Valley mining since the mine shut,” Williams said. “That’s huge for Hecla, that’s huge for Americas Gold and Silver. That’s huge for us.”

It’s also good for New York-based Electrum Group, a finance company that owns a majority of the nearby Sunshine mine that’s been on care and maintenance for several years, Williams noted. From 1904 to 2001 the mine produced 364 million oz. silver as one the country’s largest silver operations.

Shares in Bunker Hill traded at C$0.16 apiece on Tuesday, valuing the company at C$52.4 million. They’ve traded in a 52-week range of C$0.09 to C$0.19.

Coeur d’Alene

Bunker Hill mine, in Idaho’s historical Coeur d’Alene mining district, started in 1887 and produced 35 million tons of mineralization grading 8.76% lead, 3.67% zinc and 5.49 oz. per ton (188.2 grams per tonne) silver. The mine remained in care and maintenance until 2020 when Placer Mining took over the project, and sold it to Bunker Hill in 2022.

The new project has a five-year life, an after-tax net present value of $52 million at an 8% discount rate and an internal rate of return of 36%, according to the 2022 prefeasibility study.

The site holds 3.2 million probable tonnes grading 1.12 grams silver per tonne, 2.59% lead and 5.81% zinc for 3.6 million oz. silver, 166 million lb. lead and 372.1 million lb. zinc, according to a 2022 resource.

”We are thrilled to announce this first step in a potential partnership with the Export Import Bank to rapidly expand Bunker Hill’s contribution to US domestic production of critical zinc and silver,” Bunker president and CEO Sam Ash said in a release.

“In the face of competition from China, Bunker Hill is proud to play its part in strengthening the US metals supply chain and creating new US mining jobs within the disadvantaged Shoshone County of northern Idaho.”

(With files by Henry Lazenby)

Robust demand in the world’s second-biggest gold consumer could further support global prices, which hit record highs last week. Rising demand for imports of gold could also widen India’s trade deficit and put pressure on the rupee.

“People are still into gold big time, even with prices at record highs during Dhanteras. With gold giving better returns than the stock market, there’s been solid demand for coins and bars,” said Saurabh Gadgil, chairman of PNG Jewellers.

Indians were celebrating Dhanteras on Tuesday, a day considered auspicious for buying gold and one of the busiest gold-buying days in India.

Local gold prices jumped to a record high of 78,919 rupees per 10 grams last week, marking an increase of more than 31% since last year’s Diwali. India’s NSE Nifty 50 share index has dropped about 7% from a record high hit on Sept. 27.

Investors are working to diversify their portfolios by adding to or increasing their allocations in gold and silver, Gadgil said.

“In value terms, turnover during this year’s Dhanteras is expected to be significantly higher than last year due to higher prices. In volume terms, it may be slightly lower or around the same level as last year,” Prithviraj Kothari, president of the India Bullion and Jewellers Association (IBJA), said.

Indian dealers on Tuesday charged a premium of up to $1 an ounce over official domestic prices – inclusive of 6% import and 3% sales levies, up from the last week’s discount of $4.

Local silver futures hit a record high of 100,081 rupees per kilogram last week.

“Demand for silver coins and bars was strong today, as silver has delivered better returns than gold in recent months,” said Chirag Thakkar, CEO of Amrapali Group Gujarat, a leading silver importer.

(By Rajendra Jadhav; Editing by Susan Fenton)

This state-of-the-art refinery will be associated with the new e-waste recycling plant that Hindalco is building in Pakhajan, Gujarat, for which Metso has already been awarded a contract for three Kaldo furnaces, an anode furnace and an anode casting shop, gas cleaning and supporting equipment. 

For the precious metals refinery, the Metso scope of delivery consists of a Kaldo furnace with off-gas handling and silver refining equipment. The Finnish firm will also deliver basic engineering for the precious metals refinery. The order value was not disclosed.

In a press release on Monday, Hindalco stated that commissioning of the plant is expected to take place within two years.

“We are excited to have been trusted with yet another important order from Hindalco Industries. The new plant will allow Hindalco Industries to increase their production of precious metals,” Lauri Närhi, director of sales, smelting, at Metso.

“Our precious metals refining technology ensures high recovery, low operating costs and high-quality products, all achieved within a short processing time. The process is highly automated, offering a safe working environment and zero toxic gas emissions.”

The total stock market valuation of the world’s biggest mining companies is up a fairly modest 8% year to end-September and despite the good run is still $240 billion below the peak hit in the second quarter of 2022. And judging by the performance of the top tier in the final quarter (BHP down 8% QTD, Rio Tinto –5%, Vale –3%, Glencore –5%, Newmont –9%, Zijin –5%, Freeport –7%) the gap won’t be closing anytime soon.

In contrast, Nvidia — the maker of chips highly prized for artificial intelligence (AI) computing — is up nearly 200% so far this year (and 2,600% over five). When comparing the graphics card maker’s stock valuation to the mining industry’s collective worth, it’s difficult not to wonder if something is not awry with how global investors appraise the industrial economy.  

Should Nvidia (or Microsoft or Apple for that matter) be worth more than twice the top 50 miners? Outside the top 50 the average market cap quickly shrinks to the low teens so Nvidia is in fact worth more than the entire listed mining industry. 

Even when extending the top 50 into metals and energy –  steel, aluminium and electricity companies often operate their own mines – Nvidia can still throw shade. BHP does not even crack the top 100 most valuable companies in the world and is worth less than Booking.com, and Temu and Zara’s owners, none of which can exactly be called the building blocks of the global economy. 

Nvidia briefly surpassed Apple on Friday to become the world’s most valuable company. Its market capitalization is approximately $3.5 trillion, just below Apple’s, which remains the highest-valued firm globally.

The permit allows the company to begin the disposing of tailings – discarded mined material – by December 2024. It comes after a July court decision that restricted Adriatic’s use of state forest land for storing mining waste. 

The company chose an alternative site at the former Veovaca open-pit mine, about two kilometres from the Vares processing plant, where Adriatic has full ownership rights.

The approved facility will employ a “dry stack” method, which stores solid tailings without requiring a liquid reservoir, and is regarded as a safer and more stable approach compared to conventional tailings ponds.

The Veovaca tailings storage facility (TSF) will be built in two phases, with the first designed to handle four to five years of production waste. This initial stage is projected to cost $5 million and is expected to be completed by the end of 2024.

Adriatic’s current tailing storage facility has a maximum capacity of around 133,000t, which is projected to allow tailings deposition until the first one to two months of 2025. Adriatic plans to complete the initial construction phase of the Veovaca TSF before that to ensure no impact on production or the current ramp up to commercial production due to tailings storage capacity, the company said.

Vares began production early this year, becoming Europe’s first new mine in over a decade. The newly named chief executive officer, Laura Tyler, said in early October the operation was in the final phase of reaching nameplate processing capacity of 800,000 tonnes.

In 2023, Adriatic contributed nearly 22% of foreign direct investment into Bosnia and 2% of its GDP. The miner deployed 69% of total capital domestically, the equivalent of $155 million, across 739 companies.

Shares in Adriatic Metals climbed on the news in both Sydney and London. In Australia, they closed up more than 4% to A$4.30 each. In the UK, the stock was up 3.7% at 221p by 2pm local time Friday, leaving the miner with a market capitalization of £720 million ($935m).

Among the 19 holes released late Tuesday were some of the best at Arakompa yet. Hole KARDD0029 hit 20.6 metres at 9.87 grams of gold equivalent per tonne from 240.6 metres depth. This included 10.7 metres at 14.97 grams gold equivalent. Hole KARDD0025 returned 23.6 metres at 6.57 grams gold equivalent. Drilling confirmed bulk mining potential given broad intercepts such as 100.8 metres at 1.92 grams gold equivalent and another that cut 111.62 metres at 1.53 grams gold equivalent per tonne.

The company’s executive vice president for exploration Chris Muller says Arakompa mineralization is comparable to the company’s producing Kainantu mine’s Kora and Judd veins. Kainantu is expected to operate until 2034, but the company aims to extend its lifespan further through expansions and exploration at the Kora, Judd, and Arakompa deposits.

“The grades and thicknesses at Arakompa mirror the Kora veins, making it just as prospective,” Muller said in a news release.

Located 4.5 km from the cornerstone Kainantu mine in the country’s Eastern Highlands, the Arakompa deposit hosts a historical resource of 800,000 oz. at 9 grams gold per tonne. It’s seen as critical for sustaining K92’s future production and could cut development costs by using existing infrastructure.

K92’s CEO, John Lewins, said the results opened up selective and bulk mining opportunities. “With Arakompa delivering grades and thicknesses like these, it fits seamlessly into our long-term strategy,” he said in the release.

Running the first drill program in 32 years on Arakompa, K92 has ramped up exploration, increasing from one to four drill rigs this year. The deposit is open along strike and at depth. The company plans to release an initial resource estimate by early next year.

Growth platform

Last year, Kainantu produced 117,607 oz. gold equivalent, including 100,533 oz. gold, 7.7 million lb. copper, and 160,628 oz. silver, beating guidance of 111,000 to 116,000 gold equivalent ounces. It forecasts 2024 output at about 130,000 oz. gold equivalent at the midpoint.

K92 released updated resource estimates for Kora and Judd deposits in December. Kora’s measured and indicated resource now stands at 6.9 million tonnes grading 10.24 grams gold equivalent per tonne, up 8% from 2.1 million oz. in October 2021. Its inferred grew to 14.3 million tonnes at 8.6 grams per tonne for 3.9 million oz., a 58% jump, thanks to drilling along the deposit’s southern extensions of the K1 and K2 lodes.

Judd’s measured and indicated resource increased to 1.2 million tonnes at 8.7 grams gold equivalent for 350,000 oz., a 167% rise from the Dec. 2021 estimate. The inferred resource tripled to 2.3 million tonnes grading 7.7 grams gold equivalent per tonne for 560,000 oz., driven by more drilling and a 130% increase in the strike length since the end of 2021.

Kainantu has measured and indicated resources of 8.7 million tonnes at 10.2 grams gold equivalent per tonne, or 2.9 million ounces. It also has inferred resources of 17.1 million tonnes at 8.6 grams per tonne, or 4.7 million ounces.

The company’s Toronto-quoted shares last traded down 1% at C$9.37, having touched C$4.64 and C$9.90 over the past 12 months. It has a market capitalization of C$2.2 billion.

The find, called the Ramp zone, lies in the Apollo system of the project in the country’s central Caldas department. Drill hole APC99-D5 is the first intercept into a major new high-grade gold system at depth that can be classified as a partially reduced intrusion related gold-silver-copper system, the company said on Wednesday.

The hole cut 57.7 metres grading 7.83 grams gold per tonne, 33 grams silver, 0.09% copper and 0.12% zinc from 811.3 metres depth, Collective said in a release. The hold included 18.9 metres at 19.39 grams gold, 83 grams silver, 0.21% copper and 0.16% zinc.

“Right at the end of the hole we entered a fantastic zone,” David Reading, special advisor to Collective, says in a new video. “It’s clearly a new high-grade discovery.”

Higher up in the same hole, the assay showed 517.4 metres grading 1.84 grams gold, 10 grams silver, 0.03% copper an 0.06% zinc from 351.6 metres depth, the company said. That included 31.3 metres at 3.24 grams gold, 16 grams silver, 0.05% copper and 0.04% zinc.

The closest hole to the high-grade intercept is about 480 metres away, suggesting there is room for lateral expansion, BMO Capital Markets mining analyst Andrew Mikitchook wrote in a note to clients this morning.

“We expect the market to react positively to this intercept as we look forward to more deep drill holes at Apollo to confirm the scale and grade of this new discovery,” he said.

The new discovery, named “Ramp Zone,” is close in elevation (1,150m) to a planned underground haulage tunnel, Mikitchook added.

“This access tunnel connects Apollo and other targets (Plutus, Trap and Tower) to mining-related infrastructure in a potential development scenario. Although it is too early for any engineering plans, accessing high-grade portions of the orebody earlier should improve the economics of the project.”

Collective shares hit a new 52-week high of C$5.41 in morning trading before easing to C$5.10. The shares have traded as low as C$3.02 in the past year. The company’s market cap sits at C$348 million.

Gold district

Guayabales and Aris Mining’s (TSX: ARIS; NYSE: ARMN) neighbouring Marmato mine are part of a precious metal district of 10 operating mines in Colombia’s Middle Cauca mineral belt. Toronto-based Collective, founded by the same team that developed and sold Continental Gold for C$1.4 billion, posted drill results in August joining the Apollo and Olympus deposits. The project delivered the top gold assay in The Northern Miner’s weekly Drill Down several times this year.

“The fact that Apollo is now transitioning into a bulk zone of high-grade gold mineralization at depth is extremely exciting and will no doubt add materially to the mineral resource endowment of Apollo,” executive chairman Ari Sussman said. “The Apollo system, which outcrops at surface, now boasts a vertical dimension of approximately 1,150 metres with further expansion dead-ahead.”

Collective also reported strong results this year at Guayabales’ Trap area, 3.5 km northeast of Apollo. It has five rigs, two each at Trap and Apollo and another at the X target, for a 40,000-metre drill program this year. The company began the project in September 2021 and has not published a resource yet.

Shares were up 7.3% at £2.50 each in early morning trading in London, stabilizing by mid-afternoon at around £2.38 each, leaving the company with a market capitalization of £1.24 billion ($1.6bn).

The South America-focused miner said it mined 16% more gold and silver in the third quarter of the year than it did in the same period of 2023, with 96,327 ounces on a gold-equivalent basis. The company uses equivalent ounces to reflect an amalgamation of both gold and silver production.

Gold production in the three months to the end of September increased 40%, boosted by the continuing ramp up of its Mara Rosa mine in Brazil, which started production early this year.

Output from the company’s flagship Inmaculada mine in Peru rose 6%, resulting from the implementation of continuous improvement projects at site. This increase helped offset a silver production fall of 17%.

Strong gold and silver prices boosted Hochschild’s cash flow, helping the miner to pay down $45 million of its net debt in the quarter.

“Hochschild Mining’s third quarter has been the strongest in almost five years,” chief executive officer Eduardo Landin said in a statement.

The company reaffirmed its annual production and cost targets, anticipating output of 343,000 to 360,000 gold equivalent ounces at all-in sustaining costs of $1,510-1,550 per gold equivalent ounce.

Hochschild Mining has operations in Peru, Argentina and Brazil and development projects in Chile and Peru.

After receiving the last permit needed in August, the Canadian companies have focused on preparing to begin early works, with first production expected by the end of 2026.

“Early works will take place from November to the end of the year with construction expected to start after the rainy season in the area, towards the second quarter,” Salazar Resources president and chief executive Fredy Salazar told BNamericas on Wednesday.

Construction of the project has been delayed on various occasions due to mining rules changes in the Andean country, legal challenges, and the takeover of one of the project’s owners — Adventus Mining.

Located about 150 km northeast of Guayaquil, the Curipamba-El Domo asset spans seven concessions over 21,500 hectares. It was originally owned by Salazar in partnership with Adventus Mining, which was acquired by Silvercorp Metals (TSX: SVM) (NYSE: SVM) in July.

Construction will be fully funded from Silvercorp’s existing cash balance combined with a $175.5 million streaming deal Adventus had signed with Wheaton Precious Metals in 2022.

The mine is considered one of the highest grade and lowest capital intensive copper-gold projects globally, and the next big mine in Ecuador after Mirador, run by China-backed Ecuacorriente, and Lundin Gold’s (TSX: LUG) Fruta del Norte.

The $250-million project is protected by an investment contract with the Ecuadorian government that grants it several incentives, such as reductions in income tax, exemption of import duties and tax stability until March 2033.

The country’s government anticipates generating over $4 billion in annual mining exports by 2025, with four new operations coming online before the end of President Guillermo Lasso’s term, including the Cascabel copper-gold project operated by Australia’s SolGold (LON, TSX: SOLG).

The report pinned the after-tax net present value at $222 million (at a 5% discount rate) and gave a 40% internal rate of return. The company, with a market cap of C$100 million, says it expects the $87 million mine to achieve payback within two years.

“With such positive parameters, we are confident we will be able to advance the project very quickly,” CEO Glenn Jessome said in a news release.

Shares in the Halifax, Nova Scotia-based company plunged 15.5% Tuesday to C$0.275, ranging between C$0.135 and C$0.355 over the past 12 months. But Jessome said management now has a “clear path” to making a construction decision.

Silver Tiger plans to develop a modest, open pit, heap-leach mine at El Tigre. The 10 year mine plan will see El Tigre in total produce 8.6 million oz. silver and 408,000 oz. gold. The project is expected to generate an undiscounted after-tax cash flow of $318 million over its life.

The report estimates all-in sustaining costs of $14.40 per silver-equivalent ounce.

The open-pit design benefits from a low strip ratio of 1.7:1 and mineralization averages 48 grams silver-equivalent per tonne in the pit from surface, enabling efficient operations. Initial processing capacity will start at 7,500 tonnes per day, but a $15 million expansion could see it scaling up to 15,000 tonnes per day by year four.

The prefeasibility study was based on the Stockwork Zone outlined in an accompanying resource update using $26 per oz. silver and $2,159 per oz. gold. The new El Tigre resource estimate holds 61.8 million tonnes of oxide and sulphide material in the measured and indicated categories. It grades 16 grams silver per tonne for 31.3 million oz. of metal, and 0.4 gram gold for 778,000 oz. of contained gold.

Underground upside

The project also holds an out-of-pit measured and indicated resource of 5.3 million tonnes at 255 silver-equivalent for 44 million oz., and 10.1 million tonnes inferred at 216 grams silver-equivalent for 70 million ounces. Jessome says the company plans to wrap an initial economic assessment around the deposit in the first half of next year.

Silver Tiger believes critical mass for the underground project means hitting an exploration target of 10 to 12 million tonnes at 225 to 265 grams of silver equivalent for 73 to 100 million silver-equivalent ounces.

This near-mine underground resource provides long-term resource upside, coupled with the fact that only 30% of the 284 sq. km property has been explored. The company plans to begin underground drilling immediately.

Bullion hit an all-time high of $2,748.36 an ounce, topping Monday’s record. Traders have flocked to the market amid a tight US presidential vote and persistent concern that violence in the Middle East may escalate into a wider war. The sentiment spilled over to the silver market, with prices of the white metal climbing for its sixth-straight session to within striking distance of $35 an ounce.

Robust central-bank buying and expectations of US interest-rate cuts have also underpinned gold’s 33% run this year. Federal Reserve officials continue to opine on the path forward, with Jeffrey Schmid favoring a slower pace of rate reductions and Mary Daly forecasting more cuts.

“Haven demand amid heightened geopolitical risks, as well as uncertainty ahead of the US election in November, have also supported gold’s record-breaking rally,” ING Bank NV wrote in a note.

While the outcome of the US election remains uncertain, Saxo Bank A/S Head of Commodity Strategy Ole Hansen suggests gold and silver are getting caught up in bets of a Republican victory.

Meanwhile, money managers have increased net-long positions in gold, while investors have added to holdings in exchange-traded funds. Citigroup Inc. analysts boosted their three-month price forecast by 3.7% to $2,800 an ounce amid expectations that further labor-market deterioration will drive demand.

Spot gold rose 1% to $2,746.41 an ounce at 2:01 p.m. in New York. The Bloomberg Dollar Spot Index was little changed. Palladium, platinum and silver all gained.

(By Jack Wittels and Yvonne Yue Li)

Graphic: Gold’s allure spreads as bulls lock in on fresh records

Shares of Guanajuato Silver gained 0.9% at C$0.28 apiece following the Sprott investment. This gives the Mexico-focused precious metals miner a market capitalization of approximately C$111 million ($80.2m).

 “We are extremely pleased to welcome the participation of Eric Sprott in this financing. His continued support is a strong endorsement of Guanajuato Silver’s vision and potential,” CEO James Anderson said in a news release.

He added that this financing will provide the company with necessary capital to accelerate production in response to rapidly rising silver prices. Earlier this week, the price of silver surged to its highest in 12 years, topping $34 an ounce.

Guanajuato Silver currently operates four mines: El Cubo, Valenciana mines complex and San Ignacio mine in Guanajuato, and the Topia mine in northwestern Durango. Last year, the company saw its highest ever production in silver-equivalent terms at 3.5 million ounces, a 64% increase over 2022.

Due to rising precious metals prices, the miner is coming off its best revenue-generating quarter, recording $20.5 million for the second quarter, a 22% improvement over the same period of 2023.

Boliden’s third quarter operating profit, excluding the revaluation of process inventory, totalled 3.0 billion Swedish crowns ($274 mln), up 58% from 1.9 billion crowns a year earlier.

That was above the expectation of 2.3 billion Swedish crowns seen in a company-provided consensus.

“Our mine production during the quarter has been good,” Boliden’s chief executive Mikael Staffas said, adding that the Garpenberg mine has had a record ore output and the Kankberg mine set a new record production for gold.

Quarterly revenue for the mining group rose 14% to 22.2 billion crowns, from 19.4 billion in the same period last year.

Shares in Boliden rose 8% in early trading before giving up their gains.

In a research note, JPMorgan noted Boliden’s 2024 guidance is unchanged but said the 2025 outlook is weaker than its own estimate.

Staffas told Reuters that it is feasible the company will finish 2024 very close to the initial guidance.

The company announced in September it expected delays to start of Odda expansion project, now expected at the end of the first quarter of 2025.

The delay came after a string of hurdles over the recent quarters, with falling metal prices, lower mining grades and the suspension of production at the company’s Tara mine, on top of the fire at its smelter at Ronneskar last year.

On Tara, Europe’s largest zinc mine, the company said preparations for a restart are running according to plan.

It also added it expects to recognize an insurance income of 935 million crowns in the fourth quarter of 2024 related to the fire.

(By Tilla Sjaavaag; Editing by Matt Scuffham)

The bank upgraded its three-month gold price view to $2,800 per ounce from $2,700 previously, adding that its 6 to 12-month forecast is $3,000.

It revised its 6 to 12-month forecast for silver prices upward to $40 per ounce from $38 per ounce.

“We note that gold and silver have performed extremely well despite weakening China retail physical demand and rising US interest rates since the Fed cut 50 (basis points) and payrolls beat last month,” the note said.

Gold should also rise in the scenario that oil spikes on near-term Middle East escalation, it added.

Gold surged to a record high on Monday while silver struck a near 12-year peak, as growing uncertainties surrounding the US presidential election and the Middle East war added to gold’s rally already fueled by expectations of interest rates easing.

Citi said it remains neutral-bullish on platinum with a three-month point price target of $1,025 per ounce and a 6 to 12-month target of $1,100 per ounce.

It added that it leans bearish palladium following the recent price gain with a three-month target of $1,000 per ounce and a 6 to 12-month target of $900 per ounce.

Citi also said that oil fundamentals point to $60 per barrel average prices in 2025, but that the potential for very near-term geopolitical escalation in the Middle East is high.

(By Anjana Anil; Editing by Aurora Ellis)

The latest estimate contains resources for the Tom and Jason deposits and the inaugural numbers for the Boundary and End zones. Together, there is an indicated resource of 56 million tonnes grading 7.27% zinc equivalent and an inferred resource of 48.5 million tonnes at 7.48% zinc equivalent.

Breaking the numbers down further, the figures look like this (with contained metal):

• Indicated: 5.50% zinc (6.78 billion lb.), 1.58% lead (1.92 billion lb.), 24.2 g/t silver (43.5 million oz.), 10.98 g/t germanium (614,800 kg) and 7.38 g/t gallium (412,900 kg).
• Inferred: 5.15% zinc (5.5 billion lb.) 2.08% lead (2.2 billion lb.), 25.3 g/t silver, 39.4 million oz.), 8.14 g/t germanium (394,400 kg) and 5.82 g/t gallium (282,100 kg).

“We are excited to be able to demonstrate the presence of significant quantities of byproduct elements germanium and gallium, propelling Macpass to a premier spot on the world stage of critical mineral districts,” said CEO Peter Hemstead.

“The mix of such large accumulations of the critical minerals zinc, tungsten, germanium and gallium on one property represents a strategic asset for North America and represents a tremendous economic opportunity for northern Canada,” he added.

This year’s exploration program at Macpass is now complete. A total of 16,013 metres were drilled in 49 holes, and assays are pending for most holes. A large regional program was also completed, including extensive ground gravity surveys, prospecting, soil sampling, and airborne geophysical surveys of LiDAR and VTEM-magnetics.

Its stock rose to $5.23 apiece during early trading hours in New York, before pulling back to $5.10 by 11:00 a.m. ET. The company has a market capitalization of approximately $1.25 billion.

According to the company, surface mill and infrastructure construction have reached 90%, with more than $258 million of the project’s budget spent to date. Project commitments total $270 million, representing 99% of the $271 million capital budget.

During the third quarter, 1,051 meters were developed underground, bringing the project’s total to 5,544 meters.

Underground explosive magazines have been completed, and the application for an explosive use permit has been submitted, with approval expected later this year.

According to the company, the focus continues on the lower platform, where concrete work is well underway, and on the tailing storage facility, where underdrain embankment fill and pipe installation are advancing at a good pace.

“We’re in the final construction phase with the finish line in sight,” commented Don Gray, chief operating officer at Endeavour Silver.

Commissioning of the mine is expected in the fourth quarter, with an anticipated 10-year mine life. The Terronera project is situated within the Sierra Madre volcanic belt, which hosts most of Mexico’s silver and gold deposits.

Terronera has total proven and probable reserves of 7.4 million tonnes, grading 197 g/t silver and 2.25 g/t gold. The mine consists of the Terronera and La Luz underground deposits, both of which will be mined using a combination of long-hole and cut-and-fill methods. The processing plant will have a capacity of 2,000 tonnes per day.

A feasibility study forecasts that the project will produce 4 million oz. of silver and 38,000 oz. of gold annually the 10-year period.

Ascot Resources (TSX: AOT) said on Monday it plans to raise at least C$40 million ($29 million) to get its Premier gold project in British Columbia’s Golden Triangle back on track after shutting it down just months into its first gold pour.

The financing will consist of a new $11.25 million loan with the company’s main creditors and a minimum C$25 million private placement of shares priced at C$0.16 that can rise to C$35 million depending on demand.

This funding package, said Ascot chief executive Derek White, will enable the company to undertake mine development activities necessary to advance the Premier Northern Lights (PNL) and Big Missouri (BM) deposits located 25 km from Stewart, BC.

In September, Ascot revealed that the PNL and BM deposits have not been advancing on schedule, leading to insufficient ore feeds to the Premier mill and missed production targets. As a result, it decided to place the Premier project on care and maintenance until further development is completed, which is estimated to take 3-6 months.

At the time, the company had C$15 million in cash, which was enough to endure the suspension of operations for winter season, but additional funding was required to complete the necessary mine development work and restart operations.

Ascot’s shares plummeted to its lowest in over five years (C$0.14) following that announcement, and since then has been hovering between C$0.16 and C$0.19 a share. Monday’s financing sent the stock to C$0.22, for a market capitalization of C$155.3 million.

“While the timeframe and funding required to undertake this work has been challenging for the company, recent actions were required to ensure sustainable feed for profitable mill operations,” CEO White said in Monday’s news release, adding that Ascot is focused on returning to gold production in the second quarter of 2025.

The company achieved first pour at Premier in April and had initially expected to declare commercial production at the historical mine during the third quarter of 2024. Mining is expected to occur from total probable reserves of 3.6 million tonnes grading 5.45 g/t gold and 19.1 g/t silver, containing 637,000 oz. of gold and 2.23 million oz. of silver.

Once upon a time, the Premier mine was the largest gold mine in North America until fire destroyed its surface buildings. Before its closure in 1952, it had produced over 2 million oz. of gold and 45 million oz. of silver.

Gold pared gains after reaching a fresh record high amid tensions in the Middle East and the approaching US presidential election.

Bullion rose as much as 0.7% before retreating as some investors booked profits after the precious metal’s four-day winning streak. It breached the $2,700-an-ounce threshold last week, with analysts attributing gains to haven demand amid uncertainty around the outcome of the US election and ongoing worries over the Middle East. Israel has been discussing its attack on Iran after a Hezbollah drone exploded near Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s private home at the weekend.

Silver advanced as much as 1.7% on Monday to the highest since 2012 before surrendering those gains.

Gold has hit successive all-time highs in recent months and is up by more than 30% this year. Along with haven demand and US political uncertainty, the rally has been fueled by robust central-bank buying and expectations of US interest-rate cuts. Lower rates are often seen as bullish for non-interest bearing gold.

“The simple bottom line is that gold thrives on uncertainty,” said Rhona O’Connell, head of market analysis for EMEA and Asia at StoneX. “The lack of clarity over the medium-term direction of US foreign policy is adding to nervousness.”

Meanwhile, money managers have increased net-long positions in gold, while investors have added to exchange-traded fund holdings in recent sessions. SPDR Gold Shares, the world’s largest bullion-backed ETF, registered the biggest weekly inflow since March. Gold futures may rise to average $3,000 in the fourth quarter of 2025, Commonwealth Bank of Australia analyst Vivek Dhar said in a note.

Spot gold was little change at $2,721.31 an ounce at 4:42 p.m. in London. The Bloomberg Dollar Spot Index and US 10-year Treasury yield gained. Palladium and platinum fell.

Read More: Economic growth the main driver of long-term gold price, WGC research suggests

Explorers and developers often overstate the certainty of mineral resource classifications based on inadequate data, Desharnais said at an event in Vancouver on Wednesday. The practice has in some instances led to unexpected analyst downgrades, soaring costs and debt, and the derailment of promising assets.

“That classification debt, unfortunately, needs to get paid,” he told about 430 conference participants from 21 countries at CIM’s first Mineral Resources & Mineral Reserves conference. “The CEO may be walking around with a 3-million-oz. resource estimate, but they haven’t earned that classification with sufficient drilling. When the debt comes due, it’s often through painful reclassifications and revisions.”

Decade of missteps

Several recent projects have demonstrated the high cost of classification debt.

Rubicon Resources’ catastrophic 91% downgrade in resource estimates in 2015 stands as one of the most glaring examples. After it began initial production at the F2 gold deposit on its Phoenix property in Ontario’s Red Lake district, the company found the deposit to be uneconomic, shuttering the operation. It had not completed a feasibility study for the high-grade project.

The size of the downgrade blindsided investors and stakeholders, and the company had to undergo a painful restructuring to survive. Rebranded as Battle North Gold, Evolution Mining (ASX: EVN) bought it and its renamed Bateman project in 2021 for $343 million.

In 2018, Pretium Resources promoted the Brucejack gold project in northwestern British Columbia’s Golden Triangle, now owned by Newmont (NYSE: NEM, TSX: NGT, ASX: NEM, PNGX: NEM), as a high-grade gold deposit. Yet, the asset disappointed when gold production grades fell far below expectations.

The nuggety nature of the gold, with Brucejack’s steeply dipping quartz veins and erratic grade distribution, made it difficult to consistently meet production targets, forcing the company to push tonnage through the mill to compensate for lower-than-expected grades.

Aurora (2018), Rainy River (2019), and Gold Bar (2020) show how resource overestimation hurt Guyana Goldfields, New Gold (TSX: NGD; NYSE: NGD) and McEwen Mining (TSX: MUX; NYSE: MUX). They had to downgrade estimates mid-operation. This triggered mine plan revisions, soaring costs, production delays, and financial strain.

Grade versus geometric risk

Desharnais identifies two types of risk that contribute to resource misclassification: grade risk and geometric risk.

Grade risk reflects patchiness in ore quality, while geometric risk involves uncertainty about the size and shape of mineralized domains within the deposit.

Conditional simulations help assess grade risk, Desharnais said, but tools to quantify geometric risk are lacking.

Companies often overestimate deposit geometry without tighter drilling, leading to costly misjudgments.

“Sparse drilling gives us a simpler picture than reality,” he explained, adding that only closely spaced drilling can reveal the true complexity of orebodies.

Best practices

Mathieu Doucette, a senior geologist at ArcelorMittal (NYSE: MT), talked about the difficulty of classifying resources at Canada’s largest iron mine, the Mont-Wright iron ore mine in Quebec, producing continuously since 1974. Outdated data can affect current resource estimates. He illustrated how mixing in fresh drill holes helps manage geological risk as part of a dynamic model essential to avoid misclassification.

“The first thing [a QP] will do is akin to lighting a torch,” he said. “But everything on the edges is dark, and you can’t really see it. Drill holes are our ability to try and get some information, but sparse data hides the full picture.”

David Machuca-Mory, a principal consultant at SRK Consulting, said fixed models are risky. Deposits can be more unpredictable than they seem. Adaptive methods help ensure estimates reflect reality, reducing the chance of costly surprises.

“Even with dense drilling, some areas remain highly uncertain,” Machuca-Mory said. “Confidence intervals are large, and relying solely on drill spacing doesn’t always guarantee accurate classification.”

Cognitive biases

Desharnais said that misclassification is not just a technical problem; human psychology plays a significant role.

Anchoring bias makes companies stick with initial estimates despite new data. Authority bias pressures geologists and consultants to confirm favourable results to please management or investors.

“The consulting firm wants the next contract,” Desharnais said. “The CEO has family and friends invested and needs good news. These biases create a system where classification debt builds up across projects, only to be paid through painful revisions later.”

Owning up

Desharnais argued for more conservative resource models and said benchmarking against operating mines would help set realistic expectations. He suggested that technical reports include histograms that show the distance between drill holes and classified resources, he added.

“It forces the QP or CP to look at what they’ve done and ask: Does this make sense?” he said. “Transparent reporting would help prevent overly aggressive classifications, ensuring companies earn their resource classifications with sufficient data.”

Such measures may slow development, but they could also reduce the prevalence of misclassified resources in the industry. Desharnais urged geologists to scrutinize each block of material above the cut-off grade.

“Over-promising today only delays the inevitable correction tomorrow,” he said.

The new agreement, Newmont said, reflects the mutual commitment of all parties and is the outcome of open dialogue and safeguards the rights of all workers and provides a solid foundation for continuing operations at Peñasquito.

In 2023, employees at Peñasquito, Mexico’s largest gold mine, downed tools for over four months.

Newmont pegged the financial impact of the dispute at approximately $1 million a day in maintenance costs and $2.7 million a day in lost revenue.

The work stoppage was the third labour dispute at Peñasquito since the company acquired the mine through its merger with Goldcorp Inc. in 2019.

The company was spun out in July from G Mining Ventures (TSX: GMIN), which acquired Reunion Gold in an C$875 million deal this year for its Oko West development project.

Greenheart is focused on regional assets outside of Oko West in the Guiana Shield. These include the Abuya and Majorodam projects in Guyana and Suriname, respectively.

The financing, at C$0.50 per share and underwritten by Canaccord Genuity and Paradigm Capital, closed 44% higher than the C$25 million offering floated on Sept. 25.

Greenheart shares rose to a 12-month high of C$0.95 on Friday, having touched a low of C$0.45 in that period. It has a market capitalization of C$70 million.

Last month, CEO Justin van der Toorn said in a press release that the company had signed non-binding deal to start due diligence to buy G Mining’s 95-sq.-km IGAB gold project in Suriname. IGAB is 30 km south of Newmont’s (NYSE: NEM, TSX: NGT, ASX: NEM, PNGX: NEM) Merian mine, which hosts nearly 4 million oz. gold in reserves and another 1.5 million oz. in resources.

The early-stage prospect has already produced high-grade gold from artisanal mining, with rocks yielding bonanza 94.2 grams gold per tonne samples.

The goal is to get and maintain a pipeline of up to five or six early-stage exploration projects in Guyana and Suriname “in the near future,” Van der Toorn said in a Sept. 25 release.

Grassroots prospects

Early sampling results IGAB show promising grades, and Greenheart plans to begin detailed exploration by January. The company also plans geological mapping, soil sampling, and geophysical surveys to define drill targets along key structural contacts.

The deal is to fund prospecting, soil sampling and geological mapping at the Majorodam project in Suriname. The target area at Majorodam is on the same fold structure as Zijin Mining’s Saramacca deposit.

Greenheart will also conduct work at its Abuya project in Guyana. Located near Chinese-owned Zijin Mining’s Aurora gold mine, Abuya has shown early promise. Initial mapping is complete, and soil sample results are expected soon.
* This article has been updated to reflect that Zijin Mining now owns the Saramacca deposit, not Iamgold, any longer, as initially stated.

Tyler, who has been with Adriatic since July 2024 as a non-executive director, took on the role of interim CEO in August, when the company’s co-founder and then CEO, Paul Cronin, resigned citing family reasons.

Tyler’s nomination comes after an extensive search conducted by the the board, the company said. With over 35 years of experience in underground polymetallic mining operations and executive leadership, she was the board’s unanimous pick for the role.

“Laura has an abundance of experience in underground, polymetallic mining operations and executive leadership roles,” chairman Michael Rawlinson said in the statement.

Tyler has served previously as chief technical officer at BHP, and held roles in executive leadership for the Olympic Dam, Cannington, and Ekati underground mines.

Her leadership comes at a pivotal time for Adriatic Metals as it continues to develop the Vares silver mine in central Bosnia, which opened earlier this year. She said the company was now in the final phases of reaching nameplate capacity at the operation.

In 2023, Adriatic contributed nearly 22% of foreign direct investment into Bosnia and 2% of its GDP. The miner deployed 69% of total capital domestically, the equivalent of $155 million, across 739 companies.

Shares in Adriatic jumped on the news, closing almost 5% higher in Sydney at A$4.09 apiece. In London, the stock was up 1.20% to 209p around noon local time, leaving Adriatic with a market capitalization of nearly £680 million ($885m)

The lack of transparency and lost capital are a lesson for junior mining investors, mining engineer Michael McClintock, founder of the McClintock Group of stockholders, said in an interview with The Northern Miner. The group once held about 15% but it’s been diluted to around 3.5%, he said.

Part of McClintock’s argument is that the TSXV and Canadian securities regulators should have probed defensive capital raisings at below-market prices last year because they benefited CEO Patrick McGrath and board members at the expense of other shareholders. Share offerings at C$0.01 when the stock was C$0.02, and twice at C$0.065 apiece when the stock was around C$0.095 and C$0.08, followed a 10-to-one rollback, documents show.

“Between the three financings they did, they issued upwards of 65% new stock that was all done either to insiders or close associates,” McClintock said from Vancouver. “Two of those financings were announced as closed, which I’ve never really seen done in the industry before.”

Blue Moon’s McGrath said the company required capital raisings to stay afloat. Commenting by email, he said Michael’s father, Jack McClintock, was on the board at the time of the first financing, and that the McClintock Group could have asked to be part of the financings. They were needed because the company had C$30,000 in cash and C$315,000 in debt as of the end of 2022.

“If the company did not raise capital, it would simply not survive and it would lose its assets,” McGrath said. “This is the case of most junior TSXV companies.”

Best interests

A defensive capital raising is a pre-emptive move to discourage a takeover by offering shares to certain people at a discount. It increases the number of shares available and makes it more expensive for a hostile acquirer to buy enough shares to gain control.

They aren’t illegal in Canada, but companies are supposed to demonstrate they’re in the best interest of shareholders and not merely a tactic to entrench management. It has similarities to a ‘poison pill’ clause sometimes placed in a company’s bylaws.

McClintock’s father, John, known as Jack, has a long history with Blue Moon, starting as CEO when the company listed in 2007. He resigned in 2015, rejoined the company in 2017 as a director. He left again in February last year, unhappy with how the roll back was done and the discounted share offerings to management and directors.

Michael McClintock issued an open letter to shareholders in April 2023 raising concerns. Management wasn’t providing adequate updates, it might try to sell the Blue Moon project at a significant discount to its market value, and the share roll back was unnecessary and had further diluted shares, McClintock said. He offered to be CEO for a salary of C$1 a year.

‘No business plan’

Blue Moon replied the following month that McClintock had “no meaningful business plan, no indications of access to capital nor any prior public company experience.” McClintock had “onerous terms for the company that the board would not accept,” it said, referring to his offer to be CEO.

“The bottom line is John McClintock has led Blue Moon for 14.5 of the last 16 years without success,” Blue Moon said in May 2023. “If Blue Moon shareholders want a different plan than the last 16 years, they should be looking to the current team.”

McGrath said Blue Moon needed to roll back shares because it had 150 million shares outstanding and the company was trading well below the TSXV minimum price to complete a financing.

Defensive capital raising is rare, but one of many issues investors in junior mining companies need to be aware of, James Brown, partner at law firm Osler, and mining practice co-head Alan Hutchison said in an interview. Other concerns are being able to decipher technical reports, a stock’s liquidity, joint venture partner conflicts and how advanced the project is.

“In a lot of cases, issuers, particularly junior exploration companies, just need capital to carry on and keep the lights on and continue their programs,” Brown said by phone. “There are definitely cases in high-profile situations where there can be defensive tactics, but that is something that the securities commissions do focus on in the context of particular proxy contests or transactions.”

TMX, owner of the TSX and TSXV exchanges, and the securities commissions in British Columbia and Ontario declined to say whether Blue Moon was investigated because of McClintock’s claims.

Transparency rules

John Kaiser, who has published a mining industry newsletter for 30 years, said the Blue Moon dispute lies in a grey area where it’s difficult to determine who’s been wronged. Kaiser blamed the TSXV for weakening transparency rules on private placement details, which often hides who’s buying and how much.

“It is yet another sign of the F-You attitude the establishment has towards the investing public,” Kaiser told The Northern Miner by email. He commented on the company’s latest private placement that raised C$924,000 in August by issuing 26.4 million shares at C$0.035 each.

“The fact that the stock has developed an uptrend following a ‘pity’ priced financing, out of character with all past financings, suggests that the financing was placed with an ‘invited’ group in individual quantities below insider thresholds.”

Indeed, Blue Moon said three new proposed directors would stand for election to the board Oct. 17. All are well known reputable mining industry executives. They are former Iamgold (TSX: IMG; NYSE: IAG) interim CEO Maryse Belanger, Wheaton Precious Metals (TSX: WPM, NYSE: WPM; LSE: WPM) corporate development vice-president Haytham Hodaly, and Christian Kargl-Simard, the CEO of Adventus Mining when Silvercorp Metals (TSX: SVM; NYSE: SVM) bought it this year for C$235 million.

McGrath declined to say why or how the proposed board members were attracted to the company, but said Blue Moon would update shareholders in the coming weeks of its plans and direction.

Share surge

The CEO said the value of the McClintock Group’s shareholdings since Feb 13, 2023, the date of Jack McClintock’s resignation from Blue Moon, to Oct. 10 this year have gained about 250%.

Blue Moon’s share price has risen more than tenfold to close at C$0.345 on Tuesday from C$0.035 before the latest capital raising was announced Aug. 15. The company has a market value of C$18.2 million.

But McClintock points out the stock was at C$0.60 in 2021 when the company did a financing. From then until the August capital raising, the stock lost 94% of its value and C$8 million for shareholders, McClintock estimated. His group and other legacy shareholders dating to before the rollback have experienced 72% dilution since February 2023. McClintock says legacy shareholder losses may exceed C$20 million when based on the asset’s fair value.

McGrath said the market cap today is higher than any period in 2022 and 2023. “The McClintocks are simply cherry picking the very high and the very low and ignoring the recent share performance,” he said.

Another company where McGrath is CEO, Burell Resources (CSE: BURY), raised C$800,000 from an initial public offering in July 2021, and hasn’t issued a press release since. It has a historically explored gold project in Nevada.

‘Pressure worked’

McClintock said his group’s efforts at Blue Moon contributed to the company’s board changes and news Oct. 10 that it hired a company to conduct a new preliminary assessment on the project for release in next year’s first quarter. The last one was done in 1989 under a former owner.

“We strongly believe that the situation would have been far worse had we not applied the shareholder pressure,” McClintock said. “We really want to see Blue Moon succeed, and we hope we can impact a positive change.”

Blue Moon sold its 13-sq.-km Yava property with silver and base metal potential in Nunavut to Honey Badger Silver (CVE: TUF) on Oct. 2 in an all-share deal valued at C$340,000.

The November 2023 update at Blue Moon in California upgraded nearly half (48%) of the previous resource to the indicated category. The project holds 3.5 million indicated tonnes grading 6.14% zinc, 0.75% copper, 1.54 grams silver per tonne, 0.05 gram gold and 0.24% lead for 431 million lb. contained zinc, 53 million lb. copper 17 million lb. lead, 5 million oz. silver and 200,000 oz. gold.

The project has 3.8 million inferred tonnes grading 5.94% zinc, 0.59% copper, 1.56 grams silver, 0.05 gram gold and 0.34% lead for 455 million lb. zinc, 45 million lb. copper, 26 million lb. lead, 6 million oz. silver and 200,000 oz. gold.

Net proceeds will be used predominantly used towards furthering exploration at the 100%-owned Lunahuasi epithermal project, as well as the continued exploration and maintenance of the 69%-owned Los Helados porphyry project in South America.

Both projects host copper-gold-silver deposits. They are separated by a 10-km distance and an international border. Lunahuasi is in San Juan province, Argentina, and the Los Helados is in Region III, Chile.

Los Helados is 31%-owned by Nippon Caserones Resources, which owns the operating Caserones mine only 17 km away.

Resources have been established for Los Helados. Using a cut-off grade of 0.33% copper equivalent, the indicated portion contains 18.4 billion lb. of copper, 10.2 million oz. of gold and 97.5 million oz. of silver, and the inferred resource contains an additional 8.2 billion lb. of copper, 3.6 million oz. of gold and 50.2 million oz. of silver.

NGEx noted that the private placement is subject to regulatory approval, including the Toronto Stock Exchange. Trusts settled by the late Adolf Lundin have indicated their intention to participate offering.

Highlight holes include TXC24-087 which cut 2.6 metres grading 1,920.93 grams silver per tonne and 20.26 grams gold, including 1.1 metres at 4,328 grams silver and 46.5 grams gold, the company reported on Tuesday. That hole, drilled from 172.2 metres depth, is part of a 20,000-metre program of drilling across 50 holes that started in July and is aimed at infilling and converting resources. It’s expected to wrap up by the end of the year.

“(The drill program has) been successful in stepping out beyond the existing resource envelope identifying significant near-surface expansion potential at higher-than-average grades,” Blackrock CEO and president Andrew Pollard said in a release.

“These findings bolster our confidence in the model presented in our recent preliminary economic assessment and suggest the possibility of shortening the pre-production development timeline as we track high-grade gold and silver mineralization closer to the surface.”

The results follow Blackrock’s release six weeks ago of its preliminary economic assessment (PEA) for Tonopah West, which gave it a post-tax net present value (at a 5% discount) of $326 million, with capital costs of $178 million (including a $22 million contingency). The PEA pegged the project’s post-tax internal rate of return at 39.2%, with a 2.3-year payback period. It used a base gold price of $1,900 per oz. and silver price of $23 per ounce.

Company shares traded for C$0.41 apiece on Tuesday morning in Toronto, hitting a new 52-week high and valuing the company at C$107.5 million.

Other highlight holes include TXC24-101, which cut 1.3 metres at 687 grams silver and 6.56 grams gold from 137.6 metres depth; and TXC24-092, which returned 3.3 metres of 470.56 grams silver and 5.35 grams gold, from 141.6 metres depth, including 1.1 metres of 534 grams silver and 6.9 grams gold.

New gold-silver chute

TXC24-087 and TXC24-101 were among five holes that defined a new high-grade gold and silver chute along the Merton/Bermuda high-grade vein system, Blackrock said. The chute is about 175 metres long and is open to the northwest and southeast. Another high-grade chute starts with TXC24-092, suggesting a recurring pattern of high-grade gold and silver along the strike of the vein system.

The company’s drill program aims to upgrade about 1 million inferred tonnes of high-grade silver and gold to measured and indicated resources in the Bermuda and Merten vein systems. Those systems are located in an area where veins are shallowest and go down 200 to 300 metres.

Tonopah West hosts 6.3 million inferred tonnes grading 2.82 grams gold per tonne and 237.8 grams silver, for 577,000 oz. of gold and 48.5 million oz. of silver, according to the PEA.

The project is being developed four years after discovery at the site along US Highway 95 about 350 km northwest of Las Vegas.

India and the UAE signed a Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (CEPA) in 2022 after 88 days of negotiations. The agreement has become a template for similar trade pacts the UAE has since signed with many other nations.

The two countries held a meeting of the Joint Committee under CEPA on Monday, where officials discussed growth in bilateral trade.

India raised the issue of higher imports of silver products, platinum alloy and dry dates and “urged UAE to verify compliance to the rules of origin norms and ensure that the rules are not circumvented,” New Delhi said in a statement.

UAE has agreed to examine India’s concerns, it added.

Reuters reported last month that Indian and Emirati officials were expected to review their trade agreement amid concerns raised by Indian industry over a sharp increase in imports of precious metals from UAE.

(By Tanvi Mehta and Shivangi Acharya; Editing by Bernadette Baum)

At the end of the third quarter of 2024, the MINING.COM TOP 50* ranking of the world’s most valuable miners had a combined market capitalization of $1.51 trillion, up just under $76 billion from end-June, largely on the back of gold and royalty stocks.

The total stock market valuation of the world’s biggest mining companies is up a fairly modest 8% year to end-September and despite the good run is still $240 billion below the peak hit in the second quarter of 2022.  

Ranks, value of gold stocks swell

The value of precious metals and royalty companies climbed by a combined $42 billion, or 16% during the quarter and gold counters dominate the best performing ranks. 

Were it not for the limited tradability of stock in Russia’s Polyus, which lost some ground over the last three months despite gold’s stellar performance, bullion’s effect on the Top 50 would have been even more pronounced. 

Canada’s Alamos Gold joins the top 50 for the first time with a more than 31% jump in value, lifting it six places to number 48 with a valuation of $8.2 billion at the end of the quarter while the second quarter’s newcomer Pan American Silver (following its absorption of Yamana Gold) hangs on at no 50.

Alamos Gold last month raised its production guidance by over 20% for 2025-2026 with the inclusion of the Magino mine and its integration with its Island Gold operation in Ontario. The Toronto- based miner has long term ambitions to grow its production base to 900,000 ounces per year.

Uzbekistan is readying an IPO for Navoi Mining and Metallurgy Combinat – the world’s fourth largest gold mining company and significant uranium producer in 2025. NMMC debuted a $1 billion bond offering last week, marking the first global debt market issuance from a gold mining company since June 2023.

Navoi should easily join the ranks of gold producers in the top 50 thanks to ownership of the world’s largest gold mine, Muruntau, and annual production of 2.9 million ounces at grades and per ounce extraction costs the envy of the sector.  

The Muruntau open pit mine southwest of the Kyzylkum desert, originally developed during the Soviet era as a source of uranium, has estimated reserves of around 130 million ounces of gold. 

Goldilocks copper

Copper specialists, and those with fat gold credits, have gained a combined 36% year to date as the copper price continues to flirt with the $10,000 a tonne level, but momentum slowed dramatically during Q3 with the group contributing only $7.2 billion in added market worth during the quarter. 

Amman Mineral’s fierce rally also came to an abrupt halt during the quarter with the counter losing 18% over the three months and coming close to falling out of the top 10.

Investors who bought Amman, owner of the world’s third largest mine worldwide in terms of copper equivalent, at the IPO price in Jakarta a year ago, are still enjoying 400% gains since then, however. 

Southern Copper’s position as the world’s third most valuable mining stock seems entrenched after a double digit percentage gain in Q3 compared to a much more sedate performance by Freeport-McMoRan, which now has to gain a full $20 billion in market cap to haul in its Mexico City-based rival.

Light on lithium 

Rio Tinto’s vote of confidence in the long term future of the lithium sector (and its own ability to make M&A work) dominated the news at the start of the December-quarter but it’s worth noting that Arcadium’s more than 90% surge since the all-cash offer was first announced is not enough for the stock to enter the rankings.

Three lithium counters exited the rankings this year, Australia’s Pilbara Minerals and Mineral Resources and China’s Tianqi Lithium as the deep slump in prices for the battery metal continues to take its toll.  

Last quarter’s no 50, Ganfeng Lithium jumps six places after being swept up in the stimulus-induced rally on Chinese stock markets at the end of the quarter, while Tianqi’s performance so far in October should see it reenter the Top 50 in due course. 

Ganfeng was barely holding on at position 50 at end-June and with gold price momentum continuing and two gold mining companies waiting in the winds – Yintai and Alamos – only three lithium counters in the top 50 may be a reality for some time to come. 

After peaking in the second quarter of 2022 with a combined value of nearly $120 billion, the remaining lithium stocks’ market value has now shrunk to $34 billion.  

Iron ore ground down

Despite a modest improvement during the quarter, the mining industry’s traditional big 5 – BHP, Rio Tinto, Glencore, Vale and Anglo American – remain in the red for 2024, losing $24 billion since the start of the year. 

The big 5 diversifieds now make up 29% of the total index, down from a height of 38% at the end of 2022.  

Iron ore’s less than rosy outlook – the late boost China’s recent stimulus package notwithstanding – saw Fortescue once again feature on the biggest losers list and Cleveland Cliffs exit the ranking with the US iron ore miner’s 37% decline this year exacerbated by its inability to capitalize on the blocking of the Nippon-US Steel tie up. 

Iron ore’s representation in the top 50 have diminished in the last couple of years – Brazil’s CSN Mineração dropped out during Q1 this year while Anglo-controlled and separately-listed Kumba Iron Ore has lost touch with the top tier after a 40% fall year to date.

Click on image for full size table.

NOTES:

Source: MINING.COM, stock exchange data, company reports. Share data from primary-listed exchange at close Oct 4, 2024 close of trading converted to US$ where applicable. Percentage change based on US$ market cap difference, not share price change in local currency.  

As with any ranking, criteria for inclusion are contentious. We decided to exclude unlisted and state-owned enterprises at the outset due to a lack of information. That, of course, excludes giants like Chile’s Codelco, Uzbekistan’s Navoi Mining (the gold and uranium giant may list later this year), Eurochem, a major potash firm, and a number of entities in China and developing countries around the world.

Another central criterion was the depth of involvement in the industry before an enterprise can rightfully be called a mining company.

For instance, should smelter companies or commodity traders that own minority stakes in mining assets be included, especially if these investments have no operational component or warrant a seat on the board?

This is a common structure in Asia and excluding these types of companies removed well-known names like Japan’s Marubeni and Mitsui, Korea Zinc and Chile’s Copec. 

Levels of operational or strategic involvement and size of shareholding were other central considerations. Do streaming and royalty companies that receive metals from mining operations without shareholding qualify or are they just specialised financing vehicles? We included Franco Nevada, Royal Gold and Wheaton Precious Metals on the basis of their deep involvement in the industry.

Vertically integrated concerns like Alcoa and energy companies such as Shenhua Energy or Bayan Resources where power, ports and railways make up a large portion of revenues pose a problem. The revenue mix also tends to change alongside volatile coal prices. Same goes for battery makers like China’s CATL which is increasingly moving upstream, but where mining will continue to represent a small portion of its valuation.  

Another consideration is diversified companies such as Anglo American with separately listed majority-owned subsidiaries. We’ve included Angloplat in the ranking but excluded Kumba Iron Ore in which Anglo has a 70% stake to avoid double counting. Similarly we excluded Hindustan Zinc which is listed separately but majority owned by Vedanta.

Many steelmakers own and often operate iron ore and other metal mines, but in the interest of balance and diversity we excluded the steel industry, and with that many companies that have substantial mining assets including giants like ArcelorMittal, Magnitogorsk, Ternium, Baosteel and many others.

Head office refers to operational headquarters wherever applicable, for example BHP and Rio Tinto are shown as Melbourne, Australia, but Antofagasta is the exception that proves the rule. We consider the company’s HQ to be in London, where it has been listed since the late 1800s.

Please let us know of any errors, omissions, deletions or additions to the ranking or suggest a different methodology.

As consideration, Americas Gold will issue 170 million common shares to Sprott and pay $10 million cash. It will also issue 10 million shares priced at C$0.40 each for a total of C$4 million to certain vendors involved in the transaction.

The precious metals miner has also arranged a private placement at the same issue price to raise gross proceeds of C$40 million, and is in talks for further debt financing to improve its balance sheet as it looks to optimize and expand the Galena complex.

Following the transactions, existing Americas Gold shareholders will own approximately 53% of the company and Sprott will own 22%. The financing participants will own 19%, while management and directors will own the remaining 6%.

As part of the Galena acquisition, the company will also appoint former Karora Resources executive Paul Andre Huet as chairman and CEO to lead the next phase of its growth.

Enhanced silver leverage

The Galena complex is located in Idaho’s Silver Valley, a district famous for producing silver, lead, zinc and copper from well-known operations such as the Bunker Hill, Sunshine and Lucky Friday mines. The company’s claim holdings cover nearly 90 sq. km. and hosts three active shafts and two process facilities, one of which is producing silver concentrates.

Americas Gold acquired the project in 2014, and five years later entered a joint venture with the Sprott entity, with the company holding a 60% interest and acting as operator.

The Galena complex is currently undergoing a recapitalization plan designed to modernize its infrastructure, acquire new mining equipment and develop additional stopes for better operational flexibility.

A consolidated ownership of Galena, says Americas Gold, would provide for a focused vision centered around optimizing and expanding the operation through the utilization of existing infrastructure. “The complex is expected to be a long-term cornerstone asset supported by a robust reserve and resource base, excess mill capacity, and opportunity to grow through future exploration,” the company stated in a news release.

Galena represents one of the largest underground silver mines in North America, having produced over 240 million oz. of the precious metal for more than half a century. It reached peak production in the early 2000s, producing in excess of 5 million oz. of silver per annum.

Americas Gold’s other main asset, the 100% owned Cosalá operations, consists of the San Rafael mine, which is currently in full production, and the EC120 deposit, which has an estimated probable reserve of 2.9 million tonnes with a grade of 157 g/t silver containing 14.5 million oz.

With the recent funding for its Cosalá operations in Mexico, the company says its production, operating margins and near-term growth potential are all expected to steadily increase.

Investors would also gain higher exposure to silver, which has rallied nearly 30% this year, as approximately 80% of its revenue is expected to be generated from the metal starting in the second half of 2025.

Highlight holes include KWO-217 which cut 5 metres grading 11.21% copper and 117.89 grams silver per tonne, KWO-218 that cut 8 metres at 2.55% copper and 18.65 grams silver, and KWO-221 which cut 9 metres grading 3.93% copper and 56.13 grams silver. Those holes, part of a 3,500-metre resource upgrade program, were drilled from 105 metres depth on level 3 in Shaft 1, to the north-east and south-west of their closest historical intercepts, Trigon said.

“Even with 45 years of mining history at Kombat, the deposit continues to surprise us with new high-grade ore — even adjacent to old developments,” Trigon CEO and executive chairman Jed Richardson said in a release. “There is tremendous value in this mine yet to be realized in our market capitalization.”

Trigon restarted production at Kombat in 2022. The 15-year-life mine is expected to produce 12.1 million to 13.4 million lb. of copper next year grading 1.95% to 2.3%.

Trigon shares gained 3.4% to C$0.90 on Tuesday morning in Toronto, valuing the company at C$40.2 million. Its shares traded in a 52-week range of C$0.61 to C$1.28.

Red metal hotspot

Copper prices have been on an upswing since late September, and traded for $4.38 per lb. on Tuesday morning. Kombat, one of a handful of copper mines in Namibia, was historically among the top producers of the critical mineral in the southern African country, producing 12.5 million tonnes of ore grading 2.62% copper, 1.55% lead, and 18 grams silver per tonne between 1962 and 2008.

Other drill highlights include KWO-194, which cut 2 metres at 4.36% copper and 22.27 grams silver, and KWO-198 that cut 4 metres grading 2.83% copper and 49.75 grams silver. Both holes were drilled from 120 metres depth in level 5, and pierced the nearest historical intercepts from 80 metres and 84 metres, respectively.

Kombat hosts 2.4 million probable tonnes grading 2.4% copper and 17.4 grams silver for 58,704 tonnes copper and 41,726 kg silver in open pit, underground and stockpiled resources, according to a February update.

Kombat is located about 360 km north of the capital Windhoek, and just south of Dundee Precious Metals’ (TSX: DPM) Tsumeb polymetallic smelter.

Chakana Copper (TSXV: PERU) has elected to relinquish its option to acquire three concessions from Condor Resources (TSXV: CN) due to a lack of funding to complete its outstanding payments.

The concessions, if acquired, would make up approximately 25% of Chakana’s expanded Soledad copper-gold-silver project in Ancash, central Peru. The project is located 260 km north-northwest of Lima and 35 km south of Barrick’s Pierina mine.

The company optioned these concessions from Condor in 2017 and began exploration the same year. Since then, it has identified and drilled several targets, resulting in the discovery of additional high-grade copper-gold-silver mineralization.

Based on an initial inferred resource published in February 2022, approximately 1.2 million tonnes amenable to extraction by open pit mining methods and 4.7 million tonnes to extraction by underground mining methods are located on the Condor concessions.

Explaining the decision to relinquish the concessions, Chakana’s chairman Douglas Silver said the company was told by investors that they will not fund a project with substantial outstanding property payments. According to Silver, the remaining property payments to Condor, on top of the payments already made, “greatly exceed the current value of the property.”

“We tried over multiple months to negotiate a reasonable buyout price but were ultimately unsuccessful. While our preference is to keep the consolidated land position together, doing so only makes sense if it is economically feasible,” he said.

Chakana Copper’s stock lost C$0.01 or 28.5% during the early hours of Tuesday’s session following the latest announcement. Trading at C$0.025 apiece, the junior exploration company has a market capitalization of C$5.5 million.

While Chakana’s existing exploration permits on the Condor concessions will be cancelled, it retains the surface rights over the expanded Soledad project, including the three concessions. As such, Condor must establish an agreement with Chakana to gain access to the concessions, and will also need to start a new permitting process.

As part of a 2019 royalty purchase agreement, Condor will grant a 1% net smelter returns royalty to Chakana on the Condor concessions with a 2-sq.-km. area of interest. Condor will have the right to purchase half of the royalty for $1 million.

The company will now work on the remaining 27.8 sq. km. of the Soledad property, where it has identified numerous high-grade breccia pipes that crop out at surface as well as several porphyry targets that are being drill tested for economic mineralization.

The Anchorage-based company reported an indicated resource of 294.5 million tonnes grading 0.4 gram gold, 2 grams silver per tonne and 0.16% copper for 3.9 million oz. gold, 19 million oz. silver and 1 billion lb. of copper metal. Whistler also holds 198 million inferred tonnes at 0.7 gram gold, 1.81 grams silver and 0.07% copper for 3.3 million oz. gold, 11.5 million oz. silver and 317 million lb. copper.

US GoldMining completed its initial public offering in April 2023, netting $20 million.

The company’s CEO, Tim Smith, says the 2023 drilling program underpinned confidence in the resource update, highlighting more shallow mineralization.

“We look forward to receiving additional results from the 2024 drill hole assays which we believe will continue to support the project’s potential to host a long-life, high-quality gold-copper-silver mine in one of the most favourable mining jurisdictions in the United States,” Smith said in a news release.

The resource builds on a 2022 estimate compiled by GoldMining, which spun out US GoldMining last year to advance Whistler. It was constrained using below trailing three-year average prices for gold ($1,850 per oz.), copper ($4 per lb.) and silver ($23 per oz.).

The updated resource includes three porphyry deposits: Whistler, Raintree, and Island Mountain that occupy only 1% of the company’s total land holdings. The company is systematically exploring 12 additional targets within the so-called ‘Whistler Orbit,’ an area close to the current resources.

The resource estimate incorporates results from 2023 drilling, including hole WH23-03, which returned 547 metres grading 1.06 grams per tonne gold-equivalent. The 2024 drilling program, which has finished, added 4,006 metres of drilling in six holes, further confirming the continuity and potential of the high-grade core at the Whistler deposit.

The company believes the deposit’s high-grade centre offers opportunities for a low strip-ratio, and a high-grade starter pit, which could enhance early cash flow.

By late Monday, US GoldMining shares were trading at $13.00, giving it a market capitalization of $158 million.

The McIlvenna Bay property is in east-central Saskatchewan, about 65 km west of Flin Flon, Manitoba. The property covers approximately 20.9 sq. km.

Hole TS-24-30 intersected a wide zone of copper-rich breccia and stringer-style mineralization and zinc-rich massive sulphide. One 3.4-metre section of massive sulphide graded 4.29% copper, 8.21% zinc, 55.5 g/t silver and 0.03 g/t gold, including 0.8 metre at 7.61% copper, 9.11% zinc, 50.6 g/t silver, and 0.04 g/t gold.

A longer intersection measuring 31.2 metres of breccia and stringer mineralization graded 2.40% copper, 0.48% zinc, 19.2 g/t silver and 0.51 g/t gold, including higher-grade breccia at 4.68% copper, 0.56% zinc, 31.5 g/t silver and 1.03 g/t gold.

“The zonation from deeper zinc and gold-rich mineralization to shallower copper-dominant lenses is apparent. Through targeted infill drilling, we are enhancing our confidence and demonstrating the zone’s growing potential,” said Foran VP exploration Erin Carswell.

“These results underscore Tesla’s importance within our broader portfolio as we advance McIlvenna Bay’s construction alongside our ongoing exploration strategy, continuing to unlock the full potential of our growing district.”

Assay results are pending from six additional infill Tesla holes from this summer. Planning for he winter drill program will include more Tesla infill drilling and an expansion ice-based program from Hanson Lake.

McIlvenna Bay has probable reserves of 25.7 million tonnes at 2.51% copper equivalent containing 697 million lb. of copper and 1.4 billion lb. of zinc.

Reserves are included in an indicated resource of 39 million tonnes grading 2.04% copper equivalent for 1.0 billion lb. of copper and 1.9 billion lb. of zinc. There is also an inferred resource of 5 million tonnes grading 1.8% copper for 104 million lb. of copper and 282 million lb. of zinc.

At the end of the third quarter of 2024, the MINING.COM TOP 50* ranking of the world’s most valuable miners had a combined market capitalization of $1.51 trillion, up just under $76 billion from end-June, largely on the back of gold and royalty stocks.

The total stock market valuation of the world’s biggest mining companies is up a fairly modest 8% year to end-September and despite the good run is still $240 billion below the peak hit in the second quarter of 2022.  

Ranks, value of gold stocks swell

The value of precious metals and royalty companies climbed by a combined $42 billion or 16% during the quarter and gold counters dominate the best performing ranks. 

Were it not for the limited tradability of stock in Russia’s Polyus, which lost some ground over the three months despite gold’s stellar performance, bullion’s effect on the Top 50 would have been even more pronounced. 

Canada’s Alamos Gold joins the top 50 for the first time with a  more than 31% jump in value lifting it six places to number 48 with a valuation of $8.2 billion at the end of the quarter while the second quarter’s newcomer Pan American Silver (following its absorption of Yamana Gold) hangs on at no 50.

Alamos Gold last month raised its production guidance by over 20% for 2025-2026 with the inclusion of the Magino mine and its integration with its Island Gold operation in Ontario. The Toronto based miner has long term ambitions to grow its production base to 900,000 ounces per year.

Uzbekistan is readying an IPO for Navoi Mining and Metallurgy Combinat – the world’s fourth largest gold mining company and significant uranium producer in 2025. NMMC debuted a $1 billion bond offering last week, marking the first global debt market issuance from a gold mining company since June 2023.

Navoi should easily join the ranks of gold producers in the top 50 thanks to ownership of the world’s largest gold mine, Muruntau, and annual production of 2.9 million ounces at grades and per ounce extraction costs the envy of the sector.  

The Muruntau open pit mine southwest of the Kyzylkum desert, originally developed during the Soviet era as a source of uranium, has estimated reserves of around 130 million ounces of gold. 

Goldilocks copper

Copper specialists, and those with fat gold credits, have gained a combined 36% year to date as the copper price continues to flirt with the $10,000 a tonne level but momentum slowed dramatically during Q3 with the group contributing only $7.2 billion in added market worth during the quarter. 

Amman Mineral’s fierce rally also came to an abrupt halt during the quarter with the counter losing 18% over the three months and coming close to falling out of the top 10.

Investors who bought Amman, owner of the world’s third largest mine worldwide in terms of copper equivalent, at the IPO price in Jakarta a year ago, are still enjoying 400% gains since then however. 

Southern Copper’s position as the world’s third most valuable mining stock seems entrenched after a double digit percentage gain in Q3 compared to a much more sedate performance by Freeport-McMoRan which now has to gain a full $20 billion in market cap to haul in its Mexico City-based rival.

Light on lithium 

Rio Tinto’s vote of confidence in the long term future of the lithium sector (and its own ability to make M&A work) dominated the news at the start of the December-quarter but it’s worth noting that Arcadium’s more than 90% surge since the all-cash offer was first announced are not enough for the stock to enter the rankings.

Three lithium counters exited the rankings this year, Australia’s  Pilbara Minerals and Mineral Resources and China’s Tianqi Lithium as the deep slump in prices for the battery metal continues to take its toll.  

Last quarter’s no 50, Ganfeng Lithium jumps six places after being swept up in the stimulus-induced rally on Chinese stock markets at the end of the quarter while Tianqi’s performance so far in October should see it reenter the Top 50 in due course. 

Ganfeng was barely holding on at position 50 at end-June and with gold price momentum continuing and two gold mining companies waiting in the winds – Yintai and Alamos – only three lithium counters in the top 50 may be a reality for some time to come. 

After peaking in the second quarter of 2022 with a combined value of nearly $120 billion, the remaining lithium stocks’ market value has now shrunk to $34 billion.  

Iron ore ground down

Despite a modest improvement during the quarter, the mining industry’s traditional big 5 – BHP, Rio Tinto, Glencore, Vale and Anglo American – remain in the red for 2024, losing $24 billion since the start of the year. 

The big 5 diversifieds now make up 29% of the total index, down from a height of 38% at the end of 2022.  

Iron ore’s less than rosy outlook – the late boost China’s recent stimulus package notwithstanding – saw Fortescue once again feature on the biggest losers list and Cleveland Cliffs exit the ranking with the US iron ore miner’s 37% decline this year exacerbated by its inability to capitalize on the blocking of the Nippon-US Steel tie up. 

Iron ore’s representation in the top 50 have diminished in the last couple of years – Brazil’s CSN Mineração dropped out during Q1 this year while Anglo-controlled and separately-listed Kumba Iron Ore has lost touch with the top tier after a 40% fall year to date.

Click on image for full size table.

NOTES:

Source: MINING.COM, stock exchange data, company reports. Share data from primary-listed exchange at close Oct 4, 2024 close of trading converted to US$ where applicable. Percentage change based on US$ market cap difference, not share price change in local currency.  

As with any ranking, criteria for inclusion are contentious. We decided to exclude unlisted and state-owned enterprises at the outset due to a lack of information. That, of course, excludes giants like Chile’s Codelco, Uzbekistan’s Navoi Mining (the gold and uranium giant may list later this year), Eurochem, a major potash firm, and a number of entities in China and developing countries around the world.

Another central criterion was the depth of involvement in the industry before an enterprise can rightfully be called a mining company.

For instance, should smelter companies or commodity traders that own minority stakes in mining assets be included, especially if these investments have no operational component or warrant a seat on the board?

This is a common structure in Asia and excluding these types of companies removed well-known names like Japan’s Marubeni and Mitsui, Korea Zinc and Chile’s Copec. 

Levels of operational or strategic involvement and size of shareholding were other central considerations. Do streaming and royalty companies that receive metals from mining operations without shareholding qualify or are they just specialised financing vehicles? We included Franco Nevada, Royal Gold and Wheaton Precious Metals on the basis of their deep involvement in the industry.

Vertically integrated concerns like Alcoa and energy companies such as Shenhua Energy or Bayan Resources where power, ports and railways make up a large portion of revenues pose a problem. The revenue mix also tends to change alongside volatile coal prices. Same goes for battery makers like China’s CATL which is increasingly moving upstream, but where mining will continue to represent a small portion of its valuation.  

Another consideration is diversified companies such as Anglo American with separately listed majority-owned subsidiaries. We’ve included Angloplat in the ranking but excluded Kumba Iron Ore in which Anglo has a 70% stake to avoid double counting. Similarly we excluded Hindustan Zinc which is listed separately but majority owned by Vedanta.

Many steelmakers own and often operate iron ore and other metal mines, but in the interest of balance and diversity we excluded the steel industry, and with that many companies that have substantial mining assets including giants like ArcelorMittal, Magnitogorsk, Ternium, Baosteel and many others.

Head office refers to operational headquarters wherever applicable, for example BHP and Rio Tinto are shown as Melbourne, Australia, but Antofagasta is the exception that proves the rule. We consider the company’s HQ to be in London, where it has been listed since the late 1800s.

Please let us know of any errors, omissions, deletions or additions to the ranking or suggest a different methodology.

Silver demand has outstripped supply for three straight years and the Silver Institute projects another market deficit in 2024. This is primarily due to rapidly rising industrial demand, specifically in the solar energy sector.

In 2023, the silver market charted a structural deficit of 184.3 million ounces. The projection is for an even larger supply shortfall this year in the neighborhood of 215 million ounces. This would be the second-largest silver market deficit ever recorded.

Meanwhile, mine output has sagged since peaking in 2016.

This raises an important question: Can silver miners respond and restore the market balance?

There are significant challenges.

According to Metals Focus, silver mine production peaked at 900.1 million ounces in 2016. At the time, the price of silver averaged around $13.30 an ounce. Since 2016, the average price has increased to $20.70 an ounce. Today, the price is well over $31 an ounce.

But mine production has yet to respond to the higher price. Metals Focus projects mine output will come in 62.8 million ounces lower than that 2016 peak, a 7 percent decline.

Metals Focus forecasts that while we will see record silver prices over the next five years, “mine supply growth is likely to remain modest, with only minimal increases globally.”

Why won’t silver production ramp up to meet the demand and take advantage of these higher prices?

Metals Focus blames the price inelasticity on the fact that more than half of silver is mined as a byproduct of base metal operations.

“Although silver can be a significant revenue stream, the economics and production plans of these mines are primarily driven by the markets for copper, lead and zinc. Consequently, even significant increases in silver prices are unlikely to influence production plans that are dependent on other metals.” 

About 28 percent of the silver supply is derived from primary silver mines, where production is more tightly tied to price. But silver mines face their own challenges including declining ore grades and rapidly rising mining costs.

Ore grades have fallen by about 22 percent, meaning the silver price has to rise that much to maintain margins.

Metals Focus summarized the cost challenges facing silver miners.

“Rising production costs have further constrained silver supply. Despite higher silver prices, operating costs in many cases have outpaced revenue growth, leading to little or no improvement in operating cash flow for silver-focused mining companies. Moreover, capital expenditure requirements have continued to rise, with mining cost inflation requiring increasing investment just to maintain current production levels. As a result, many silver miners have been free cash f low negative in recent years.”

If silver prices rise as projected, mines will reach a threshold where higher revenues translate into improved free cash flow.

“At that point, the future of primary silver mine supply will depend on how management allocates capital.”

Even if mining companies allocate significant resources to finding new sources of silver and developing new mines it will take time for production to ramp up and ease the supply shortage. According to Metals Focus, “It is implausible that new production could balance the current deficits over the short to medium term. For those shortfalls to end, we are instead dependent on recycling and demand to react to the forecast price rally.”

For the next few years at least, we will have to depend on drawdowns of above-ground stocks to meet the supply deficit.