we’ve recommenced coverage of four senior gold miners newmont nem with a fair value estimate of 54 barrick gold gold with a fair value estimate of 21 agnico eagle mines aem with a fair value estimate of 53 and kinross gold kgc with a fair value estimate of 520 per share we do not think any of these companies has an economic moat newmont barrick and agnico eagle have medium uncertainty ratings kinross’ high uncertainty rating partly reflects its greater financial leverage we think the shares of newmont and barrick are undervalued trading at discounts to fair value of 10 and 8 respectively while agnico eagle trades at an 8 premium and kinross appears fairly valued spot gold prices have risen recently to around 2000 per ounce on fears regarding the stability of the financial system as well as a potential recession while higher gold prices are a tailwind concerns remain over rising interest rates which increase the opportunity cost to hold gold and cost inflation gold investment lacks cash flows for owners and rising yields make bonds relatively more attractive meanwhile inflation in labor fuel and other costs is pushing up the cost curve and affecting gold miners’ margins we now assume gold averages about 1880 per ounce from 2023 to 2025 based on the futures curve up from around 1810 previously we’ve also raised our assumed midcycle price for gold to 1700 per ounce from 2026 up from about 1600 this reflects rising unit costs and our updated estimate of the marginal cost of production utilizing the latest cost curve data from the world gold council gold has a price that tends to be relatively uncorrelated to the broader economic cycle in addition it has perceived countercyclical safehaven investment attributes while also being seen as an inflation hedge investment and jewelry take up most of global gold demand and a demand slowdown is the key risk to cash flows a reduction in chinese fixedasset investment lowering demand for copper would also have some impact newmont is the world’s largest gold miner producing around 6 million attributable ounces of gold in 2022 and accounting for about 5 of total 2022 mined production newmont’s allin sustaining cost of around 1200 per ounce in 2022 places the company toward the upper end of the second quartile of the gold aisc curve—not low enough to justify a moat in our view we forecast newmont will increase attributable gold production to around 64 million ounces in 2027 the increase is driven by higher gold production from the company’s 385 stake in the nevada gold mines joint venture with barrick along with its mines in ghana and 40 stake in the pueblo viejo mine in the dominican republic this is partially offset by falling production at its yanacocha mine which will reach the end of its life toward the end of our fiveyear forecast period newmont’s 385 share in ngm and the ahafo and boddington mines account for roughly 45 of midcycle production in 2027 barrick is the world’s secondlargest gold miner producing nearly 41 million attributable ounces of gold and about 440 million pounds of copper in 2022 barrick’s aisc of around 1200 per ounce in 2022 places the company toward the upper end of the second quartile of the gold aisc curve which is also not low enough to justify a moat we forecast barrick to increase attributable gold production to around 46 million ounces in 2027 driven by increased production at its ngm joint venture with newmont and its 60owned pueblo viejo mine in the dominican republic its share of the ngm joint venture pueblo viejo and loulogounkoto account for around two thirds of barrick’s midcycle production in 2027 agnico eagle produced around 31 million ounces of gold in 2022 making it the world’s thirdlargest gold miner it is lowercost than its larger competitors newmont and barrick with its aisc of roughly 1100 per ounce in 2022 placing agnico around the middle of the second quartile of the gold cost curve however similar to newmont and barrick we don’t think its unit costs are low enough to justify a moat we forecast agnico eagle’s gold production to be about 36 million ounces in 2027 this is driven by the purchase of the remaining 50 of its canadian malartic mine in 2023 and increased production at its macassa meadowbank and detour lake mines partially offset by lower production at its fosterville mine in australia detour lake canadian malartic meadowbank meliadine and laronde account for more than 70 of agnico eagle’s midcycle production in 2027 rounding out the additions to our coverage list kinross produced more than 19 million attributable gold equivalent ounces in 2022 kinross has the highest unit costs of the gold miners that we cover its average aisc of roughly 1300 per gold equivalent ounce in 2022 places kinross at around the 55th percentile of the gold cost curve we forecast kinross’ attributable production to modestly decline to about 18 million gold equivalent ounces in 2027 kinross’ paracatu mine in brazil and tasiast mine in mauritania account for more than half of its midcycle production in 2027 remove the guesswork and make informed decisions faster morningstar investor’s stock ratings analysis and insights are all backed by our transparent meticulous methodology learn more and start a sevenday free trial today