The chart for Newmont Corporation (NEM +0.17%) is, shall we say, interesting. Not interesting in the way a particularly well-organized spreadsheet is interesting, but in the way that discovering a previously unknown species of mildly disgruntled space slug is interesting. It’s a line that appears to have been drawn by someone attempting to navigate a particularly bumpy asteroid field whilst simultaneously balancing a stack of pancakes. For decades it wobbled, occasionally brushing the $86 mark (a figure which, statistically speaking, is almost entirely arbitrary), before deciding, approximately a year ago, that gravity was merely a suggestion.
Now, if you’d been possessed by the rather sensible notion of investing $1,000 in Newmont stock a year ago – a decision that, in the grand scheme of things, is approximately as likely as a penguin winning the Kentucky Derby – that $1,000 would currently be worth around $2,650. Yes, you read that correctly. A significant increase, even after the recent, rather unsettling dip coinciding with global geopolitical anxieties and the fluctuating price of shiny metal. (The fluctuations, of course, being due to a complex interplay of supply, demand, and the enduring human fascination with things that don’t tarnish easily.)
What’s Actually Happening with Newmont?
Newmont, you see, is the world’s largest gold mining company. This means they spend a considerable amount of time and resources digging up something that, fundamentally, is utterly useless. And yet, people want it. A lot. (It’s a bit like collecting bottle caps, really, but with more zeroes attached.) This demand, combined with a recent surge in gold prices – hitting an all-time high of $5,608.35 per ounce in January 2026 – has been… beneficial. Their average realized gold price jumped 45%, and free cash flow reached a record $7.3 billion on net income of $7.2 billion in 2025. (One assumes they’re building a very large, very shiny vault.)
They’ve also been rather sensible about things, repaying $3.4 billion in debt and returning another $3.4 billion to shareholders through dividends and share repurchases. (Presumably, so those shareholders can buy even more useless shiny metal.)
Is Newmont Still Worth a Punt?
Currently, Newmont holds more cash than debt. Which is… unusual for a company that spends its days excavating the Earth’s crust. (It’s a bit like a squirrel having a surplus of nuts, if the nuts were incredibly heavy and required specialized machinery to collect.)
They’re guiding for slightly softer results in 2026 due to lower production, and the stock has understandably wobbled a bit amidst all the geopolitical noise and the aforementioned price fluctuations. However, a recovery in gold prices could, naturally, offset that. And their impressively robust balance sheet should help them navigate the inevitable commodity cycles. (Which, let’s be honest, are mostly just a lot of numbers going up and down in a seemingly random fashion.)
In the grand, utterly improbable scheme of things, Newmont is, at the very least, a fascinating case study in the enduring human desire for things that are, fundamentally, not particularly useful. And that, in itself, is worth pondering.
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2026-03-09 15:02