Latest / Kitco MINING / Gold Stocks May Finally Be Ready to Outperform | John Hathaway

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Gold Stocks May Finally Be Ready to Outperform | John Hathaway · Kitco MINING

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_02: Kitco Mining on-site coverage of the Precious Metal Summit is presented by Newcore Gold.
• 0:10
  SPEAKER_01: Hello and welcome to Kitco Mining with me, Paul Harris, here at the 2026 Precious Metal Summit in Beaver Creek, Colorado.
• 0:17
  SPEAKER_01: We're kicking off day two with uh one of the legends in the gold investment space.
• 0:22
  SPEAKER_01: A great pleasure to be joined by John Hathaway, managing partner at Sprot Asset Management.
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_01: John, welcome back to Kitko.
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you, Paul.
• 0:29
  SPEAKER_01: John, I want to start off taking advantage of this opportunity by there's a lot going on today that I want to get into with you, but uh I want to sort of perhaps couch that into a broader context.
• 0:39
  SPEAKER_01: And so maybe if we can sort of go back to sort of the early days of your career uh when you started out as an equity analyst in the 1970s, what was it that sort of drew you to investing and when did sort of gold become a serious part of uh your thinking and what you do?
• 0:56
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I I had a whole other career before I got involved in gold.
• 1:00
  SPEAKER_00: Um I followed um uh paper and forest product stocks, uh resource stocks in general, um, and um I did that for a number of years, probably a decade and a half, and then I went to the uh buy side with a value firm, David J.
• 1:18
  SPEAKER_00: Green, which no longer exists.
• 1:20
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, every firm I worked with no longer exists.
• 1:23
  SPEAKER_01: So is that the kiss of death or so much success that people buy you?
• 1:28
  SPEAKER_00: It was me.
• 1:28
  SPEAKER_00: I think it was just the evolution of the uh of the business.
• 1:32
  SPEAKER_00: And then um in 98 I joined a former colleague of mine from David J.
• 1:38
  SPEAKER_00: Green at Tocqueville Asset Management, and uh we um were a contrarian value firm, which was kind of what I had become at that stage, and um uh we decided to launch a gold fund.
• 1:54
  SPEAKER_00: And uh we did that in um June of '98 with ten million dollars of our money and clients' money, and it grew to three billion over the next uh 15 years or so.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_00: So that was a big success, but it basically kind of got me full-time, 100% into uh the space that we are we're in now.
• 2:18
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, and Tocqueville was eventually acquired by Sprout in 2020, if I'm not mistaken.
• 2:23
  SPEAKER_00: My my my business at Tocqueville was acquired by Sprout in 2020.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_01: How has being at Sprout changed the the what you can do as an investor?
• 2:32
  SPEAKER_01: Is it just John, you're doing great, carry on, or you know, we'd like you to sort of perhaps do something a little bit different?
• 2:38
  SPEAKER_00: No, it was a it was the idea that uh the uh Sprout was looking for an active manager, which is what I am and my team is.
• 2:47
  SPEAKER_00: Um and um just to kind of fill out their suite of what they do.
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_00: When I joined Sprat in 2020, I think the AUMs were they were less than uh 15 billion, let's say, and today they're almost 60.
• 3:01
  SPEAKER_01: Wow, that's quite a bit of growth.
• 3:03
  SPEAKER_01: Now you've invested through cycles of inflation, deflation, financial crisis, technology bubbles, uh, several commodity cycles, of course.
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_01: Which period or or what kind of situation has done the most to shape your approach to investing in the sector?
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_00: I would say all of the above.
• 3:20
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, frankly, um uh to me, gold is an all-weather strategy, not recognized as such.
• 3:27
  SPEAKER_00: It's usually thought of as kind of a doomsday um uh solution to all the worries that are out there on the front pages and maybe have yet to pop up.
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_00: Um but uh gold's a diversifier, um, and that's been academically justified and proven.
• 3:46
  SPEAKER_00: Um I like to say that gold has outperformed the SP since 20 uh since 2000, uh, which was kind of the dawn of radical monetary experimentation by the central banks.
• 3:58
  SPEAKER_00: Um it's it's done it by, you know, not a huge amount, but it's it's actually it's not only kept pace, but uh beat the SP with dividends reinvested.
• 4:09
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 4:09
  SPEAKER_01: Over the course of your career, I think it would be fair to say that more information has become available, more tools have become available.
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_01: Has the mining industry therefore become easier to analyze and invest in over the years, or have there been other things that continue to um make it sort of complicated and challenging?
• 4:27
  SPEAKER_00: It's always challenging.
• 4:29
  SPEAKER_00: Um but I think it's a better industry than it was um at the last peak of the gold price, which was um 2011.
• 4:39
  SPEAKER_00: I remember it well.
• 4:41
  SPEAKER_00: Um I think the industry has come a long way in terms of capital allocation, uh just general financial management, all of that sort of thing.
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_00: And obviously today it's it's way more profitable than it's been in in any any time in my history that since 2098 that that uh that I've seen.
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_00: So um it's changed in that way.
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_00: But it's it's it's always complicated.
• 5:05
  SPEAKER_00: Uh it's really if you look at a bottoms-up kind of analysis, every asset's got differences, every jurisdiction has differences.
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_00: We we dig into all of that.
• 5:15
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 5:16
  SPEAKER_01: It I think it's very interesting and pertinent you talk about how the financial management of the gold miners has improved.
• 5:22
  SPEAKER_01: Do you think they've sort of completed that task or is there still more for them to do to No, I think it's ongoing.
• 5:27
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, one thing um be in my bonnet is um I think that the way they present their story could could be improved vastly.
• 5:37
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I I've I've seen like 25 different presentations in this last couple days.
• 5:44
  SPEAKER_00: I'll see a few more today.
• 5:46
  SPEAKER_00: And they really need to do a better job about laying out the investment thesis.
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_00: Why should we, or why should anyone invest in this particular stock?
• 5:58
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, that should be on page one.
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_00: And you don't see that.
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_01: John, you you you you're preaching to the choir here.
• 6:04
  SPEAKER_01: That this is a real bee in my bonnet as well.
• 6:06
  SPEAKER_01: Um I I watch Shark Tank a lot.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_01: What does the shark say?
• 6:08
  SPEAKER_01: And everyone, what's your business plan?
• 6:10
  SPEAKER_01: Give me your three things you're gonna do.
• 6:12
  SPEAKER_01: Nobody has that in their presentation.
• 6:15
  SPEAKER_00: They they um I'm not sure why.
• 6:19
  SPEAKER_00: Um it is that way, but it's not it's an easy fix.
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_00: I think I it hasn't really been articulated.
• 6:24
  SPEAKER_00: I think Ronnie Stoferley uh brought it up the other day, and I think he makes a great point that this industry could be way better to attract generalists.
• 6:34
  SPEAKER_00: Generalists are not interested in drill holes, they're interested in um financial management, cash generation, growth if there is any, um, what if if there are problems?
• 6:47
  SPEAKER_00: There always there's always something within any individual company that's particular to say to why is it gonna go from A to B.
• 6:55
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 6:56
  SPEAKER_01: Investors wanna hear a concept, they want to know how you're gonna increase value, how long is it gonna take, and how much is it gonna cost.
• 7:04
  SPEAKER_01: Doesn't need to be more complicated than it's quite simple.
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_00: But they make it make it complicated.
• 7:08
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that that could be one reason that the generalists they'll come into it, but that's why the generalists have generally avoided it, and it's so much easier for a generalist to invest in the metal.
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_00: And frankly, the returns over a long period of time have not been that different.
• 7:27
  SPEAKER_00: I think that's gonna change, but um so far, uh much easier sale to get somebody to understand the thesis for investing in gold, the protection it offers, the diversification it offers, and then you know, and then you don't have to do any any forensic work on the underlying assets.
• 7:48
  SPEAKER_00: Um the reason you would invest in a gold stock in my mind, and it's starting to play out, is is the torque that you get relative to uh directional changes in the gold price.
• 8:00
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 8:00
  SPEAKER_01: Um I'd like to touch on another point that Ton Ronnie talks about quite a lot, and that is the fact that most gold producers do not hold any bullion on their balance sheet.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_01: Um he's he he wrote about this earlier this year, he presented quite a quite a compelling argument for that from you know protecting your the assets for if you're really if you really think the gold price is gonna go up, you you can benefit from that appreciation.
• 8:23
  SPEAKER_01: What why don't companies do it?
• 8:27
  SPEAKER_00: I think I think w what's missing and what I haven't seen.
• 8:34
  SPEAKER_00: Now it used to used to be the case, but in the last thirty years or so, you don't see very many C-suites that actually champion the product that they that they produce.
• 8:45
  SPEAKER_00: Um now I'm not saying that a mining engineer should be conversant with all the all the mining issues, but there should at least be some sense that that gold is uh it's a form of money, um, it's it's scarce, uh, it's hard to get, and um, you know, they don't have to be uh chapter and verse on all the macro arguments, but they they need to uh you need to see more of an awareness of what they're doing, what they're producing, which is very different than you know, uh everyday industrial company.
• 9:17
  SPEAKER_00: So should they should they stockpile gold on the balance sheet?
• 9:21
  SPEAKER_00: I think that's kind of a yes, it it but but you don't want to bet the ranch on that.
• 9:27
  SPEAKER_00: I mean they have to generate cash, which is what they do by selling the selling the metal.
• 9:33
  SPEAKER_00: But yeah, but in the at a time like this when they're flush, why wouldn't you have some of your treasury invested in the metal?
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 9:43
  SPEAKER_01: And going back to your points earlier about the improved financial management, it would seem to be remiss of the management of the the bigger gold producers who have perhaps had more than a billion dollars in cash on their balance sheets for five years.
• 9:55
  SPEAKER_01: Over five years, the the purchasing power of that cash has diminished considerably.
• 10:00
  SPEAKER_01: Um so that would seem to be perhaps irresponsible.
• 10:03
  SPEAKER_00: Uh I wouldn't I wouldn't quite go that far.
• 10:06
  SPEAKER_00: But uh but it I do think the the point isn't lost.
• 10:10
  SPEAKER_00: Um having too much cash uh is is not necessarily have that's what we you could you would call a lazy balance sheet.
• 10:18
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah, it should either be deployed in share buyback, uh returning it to shareholders in higher dividends and share buybacks, um, maybe judicious acquisitions and bullion.
• 10:32
  SPEAKER_00: So I mean, but it um I think it's again it's all case-specific.
• 10:37
  SPEAKER_00: Um of these companies are actually investing in growth.
• 10:41
  SPEAKER_00: Um so you know that they don't have free cash, and so you can't blame them for not having physical metal.
• 10:48
  SPEAKER_00: But yeah, the big guys, they should they should make it make a statement.
• 10:52
  SPEAKER_01: I imagine this is gonna become more of a sort of challenge for them if high metals prices persist because they are making very, very good margins.
• 11:00
  SPEAKER_01: They are increasing their returns to shareholders through buybacks and increasing dividends, but they're still, as you say, perhaps having lazy balance sheets with too much cash just uh sitting there.
• 11:08
  SPEAKER_01: Um maybe there's um some scarring from the down cycle, they feel they need that added happy.
• 11:14
  SPEAKER_00: There's a memory of uh of the uh yeah, so the the lean times, the early post-2011, maybe through the mid-teens, late teens, was was hard times.
• 11:27
  SPEAKER_00: It was like kind of a nuclear winner for the industry.
• 11:30
  SPEAKER_00: And so, well, there's but but by and large, there's sort of institutional memory of that, but by and large, from what I've seen um over the last decade, there's been a huge amount of change at the top in the industry and and and for the better, I would say.
• 11:44
  SPEAKER_01: Now, with companies, the the the bigger producers being flushed with cash, obviously they're exploiting uh resources that's um uh uh declining and degrading.
• 11:54
  SPEAKER_01: There doesn't seem to be perhaps an urgency to replenish their pipelines by buying other companies, which is obviously uh a legitimate use of uh the money they're generating.
• 12:05
  SPEAKER_01: Why do you think that is?
• 12:07
  SPEAKER_01: Would you expect there at this point in the cycle, would you expect to see more buying of other companies, buying of the smaller companies, buying the development assets?
• 12:16
  SPEAKER_00: I think that's that's just around the corner.
• 12:18
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, we've seen some MA uh bolt-on acquisitions and you know larger mergers.
• 12:24
  SPEAKER_00: Um and the cash, uh it's kind of burning a hole in their pockets.
• 12:29
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, you what to do with it?
• 12:31
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, you know, we've talked about share buybacks, we've talked about dividend increases, we've talked about maybe stockpiling bullion.
• 12:38
  SPEAKER_00: Um but um and of course the valuation of everything in the space has gone up.
• 12:44
  SPEAKER_00: But at the end of the day, when you look at the margins that the companies are generating today, um and the and the valuation in the space, which is ridic ridiculously low, um, especially if you have a positive view of the gold price, yeah, there there's there's work to be done on the MA side.
• 13:04
  SPEAKER_01: Given your your viewpoint there that um the gold and silver equities are still historically inexpensive, where do you see the sort of best opportunities for investment at the moment?
• 13:14
  SPEAKER_01: You know, when you put your sort of fund management ad on, where where do you see the you know the best risk reward?
• 13:20
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I think generally speaking, the the the the I think that the the the day has come for the gold stocks to start to really perform.
• 13:31
  SPEAKER_00: Um and that's without any sort of increase in the gold price.
• 13:34
  SPEAKER_00: If the gold price goes up more and further, uh, and I think there's a lot of potential for that, um you could you could almost throw darts.
• 13:45
  SPEAKER_00: I yeah, you we would never do that, but you you almost could.
• 13:48
  SPEAKER_00: But I would say you would you would want a good mix of solid big cap producers, uh uh and um and then uh look for the growth stories, look for the takeout candidates.
• 14:01
  SPEAKER_00: And we we do this every day, and uh there's there's a lot, as I say, there's lots to be done.
• 14:06
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, so um you you mentioned the big producers, the medium producers, the developers.
• 14:12
  SPEAKER_01: It sounds like there's a lot of opportunity in those, so perhaps you don't need to take on the risk of the explorers at the moment.
• 14:18
  SPEAKER_00: No, you don't.
• 14:19
  SPEAKER_00: Uh but uh but the when you when you think about it, um, and you like go back to um you know pre-2011, there was huge money made in the in the small cap names.
• 14:32
  SPEAKER_00: Um and I'm hearing, you know, like every s every every half hour I have a new story, or not a new story, but we uh obviously talk to companies we own.
• 14:41
  SPEAKER_00: But there's a lot of um first of all, there are a lot of bright people in the space.
• 14:47
  SPEAKER_00: There are a lot of ambitious younger teams that are building building companies.
• 14:53
  SPEAKER_00: Um and you know, we always look at um I mean the questions that we always ask are, you know, when if if you're a developer, when's that cash going to start to happen?
• 15:04
  SPEAKER_00: And you know, some of them you're gonna have to wait for five or six years.
• 15:07
  SPEAKER_00: And maybe, maybe that's too long a wait for the way we do things.
• 15:11
  SPEAKER_00: But if it's if it's like in a year or two years, that's that's exciting.
• 15:16
  SPEAKER_00: That can be exciting, especially if it's not properly priced.
• 15:20
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 15:20
  SPEAKER_01: Um the producers, the average all-in sustaining cost at the moment is around sort of$1,900 US dollars per ounce, which means they're getting an all-in-sustaining cost margin of$2,000 to$2,400 per ounce.
• 15:33
  SPEAKER_01: Um that's obviously very, very strong and explains why they're having very strong free cash flows and very strong record cash positions.
• 15:40
  SPEAKER_01: How sustainable do you think these sort of margins are, 60, 70% all-in-sustaining cost margin?
• 15:45
  SPEAKER_01: Or should investors expect that sooner or later labor costs, energy costs, equipment costs, government take, all of these things are gonna eat into those margins?
• 15:54
  SPEAKER_00: Well, if we just stay here at in the mid-4000s, yeah, inflation is, you know, I just I can never understand the two percent number that the Fed talks about, which they've never done, which we've never had in, you know, years and years.
• 16:09
  SPEAKER_00: But you know, the the I think the the the rate of inflation, especially for um CapEx, um, you know, forget labor.
• 16:19
  SPEAKER_00: Labor is a huge issue too.
• 16:20
  SPEAKER_00: But it's uh it's more like 10 percent.
• 16:23
  SPEAKER_00: And I don't know if the if the you know, I think to me that's a better read on the rate of inflation than these these ridiculous numbers that the Fed and and people who follow the Fed parse uh every day on TV.
• 16:35
  SPEAKER_00: Um I think the real inflation number, just based on the real world that we see, the mining companies, is is it's not it's not two percent, it's probably eight, nine, could be ten percent.
• 16:48
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, so far the gold price has been accelerating more than cost.
• 16:52
  SPEAKER_01: So you've Yes, yeah.
• 16:53
  SPEAKER_00: You we've had a margins have expanded.
• 16:55
  SPEAKER_00: But if we sort of mark time here for let's say two years, three years in the mid 4000s for the gold price, I think you will see you you of course will see margins uh um uh constrained.
• 17:10
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 17:11
  SPEAKER_01: The the gold price hit an all-time high of over 5,000 US dollars per ounce earlier this year.
• 17:15
  SPEAKER_01: It's pulled back, pulled back down to sort of 4,000.
• 17:18
  SPEAKER_01: We're currently at what, 4,200, 4,300.
• 17:21
  SPEAKER_01: We seem to be in a bit of a consolidation phase.
• 17:23
  SPEAKER_01: Uh speaking with uh Ronnie Stirfley yesterday, he said you know the the thesis still stands for gold to eventually move up towards eight thousand nine hundred dollars per ounce.
• 17:32
  SPEAKER_01: That's his uh That's his number.
• 17:33
  SPEAKER_01: That's his number in I think he said, you know, by within five years.
• 17:37
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, no, it's a very logical case.
• 17:40
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 17:40
  SPEAKER_01: Um what what what for you what would indicate that the gold cycle is perhaps becoming speculative and approaching its later stages?
• 17:50
  SPEAKER_00: Well, what we saw earlier this year, you saw a parabolic rise in the price of gold and silver and the stocks.
• 17:58
  SPEAKER_00: And you oh you you know, I've been in these mark in markets for over 50 years.
• 18:03
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, that that was a that was an important top.
• 18:07
  SPEAKER_00: Um and I'm I would be very happy if we sort of got through the rest of this year kind of where we are.
• 18:14
  SPEAKER_00: And you know, maybe you know, I think um shares are up year to date, thinking about GDX, roughly 11%, something like that.
• 18:22
  SPEAKER_00: The gold price is flat.
• 18:24
  SPEAKER_00: I'd be I'd be delighted if that was the year-end number.
• 18:27
  SPEAKER_00: Because I think you need to consolidate, burn off that that excessive uh sentiment um that we saw at the end of January.
• 18:37
  SPEAKER_00: And then, you know, and then you you know, I think we're you're right.
• 18:41
  SPEAKER_00: It's the consolidation phase.
• 18:43
  SPEAKER_00: It's good, it needs to it needs to happen.
• 18:46
  SPEAKER_00: Sentiment, I think, has dropped down quite a bit.
• 18:49
  SPEAKER_00: So you look at all those things, um, I think we're a way better place than we than we were.
• 18:54
  SPEAKER_00: So I but I think that was kind of an intermediate top.
• 18:57
  SPEAKER_00: And you know, I agree with Ronnie, it could it could double from here.
• 19:00
  SPEAKER_00: I think it could be in five digits.
• 19:02
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 19:03
  SPEAKER_01: Now we we um spoken about a lot of things, but um one of the key things is that the people in the gold sector often talk about is you know, when are the generalists gonna show up?
• 19:13
  SPEAKER_01: Um the the the SP 500, that's been very strong.
• 19:16
  SPEAKER_01: Tech strong stocks have been very strong.
• 19:19
  SPEAKER_01: When are investors gonna start cycling into the resource stocks?
• 19:23
  SPEAKER_01: We're seeing gold producers with record margins, record cash flow really strengthening their businesses.
• 19:29
  SPEAKER_01: Is that what it's gonna take to have the generalists start taking positions again in the in the mining space?
• 19:36
  SPEAKER_00: Um I think that's part of it.
• 19:38
  SPEAKER_00: I think I think one thing that really has to happen is that the generalist investor has to lose confidence in his current positioning.
• 19:47
  SPEAKER_00: And that would be bonds.
• 19:48
  SPEAKER_00: When you know we're seeing every day, you know, bonds are just just a uh horror story.
• 19:54
  SPEAKER_00: Um so I think um, you know, some migration out of bonds.
• 20:00
  SPEAKER_00: I think if we see uh a kind of drawdown like we saw in 2000, the dot-com bust, and god forbid we have another GFC like we had in 07, 08, um, though those would be the events that I would I would say would make people rethink their positioning.
• 20:18
  SPEAKER_00: And I think in the process they they will discover gold as a safe haven.
• 20:22
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, and um they'll look at say, you know, how can I enhance this exposure?
• 20:28
  SPEAKER_00: So we're beginning to see it, but you look at GDX again, flows are are pathetic.
• 20:35
  SPEAKER_00: Um you look at GLD, I mean it's way up, but it has fewer tons in it globally, all the all the various iterations of GLD, gold-backed ETFs, are lower than they were five years ago, and that's incredible to me.
• 20:51
  SPEAKER_00: So and and and if you do a census of exposure um to just gold to metal, it's it's it's like one or two percent.
• 21:01
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, it's hard to get good numbers, but it's not ten percent.
• 21:04
  SPEAKER_00: And I I think if you if if you know if people take someone like Mike Wilson or Morgan Stanley at his word, 20% in gold instead of 40% in bonds, 20% bonds, 20% gold, I mean that that you could easily uh get to a five-digit number in the gold price.
• 21:22
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 21:23
  SPEAKER_01: Well, let's end uh John by sort of looking forwards and looking backwards at the same time.
• 21:27
  SPEAKER_01: Um people learn by looking backwards and you know, looking at what happened, analyzing it, drawing conclusions from that, looking at their mistakes, learning from those.
• 21:35
  SPEAKER_01: When investors look back in five years' time to the present period, what do you think will seem obvious in hindsight?
• 21:44
  SPEAKER_00: I think I think they'll see that um the jet the the the the the the S P is has been has been driven by a small number of stocks, high concentration in an investment thesis, AI, uh, and all the iterations of that that was uh way overdone.
• 22:06
  SPEAKER_00: I think to me it's obvious today, but I think we but in five years I would be astonished if there wasn't a big setback in that whole thesis, and we could talk forever about why that would be the case.
• 22:19
  SPEAKER_01: I mean that would seem to be perhaps an echo to the dot-com boom.
• 22:22
  SPEAKER_00: Then that's that's an echo to the dot-com boom.
• 22:24
  SPEAKER_00: I also think that the the the the fiscal issues that are becoming increasingly obvious, and the reason why bonds are having such a hard time.
• 22:33
  SPEAKER_00: I think you'll see you'll you'll people will say, yeah, I saw that coming, but why didn't I do anything about it?
• 22:40
  SPEAKER_00: Um But I think those are the two things that uh you know I could mention private equity, you could mention a bunch of other things.
• 22:47
  SPEAKER_00: The geopolitical thing um is way more uh troubling today than it would have been five years ago.
• 22:57
  SPEAKER_00: And and and yet most investors in my mind are s are whistling past the graveyard there, and they'll say, Well, they're gonna fix it all, you know.
• 23:05
  SPEAKER_00: We're the the Iranians will come to their sense, and you know, to me, the you know, the toothpaste is out of the tube in that whole thing.
• 23:12
  SPEAKER_00: And that to me, that has a life of its own, which I you know it's scary, but it's but it's definitely I think that the markets are not positioned for what to me are reasonably uh justifiable outcomes there, which is like a prolonged um mess.
• 23:30
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, holding on until we can't hold on any longer.
• 23:33
  SPEAKER_01: So this has been fantastic.
• 23:36
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, I really appreciate you spending some time with us today.
• 23:38
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you.
• 23:38
  SPEAKER_01: John Hathway, thank you very much for joining me.
• 23:40
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you, Paul.
• 23:41
  SPEAKER_01: We have a lot more to come from the 2026 Precious Metal Summit here in Beaver Creek, Colorado.
• 23:47
  SPEAKER_01: So stay tuned and hit that subscribe button.
• 23:50
  SPEAKER_02: I'm Paul Harris, and this is Kitco Mining.
• 23:53
  SPEAKER_02: Kitco Mining on site coverage of the Precious Metal Summit is presented by New Core Gold.