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Gold Miners Are Leaving Value on the Table in M&A | Warren Irwin · Kitco MINING

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_01: Kitco Mining on-site coverage of the Precious Metal Summit is presented by Newcore Gold.
• 0:11
  SPEAKER_00: What ails the gold sector?
• 0:13
  SPEAKER_00: Hello and welcome to Kitco Mining with me, Paul Harris, here at the 2026 Precious Metal Summit in Beaver Creek, Colorado.
• 0:19
  SPEAKER_00: Today I'm joined by Warren Erin, President and CIO Chief Investment Officer of Rosso Asset Management.
• 0:26
  SPEAKER_00: Warren, welcome back to Kitco.
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_00: Well, thanks for having me, Paul.
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_00: It's been far too long since we've sat down like this.
• 0:31
  SPEAKER_00: A lot of water's gone under the bridge, but that means we've got a lot of things to catch up on and talk about.
• 0:36
  SPEAKER_00: Top of the agenda has got to be gold and the gold price.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_00: What's your view?
• 0:47
  SPEAKER_00: What's your take on where we are with the gold price?
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_02: Well, there's one thing in life that's guaranteed uh in the investment world that I've seen, and that is uh the irresponsible spending of governments.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_02: And hence uh we're seeing it firsthand here with not only the Canadian government but also the US government.
• 1:03
  SPEAKER_02: Printing of money which ensures that the price of gold long term is going up.
• 1:07
  SPEAKER_02: What gold could do short term, you know, is anyone's guess, but long term, you know, it's pretty easy to call 10,000 gold over time.
• 1:15
  SPEAKER_02: How long it's going to take, I don't know.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_02: But we're definitely hitting that as the the value of fiat money is worth less and less every year, and that's a given.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_02: So gold is going higher, without a doubt.
• 1:25
  SPEAKER_02: Uh, it's just a matter of how long it takes and uh the little ride we have along the way.
• 1:30
  SPEAKER_00: Trust is obviously a key part of fiat money, the fiat money construct, and uh we're obviously seeing uh a lot of erosion of trust and the belief that money will have value tomorrow.
• 1:41
  SPEAKER_00: Um at government or state level, nation level, we're seeing countries such as Holland, the Netherlands, France, Germany repatriating gold from the United States into their own sort of domestic uh national possession, um, which shows trust being questioned at an even higher level.
• 1:58
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, absolutely.
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_02: If I was in in if I was in those countries, I'd be doing the exact same thing.
• 2:03
  SPEAKER_02: The US is really not a country that can be trusted, has been proven.
• 2:07
  SPEAKER_02: Uh we're seeing it firsthand as Canadians and uh what they're trying to do to us, uh blackmailing us from a from a trade point of view and how they're trying to abuse us.
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_02: Ten ways of Sunday, whether it be call us the 51st state or or or whatever, any of the nonsense the Trump administration is doing.
• 2:23
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, being clear, is that the art of the deal?
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_02: You bully someone until you get what you want?
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_02: Well, I think he I think he underestimates Canadians.
• 2:30
  SPEAKER_02: We're a lot tougher than we let on.
• 2:32
  SPEAKER_02: And uh we'll see how it ends.
• 2:34
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
• 2:34
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_00: Um let's talk a little bit about gold equities.
• 2:38
  SPEAKER_00: Um gold equities have been increasingly valued, but uh uh compared to historical levels, they're still quite undervalued.
• 2:45
  SPEAKER_00: From your point of view, is there perhaps a fundamental shift, paradigm shift in how equities are valued?
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_00: And uh are there fewer investors which brings down valuations, or is there a catch-up moment still to come?
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_02: Well, it's really all I found in the years I've been investing, which has been many, many decades, is uh it's all about funds flow.
• 3:06
  SPEAKER_02: And right now, a lot of the big money is quite happy to play AI, uh, chips, various other uh tech names.
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_02: Where I found, let's say the good ex good example would have been when the tech market collapsed in 2000.
• 3:17
  SPEAKER_02: Uh then everybody stepped back, took a look at what they owned.
• 3:21
  SPEAKER_02: So, okay, let's get invested in real assets once the the froth came off uh all the all the internet hype stocks, right?
• 3:27
  SPEAKER_02: So I don't uh I I anticipate well we're we're in a we're in a time right now where we're hitting all-time highs, the SP 500.
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_02: We've got uh uh we've got a 5% yield on the 10-year US Treasury.
• 3:41
  SPEAKER_02: Uh that's gonna start competing with equities pretty soon.
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_02: I think the blind spot for a number of people is the bond market and the yields, like nobody's buying US Treasuries, so the Fed has to buy them and rates are going up.
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_02: So that's gonna destroy the overall market at some point.
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_02: When that happens, uh when there is a setback in the overall market, people may step back and they say, okay, for the next run, what do we want to invest in?
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_02: We want to invest in the hype of AI or do we want to invest in in something a little bit more solid?
• 4:09
  SPEAKER_02: In the early 2000s, I saw that happen firsthand where people stepped away from tech and then they got into some real assets.
• 4:15
  SPEAKER_02: We had like a 10-year run in the uh in the metal sector, and it was a solid work.
• 4:18
  SPEAKER_00: We're starting to see that sort of play out because there's been some weakness in tech stocks, a AI stocks recently.
• 4:24
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, we're gonna like you will really notice the weakness when it happens because we're setting ourselves up for what could be quite a quite a kick in the teeth for sure, or in the overall market basis, anyways.
• 4:35
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 4:35
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, well, I want to sort of talk more about sort of companies and stocks uh with you, Warren.
• 4:40
  SPEAKER_00: Um, we're at the Precious Metal Summit.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_00: There's always a lot of news flow leading into this event and during this event, and this year I think it's been quite exceptional.
• 4:48
  SPEAKER_00: The the volume of news has been significant.
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_00: In part, I imagine that's because the exploration companies have been able to raise a lot of money, they've been able to do a lot of work.
• 4:56
  SPEAKER_00: We're now seeing the product of that work being reported.
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_00: There are several economic studies out this week, but rather than sort of talk about specific individual companies and studies and projects, um, some of the things that general takeaways, a lot of companies are using, let's say, 3,500 US dollars per ounce as their base case goal price.
• 5:17
  SPEAKER_00: And projects are yielding, uh a lot of projects are yielding 30 or 35% IRRs, internal rates of returns at those levels.
• 5:24
  SPEAKER_00: Um, 30% may sound quite attractive, but uh I think the better companies, the better projects, you're looking at 60, 70, 80, 100% IRRs.
• 5:33
  SPEAKER_00: So does that beg the question that 30% is you know that's a marginal project in this day and age?
• 5:38
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I know it could be in the lower end for sure.
• 5:40
  SPEAKER_02: Uh the the issue there is you've got um uh you've got you know$3,500 being used, gold's roughly what,$4,200.
• 5:49
  SPEAKER_02: A$700 move in the price of gold in the last year is not a not a significant move.
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_02: So the volatility for gold is quite high.
• 5:57
  SPEAKER_02: And the um um so we're in a bit of a new world order with respect to the massive volatility in gold.
• 6:03
  SPEAKER_02: So you definitely have to be cognizant of that.
• 6:05
  SPEAKER_02: And I would agree with you, like 30% probably is the the lowest I'd go.
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_02: And and prior to that, of course, that was sort of my my goal is to be 30 or greater.
• 6:13
  SPEAKER_02: So if you want a bit more um uh protection from a a downside spike in gold, um I would stick with the higher higher ones, but you're exactly right.
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_02: 30% seems to be getting near the getting near the bottom given the the risk profile in gold and the volatility.
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_00: For some people, 30% may sound a you know a grid IRR or an attractive IRR.
• 6:36
  SPEAKER_00: Does that lead lend us into a situation where projects will get built, will get financed that are going to be vulnerable in a downturn?
• 6:45
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, you know, every time, every every cycle I've been involved in, uh things when things get hyped up a little too much, there's always mines that get built that should never be built.
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_02: And that annoys the heck out of me because I just see the wasted resources and wasted time on that.
• 7:00
  SPEAKER_02: Um, but I I'm not I'm not getting the sense right now that we're as super hyped as that's uncontrollably uh out of hand.
• 7:08
  SPEAKER_02: So um I don't I don't see that right now at at 30 percent.
• 7:13
  SPEAKER_02: But uh if we start getting uh a little headier and we get six thousand dollar gold, seven thousand dollar gold, and they start bumping the numbers, um, and then we get it we get a you know a thousand or two thousand dollar setback and mines were built on on assumptions that are no longer accurate, that's really where we're gonna get it.
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_02: And it's that's more of an overhyped market.
• 7:32
  SPEAKER_02: I don't see ourselves being overhyped.
• 7:33
  SPEAKER_02: And you know, I it would be a tough for me to judge if I was a mining executive whether we use 3,500 or or 3,000 or whatever the number is, but uh definitely the volatility is quite quite extraordinary, that's for sure.
• 7:48
  SPEAKER_00: Very much so.
• 7:49
  SPEAKER_00: And I guess when we factor in inflation as well, um a lot of people think you know real inflation's uh you know at least 10%.
• 7:56
  SPEAKER_00: Um so costs are gonna go up, and that can quickly eat into the sort of potential margin you think you've got at uh at 3,500 gold, and you can be sort of laid quite bare very quickly.
• 8:08
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, nothing like CapEx expansion to kind of screw up your uh your your valuation of your company for sure.
• 8:13
  SPEAKER_00: And of course, given what's going on in the Gulf, the the escalation of fuel prices can quickly destroy your your OPEX estimates.
• 8:20
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I'm uh I'm driving a diesel truck right now, and I love pulling up to the pump where I used to buy it buy diesel at a discount to gasoline.
• 8:27
  SPEAKER_02: Now I'm paying 80 cents a liter more.
• 8:28
  SPEAKER_02: It's uh it's quite annoying.
• 8:30
  SPEAKER_02: It cost me almost$300 to fill up my truck the other day.
• 8:33
  SPEAKER_02: It was pretty that's getting kind of insane in my opinion.
• 8:35
  SPEAKER_02: The sharpen take of breath.
• 8:38
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, um, I want to carry on with the theme of mines being built because um one of the surprises for me here at this event is there hasn't been much chitter-chatter about MA.
• 8:50
  SPEAKER_00: And there could be various reasons for that.
• 8:53
  SPEAKER_00: Companies, the juniors have been able to finance more, able to do more work, they're perhaps more resilient, they don't necessarily need an MA transaction as much as that perhaps they did a couple of years ago.
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but also I think there's part of the narrative that the the miners themselves are reluctant to engage.
• 9:11
  SPEAKER_00: Um they're looking for assets to be more or less fully de-risked before they contemplate an MA transaction.
• 9:21
  SPEAKER_00: Obviously, being fully de-risked could mean a project being built before a bigger mining company comes for it.
• 9:27
  SPEAKER_00: Um, what for you is the idle moment of time for a major to do an MA transaction?
• 9:34
  SPEAKER_00: Because you know, running the numbers, once a developer, junior developer has built an operation up that first ounce, their valuation can spike or and does spike in this market, it is spiking.
• 9:47
  SPEAKER_00: So 40% on top of a uh a company's market capitalization that's already gone up two, three, four times, that becomes a very different proposition than paying a 40% premium on what a market cap is prior to sticking that first spade in the ground.
• 10:02
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
• 10:03
  SPEAKER_02: Well, as a mining company, you need to try and ask yourself uh where do we really add value in the whole process?
• 10:09
  SPEAKER_02: And in my opinion, a significant amount of value, that value is is added by taking a development project and bringing it to production.
• 10:17
  SPEAKER_02: And uh there are a number of mining companies who who are more financial players and do not want to take the build risk.
• 10:23
  SPEAKER_02: There is build risk, as you know, capex uh uh capex overruns and and time time delays and things like that.
• 10:30
  SPEAKER_02: But um I think the the the key area, and this is the problem you've got when you've got beta, you've got the price of gold going from you know a few thousand to five thousand, that covers a lot of mistakes, right?
• 10:41
  SPEAKER_02: So um, and that's that's one of the biggest problems of the gold business, is that you you you know some of the guys could could uh make some interesting financial moves, but the reality is if you're a mining company, what do you do?
• 10:54
  SPEAKER_02: Well you you you build mines and you operate mines.
• 10:57
  SPEAKER_02: If you already buy a mine that's already built, and you're just so you're taking somebody else's screwed-up project who may have made some mistakes in the build, and then you're just gonna run it.
• 11:06
  SPEAKER_02: What are you gonna do?
• 11:06
  SPEAKER_02: Run it more efficiently because you could buy powers of scale and um uh uh in running it, so you might say save, you know, low single-digit efficiency levels.
• 11:16
  SPEAKER_02: Whereas, like you'd mentioned correctly, you're gonna see a three or four-fold increase in value by actually taking a little bit more risk, buying it at the development stage, perhaps permitted or unpermitted, design it all so that you're you're building it to the tier one mining company quality, you're taking your many, many decades of experience in building it, uh building mines to make sure when the mine is indeed built, it's to your standards, everybody it's it's built the most optimal fashion.
• 11:43
  SPEAKER_02: Whereas um if you let a junior build it, which I'm not in favor of, um sometimes you'll end up with a bit of a messed up operation that uh is not built built properly.
• 11:54
  SPEAKER_02: And then if you buy it as a major, you're spending quite a bit of time fixing problems.
• 11:58
  SPEAKER_02: And meanwhile, like you said, you're paying four times what you could have bought it for a few years earlier.
• 12:02
  SPEAKER_02: Uh I've seen a lot of examples of both ways.
• 12:04
  SPEAKER_02: One example uh paid out for for waiting, for instance, of Cisco, uh the original of Cisco, when it was there was rumors it was going to be bought out in your in the teens uh uh as a development project, and then it was bought out, I think, around the eight dollar level after it was actually built.
• 12:21
  SPEAKER_02: So so the majors who perhaps said, Well, being in the teens is a bit ahead of itself as a development project, let's just sit back a bit.
• 12:29
  SPEAKER_02: And they were able to buy it back cheaper after it was indeed built.
• 12:33
  SPEAKER_02: So there's an example, one of the rare examples, I think, of where you're sitting back and you buy something cheaper.
• 12:38
  SPEAKER_02: But I am 100% behind that if you're a mining company, a significant amount of the value you create, which is non-gold price related, is taking a development project and building it a world-class mine to the standards in which you operate.
• 12:53
  SPEAKER_00: I think, yeah, absolutely.
• 12:54
  SPEAKER_00: There's definitely a very large chunk of Kabab MTOR if you're buying uh if a major is buying a project that a junior has built.
• 13:01
  SPEAKER_00: And uh, I think a recent example of that is B2 Golden Goose.
• 13:05
  SPEAKER_00: Um B2Gold bought the project and the company before the build was finished.
• 13:11
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but they when they sort of lifted up the hood, they encountered a whole bunch of stuff they didn't like and spent a lot of time and money right sizing or putting it right so it be would become a B2 project.
• 13:22
  SPEAKER_00: I guess the surprise there is why didn't they move a little bit earlier so they could have started the build from the get-go to their to their plan?
• 13:29
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah.
• 13:30
  SPEAKER_02: A lot of it perhaps has to do with uh right now everybody looks back and said, we should have bought development projects because they're all cashed up now.
• 13:37
  SPEAKER_02: But remember, sometimes when those decisions were made, gold wasn't at 5,000.
• 13:41
  SPEAKER_02: There wasn't perhaps as much cash in the treasury.
• 13:44
  SPEAKER_02: Um I think the one of the biggest risks of of a junior building versus a major building, if you have a major with a mine building teams that have worked together for 20, 30 years, they've gelled.
• 13:54
  SPEAKER_02: Whereas a junior putting together, you know, a guy from Rio Tinto, a guy from BHP, a guy from various other organizations to put them all together into a team that hasn't gelled and tell them go ahead and build a mine in a jurisdiction none of you guys are familiar with.
• 14:08
  SPEAKER_02: Um, that's where the the risks come in and that's where mistakes are made.
• 14:11
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you.
• 14:12
  SPEAKER_00: Um going the other way, I think is can be quite positive.
• 14:15
  SPEAKER_00: And uh I'm thinking here of sort of Talamor Resources, which has the coffee project that was uh operated and advanced by Newmont.
• 14:23
  SPEAKER_00: And speaking to this um Talamore CEO Tim Warman, he said, you know, pretty much everything has been designed, it's bulletproof.
• 14:30
  SPEAKER_00: The metallurgy was bulletproof.
• 14:32
  SPEAKER_00: They did a ridiculous amount of testing to make sure that absolutely everything would work as planned.
• 14:37
  SPEAKER_00: And obviously, Talamor, you know, Newmont sold in on Talamor benefits from all that work, effort, and expertise that's gone into that.
• 14:44
  SPEAKER_00: And uh they're now sort of progressing ahead with the the build there.
• 14:47
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, no, they definitely the majors at times, especially the big guys like BHP, Rio Tinto, they definitely can uh gold plate an asset and uh a little bit more than a junior can.
• 14:57
  SPEAKER_02: But I've seen some pretty disastrous mine builds by juniors, and uh there's uh I'm not sure as a major I'd want to take that risk unless it's pretty simple operation, maybe an open pit.
• 15:07
  SPEAKER_02: But as soon as you start talking underground, for sure, for sure, I would not want to buy an underground mine built by a junior.
• 15:12
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 15:13
  SPEAKER_00: Well, let's continue with the theme, Warren.
• 15:15
  SPEAKER_00: Um, if majors are not in general buying development projects, you know what are they spending their money on?
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_00: The average all-in-sustaining cost is what$1,900 per ounce.
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_00: Gold price is you know$4,400,$200 per ounce.
• 15:30
  SPEAKER_00: So they're making sort of$2,000,$2,500 per ounce in all-in-sustaining cost margin.
• 15:35
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, they've got their balance sheets in in better order, paid down debt.
• 15:39
  SPEAKER_00: They're increasing shareholder returns through dividends and buybacks, but they're still holding um a lot of cash on their balance sheet.
• 15:47
  SPEAKER_00: There's at least 10 or 12 companies that have um at least a billion dollars in cash sitting on their balance sheets.
• 15:54
  SPEAKER_00: I spoke with John Hathaway this morning with asset management, and he was talking about lazy balance sheets.
• 15:58
  SPEAKER_00: There's too much cash there.
• 16:00
  SPEAKER_00: Why aren't they holding some of their cash in bullion?
• 16:05
  SPEAKER_00: It serves many functions for investors.
• 16:07
  SPEAKER_00: Surely it would serve serve similar functions for the miners too.
• 16:11
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, well, what they could do is hold back a certain amount of their their production and keep it in safe storage.
• 16:17
  SPEAKER_02: And uh, if they're a believer, I've seen uh uh I think I've seen one executive do that over the years, over many decades, where basically they uh they retained a significant amount of the retained earnings was actually in in gold bullion.
• 16:30
  SPEAKER_02: It's certainly um if you are a gold mining company and you believe in gold, it's probably not a not a dumb thing to do.
• 16:36
  SPEAKER_02: And uh it's interesting though about lazy balance sheets and aggressive balance sheets is we're the stage now where everybody's as you know, everything's in cycles, and we're the stage now where everybody's loaded up with cash and there'll be lots of pressure of from investors to go out there and make some acquisitions and put this money to work.
• 16:53
  SPEAKER_02: And then, of course, when the market hits a downturn, then there'll be pressure from investors to do the divest, focus on your key properties.
• 17:01
  SPEAKER_02: Why'd you buy the all these stupid little projects?
• 17:02
  SPEAKER_02: Well, we bought all these stupid little projects which don't mean anything to us now because you put pressure on us when we had lots of cash to buy stupid projects and they were the only ones available.
• 17:11
  SPEAKER_02: So it's a cycle, it's it's a cycle in the business, and I would encourage any uh any major mining company to ignore what investors are telling them because they're always they're they're they're manic and we're depressive.
• 17:23
  SPEAKER_02: Like they're they're always definitely the number of downturns I've been involved in where you have all the all the investors just shouting out de-risk, d-lever, uh, you know, focus on your core competency.
• 17:35
  SPEAKER_02: Why are you involved in five five countries?
• 17:36
  SPEAKER_02: Why aren't you zeroed down to three?
• 17:38
  SPEAKER_02: And then all the juniors who buy these other ones that are divestive get great deals at the bottom of the market, and now they are they're saying, You got too much on your balance sheet, is lazy.
• 17:46
  SPEAKER_02: Uh, you know, you should uh go out there, buy properties, and pay pay top prices for things.
• 17:52
  SPEAKER_02: And it it's um I I'd encourage uh the mining companies to have a long-term view and ignore uh the pressure from these investors.
• 18:00
  SPEAKER_00: One of the takeaways I've got from that, Warren, is that investors are never satisfied.
• 18:04
  SPEAKER_02: No, they're just they're like uh I'm an investor, but man, the stuff coming out of investors' mouths sometimes, they're they're crazy.
• 18:11
  SPEAKER_02: And to to the extent I think a management team can tell them to come on, guys, just relax.
• 18:16
  SPEAKER_02: We take the long-term view here.
• 18:18
  SPEAKER_02: We buy things when they make sense, and we sell things when they make sense.
• 18:21
  SPEAKER_02: Let's not get carried away with the cycle of uh the mining cycle, which is always the mining cycle is always the mining cycle, and it's up and down all the time.
• 18:29
  SPEAKER_00: That I think is leads us into perhaps an interesting or down an interesting rabbit hole, Warren, because um as a CEO of a mining company, you you need you know, cojones for quite a few things, and standing up to investors that are demanding things of you uh would be one of those scenarios.
• 18:46
  SPEAKER_00: And you perhaps see this more in in the juniors, the junior developers.
• 18:50
  SPEAKER_00: Um you often don't see a CEO that will stand up to the money, the investors, and say, I'm not gonna build this project, we're not the right team, it's not the right time, uh, we don't have the competence, or whatever, it's marginal, whatever the case may be.
• 19:04
  SPEAKER_00: You don't often see that.
• 19:05
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, well, as a junior in that position, uh, and I've been a shareholder in situations like that, unfortunately, they have to fake it until they make it, right?
• 19:13
  SPEAKER_02: They have to fake that they're they have the capabilities to put it into production, and they're hoping to God that they never have to, right?
• 19:20
  SPEAKER_02: Because they don't want to build it.
• 19:22
  SPEAKER_02: But unless if they sit back with a development project and say, it's up for sale, there's a for sale sign, and uh the majors will play all sorts of games, they'll wait them out and they'll drag their feet.
• 19:33
  SPEAKER_02: And next thing you know, these guys haven't done anything for three years, they haven't moved it forward on permitting or environmental work or anything.
• 19:39
  SPEAKER_02: So uh I wouldn't although it doesn't seem intuitive initially, uh, and it does seem to make sense if you don't have the capabilities to admit that.
• 19:48
  SPEAKER_02: You can't really admit that.
• 19:49
  SPEAKER_02: You just have to continue to do what you can within your within your stable competency.
• 19:54
  SPEAKER_02: Continue you have to continue to move the project forward or you're dead in the water because the majors will will know that and they'll wait you, they'll wait you out.
• 20:02
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 20:02
  SPEAKER_00: Um, yeah, you don't be under siege from a major, that's for sure.
• 20:06
  SPEAKER_00: Now let's wrap up by sort of you know talking uh broadly.
• 20:11
  SPEAKER_00: You you're uh a money manager, you're an investor.
• 20:14
  SPEAKER_00: If you were constructing a precious metals portfolio today, how would you allocate amongst physical gold, physical silver, royalty companies, large producers, intermediates, developers, explorers?
• 20:26
  SPEAKER_02: Well, I'm on the higher end of the spectrum, so higher risk area of the spectrum.
• 20:31
  SPEAKER_02: Uh allocating new new funds.
• 20:33
  SPEAKER_02: Um, the ones I'm finding the most exciting here uh at the show are the ones where um I get called and say, Warren, come on over here.
• 20:41
  SPEAKER_02: We're building this, we're starting this zoo company.
• 20:43
  SPEAKER_02: This is where we're doing.
• 20:44
  SPEAKER_02: We've got this tremendous property from XYZ place.
• 20:48
  SPEAKER_02: And those are the ones that I really make the most money on, getting getting in early, getting in big.
• 20:54
  SPEAKER_02: And um, but if I was building, let's say, as a retail investor, building a portfolio, you probably want a bit of everything, right?
• 21:00
  SPEAKER_02: You'd want to definitely have some of the royalty companies, some of the seniors, uh, for good solid cash flow, possibly some dividends.
• 21:06
  SPEAKER_02: And then you want some of the, you know, um, you know, some exploration for some some pretty significant upside.
• 21:13
  SPEAKER_02: So you want a a bit of a diversified there.
• 21:15
  SPEAKER_02: But for me personally and what I do for a living, uh, I don't think I add much value buying, you know, Barrick or Agnik or any of those names.
• 21:22
  SPEAKER_02: I I add value by buying the early stage ones that gradually uh morph into uh multi-billion dollar companies and get ideally get bought out.
• 21:31
  SPEAKER_00: Well, it's been a fascinating conversation, Warren, and thank you very much for joining me this afternoon.
• 21:35
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, thank you, Paul.
• 21:35
  SPEAKER_00: Great training.
• 21:36
  SPEAKER_00: We have a lot more to come from the 2026 Precious Metal Summit here in Beaver Creek, so stay tuned and hit that subscribe button.
• 21:43
  SPEAKER_01: I'm Paul Harris, and this is Kitco Mining.
• 21:46
  SPEAKER_01: Kitco Mining on site coverage of the Precious Metal Summit is presented by Newcore Gold.