Agnico Eagle

Despite increased unit costs on modestly lower ounces sold, stronger realized gold prices mean Agnico Eagle's Q2 2026 adjusted NPAT is up around 60% from a year ago, to USD 1.5 billion or USD 3.05 per share. It declared a USD 0.45 quarterly dividend in line with its payout policy, up 13%.

Why it matters: Guidance is unchanged. EPS of USD 6.46 for the half is tracking broadly in line with our unchanged full-year estimate for USD 12.43. Based on the futures curve, we expect a lower gold price in the second half but for it to sell similar ounces to the 1.67 million sold in the first half.

The bottom line: We make no change to our USD 87 (CAD 125) fair value estimate for no-moat Agnico Eagle. While shares are down 43% since March highs, they remain expensive. This is likely due to gold at USD 4,100 per ounce being double our USD 2,050 midcycle assumption based on the estimated long-run marginal cost of production. Shares also offer a low forward yield of 1.2% based on our 2026 DPS of USD 1.80, up from USD 1.65 in 2025.

Long view: Agnico is developing the Hope Bay project in Nunavut and is likely to proceed with other projects such as expansions at Canadian Malartic and Detour Lake as it seeks to raise production to take advantage of the elevated gold price. We assume a 75% chance that it develops all its various projects and forecast sales volumes of about 4 million ounces midcycle, from around 3.3 million in 2026. We think this leads to some improvement in its already attractive unit cost profile. Midcycle margins are likely to be materially higher than they have been over the past decade. Even so, a lower gold price from midcycle more than offsets, and our forecast 5-year NPAT CAGR is negative 12%.

Bulls say: The gold price will be higher for longer. Our fair value rises to USD 130 in our Bull case scenario. Here we assume gold averages around USD 5,250 from 2026 through 2028 and USD 2,450 from midcycle in 2030, roughly 20% above our Base case assumptions.

Agnico sold 836,000 ounces in the second quarter, modestly down from 847,000 in the same quarter of 2025. But a 36% increase in its average realized gold price, to USD 4,480 per ounce, more than offset higher unit costs driven by increased labor and energy expenses.

Our fair value estimate for Agnico Eagle is USD 87 per share.

We assume gold averages around USD 4,400 per ounce from 2026 to 2028 based on the futures curve. However, our assumed midcycle price is about USD 2,050 per ounce from 2030. This is based on our estimate of the long-run marginal cost of production.

Cuing off the futures curve, our assumed average copper price from 2026 to 2028 is about USD 6.00 per pound. Based on our estimate of the long-run marginal cost of production, we assume a midcycle price of about USD 3.80 per pound from 2030.

We also assume silver averages about USD 60 per ounce from 2027 based on spot, reverting to around USD 37 per ounce midcycle from 2030, 1/55th of our assumed midcycle gold price.

Cash flow is discounted at a 7.6% weighted average cost of capital, based on a long-term capital structure comprising 25% debt and 75% equity. We assume an 8.9% long-term cost of equity, reflecting gold's lack of systematic risk and correlation to gross domestic product. We apply a 5.4% pretax cost of debt, reflecting what we expect Agnico Eagle’s long-term cost of debt will be in a normalized interest rate environment. Our implied enterprise value/EBITDA terminal multiple of 8 is in line with its senior gold-mining peers.

As a commodity producer, Agnico Eagle is a price taker and needs low-cost mines with long lives and a low installed capital base to support the longer-term excess returns needed to justify an economic moat. We assign a no-moat rating to Agnico Eagle.

Its gold all-in sustaining costs of around USD 1,340 per ounce in 2025 place it around the 25th percentile of the gold AISC curve. Due to the flatness of the industry cost curve, only miners in the lowest quartile tend to enjoy a material operating cost advantage. And that would need to be paired with an efficiently invested capital base and long reserve life to warrant a moat. Agnico Eagle’s costs are not low enough to justify a moat, and so we don’t think the company exhibits a low-cost advantage.

Agnico Eagle’s adjusted return on invested capital is below its weighted average cost of capital. We have included around USD 1.1 billion in asset and intangible asset write downs on the basis that the impairments relate to assets developed or acquired in the ordinary course of business and so should be included when calculating ROIC, as they are a normal part of doing business as a gold miner. Agnico’s inflated invested capital base makes it unlikely that the firm will maintainably generate economic returns in excess of its cost of capital, even if operating costs were to materially fall.

The company’s ROIC averaged about 7.5% over the 10 years ended Dec. 31, 2025, and around 10% over the five years ended the same date, and we estimate that Agnico Eagle will generate a ROIC in the midsingle digits in 2030, below its WACC of 7.6%. Forecasts below WACC returns support our qualitative no-moat assessment.

In terms of commodity prices used for our forecasts, our respective midcycle assumptions for gold and copper are about USD 2,050 per ounce and USD 3.80 per pound from 2030, based on our estimate of the marginal costs of production. We also assume silver prices of about USD 37 per ounce midcycle from 2030, being 1/55th of our assumed midcycle gold price. We assume zinc averages about USD 1.60 per pound from 2027 based on spot.

Agnico Eagle has around 15 years of reserves at the end of December 2025, with various opportunities to increase gold production in the coming years.

For investors seeking gold miners with lower geopolitical risk, Agnico Eagle’s mines are in relatively stable and mining-friendly countries of Canada, Mexico, Finland, and Australia.

Gold stocks tend not to follow general economic cycles. They can also provide a hedge against inflation risk.

While it is located around the 25th percentile of the gold cost curve, it is still meaningfully leveraged to changes in the gold price.

We think the company paid the full price for the remaining 50% of the Canadian Malartic mine and other assets acquired from Yamana Gold in 2023.

Gold is subject to the whims of investors’ sentiment, who can move as a herd and affect the gold price.