Why Mineros’ Growth Assets Don’t Register in Any Valuation Model

Mineros S.A. is trading at roughly four times annualised earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA), holds approximately US$200 million in cash and bullion, and has posted record financial results across two consecutive reporting periods. The market has priced the cash flow it can see. It has not priced what sits behind it.

Behind that cash flow are two long-dated pipeline assets. One is a roughly 28-million-ounce Colombian deposit formerly held by AngloGold Ashanti after close to one billion dollars of exploration spend. The other is a 2.5-million-ounce Chilean project in the Maricunga Gold Belt, sitting next door to Kinross, Gold Fields, and Rio Tinto. Neither carries a single published economic study, which means each contributes zero to any net asset value the market might apply.

Together, those two projects represent approximately 30 million ounces of unvalued gold on a balance sheet that is effectively debt-free. This piece works through each asset on its own terms, examines why both remain outside current market pricing, and maps the specific milestones that would need to land before a re-rating becomes possible. After reading, you will have a clear framework for what the Mineros growth assets are actually worth tracking, and when.

What the market is pricing in, and what it is not

The financial picture is unambiguous, and the market can see all of it. Full-year 2025 adjusted EBITDA reached US$358.4 million, up 71% from US$210.1 million the prior year. Revenue climbed to US$799.7 million, a 48% year-on-year increase, and net profit rose 68% to US$145.0 million.

The momentum carried into the current year. For the six months to 30 June 2026, Mineros reported adjusted EBITDA of US$260.475 million, up 70% from US$153.578 million in the same period a year earlier, according to a Business Wire release distributed in August 2026.

Here is the confirmed financial baseline the market is working from:

The Mineros investor relations financials page provides direct access to the consolidated statements and management discussion underlying the H1 2026 and full-year 2025 results cited above, including the EBITDA reconciliations and free cash flow disclosures that anchor the valuation discussion.

• 2025 adjusted EBITDA: US$358.4 million (up 71%)
• 2025 revenue: US$799.7 million (up 48%)
• 2025 free cash flow: US$138.6 million (a company record)
• H1 2026 adjusted EBITDA: US$260.475 million (up 70% year-on-year)
• Cash and bullion: approximately US$200 million

At a market capitalisation of roughly US$2.2 billion, and with that cash position stripped out, the enterprise value lands near US$2.0 billion, according to figures stated by President and Chief Executive Officer Daniel Hau. Annualise the first-half EBITDA and the business is trading at approximately four times earnings.

The valuation anchor A near-debt-free gold producer generating record cash flow, priced at roughly four times annualised EBITDA.

A four-times multiple on a debt-free, record-cash-flow producer is already a signal of market underappreciation. But the more consequential signal is what the valuation model leaves out entirely.

The four-times EBITDA multiple Mineros commands sits at the lower end of a sector-wide compression: gold mining equity valuations have diverged structurally from the underlying metal price across the mid-tier producer universe in 2026, reflecting the same liquidity and institutional access constraints that keep Mineros priced as if its pipeline does not exist.

Approximately 30 million ounces of gold resources across the portfolio carry no economic studies, Hau has stated. No preliminary economic assessment, no prefeasibility number, nothing the market can anchor a valuation to. The resource inventory driving the company’s long-term optionality does not even appear in the denominator of any model currently being run against the stock. That gap, between the operational business the market is paying for and the resource base it is ignoring, is the starting point for everything that follows.

The Colombian deposit: a top-10 global asset with community engagement as its critical path

Start with the scale. The Colombian deposit carries a historical resource estimate of approximately 28 million ounces of gold, declared by AngloGold Ashanti through December 2024, and management ranks it among the top 10 gold deposits globally by resource size. AngloGold invested close to one billion dollars in exploration and studies before the asset changed hands, producing trade-off and prefeasibility work that forms part of the data package Mineros now holds.

That prior spend matters because it settles most of the geological question. The ground has been drilled, studied, and modelled at a scale few single-asset explorers could ever fund.

Which is why the genuine uncertainty does not live in the rock. It lives in the communities surrounding it.

Mineros has signalled it will not replicate AngloGold’s earlier plan to produce around one million ounces annually. Management identifies community engagement, not geology or technical execution, as the primary near-term challenge. For an asset of this scale in Colombia, that framing is telling: the path to production runs through local consent, and consent is not guaranteed.

How Mineros plans to bring communities along

The mechanism Mineros is leaning on is a Colombian tax provision that allows income tax obligations to be partially fulfilled through the delivery of community infrastructure rather than straight cash payment to government. In practice, that means building schools, roads, bridges, and health facilities in the regions around the deposit.

The live example is a school for 2,000 students currently under construction in the Bajo Cauca region. It is a concrete demonstration of the approach rather than a promise.

The interpretive question for you as an investor is whether infrastructure delivery genuinely aligns community incentives with the development timeline, or whether it manages the visible surface of consent without resolving the underlying concerns that have stalled comparable projects.

Those concerns are well documented in the Colombian gold sector. AngloGold’s La Colosa and Eco Oro’s Angostura both show how large-scale projects can stall even after heavy sunk capital. The recurring risk factors are consistent across cases:

• Community referenda and court rulings that can suspend or halt projects outright
• Environmental objections centred on water use, tailings, and páramo ecosystems
• Disputes over how tax and royalty benefits are distributed locally
• Prolonged consultation and permitting processes, often accompanied by litigation

Here is the practical read. The geological work is largely done, paid for by a prior owner. What determines whether this deposit ever produces an ounce is whether Mineros can navigate a consent process that has derailed larger and better-capitalised operators before it. This is the biggest single source of unvalued optionality on the balance sheet, and it carries the most uncertain timeline. Chile, not Colombia, is expected to produce first.

La Pepa and the Maricunga playbook: a phased approach in proven ground

La Pepa is where the pipeline gets nearer-term. The Phase 1 resource stands at 2.5 million ounces in Chile’s Maricunga Gold Belt, and Mineros acquired full ownership on 22 September 2025 by purchasing Pan American Silver’s interest for US$40 million, terminating the prior joint venture and taking 100% control.

The neighbourhood is the first thing worth noting. Kinross, Gold Fields, and Rio Tinto all operate in the same belt, and Rio Tinto’s adjacent Phoenix mine is the specific template Mineros intends to follow.

Maricunga Belt exploration activity in 2026 extends well beyond the major operators, with junior companies also drilling targets in the same structural corridor that hosts La Pepa, a pattern that reinforces the district-level geological conviction underpinning Mineros’ phased development thesis.

The acquisition maths US$40 million for a 2.5-million-ounce resource in a belt where three major operators are actively developing.

That price tells you something about either the bargain Mineros struck or the risk the market still attaches to this jurisdiction and its 4,200-metre elevation. The phased development plan is designed to manage exactly that risk: begin with oxide ore processing, modelled on Rio Tinto’s Phoenix operation, and target Phase 1 production of 100,000-130,000 ounces annually according to conference transcripts, with Hau citing an upper bound of 150,000 ounces in a separate context. Both figures come from management, and the discrepancy is worth flagging rather than smoothing over.

The milestone that resolves the ambiguity is the preliminary economic assessment, or PEA, an early-stage study that models a project’s economics for the first time. Mineros is targeting release in early 2027 and remains in the pre-PEA phase, meaning no economics document yet exists for the asset.

That PEA is the first event that would let the market put a number on La Pepa. With Chile positioned as the next producing jurisdiction ahead of Colombia, it is also the nearer-term catalyst in the entire pipeline sequence, the point where “unvalued optionality” could become “asset with a modelled NPV.”

Why these assets are not in the price, and what would need to change

The valuation discount is not a story of market irrationality. It is the product of specific structural mechanisms, each of which can be identified and, in principle, removed.

Pre-PEA valuation dynamics consistently show the same pattern across the gold development universe: market capitalisation often drifts toward a floor set by cash, adjacent comparables, and management credibility, then re-rates sharply once an independent study provides a modelled NPV that institutional analysts can stress-test against conservative price assumptions.

The mechanisms keeping the pipeline at zero in the market’s model are straightforward:

• No published economic studies. Without a PEA or prefeasibility study, there is no modelled NPV, IRR, or all-in sustaining cost (AISC) figure to anchor a valuation to.
• Thin trading liquidity. Mineros trades on the Bogotá Stock Exchange (BVC: MINEROS), which limits the institutional price discovery that drives re-ratings.
• Documented jurisdictional risk. Community-consent exposure in Colombia and permitting risk in Chile are real, not theoretical.

Sector history shows how these discounts unwind. Re-rating episodes in mid-tier gold producers have consistently followed a recognisable sequence: a credible, independently reviewed economic study showing robust numbers at conservative gold prices, then financing or streaming clarity, then permitting and community-consent progress. Lundin Gold at Fruta del Norte and Roxgold at Yaramoko are the commonly cited examples of projects that re-rated as they advanced through that chain.

Applied to Mineros, the milestones form a causal sequence rather than a shopping list:

1. La Pepa PEA, targeted early 2027. The first observable de-risking event and the first modelled economics for either asset.
2. La Pepa prefeasibility. The next step up in study confidence, converting a conceptual number into a bankable one.
3. Colombian deposit economic study. The point at which the 28-million-ounce prize begins to carry a valuation.
4. Community-consent progress in Colombia. The longer-horizon unlock, with no confirmed endpoint.
5. Financing or streaming arrangement. The funding clarity that historically precedes a construction decision.

Each step depends on the one before it landing, and both projects sit at the earliest observable stage of that chain. That is the honest shape of the re-rating case: logical, but highly sequential.

There is also a nearer production bridge that does not depend on the pipeline at all. Debottlenecking is expected to add 30,000-40,000 ounces, moving the company toward a medium-term milestone of approximately 300,000 ounces annually. That alone could lift the absolute EBITDA base before La Pepa or Colombia contributes a single ounce, which is worth holding in mind when you weigh the risk of waiting.

What Mineros’ pipeline actually means for long-term investors

Pull the two threads together and the investor proposition becomes clear. You have a cash-generative, near-debt-free producer priced at roughly four times EBITDA, sitting on approximately 30 million ounces of resources the market is not paying for.

The optionality gap Approximately 30 million ounces of gold resources, across two assets, currently carry no economic studies and no market valuation.

The two assets are not symmetrical. La Pepa is the nearer catalyst, with a 2027 PEA on the horizon and a phased development model already defined. The Colombian deposit is the larger prize, but it carries the longer and more uncertain path, gated by a community-consent process with no fixed timeline.

If you are unfamiliar with how pipeline assets get valued in the gold sector, the key point is this: a PEA is the first moment a modelled NPV exists, and it is the point at which institutional investors begin assigning probability-weighted value to future production. Before that study lands, the resource sits on the balance sheet as a number without a price. This is precisely why both Mineros assets register as zero in current valuation models.

Meanwhile, the operational business continues to return capital. The company generated record free cash flow of US$138.6 million in 2025 and is actively paying dividends and repurchasing shares.

So the position you hold today is exposure to that operational cash flow at a discount, with free options on two large assets the market has not yet priced. The question is not whether those options have value. It is whether the development pathway is long enough that the discount persists for years rather than months, and whether you are comfortable being paid in dividends and buybacks while you wait.

This article is for informational purposes only and should not be considered financial advice. Investors should conduct their own research and consult with financial professionals before making investment decisions. Past performance does not guarantee future results. Financial projections are subject to market conditions and various risk factors, and forward-looking statements are speculative and subject to change based on market developments and company performance.

The PEA as the pivot: what early 2027 will tell investors about Mineros’ growth ambition

Everything in the pipeline narrative converges on a single near-term event. The La Pepa PEA, targeted for early 2027, will be the first independently structured economics document for either growth asset, and it is the moment the “unvalued optionality” framing either begins to resolve or faces its first material test.

To move the market, that study will need to answer specific questions:

The Omai Gold Mines result illustrates what a transformational PEA delivers for an asset that previously carried no market-assigned economics: a single study converted an unvalued resource into a project with a modelled four-billion-dollar NPV, demonstrating the mechanism through which a La Pepa equivalent study could shift institutional perception of Mineros overnight.

• NPV at a conservative gold price assumption, not a spot-price flattery case
• Projected AISC, which tells you how defensible the margins are through a price cycle
• Capital intensity of the phased oxide approach, which shapes the funding requirement
• Implied value per ounce relative to the US$40 million acquisition cost

A strong result on those metrics would tell you whether the phased Maricunga approach is compelling enough to justify accelerating the development schedule, or whether La Pepa remains a later-decade story.

Even a strong PEA, though, resolves nothing in Colombia. The larger long-term re-rating still depends on a community-consent process that has no confirmed endpoint, and no economic study timeline has been set for the 28-million-ounce deposit.

That leaves the decision point where it started. At roughly four times EBITDA, with a near-debt-free balance sheet and record cash generation, the current price offers exposure to the operating business at a discount, with the pipeline attached as an uncosted call option. The early 2027 PEA is not a finish line. It is the first information event that will tell you whether that option is beginning to acquire a price.