In this article, we will look at the 10 Best Gold Stocks to Buy According to Reddit and Robinhood.
Regarded as a safe investment option, hedging investors against inflation, Gold has been a highly demanded precious metal historically. As such, in 2023, the precious metal’s demand soared by 3% year-over-year (YoY), hitting the 4,899 tons mark. This is on the back of growing demand from emerging markets like India and China, who were responsible for 75% of this demand. This ever-increasing trajectory of demand is expected to continue in the current year as well which is going to be discussed below.
Amidst the inflationary state in the U.S. for the past while, and the resulting uncertainty in the market, gold has seen its prices rise in 2023, reaching its all-time high, on the back of 13% increase. The increase in demand mainly came from central banks, the industrial sector, and investors. A trend was also observed in 2023, wherein the global sovereign wealth funds were reported to be increasing their holdings in the precious metal.
The price of gold is a complex mechanism, as it is impacted by several factors like demand, market stability, and interest rates, to name a few. Nevertheless, several analysts are looking to a positive future for gold, as they expect the prices to be sitting somewhere between $2,421.00 and $2,651.00 (per ounce rate) by the current year end, as compared to its current price of $2374.31, as of writing this article.
This trend is also shaping up on the back of the Fed’s plans for a rate cut later in the year, as the gold prices usually have an inverse relationship with the market interest rate. As such, the rate cut that is expected to occur somewhere in September is also helping analysts forecast the precious metal’s price increase in 2024.
Following is what was spoken about the gold market by an analyst at PrimeXBT, Kathryn Davies, in June 2024:
“Gold has fallen from its all-time high of $2,222 after the SNB cut rates, boosting the USD. However, the gold price remains supported by the prospect of Federal Reserve rate cuts and a lower interest rate environment globally. Elevated geopolitical tensions and central bank purchases also keep demand high, and the price supported. As a result, Gold could see more all-time highs as we progress through 2024, rising to $2400 by the year’s end.”
In terms of the global market, China is a crucial player in the gold market – China is not only the largest producer of gold (producing 12% of gold in 2023), but also the largest consumer of gold, with its central bank, on its own, buying 225 tons of gold in 2023, up from 62 tons in the previous year. Analysts have attributed China’s massive buying of gold to the freezing of Russian assets by the U.S. and its allies, which China is attempting to hedge itself from by buying Gold – pushing up the gold prices by doing so.
Australia and Russia closely follow China in the gold production game; in 2023, China, Russia, and Australia recorded a gold production volume of 375 tons, 325 tons, and 314 tons, respectively. The U.S. was placed 5th on the same list created by Insider Monkey, with a production volume of 173 tons! To date, 209,000 tons of gold have been mined across the globe, equaling a value of massive $12 trillion!
Having discussed the expected future of gold prices, it’s time we explore the world of gold stocks, which directly correlate with the gold price trajectory. Thus, let’s now jump to our list of 10 Best Gold Stocks to Buy According to Reddit and Robinhood.
A closeup image of a miner holding a pile of gold nuggets, a representation of the company’s royalty.
Methodology
Extensive research across the Reddit discussion forums, along with the Robinhood Index, helped us in curating our preliminary list of all the stocks discussed across the two sources. Based on the analysts’ sentiment regarding each stock across both sources, we assigned the Reddit score and Robinhood score to the stocks and ranked them based on the average score, which we will refer to as the Overall score. Lower the score, better the ranking of stock. For stocks with an equal Overall score, we used Reddit score as the tiebreaker.
The overall score was derived from the number of upticks on Reddit forums against the respective stocks, and the number of analysts assigning buy ratings to the respective stocks on Robinhood. We also peeked into Insider Monkey’s database that tracks the activity of 920 hedge funds, wherein we collected information about the hedge fund investors’ holders of all these stocks to reaffirm the respective stocks’ sentiment across the two sources.
Why are we interested in the stocks that hedge funds pile into? The reason is simple: our research has shown that we can outperform the market by imitating the top stock picks of the best hedge funds. Our quarterly newsletter’s strategy selects 14 small-cap and large-cap stocks every quarter and has returned 275% since May 2014, beating its benchmark by 150 percentage points (see more details here).
10. Alamos Gold Inc. (NYSE:AGI)
Overall Score: 8.5
Reddit Score: 8
Robinhood Score: 9
Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 30
With 90% of analysts at Robinhood giving a buy rating to the stock, Alamos Gold Inc. (NYSE: AGI), a Canadian gold mining company, is on our list of Best Gold Stocks to Buy According to Reddit and Robinhood.
In April, we noticed that some analysts at Bank of America upgraded the rating of the stock from hold to buy. Alamos Gold Inc. is engaged in three operating mines in North America, including Young-Davidson mine and Island Gold mine in Canada, and Mulatos mine in Mexico. It has four other projects well under development as of now.
On top of that, in March 2024, Alamos Gold Inc. (NYSE:AGI) acquired the Magino mine in Ontario, Canada, which would boost the miner’s production to 600,000 ounces per year in the shorter run, while producing up to 900,000 ounces per year in the longer run. Furthermore, their acquisition of Magino mine also included Argonaut, both of which would result in pretax synergies of $515 million.
The company also performed quite impressively in Q1 2024, in which they bagged a record quarterly revenue of $280 million (10% increase from 1st quarter of 2023), also generating $24 million worth of free cash flow!
This was on the back of gold production which took an upturn in the quarter, increasing 6% from the first quarter of 2023 to 135,700 ounces of gold production. The production from the Mulatos mine and the resulting staggering output of 62,200 ounces of gold (up by 23.2% from Q1 2023) primarily drove this overall revenue growth in the quarter. Higher demand of gold and increased gold prices further bolstered the company’s performance in the quarter.
Having said that, with its total quarterly cash costs and all-in sustaining costs above the company’s annual guidance (expected to come down in the following three quarters) – with an upside potential of 15.3%, and with hedge fund holdings worth $426.8 million, it’s quite understandable why the stock makes it to our list of Best Gold Stocks to Buy.
9. Rio Tinto Group (NYSE:RIO)
Overall Score: 8
Reddit Score: 10
Robinhood Score: 6
Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 37
With Oyu Tolgoi and Kennecott projects to their name, Rio Tinto Group (NYSE:RIO) operates gold mines and extracts gold from them. These mines hold deposits of copper as well.
Rio Tinto Group (NYSE:RIO) is the 2nd biggest mining company in the world by revenue, after boasting a revenue of a whopping $54.04 billion in 2023. The positive aspect of investing in this stock includes greater exposure to several markets, including but not limited to, the lithium market and iron ore market, in addition to gold; it is one of the best lithium and battery stocks to buy now as well.
The stock has seen rising interest from hedge fund investors, as three more investors have grabbed a stake in the stock since the last quarter of 2023, taking the total tally to 37, and taking the total stake to a whopping $1.4 billion! Fisher Asset Management and Citadel Investment Group hold the biggest chunk of the stock’s ownership amongst these investors with investments of $1 billion and $136 million, respectively. Moreover, 70% of the analysts at Robinhood are recommending that investors buy the stock; this might be on the back of the stock’s massive upside of 24.31%!
However, this outlook of the stock is against the recent stock price performance, as it has fallen 10.4% on year-to-date (YTD) basis. But that’s quite common with the mineral stocks, which are quite cyclical, and as such, the lower aluminum and other mineral prices resulted in a reduction in its underlying earnings for the year 2023 from $13.4 billion in the previous year to $11.8 billion (a 11.94% decrease), affecting the investors’ sentiments regarding the stock. The aluminum prices fell to $2,100 level during 2023, down from its $2,662 level at the start of the year, primarily due to China’s (biggest aluminum producer) timid recovery from COVID-19.
Moreover, the company expects its per unit costs of Pilbara iron ore operation to increase in 2024 to $21.75-23.5 from $21.5 in 2023 due to larger workforce requirements and post-inflation lags. For the 2nd quarter of 2024, aluminum, copper, and gold output saw an uptick from the output level in Q2 2023, increasing 1%, 18%, and 9%, respectively, due to improvement in the operations. However, the iron ore production in Pilbara was down 2% from the same period in 2023, due to train collision resulting in a loss of six days rail capacity.
However, the company increased its production from the Pilbara operation by five million tons in 2023, and expects a further five million uptick in production in 2024, as they stated in their guidance for the year. Furthermore, the company has entered into an agreement with Ngarluma Aboriginal Corporation (NAC) in July 2024 to construct an 80 MW solar farm, with the purpose of supplying renewable energy to its Pilbara operations. With the project potentially replacing up to 11% of natural gas currently consumed in the operations, we can expect operational costs to go down post the installation.
Thus, having said that, with the stock giving out good value trading at just 10.95 times its earning and giving out a yield of 6.52%, the stock seems to be quite a good bet, making it to our list of best gold stocks to buy according to Reddit and Robinhood.
8. Royal Gold, Inc. (NASDAQ:RGLD)
Overall Score: 7.5
Reddit Score: 9
Robinhood Score: 6
Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 31
Royal Gold, Inc. is a precious metal streaming company and holds royalty interests in mines located in the U.S., Canada, Australia, and several other countries.
Royal Gold, Inc. (NASDAQ:RGLD) is one of the best gold stocks according to Reddit and Robinhood. The company has kept on giving out dividends for the past 23 years, with dividend increasing every year! Also, the stock boasts a dividend yield of 1.23%! In Q1 2024, the company gave out a dividend of $0.4 per share, which was a 7% increase from the previous quarter.
The revenue for the company’s gold segment was up by 10%, even though the overall revenue was down 13% to the quarter a year ago, which itself was the highest revenue-generating quarter of the company’s history; this change was associated with an increase in gold prices which were up by 10% in the quarter, along with a reduction in contributions of few mines like Mount Milligan, Pueblo Viejo and the Cortez legacy zone, to name a few. On the other hand, the company recorded its best quarterly operating cash flow, amounting to $138 million, which was a 27% increase over the previous year’s same quarter, attributed to payment received as per cost support agreement with Mount Milligan, and capitalized interest received from the loan facility repayment.
Interestingly, the stock has its price already going in an upward trajectory not only on YTD basis (15.65%), but also in the last one month, in which it has gained a sweet 15.4%. This is on the back of analysts’ estimates that the company’s EPS is going to go up by 28.1% in 2024 to $4.65 per share from $3.63 in 2023, and revenue is going to go up by 25.1% to $785.37 million in 2025 from forecasted $627.63 million in 2024. These projections can be attributed to the company’s new ventures opening up at Mara Rosa in Brazil and Cote Gold in Ontario, wherein the first batch of gold production was off and running. The new Goldrush mine at Cortez is also underway, expecting to give out an initial ramp-up production of 130,000 ounces in 2024, eventually expected to reach 400,000 by 2028.
Analysts view the stock quite highly as well, as they have set a price target of $152, whereas their current price sits at $130.62, as of writing this article – that’s an upside potential of 16.37%! As such, 31 hedge fund holders hold a stake in the stock, worth $321 million!
Furthermore, the Q2 production is rolling as the gold production increased by 2.6%, along with an increase in realized gold price from $2,070 in Q1 2024 to $2,339 in Q2 2024. Investors must keep an eye out for the details of the Q2 figures, that are to be disclosed in August 2024, but from what it seems like, the company is on its course to realizing the potential that investors are seeing in the stock.
7. B2Gold Corp. (NYSE:BTG)
Overall Score: 7
Reddit Score: 6
Robinhood Score: 8
Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 19
B2Gold Corp. (NYSE:BTG) is the 11th biggest Canadian mining company with revenue figures of $1.93 billion in the year 2023, also successfully making it to our list of Best Gold Stocks to Buy According to Reddit and Robinhood. B2Gold Corp., headquartered in Vancouver, Canada, is a gold producer with its operations based in Mali, Namibia and the Philippines; on the other hand, it has the Goose Project under construction in northern Canada, and several other development and exploration projects in various countries including Mali, Colombia and Finland.
The company recorded adjusted EPS of $0.06 (beating analysts’ estimates) on the back of gold production of 225,716 ounces in Q1 2024, in line with the company’s guidance. Moreover, the company’s liquidity position is placed quite well with the company recording a working capital of $629 million in the quarter. It is further bolstered by the company’s cash and cash equivalents balance of $568 million, which was up because of an increase of $507 million in operating cash flows. Acting as a cherry on top, the dividend was also declared in the quarter, worth $0.04.
On top of that, the company has penned an agreement with Sandbox Royalties in June 2024, giving birth to Versamet Royalties, a royalty company comprising of eight assets, which would result in a revenue stream worth $30 million by 2026, which would be an increase from these assets’ current revenue of $10 million. Furthermore, Gold production of somewhere between 860,000 and 940,000 ounces is expected to occur in 2024, which would be an increase from 590,243 ounces in 2023. Thus, analysts are expecting EPS to be around $0.26 per share this year from $0.01 per share in 2023, and the revenue is expected to jump to $2.52 billion in 2025 from the predicted revenue of $1.96 billion in 2024.
As such, the stock has seen an uptick of 20% in the last one month. Moreover, 11 analysts are giving out buy rating for the stock, setting the target stock price at $4.37, forecasting an upside of a whopping 40.5%!
However, it might be disturbing to see that the stock has experienced a 15.7% decrease in its share price in the last one year, during which it also experienced net loss in the last quarter of 2023, giving out an EPS of negative $0.09 per share. The timid performance was attributed to lower gold production and sales volume which were both down from 352,769 ounces and 339,355 ounces in Q4 2022 to 256,921 ounces and 270,611 ounces, respectively, in Q4 2023.
Nevertheless, 19 hedge fund holders have held interest in the stock, worth $127 million, in which First Eagle Investment Management holds the most of it, worth $71.4 million – believing in the potential of Versamet Royalties and resulting boost to company’s growth in coming years.
6. Sandstorm Gold Ltd. (NYSE:SAND)
Overall Score: 7
Reddit Score: 7
Robinhood Score: 7
Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 16
With its operations based in several countries, including Canada, Mexico, the U.S., to name a few, Sandstorm Gold Ltd. (NYSE:SAND) is a gold royalty company that gets the right to a share of mine’s gold production against the company’s upfront funding to the miners to acquire the mine. The company has acquired 230 royalties on mining projects that span across the globe.
The company reported a decrease in its revenue and income for the 1st quarter of 2024, wherein it reported a revenue of $42.8 million against $44 million in the 1st quarter of 2023, and a net loss of $3.9 million against a net income of $15.6 million in the period a year ago. The company associated this quarterly downfall to 12% reduction in the gold equivalent ounces (GEO) sold, a decrease of $10 million in its other income pertaining to royalty payment, and an incurred loss through fair value assessment of one of its debentures investment.
Nevertheless, Sandstorm Gold Ltd. (NYSE:SAND) has experienced a share price appreciation of 4.5% since the last month, and a sweet 10.71% on the year-to-date (YTD) basis. Moreover, the analysts eye the share price to keep climbing, expecting it to reach $7.44 from its current price of $5.58, which would be an upside of a staggering 33.3%! Plus, the popularity of the stock has also grown since the last quarter amongst the hedge fund holders, as the number has increased by four, taking the total tally to 16, who hold an investment of $72.4 million, as of Q1 2024.
Horizon Asset Management and Sprott Asset Management are two hedge funds with greatest investment values of $23.3 million and $2.8 million, respectively. Moreover, over nine analysts at Robinhood are giving a buy rating of the stock.
The company has also penned a deal in May 2024 (to be completed in 2nd quarter of 2024), worth $21 million with Evolve Strategic Element Royalties, selling its several non-precious metal royalties, proceeds of which it plans to use to repay its debt, hoping to solidify its liquidity and cashflow position.
Moreover, the analysts at Reddit are keeping their eyes hung up on one of the company’s holdings, Platreef mine in South Africa, which would bolster the company’s production further, once it becomes operational. With the gold production forecasted to be somewhere between 75,000 and 90,000 in 2024, and 125,000 within the next five years, this is stock is one to keep an eye out on, hence, also making it to our list of Best Gold Stocks to Buy According to Reddit and Robinhood.
5. Kinross Gold Corporation (NYSE:KGC)
Overall Score: 6.5
Reddit Score: 4
Robinhood Score: 9
Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 31
Another Canadian mining company, Kinross Gold Corporation (NYSE:KGC), makes it to our list of Best Gold Stocks to Buy According to Reddit and Robinhood. This comes on the back of a 74% uptick in the stock’s price last year! Kinross Gold Corporation has its operations in the U.S. (two mines), and in Brazil, Chile, Mauritania and Canada, with one mine located in each country.
For the 1st quarter of 2024, the company recorded gold production of 522,000 ounces, amidst increased gold prices. The profit margins recorded by the company were also strong, with per ounce margin recorded at $1,088, as the gold prices rose and the cost of sales was kept at the same level as the previous quarter’s. The company’s cashflow position is going strong as well, as they ended the quarter with $407 million in cash, after generating $145 million of attributable free cash flows in the quarter, hence well placed on its track towards debt repayment. Also, the company is well-positioned to achieve its full-year guidance in terms of its production and costs, promising growth in the coming nine months.
The company is also expanding its portfolio as it was seen signing an agreement with Riley Gold in March 2024, which could lead Kinross to grabbing a 75% stake in the project, given a $20 million investment is made by them for the qualifying work expenses.
Thus, the analysts are putting faith in the stock, as they eye a stock price target of $9.11 as compared to its current price of $8.4 as of writing this article, which is an upside potential of 8.3%. Also, 12 analysts at Robinhood believe in the stock, as they are giving out a buy rating on the stock, and 31 hedge fund investors have held interest in the stock, worth $374 million, furthering the argument in favor of the stock being one of the Best Gold Stocks to Buy. Lastly, analysts are predicting an EPS growth of 42.4% in 2024, while they are expecting revenue to climb 10.8% from $4.24 billion in 2023 to $4.7 billion in 2024.
