Why Gold's Record Output Isn't Solving Its Supply Problem

The gold industry mined more metal in 2025 than in any prior year and still faces a structural supply problem. Reserves are depleting faster than new deposits are found, capital costs are rising, and permitting timelines are lengthening. For Agnico Eagle Mines (NYSE: AEM), Franco-Nevada Corp (NYSE: FNV), and Kinross Gold Corp (NYSE: KGC), that gap shapes capital allocation decisions, growth pipelines, and the terms on which new projects attract funding. Hamak Strategy Limited (LSE: HAMA) (OTCQB: HASTF) is a junior explorer in West Africa with a plan to add new ounces to a pipeline that badly needs them.

#The Supply Side of the Gold Story

Global gold mine production set a record in 2025 at approximately 3,672 tonnes, according to the World Gold Council¹, yet output has barely moved over the past decade despite gold prices roughly quadrupling. The WGC's April 2026 Gold Demand Trends report noted production will likely rise only modestly in 2026², constrained by declining reserves, longer permitting timelines, and rising capital costs. The industry is finding fewer world-class deposits, and those it finds take longer and cost more to build. Those constraints are what make new discoveries commercially valuable, and where Agnico, Franco-Nevada, and Kinross each have a direct stake.

Hamak Strategy (LSE: HAMA) (OTCQB: HASTF) is precisely the kind of company the supply picture above puts in focus. It is a pre-revenue junior explorer with an active drill program on a near-surface oxide target, advancing two West African projects alongside a treasury strategy holding physical gold and Bitcoin³. Its primary near-term catalyst is the Akoko project in Ghana's Ashanti greenstone belt, where a reverse circulation (RC) drilling program is advancing across the license area. Results received to date include a headline intercept of 29.53 g/t gold from the first batch of assays, with two further June 2026 updates continuing to deliver strong, wide, near-surface oxide intercepts. The most recent results include 3.42 g/t gold over 23 metres from 15 metres depth, with a higher-grade interval of 24.01 g/t gold over 1 metre within that section, and 2.12 g/t gold over 28 metres from just 3 metres depth. With 39 RC holes totalling 2,280 metres now completed at Akoko North, the drill rig is being mobilised to the Akoko South prospect, where 36 holes for 1,940 metres are planned. The program is targeting conversion of a historical non-JORC estimate of approximately 252,000 ounces into a compliant resource, with a Preliminary Economic Assessment of open-pit heap leach potential to follow. The option was acquired at roughly US$10 per historical ounce, with drilling and the PEA both targeted for completion before year-end 2026, subject to assay turnaround. Risks are material. Early results may not confirm historical estimates, future financing will be required, and the Akoko option exercise remains conditional on study outcomes.

Agnico Eagle Mines (NYSE: AEM) is among the world's largest gold producers, with mines in Canada, Finland, Australia, and Mexico, and its 2025 reserve update illustrates the core tension in the gold supply story. The company ran 120 diamond drill rigs for the full year and budgeted $565–$635 million on exploration and project expenses for 2026⁴. Yet after replacing 3 million ounces of depletion, net reserves grew by just 1.16 million ounces in 2025, a 2.1% increase on a base of 55.4 million ounces. Strong margins fund that effort. Agnico reported record annual free cash flow in 2025 and followed it with net income of $1.695 billion in Q1 2026 alone⁵. But cash generation does not make the ounces easier to find. It simply pays for the search. For a company of Agnico's scale and capability, adding reserves is a capital-intensive, slow-moving process. Junior explorers in proven belts may represent the upstream source of future reserves.

Franco-Nevada Corporation (NYSE: FNV) occupies the most insulated position in the gold value chain, owning royalties and streams on assets ranging from exploration stage through production, rather than operating mines itself. That positioning makes it a structural beneficiary of the very problem the gold industry faces by insulating it from the cost inflation and capital risk that producers absorb. When explorers need capital to advance projects, royalty and streaming companies provide financing in exchange for a share of future production, and the harder it becomes to find and fund new deposits, the more valuable that financing role becomes. Franco-Nevada has built the largest such portfolio in the sector. In Q1 2026, the company posted record revenue of $650.7 million, up 77% year-on-year, with an adjusted EBITDA margin of 91% and available capital of $3.36 billion⁶. Precious metals accounted for 87% of revenue during the quarter. Its annual dividend has increased for 19 consecutive years since its December 2007 IPO, reflecting the durability of the royalty model through commodity cycles⁷. For investors, Franco-Nevada maps the commercial pathway through which upstream projects could one day attract institutional capital.

Kinross Gold Corporation (NYSE: KGC) is a large-cap gold producer with operations in the United States, South America, Africa, and Canada, producing approximately 2 million gold equivalent ounces per year⁸. Its 2026 guidance holds output flat at that level through 2028, reflecting the difficulty even a well-funded, multi-asset producer faces in growing organically. Kinross is advancing its Great Bear project in Ontario toward a construction start targeted for 2027 and first production in 2029. Ontario has fast-tracked permitting approvals for the project, cutting timelines in half⁹. At peak the project is expected to produce more than 500,000 ounces annually, but it has taken years of drilling, studies, and permitting work to reach this point¹⁰. That timeline is the real illustration of the supply problem. Kinross generated record attributable free cash flow of $837.5 million in Q1 2026¹¹, yet even that financial strength cannot compress the years it takes to bring a new mine into production.

#More Money, Fewer Ounces

The gold industry's supply problem is not a function of price or effort. Agnico is spending $600 million a year on exploration and barely growing reserves. Kinross needs until 2029 to bring its next major mine online despite fast-tracked permitting. Franco-Nevada is expanding because the harder mining gets, the more valuable its financing role becomes. Hamak sits at the start of that chain, a junior explorer drilling a near-surface oxide target in Ghana with a clear milestone path through 2026.