⚠ The Peer Group Guides a Full Band LowerHigh threat

Barrick Mining (B) — threat to the moat

Barrick guides 2026 AISC at $1,760-$1,950 and Agnico at $1,400-$1,550 -- ranges that do not touch, on every ounce, all year.

All-in sustaining cost is the number that decides which gold miners survive a downturn, and Barrick's is going the wrong way relative to the company it is most often compared with.

2026 AISC guidance ranges ($/oz)1,400Agnico low1,550Agnico high1,760Barrick low1,950Barrick highSeveral hundred dollars a difference, on every ounce, all year.
At $3,431 gold the gap is invisible. At $2,000 it decides who buys whose mines.

Barrick's AISC rose roughly 10 percent in 2025 to $1,637 an ounce and is guided to $1,760 to $1,950 for 2026. Agnico Eagle, which overtook Barrick for second place in production, guided 2026 all-in sustaining costs of $1,400 to $1,5501. The two ranges do not touch. On the current guidance a Barrick ounce costs several hundred dollars more to produce than an Agnico ounce, every ounce, all year.

At an average gold price of $3,431 in 2025 that difference is invisible in the earnings and enormous in the analysis, because it is exactly the difference that determines behaviour at $2,000 gold. The company with the lower cost keeps its mines open and buys the assets of the company that does not.

Barrick's answer is composition — harder jurisdictions, and Lumwana capital flowing through the cost line before the copper arrives — and both are legitimate.

The falsifier is convergence. If the gap has not narrowed materially by 2027, once Lumwana's capital rolls off, then the explanation was not composition and the cost-position page is describing something the company does not have.

References
  1. ReportedBarrick guided 2026 AISC of $1,760-$1,950 per ounce against Agnico Eagle's $1,400-$1,550, with Barrick's 2025 figure at $1,637 after a 10% rise.
    Gold-miner peer comparison, 2025 results and 2026 guidance — Newmont led global production with 5.89 million attributable ounces in 2025; Agnico Eagle secured the number two global position with payable gold production of 3.447 million ounces, exceeding Barrick's 3.26 million ounces by nearly 200,000; Barrick's all-in sustaining costs rose 10% year on year to $1,637 per ounce in 2025 and are guided to $1,760-$1,950 for 2026, with cash costs of $1,330-$1,470 against $1,199 in 2025, while Agnico guided 2026 AISC of $1,400-$1,550 per ounce; Agnico trades at a forward twelve-month earnings multiple of about 11.5x, roughly 21.7% above the industry average of 9.48x; AngloGold and Agnico Eagle separated themselves from the pack through superior cost control and jurisdiction management while Barrick struggled with geopolitical friction, notably the dispute with Mali's authorities over the Loulo-Gounkoto complex — FY2025 / 2026 guidance · publ. 2026 · source ↗
Sources
Generated September 23, 2026