Five mining stocks to watch in 2025

We caught up with a handful of small-cap miners at the recent Mining Indaba in Cape Town. Each looks forward to an exciting year ahead, some with long-term projects and strong economics and access to gold, lithium, graphite, diamonds and uranium.

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Sapan Ghai, chief commercial officer, Sovereign Metals:​“Sovereign Metals Ltd (LSE:SVML) is an AIM- and Australian Securities Exchange (ASX)-listed company. We’re developing the Kasiya rutile graphite project in Malawi. It’s the world’s largest rutile deposit. It’s also the world’s second-largest graphite deposit, all in one. Our proposition is pretty simple, we’re expected to be the largest producer in both rutile, which ends up as titanium, and graphite, for the next 25 years, 50 years maybe. And also the lowest-cost producer in both those critical minerals.

“We just announced an optimised pre-feasibility study. Some very good economics came out of that. It does show that we would be the largest producer of rutile. We would be the largest producer of graphite. We’d also be the lowest cost in both those minerals. It would have a 25-year mine life. And after those 25 years, we’ve only mined 30% of the known resource, so this could be a 50, 75-year project. We have an NPV [net present value] on the project from that pre-feasibility study of $2.3 billion pre-tax. So, this is a genuine Tier 1 project.”

Dennis Edmonds, chief executive, Kazera Global:“​I think it’s going to be a brilliant year for Kazera Global (LSE:KZG). We’ve got three different projects. The first one is diamonds, which are in the Northern Cape. We’ve got heavy mineral sands, which are part of the diamond project, but it’s going to be the big focus going forward. And then we have an interest in a mine in Namibia, which is a tantalum and lithium mine, which we sold a couple of years ago. We’ve been paid $5 million. There remains another $10 million, together with interest owing to us, and we’re in the process of arbitrating to recover that.

“The flagship project is the heavy mineral sands. We’re in production already. We will anticipate that we’ll be doing our first delivery by next month, possibly even earlier than that. And we will at the same time be generating diamonds. Diamonds are sold by Alexkor. So, there’ll be two different revenue streams from those, and we’re also expecting some sort of results on the arbitration fairly shortly. So, overall, lots of things to happen quite soon.”

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Andre Liebenberg, chief executive, Yellow Cake: ​“Yellow Cake Ordinary Shares (LSE:YCA)’s a company that owns physical uranium, so we’re essentially a physically backed exchange-traded fund (ETF). We’ve got uranium, and we’ve got a little bit of cash, so nothing else.

“The reason it was created was to provide investors with a way of investing in the uranium commodity, because it’s very difficult to do that on an individual basis. It’s a very regulated commodity. You need to open up storage accounts and go through various regulatory hurdles. So, it’s a simple mechanism for people to track the uranium price.

“What’s happened in the last 12 months? I think the first big thing was the data centre/AI/hyperscaler story. I think that’s been a bit of a game-changer for nuclear. When the Amazons, the Microsofts, the Metas, start looking at nuclear to drive their data centres, that changed the game.

“I think the other thing that happened last year, we saw the US ban Russian fuel. So, from 2028, no Russian fuel can come into the US. And the back end of last year, we saw the Russians, or Putin, counteract with his own sanctions saying, “We’ll selectively decide what fuel we send to the US.” So, the US gets 20% of its enriched fuel from Russia, so that was a big change. 

“I think the other big thing last year was on the supply side. For me, the real theme in this nuclear story is supply. I think we’ve got a growing demand side, and we’ve got a fragile supply side. Last year we saw China sign another deal with Kazatomprom in Kazakhstan. Fifty per cent of Kazakhstan’s fuel or uranium now goes to China. And if you add the component that goes to Russia, you’re talking two-thirds to three-quarters. So, the world’s biggest producer doesn’t have a lot of spare capacity that can go to the West. And for Western utility, that’s a real wake-up call. Where are they going to get their future fuel needs from?”

Segun Lawson, chief executive, Thor Explorations:“Thor Explorations Ltd Ordinary Shares (LSE:THX) is a West Africa-focused gold producer. We have our flagship project in Nigeria, where we produced 85,000 ounces last year. We’re looking to produce between 85,000 and 95,000 ounces this year as well. We also have a project in Senegal, the Douta project, which we’re developing and are in the final stages of a preliminary feasibility study. And in the second half of last year, we expanded into Côte d’Ivoire, where we’ve picked up an early stage portfolio of gold explorationground.

“2025 is the year where we aim to produce with a completely de-levered balance sheet after paying back our senior debt, and growth through exploration in Nigeria, Senegal and Côte d’Ivoire.”

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Bernard Aylward, chief executive, Kodal Minerals: ​“Kodal Minerals (LSE:KOD) – AIM-listed explorer, developer and soon-to-be lithium miner, with our project of the Bougouni Lithium Project in southern Mali. The next 12 months is going to be fantastic for Kodal. As we’ve stated in December, we’ve started commissioning a plant at Bougouni. We’re nearly complete now – looking forward to starting – introducing ore and undertaking the process. We confirm we’re going to have production in the first quarter of 2025, and then looking to a steady build-up towards nameplate capacity, and expect to have production full steam ahead for the rest of the year. And finally, we’re going to continue our drilling and development of the Bumu prospect, and continue to expand that to underpin our long-term mining future at Bougouni. 

“I think for me, there’s a lot of positives about Kodal Minerals at the moment. Number one, we’re coming into production at the Bougouni Lithium Project. We’ve got a fantastic project there, that’s going to continue to grow. The exploration upside is fantastic, and we’re looking to show/demonstrate the ability to underpin a long-life mine exceeding 15 years of operation.

“On top of that, Kodal, we have opportunities throughout West Africa to acquire additional lithium projects. We feel that we have expertise and advantage compared to other companies that will allow us to acquire additional projects. And finally, we have gold assets. Clearly, we’re all seeing a massive rise in the gold price. Those projects that we have, clear opportunities to demonstrate resources/mineral resources. So, again, we’ll have clear opportunities for continued growth in Kodal in the future.”