Newmont is the world's largest gold mining company. It digs gold out of the ground at 13 active mine operations across the United States, Australia, Ghana, Papua New Guinea, Mexico, Canada, Peru, Argentina, and Suriname. It sells that gold as refined bullion or doré bars, a rough alloy that refiners turn into pure gold. Gold makes up 85% of total sales. The rest comes from copper, silver, lead, and zinc pulled from the same ore bodies. Every dollar Newmont earns starts with metal in the ground, a price set by global markets, and the cost of getting that metal out. The diagram below traces where the money goes.
How Newmont Makes Money
flowchart TD
A["Mine Operations
12 active sites"] --> B["Gold & Metal Extraction
5.9B oz gold, 296M lbs copper"]
B --> C["Product Sales
$22.7B revenue"]
C --> D["Gold Doré Sales
$14.3B, 85% of revenue"]
C --> E["Concentrate & Metals
$8.3B copper, silver, lead, zinc"]
D --> F["Operating Cash Flow
$10.3B"]
E --> F
F --> G["Reinvestment Loop
Capital for new mines"]
F --> H["Dividends & Debt Reduction
Stockholders & balance sheet"]
G --> A
I["Proven Reserves
118.2M oz gold"] --> A
J["Land Position
19,200 sq miles"] --> A
A -.->|"Depletes over time"| I
Five years of financial data tell a story of a company that got dramatically bigger, then deliberately got more focused. From 2021 through 2023, revenue held in a narrow band around $12 billion per year, while cash generation quietly slipped. Then two things changed. In late 2023, Newmont completed the acquisition of Newcrest Mining, a major Australian gold and copper producer, for $13.5 billion in stock. Revenue jumped. But the company also took on a heavy debt load, with net debt rising from $0.7 billion in 2021 to $7.8 billion in 2023. The next move was deliberate pruning. Newmont sold off six mines and one development project it considered non-core, collecting $4.3 billion from those sales. By 2025, the financial picture looked very different.
Revenue 2021 to 2025 ($B)
Revenue was essentially flat for three years, then roughly doubled in two years after the Newcrest acquisition and rising gold prices.
The cash flow story is even sharper. Operating cash flow was $4.3 billion in 2021, fell to $2.8 billion in 2023 as the Newcrest deal costs weighed on the business, then surged to $10.3 billion in 2025. The debt picture flipped too. After peaking at $7.8 billion net debt in 2023, Newmont ended 2025 with net cash of $2.5 billion, meaning it now holds more cash than it owes. A big part of what drove that improvement was the gold price itself.
Why the gold price matters so much
Newmont's costs to mine an ounce of gold do not change much from year to year. But the price gold sells for can swing by hundreds of dollars. When gold prices rise, nearly every extra dollar above the cost of production flows straight to profit. When prices fall, margins compress fast. This is why gold miners are sometimes called leveraged bets on the gold price.
The average gold price was $1,799 per ounce in 2021. By 2025, it had climbed to an average of $3,432 per ounce, with prices reaching as high as $4,449 during the year. Early 2026 data in the filing shows prices touching $5,043 per ounce on February 12, 2026. That price surge explains a large portion of Newmont's revenue and cash flow explosion, independent of anything the company itself did.
$3,432
Average gold price per ounce in 2025, up from $1,799 in 2021
The risks Newmont faces are real and specific. The most immediate is one it cannot control at all: the gold price. If prices fall significantly and stay low, mines that are profitable today become unprofitable, and Newmont may have to stop mining some deposits entirely, delay new projects, or write down the value of its ore stockpiles. A second risk sits inside the company itself. Every mine runs out of ore eventually. Newmont must constantly find and prove new reserves to replace what it digs up. Exploration is expensive and often fails. If reserve replacement falters, long-term production declines even if gold prices stay strong.
2026
crisis
Newmont accuses Barrick of mismanaging their shared Nevada mines
In January 2026, Newmont told its joint venture partner Barrick that it had found evidence Barrick diverted resources from their shared Nevada Gold Mines operation to benefit Barrick's own separate projects. Newmont owns 38.5% of Nevada Gold Mines but cannot control its day-to-day operations. Newmont sent Barrick a formal notice of default in February 2026. Nevada is one of Newmont's largest producing assets, contributing roughly 999,000 ounces of gold in 2025. How this dispute resolves could have a material effect on one of the company's most important revenue streams.
Two additional risks deserve attention. First, costs are rising across the business. Labor, fuel, electricity, chemicals, and equipment are all more expensive, particularly at mines in high-inflation countries like Argentina, Ghana, and Suriname. If those local costs keep climbing without a matching rise in metal prices, profitability at affected mines shrinks. Second, Newmont's Ghana operations face a newly uncertain tax environment. The stability agreement that previously capped Ghana's corporate tax rate and set a sliding royalty scale expired at the end of 2025. Ghana's government is now proposing a new royalty structure with rates that could rise as high as 12% when gold prices are high, up from the previous 5% ceiling. Ghana generated $2.07 billion in pre-tax income in 2025, making this a material exposure.
$2.07B
Pre-tax income from Ghana operations in 2025, now subject to a new and still-uncertain tax regime
What "reserve replacement" means
A gold mine is a depleting asset. Every ounce dug out is an ounce gone forever. To stay in business over decades, a mining company must find new deposits to replace what it removes. Proving a new reserve requires years of drilling, testing, and permitting before a single ounce can be produced. If a company fails to replace reserves fast enough, its total mineable gold shrinks, and so does its future production.
Newmont reported 118.2 million attributable ounces of proven and probable gold reserves as of December 31, 2025. That is the pool of ore the company has proven it can mine economically at current gold prices and costs. How quickly that number erodes or grows over the next several years is a leading indicator of the company's long-term health, independent of what gold prices do in any given quarter.
118.2M oz
Attributable proven and probable gold reserves at December 31, 2025
Newmont produced 5.53 million ounces of gold in 2025 from continuing operations. At that rate, its current proven and probable reserves represent roughly 21 years of production, though actual mine lives vary widely by site and reserve estimates shift as prices and costs change.
The Bet
Gold prices stay high enough, for long enough, that Newmont can convert its expanded reserve base into cash faster than operating costs inflate, reserves deplete, and host governments raise their take. At $3,432 average gold per ounce in 2025, the business generated $10.3 billion in operating cash flow. At $1,799 per ounce, as in 2021, the same mine portfolio generated $4.3 billion. The whole financial case for the current business scale rests on the assumption that the gold price environment of 2024 and 2025 reflects a durable shift rather than a temporary spike. If gold reverts toward prior decade averages, revenue, margins, and cash flow all compress sharply, and the company's expanded cost structure becomes a heavier burden to carry.
Open question
Newmont has used a period of record gold prices to pay down debt, sell weaker assets, and generate more cash than at any point in its recent history. The company now holds net cash, controls 118 million ounces of proven and probable reserves, and has new mines coming online. But it also faces a disputed joint venture in Nevada, rising costs across multiple high-inflation countries, an expiring tax deal in Ghana, and a business model that rises and falls almost entirely with a commodity price it cannot set. If gold prices pull back meaningfully from their 2025 highs, how quickly does the financial improvement of the last two years unwind, and does the company's expanded operating base become an advantage or a liability?
Compiled · 10-K · FY2025
Commodity Price Volatility
The company's profits depend heavily on gold, copper, silver, lead, and zinc prices, which change daily based on factors beyond its control like government actions, interest rates, and investor sentiment. If prices drop significantly and stay low, the company may have to stop mining some deposits, write down the value of its ore stockpiles, delay new projects, and reduce its total mineable reserves.
Reserve Replacement and Exploration
The company must constantly find new ore deposits to replace what it mines, but exploration is risky and often unsuccessful. Even when new deposits are found, it takes many years and significant money to start production, and the economics may change during that time. If the company cannot replace depleted reserves, its long-term production and returns will decline.
Peru Water Regulations
Peru's environmental agency issued stricter water quality rules in 2015 and 2017 that apply to Newmont's Yanacocha mine. The company must build new water treatment plants and may face significantly higher closure costs as ongoing studies continue. These uncertain costs could materially increase the company's financial obligations.
NGM Joint Venture Mismanagement
Newmont owns 38.5 percent of Nevada Gold and Casinos (NGM), a joint venture with Barrick Gold that operates major Nevada mines. In January 2026, Newmont discovered evidence that Barrick may have diverted NGM resources to benefit Barrick's own projects. Since Barrick controls the day-to-day operations and Newmont cannot force decisions, disputes could materially harm Newmont's interest in this major asset.
Operating Cost Inflation
The company's costs are rising due to inflation in labor, fuel, electricity, chemicals, and equipment, and some of its mines are in countries with high inflation like Argentina, Suriname, and Ghana. If local currency costs increase without matching increases in metal prices or currency devaluation, the company's profitability could decline significantly at affected mines.
10-K Item 1A · Risk Factors
