Miners: Perseus Rises to AUD 2.33 as Lithium Plummets

The Periodic Table as a Portfolio: Gold and Silver Up, Lithium Down

October 2025. Silver is trading above $50 an ounce and has been included in the draft list of critical minerals by the US. In the same month, the Maverick Springs project—silver and gold in Nevada, with inferred resources and antimony exploration—makes it onto the agenda for the meeting between Trump and the Australian Prime Minister on critical minerals. Miners aren't reading this as a diplomatic anecdote. They're reading it as a signal: the periodic table is no longer a geological curiosity but foreign policy. The sector tracking that forms the basis of this text has accumulated five years of a proprietary portfolio in gold, silver, copper, tin, uranium, lithium, and rare earths, with specific names and concrete losses.

Perseus Mining: From AUD 1.72 to 2.33

Perseus Mining, an Australian gold miner listed on the ASX, appears most frequently and sells the worst: those holding it admit they don't know how to interpret a chart and regret not selling during the previous two rallies. Shares went from AUD 1.72 to 2.33, with gold around $1,870 an ounce and the AUD/EUR exchange rate at 0.64. The underlying argument is that if the metal keeps rising, the miner won't fall. The company is already working on its next mine, Adventus, with production expected by the end of 2027.

The scene repeats with every company in the sector: buy the macro narrative, endure the correction, and then hesitate. In the case of a silver producer, a sale closed with a 500 euro profit just before the metal's surge made it clear that timing is the part of the business no report covers.

Uranium Awakens, Rare Earths Multiply

While gold and silver garnered little interest, money flowed into base metals and nuclear energy. Uranium Energy Corp went from $1.95 to 3.4. Denison Mines reported EPS 400% higher than the previous quarter and sales 265% greater. Cameco, the Canadian giant, hovered around 120—the terror of anyone looking at the P/E ratio—and controls 49% of Westinghouse, the reactor manufacturer, with Brookfield holding the remaining 51%. The energy thesis holds that the crisis is real and China is already experimenting with thorium.

Rare earths have their own case: Lynas, the major producer outside China, went from AUD 7 to 20 per share during the tracking period.

The Lithium That Promised and Now Fails to Deliver

The Global X lithium ETF went from 40 to 85 in a year. The floating question—has it risen too much?—has an uncomfortable answer in the penny stocks. Celsius Resources, a copper and cobalt miner on the ASX, has accumulated substantial losses. Critical Resources changed its narrative and acquired a license to explore for antimony. Tesoro Resources traded at AUD 0.20 in 2021 and is now at 0.032. Mako Gold fell from AUD 0.09 to 0.011. Cobalt was trading at 37,000.

Critical Minerals: Geopolitics Reigns

The meeting between Trump and the Australian Prime Minister on critical minerals put Sun Silver in the spotlight. Its Maverick Springs project is an inferred resource, meaning unproven, but silver has just entered the US draft list of critical minerals and is trading above $50. In parallel, the bid by Panamerican and Agnico for Yamana was seen as the first serious M&A move in a sector that had been in the doldrums for years.

The Macro Case Supporting the Thesis

The macro argument hasn't changed in five years: China, India, Turkey, and Russia buying gold to evade sanctions, a petroyuan backed by metal, miners at decades-long lows, and a dollar that was supposed to weaken. A calculation circulating in the tracking started with the gold/silver ratio and gave a target price of $57 for silver.

And that's where everything gets stuck. Silver could go to $57 or $40. Perseus could be sold in the next rally or remain in the portfolio for another year. Celsius could receive financing for the mine or dilute shareholders once more. No one has closed this part of the calculation, and with the available data, there's no way to close it either.