Morning Briefing: Middle East Tension Escalate, Chine Remains a Big Buyer of Gold

Good morning and welcome back to the Mining Stock Daily morning briefing. I am Trevor Hall. 

It's Wednesday, June 10.

The elevator is heading down this morning. Gold is off 2.5% to $4,179 an ounce. Silver has fallen 1.4% to $64.24 — and that break below the 200-day moving average is a technically significant development. Copper is also pulling back to $6.24 a pound.

The move in metals this morning is being driven by real interest rates. May CPI is due at 8:30 this morning and the market is bracing for a print of around 4.2% year-over-year — which would be the highest reading in roughly three years — following April's already elevated 3.8%, itself driven in part by the oil shock from the ongoing Iran war. Gold earns nothing, so it competes directly with real yields. When markets price in higher sustained inflation against a Fed that is on hold, real rates grind higher — and that is the pressure being applied to metals this morning. Silver's break below its 200-day moving average adds a technical layer to the macro pain: in rate-driven selloffs, silver's industrial exposure typically makes it more vulnerable than gold.

Overnight, the geopolitical situation escalated sharply. Iran downed a US Army Apache helicopter in the Strait of Hormuz Tuesday evening. The US struck back against nearly 20 Iranian targets. Iran then responded with 21 attacks on US bases across the region — including F-35 hangars at Al Azraq air base in Jordan — and the IRGC has vowed more devastating strikes to follow. This conflict has already included attacks on civilian water infrastructure, among them a strike on a desalination plant on Iran's Qeshm Island earlier in the war that cut supply to 30 villages. Gold falling 2.5% through all of this tells you exactly where the market's attention is: rates, not guns.

One constructive signal buried in today's noise: China's central bank added 10 tonnes of gold to its reserves in May — the largest monthly purchase since January 2025 — following 8 tonnes in April and extending a 19-month consecutive buying streak. Sharp selloffs like today's are historically when patient state buyers accumulate.

We’ll get to the news from the miners and explorers in just a moment, but first a word about today’s sponsor. 

This episode of Mining Stock Daily is brought to you by…Equinox Gold.

Equinox Gold is a Canadian multi-mine gold producer with operations across the Americas, including Greenstone in Ontario and Valentine in Newfoundland. The company is currently advancing a combination with Orla Mining that would create a new senior gold producer targeting over 1.1 million ounces of annual production from six North American mines — a deal expected to close in Q3 2026. Learn more at equinoxgold.com.

Here’s what you need to know today.

Mithril Silver and Gold has released new drill results from Target 1 at the Copalquin gold-silver project in Durango, Mexico, with the standout hole returning 7.25 metres grading 4.01 grams per tonne gold and 225 grams per tonne silver from 375.70 metres depth within the El Refugio vein system — including a high-grade sub-interval of 0.50 metres at 15.25 grams per tonne gold and 533 grams per tonne silver, or 22.86 grams per tonne gold equivalent. The results are part of an ongoing 25,000-metre 2026 drill program designed to de-risk inferred resource areas and test vein continuity across the deposit, with 11,238 metres completed to date (TSXV: MSG, ASX: MTH, OTCQB: MTIRF). News Release

Camino Minerals has announced Phase 2 drill results from the Adriana target at its Costa de Cobre IOCG copper project on the southern coast of Peru, with all five holes intercepting strong copper mineralization across an approximately 400-metre strike length along the Diva trend. The best hole, DCH-133, returned 76.2 metres grading 0.88% copper and 2.03 grams per tonne silver, including 16.25 metres at 2.67% copper and 6.82 grams per tonne silver. Nittetsu Mining is completing a 35% earn-in at Costa de Cobre while Camino's Puquios copper project in Chile is advancing toward mine construction — the company is building a dual-country copper platform in a market where new supply is increasingly difficult to find (TSXV: COR, OTC: CAMZF). News Release

Ero Copper has released Phase 2 and Phase 3 assay results from the Furnas Copper-Gold Project in Brazil's Carajás Mineral Province, highlighted by a step-out in the Southeast Zone that extends known mineralization approximately 115 metres down-dip beyond the current inferred resource — hole FURN-DD-00357 returning 90 metres grading 1.13% copper equivalent, including 32 metres at 1.70% copper equivalent. New drilling in the Central Zone, more than a kilometre west of the high-grade Southeast Zone resource, returned 41 metres at 1.28% copper equivalent, opening up a new exploration opportunity between two established mineralized corridors. Ero has now drilled more than 75,000 metres at Furnas with 10 rigs on site; a Pre-Feasibility Study is expected in 2027, supported by a PEA published earlier this year that outlined a 24-year mine life with average annual production of 108,000 tonnes copper equivalent over the first 15 years (TSX: ERO, NYSE: ERO). News Release

NorthIsle Copper and Gold has released drill results from the Red Dog deposit within its North Island Project in British Columbia, with the most significant finding being the identification of a new high-grade mineralized trend in the eastern portion of the deposit that extends beyond the current resource envelope at depth. Standout intercepts include 216.0 metres grading 0.67% copper equivalent from 156 metres — including 64.1 metres at 1.10% copper equivalent — as well as 163.4 metres at 0.86% copper equivalent and 141.4 metres at 0.97% copper equivalent from just 3.6 metres depth. The company is now incorporating these Red Dog results into an integrated resource estimate underpinning the ongoing Pre-Feasibility Study, with PFS results expected in the first quarter of 2027 (TSXV: NCX, OTCQX: NTCPF). News Release

Hemlo Mining has received final approval to graduate to the Toronto Stock Exchange from the TSX Venture Exchange, with trading on the TSX set to begin at market open on Monday, June 15. Hemlo operates the Hemlo Gold Mine in northwestern Ontario — one of Canada's most historic gold camps, with approximately 25 million ounces produced since 1985 — and CEO Jason Kosec says the listing is expected to broaden the shareholder base, enhance trading liquidity, and position the company for potential index inclusion. Shares will delist from the TSXV at the close of market this Friday and begin trading on the senior exchange under the same symbol HMMC (TSXV: HMMC, OTCQX: HMMCF). News Release

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That's it for today everyone. Have a great day. Stay safe.

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