Any time a mining company’s long-term runway doesn’t mesh with recent stock performance, active investors in the space owe it to themselves to verify whether or not there’s value to be harvested. This is especially true when target commodities are critical minerals, whose supplies are expected to play essential roles in the development of the global industrial complex.
In the newest edition of Stockhouse’s Weekly Market Movers, I’ll present you with two strong candidates for market misperception, whose production-stage assets and attractive growth profiles tell a more encouraging story than their stock prices imply. Each company sat down with us for an interview over the past week.
Ur-Energy
Our first critical mineral stock worth noting is Ur-Energy, market capitalization C$388.53 million, a uranium miner operating its flagship Lost Creek in-situ recovery facility in Wyoming. The facility has produced nearly 3 million pounds of triuranium octoxide (U3O8) since 2013, making it one of the largest in the United States.
As of 2024, Lost Creek is estimated to contain 12.7 million pounds eU3O8 measured and indicated and 6.1 million pounds eU3O8 inferred. Based on U3O8 futures trading at US$65.65 at the time of writing, this represents over US$1.2 billion in resources in the ground.
Ur-Energy has its sights set on production growth through expansions at Lost Creek and ongoing development of its Shirley Basin facility, also in Wyoming, since making a positive investment decision in March 2024. Shirley Basin is estimated to contain 8.8 million pounds eU3O8 measured and indicated, of which 6.4 million are expected to be recovered, adding over US$400 million in potential revenue for the company. Mine start-up is slated for early 2026.
Supported by an ongoing uranium shortage and global reactor demand projected to as much as triple through 2040 – thanks to uranium’s unique status as an energy-dense and carbon-free fuel source – Ur-Energy’s production pipeline is clearly essential to U.S. energy security, granting the company a differentiated path on the road to generating shareholder value.
Investors have yet to appreciate the multi-bagger potential at play here, cutting Ur-Energy stock (TSX:URE) in half year-over-year, while enjoying only a 22.99 per cent return since 2020, despite the price of uranium losing approximately 30 per cent and gaining 97 per cent, respectively.
John Cash, Ur-Energy’s chairman, president and chief executive officer (CEO), spoke with Stockhouse’s Lyndsay Malchuk about construction and production updates for Q1 2025. Watch the interview here.
Northern Graphite
Northern Graphite, market capitalization C$19.41 million, stands alone as the only flake graphite producer in North America from its Lac des Iles mine in Quebec, making it a key link in the global supply chain for products critical to the green economy – including fuel cells, graphene and anode material for lithium-ion batteries and EVs – all of which rely on graphite’s light weight, excellent conductivity and stability under high temperatures to perform as expected.
Concurrent with production, Northern Graphite’s Battery Materials Division operates a laboratory in Frankfurt developing anode materials to advance the performance of lithium-ion batteries. The company is in discussions with infrastructure leader BMI Group to build a battery anode material facility at a former paper mill in Baie-Comeau, Quebec. The lab also markets Northern Graphite’s Porocarb products, a line of synthetic conductive carbon additives designed to optimize energy storage systems.
When we consider that China controls about 80 per cent of graphite supply and that global demand could as much as quadruple by 2040, according to the International Energy Agency, it isn’t hard to make ends meet and see that Northern Graphite’s first-mover advantage and presence both up and downstream make it a go-to name for conflict-free graphite.
Investors have been more pessimistic in their assessment of the company, with Northern Graphite stock (TSXV:NGC) enduring a 14.71 per cent loss since 2020, as the price of graphite wavers in wait for a rise in EV demand expected to triple demand for the critical mineral by 2040.
Hugues Jacquemin, Northern Graphite’s CEO, sat down with Lyndsay Malchuk to shed light on the company’s battery anode collaboration with BMI Group. Watch the interview here.
Thanks for reading! I’ll see you next week for a new edition of Stockhouse’s Weekly Market Movers. Here’s last week’s article, in case you missed it.
Join the discussion: Find out what everybody’s saying about these top critical mineral stocks on the Ur-Energy Inc. and Northern Graphite Corp. Bullboards and check out Stockhouse’s stock forums and message boards.
This is sponsored content issued on behalf of Ur-Energy Inc. and Northern Graphite Corp., please see full disclaimer here.
(Top image, generated by AI: Adobe Stock)