$GLDC.V: I recently published Cassiar Gold on my Substack at C$0.45. I think the company is a great buy for this Q4 of 2026. The thesis is simple:
-The stock trades cheaper than its peers at the pre-PEA stage, even though it has several reasons to trade at a higher value per ounce. Today Cassiar has 2.34 Moz at 1.01 g/t and trades at ~US$20/oz on EV. Canadian peers with a resource and no economic study trade at ~US$34/oz on average. The main asset is the Taurus deposit at Cassiar North, and that's where almost all the long-term value is.
-Yes, Taurus has a higher % of Inferred ounces than its peers (~83%). But look at what the deposit is: one very big open pit, not a cluster of satellite pits. That means one pit, one waste dump and one plant for the whole resource. It's bulk tonnage, with good grade for this kind of system (1.01 g/t at a 0.40 g/t cut-off, versus 0.7-0.9 g/t at most peers). 81% of the tonnage is within 100m of surface, and there are very high-grade zones that could matter a lot in the first years of production. Bulk-tonnage potential, real near surface, single-deposit, and already permitted (they need to update the permits).On top of that it sits next to Highway 37 with grid power already connected, which removes a big part of the capex surprises you usually get in northern BC.
-Then you have Cassiar South, a secondary asset in the historic Cassiar camp. It has a 300 tpd mill already built and ~25km of underground development. They're trying to restart it in 2028 for US$30-40M of capex, producing 30-60k oz of gold per year. The CEO puts the replacement value of the South infrastructure alone at C$200M+, against a company worth ~C$75M. It's already permitted but in care and maintenance, so they need to update the permits, not get them from zero, and that shouldn't be a problem. A greenfield project needs a decade to cover that same ground.
-Peers trade ~50% higher per ounce than my entry point. That case alone gives you ~50% upside, and it needs nothing else: no premium, no new ounces, no higher gold price, no PEA. Only for the market to stop discounting Cassiar more harshly than the companies next to it.
-But the PEA is also coming in November, and Q4 is full of potential catalysts. With the PEA they'll update the MRE. It will probably include ~10km of drilling, mostly step-out, and probably lower the cut-off grade to 0.3 g/t, which is much more realistic with gold where it is today. That should take us to 3+ Moz. The updated MRE alone makes the stock even cheaper, because you get more ounces for the same market cap. Then the PEA adds value per ounce on top. It's the first time anyone puts cash flows, NPV, IRR and capex on Taurus, and it moves Cassiar out of the bucket the market prices only on ounces.
-To get a sense of what the project could be worth, I built my own model of Taurus from scratch while we wait for the PEA. It's my approximate estimate. It's a 15,000 t/d open pit, with costs and capex benchmarked line by line to a comparable engineered study in BC. The key point: I did it only with the current 2.34 Moz. It does NOT include the resource expansion that will probably come with the updated MRE. That means no ounces from the 10km of drilling and no lower cut-off. On top of that I only convert 75% of the resource into mill feed, I run the grade flat at 1.01 g/t with no high-grading in the first years. Even so, the post-tax NPV5 comes out at ~US$2.1B at US$4,500 gold (54% IRR) and ~US$1.4B at US$3,500. That's ~C$15 of NPV per share against a C$0.45 stock, so the market is potentially paying ~3% of the project's present value according to my own computations. If you add the 3+ Moz I expect after the MRE update and mine the higher grade first, the NPV goes up from this initial scenario. None of that upside is in my base case.
-Why I think this PEA is more predictable than most: it's one simple, continuous deposit, open pit only, no underground component, on flat ground. Road, power and permits are usually the three things that blow up a first study in BC, and here they're largely in place.
-In Q4 we get drill results, metallurgical results, the updated MRE (lower cut-off plus the new drilling) together with the PEA, a potential JV confirmation for Cassiar South, and potentially the results of the internal studies on Cassiar South restart. That's a lot of news flow for a company that today has little volume and few eyes on it and that is cheaper than rest imho.
-If we get a bit lucky, the Cassiar South JV could happen this Q4 and we get some nice cash for Cassiar Gold. Imagine that right after a successful PEA they tell the market: "we're fully funded for the PFS, don't worry about dilution for now." It would rerate even more, because the market isn't expecting that and dilution is exactly what usually caps these stocks after a PEA. And market potentially will see that the company will raise at a lot higher valuations. Also, there are already 7.27M warrants in the capital structure that can only be exercised if a JV or transaction happens at Cassiar South. That tells you the company has always treated a partner there as a real option. Lets see if it happens.
It's really hard to find stocks that trade below their peers, have real reasons to trade at a premium, and have imminent, important de-risking catalysts. This is a medium-term rerate buy imho.
Not investment advice. Make your own DD.