ASX investors are always on the lookout for ASX 200 mining stocks with significant upside.
Northern Star Resources Ltd (ASX: NST) rocketed 75% between July 2024 and June 2025. However, the past month has not been kind to the gold mining company, with its share price down 26% since 13 June.
Yesterday, The Motley Fool's Bernd Struben covered the ASX 200 company's most recent trading update.
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What happened?
The company released an operational update, revised its full FY25 guidance, and issued guidance for FY26 for the first time.
The miner sold 444,000 ounces of gold during the June quarter, bringing the total volume of gold sold in FY25 to 1.634 million ounces. This fell within the revised guidance range.
Management also advised that the Kalgoorlie Production Centre had underperformed the revised guidance range.
Looking forward, management provided FY 2026 guidance of 1.700 to 1.800 million ounces of gold sold.
September is expected to be the softest quarter for the miner due to planned major shutdowns across all three of its production centres.
This announcement was not well received by investors, with Northern Star's share price tumbling 7%.
Investors may be wondering whether this is a buying opportunity.
Let's see what one expert had to say.
Macquarie tips Northern Star Resources to outperform
In a 7 July research note, Macquarie Group Ltd (ASX: MQG) reiterated its outperform rating on the ASX 200 stock after reviewing this trading update.
The broker set a price target of $27.00 on the stock. At the time of writing, shares are changing hands for $16.80. This suggests a compelling 63% upside over the next 12 months, including both capital gains and dividends.
Northern Star Resources currently offers a dividend yield just short of 3.0%.
When affirming its recommendation, the broker said:
NST's 4QFY25 was in-line, while FY26 guidance was a miss. NST has fully retreated from its 2Moz outlook for FY26 and also highlighted a slow start to FY26 at its KCGM operation.
However, Macquarie also acknowledged that movements in the gold price presented a key risk to its base-case earnings forecast and valuation for Northern Star Resources shares (and other gold stocks in the coverage universe).
The gold price has rallied strongly over the past couple of years. After surging around 25% for the year to date on the back of geopolitical tensions, it currently sits at US$3,339 per ounce. This is not too far off its all-time high of US$3,500 an ounce reached back in April.
What are other experts saying?
It seems that broker JP Morgan Chase & Co (NYSE: JPM) is less optimistic than Macquarie.
After seeing the result, JP Morgan downgraded Northern Star Resources shares from overweight to neutral.
The broker also cut its price target from $21.25 to $17.50.
JP Morgan expects the ASX 200 miner to stay relatively flat from here over the next 12 months, while Macquarie has tipped substantial upside.
Which expert is right? Only time will tell.
